Past Articles from 2004 until last year. Many important lessons can be found in each of these articles.
I was able to watch a good deal of the Masters Tournament this last weekend. I hadn’t just sat down and watched hours of golf in a long time, although much of my childhood was spent at my grandfather’s side doing just that. The game itself was being played at an especially high level this weekend, even for a Masters Tournament. There were multiple holes in one, and Phil Mickelson had consecutive eagles (he came within an inch of a consecutive third) on Saturday. But when that level of golf is played risks are taken, and not all are successful. There were plenty of shots from the pine straw, through the trees. Nick Faldo who was doing color commentary for CBS would lament in subdued tones following each of these bad shots – “Well, that’s an unforced error there.” Every bad shot was described as an “unforced error.”
It’s not that I hadn’t heard that phrase used before, or used by him before, but hearing it so many times made me think – What, in golf, would be a “forced” error? Golf isn’t a contact sport – it’s not like you rushed your swing to avoid being sacked. Golf is not a team sport – not like baseball is anyway, so you can’t blame a bad throw by the cut off man for your missing that four foot putt. I guess a Canadian goose carrying your ball into the water, or someone ruining your drive by shooting you with a super-soaker during your back-swing might be a forced error.
During the final round, on the third green, eventual winner, Phil Mickelson, had a short putt for birdie go wide of the cup because just as he struck the ball a seed-pod fell from a tree directly into its path, causing it to veer off course as it rolled over the seed-pod. That was an unforced error, I guess. I used to play golf with my granddad at a course in Eastern Kentucky whimsically named “Rolling Meadows.” It was a course from which you basically shot from hilltop to hilltop (my dad called it “The Billy-Goat Farm”). The fourth hole was a par four. You teed off from one hill and hit onto a slightly lower ridge at a right angle to the line of the tee (that was whimsically called a “dog-leg” on the score-card). A huge headstone stood in the middle of the fairway, and my granddad would always say, “Take a 3-wood and aim for the headstone and you’ll be all-right.” One day I hit the headstone dead-on (no pun intended) and my brand-new Titleist shot off into the Eastern Kentucky forest like it had afterburners. My granddad called that an unforced error, and let me drop a ball without taking a penalty. But things like that happen so rarely they are barely worth building your jargon around.
They do happen, though. So I guess there are forced errors in golf.
But what about life?
Years ago Flip Wilson, as Geraldine, used to say when caught in an indiscretion, “The Devil made me do it.” It was a sure laugh line at the time. We laugh at things because we perceive them to be absurd but true. The truth in that absurdity is not that the Devil makes us do anything, but that we like to believe our sins are “forced errors.”
There are forced errors in golf, but not in life. Not if by “error” we mean sin.
There are two reasons for this assertion. The first is that sin, by definition, is an act of will – the culmination of an involved mental process which turns desire into action (James 1.13-15). In Genesis 3, when sin enters the world, Eve’s thorough knowledge of the truth, and her decision to rebel against it are described in detail. Both Adam and Eve, when confronted by God, claim their sin was, somehow, a forced error. God is unconvinced. Sin is an act of will or it isn’t sin at all. If it is an act of will it is an “unforced” error.
In addition to this we are promised that God manages the level of temptation each of us faces so that it is not beyond our ability to bear (I Corinthians 10.13). Since that level is different for each of us it is a sort of a way to handicap the process. The verse cited above tells us that God provides strength to bear-up, and also a means of escape when we are tempted. Endurance and escape, provided by God, means that sin can never be an “unforced error.”
And so, if we were able to hear Nick Faldo and Jim Nantz doing commentary on our lives as we live them, there would never be a reason for Nick to say, “Well, Jim, that’s another unforced error.”
I recently read a review of three books on the cutting edge of Happiness research,* Derek Bok’s The Politics of Happiness, Carol Graham’s Happiness Around the World, and Daniel Gilbert’s Stumbling on Happiness. Each of these texts is the product of serious scientific research, and has far ranging implications for our personal lives, and for public policy. Happiness research as a scientific pursuit began in earnest in the 1970s. A foundational study, reported in 1978 in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, found that persons who had suffered from debilitating accidents (most of whom were wheel-chair bound) were slightly happier than lottery winners. These latest studies confirm what the earlier studies suggested – what we often think will make us happier will not.We Americans were happier during the Great Depression than we are now. Our happiness level has been stagnant since the 1950’s as our real incomes have doubled, and our homes have tripled in size. Nigerians are as happy as the Japanese who are 25 times richer. Afghanistanis are happier and more cheerful than Americans. This is the raw data. The reasons are debated. Maybe people adjust to their economic level – the “happy peasant” effect – and thus the rich, having more stuff to care for and maintain, would naturally be less happy. Maybe some of us are genetically predisposed to be satisfied, and some of us are not. Those hard-wired to be dissatisfied will naturally seek what is more and better, and thus have more, without ever getting the satisfaction of it. Perhaps we are just completely unaware of what is truly valuable. Whatever the reason, having more, and being better don’t make a person appreciably happier whether that person lives in Peshawar, Paris, Pittsburgh, or Pomona.
What does satisfy? The cutting edge of happiness research indicates that work - productive occupation for its own sake, is important. Also, freedom from chronic fear and chronic pain, relationships that last, and committing to a choice or cause seem to be the essential elements of happiness.
The Army Mule is making a comeback, so is its Marine brother. It seems nothing our military industrial complex has developed is better at moving supplies through the mountains of Afghanistan than a mule. And so, more than 50 years after the last Army Mules, Trotter (583R) and Hambone (9YLL) were deactivated, soldiers in Hawthorne, Nevada, and marines in Bridgeport, California are learning how to pack and drive mules in mountain terrain. George Washington was the first American general to advocate the use of mules. The best mules to be found in America at the end of the eighteenth century were from Mount Vernon, being sired by an Andalusian donkey named Royal Gift, which was, indeed, a present from the King of Spain.
Mules have so much to offer as draft animals. They cooperate better than donkeys, and spook less than horses. They eat comparatively little. They are surer footed than horses, and sturdier boned. Mule fanciers have long argued that mules are more intelligent than either donkeys or horses, and recent studies suggest that they indeed excel either of their equine competitors at the tasks we need them to do. A mule, unlike a horse, will not eat till it founders. Horses will run, or work until they are dead, but mules will only work to exhaustion (hence the image of the “stubborn” mule which won’t move another step).
Well into the last century mules did every sort of farm work on most of our farms, and served our military in every corner of the globe. In rough terrain they are a force multiplier of 3, tripling what troops without mules can do. Although our military has just begun to reactivate mules, the CIA provided them to the Mujahideen throughout the 1980’s – more than 1200 - purchased from breeders in Tennessee. They were flown to Islamabad, trucked to Peshawar where local drovers would take them across the Afghanistan border. The mule also has its advocate as mount. Although not nearly as fast as a horse, the mule eats less and is sturdier. Kit Carson, who logged more miles traversing the American west than anyone, always preferred the mule. Riders who are older or are recovering from surgery are finding what a gentler mount a mule is than a horse.
Theologically, this information delights me immensely. Again we find that there is nothing we can manufacture that improves upon what God has done, I think to myself. But then I remember that mules are a hybrid. We breed them, they rarely ever occur naturally. Technically, a mule is a critter which has a donkey for a dad and a horse for a mom. The critter produced when you switch that around is not a mule, but a “hinny”, and hinnies, for some reason, are not nearly so valuable as mules. Humans learned all this, and learned all this thousands of years ago. Absalom rode a mule into combat (II Samuel 18.9). God made horses, God made donkeys. Humans managed their breeding and produced mules.
I was watching the Westminster Dog Show the other night and was again reminded of the variety of tasks we have bred dogs to do – and to do better than we ever could ourselves. God made dogs, and we bred some to track, some to herd, some to haul, some to detect bombs, some to detect seizures, and some to find survivors beneath the rubble.
“God planted a garden,” we are told in Genesis 2.8, “and in it he placed the man he had formed.” The image provided by the artists and illustrators over the years is filled with pristine waterfalls and clusters of grapes always ripe and within reach. But let us not forget that even in the garden we were given the tasks of farming and animal husbandry (Genesis 2.15, 1.28). I hope you don’t think it a stretch to say that mules have a lot to teach us about God and us, and the way he blesses. Yes, “every good and perfect gift comes from above,” (James 1.17). But once we receive that blessing we are responsible for our use of it. Isn’t that the lesson of the Parable of the Talents (Matthew 25.14-30)? A blessing, then, is not so much a gift wrapped in ribbon, but abundant raw material. God provides the fully stocked kitchen, pantry, and larder. We make the cake.
Through the strength that God provides.
Sources: “Riding High” by Susan Orlean in The New Yorker (Feb. 15&22, 2010)
All Cloudless Glory: the Life of George Washington, Vol. II, by Harrison Clark
A Newer World: Kit Carson, John C. Fremont, and the Claiming of the American West,
By Harrison Clark.
Last Monday night I was the recipient of a great deal of help. We are, as you all know, preparing for the wedding of our eldest daughter this coming Saturday. Preparatory to that we had planned to paint the fellowship room. At 6:30 pm a crowd of about 18 showed up to help. Word of mouth had collected a work crew. I had prepped the room, and thought I might have two or three to help that evening. I had so many helpers that I didn’t have enough rollers and brushes. I ended up not painting at all, but spent my time “coordinating” like Fred Sanford. At least that’s how I felt. I was compared by several to Tom Sawyer, as I walked around not painting. If Tom Sawyer felt a great deal of awkwardness and guilt at not white-washing Aunt Sally’s fence, then I guess that is exactly who I was.
Who I felt like was not so much Tom Sawyer, as George Bailey, who was, indeed, “the richest man in town.” It is not easy for many of us to receive help. We are eager to give it, but receiving it is hard. I don’t know why. But when Peter says to Jesus, “You will never wash my feet,” (John 13.8) we understand. “No, I’m fine. Thank you, though” is one of the most used sentences in my repertoire.
When help is truly received, however, it is an overwhelming blessing. 5 years ago, the Wednesday night before my cancer surgery I was surprised by a prayer service focused on my wellbeing. I have to say that after that prayer service I was prepared for any outcome. The strength transferred by the prayers by my brothers and sisters provided was greater than any disease.
God has made us into a body comprised of interdependent parts. In one of the two extended passages which facets this truth (1 Corinthians 12.1-30), Paul gives voice to the way we fail to cooperate with God’s plan. The foot says “because I am not the hand I am not part of the body” ((1 Corinthians 12.15). Silly isn’t it? I have never felt that way. I have been blessed to always feel at home in the body. Later in the passage (1 Corinthians 12.21), the eye tries to say to the hand “I have no need of you.” That I have said. This not the same as saying “I don’t love you,” or “I don’t feel connected to you.” This is saying, “I prefer not to need your help.” What Paul reminds us is that God has created us to need each other’s help, and to refuse this pattern is to refuse the will of God.
Bearing one another’s burdens requires the willingness for burdens to be shared. To refuse help is to refuse to cooperate with this command.
Thank you, everyone. Teresa and I appreciate deeply all the help given to us. We are overwhelmed, because grace is overwhelming, and grace is the source of all this. And thank you, Father, for such a family.
In Tiger Wood’s second public statement after his car wreck, before details of what was going on started to come out, he finally acknowledged he had sinned. Sort of. He said my “transgressions” - a Biblical reference to sin so those of us who still think of cheating in terms of right or wrong would get it – but not “my sins”- so the rest of us who don’t wouldn’t be offended. The “sin” word did come out later in his statement, just in a more opaque, somewhat defiant way, “Personal sins should not require press releases”. Although looking back it seems he was still trying to throw us off the trail, at least he had the decency to indirectly refer to what we now know to be his infidelity for what it was – sin.
Of course it took several more days of what appears to be a public cover up, and a lot longer period of time of what appears to be a private cover-up, for the truth- as we know it from afar – to be told. It sure looks like one of the most prominent, powerful guys in all of sports and life spent considerable effort to not get caught for doing what was in God’s eyes wrong – and had a hard time owning up to it right to the last moment.
No matter our perspective, we all just witnessed possibly one of the greatest public “falls from grace”, if you will, because of his elite superstar status. When President Clinton was caught – well that wasn’t so surprising – our esteem for politicians, even for the President, isn’t all that high anymore. But Tiger, though reserved, always seemed almost perfect. He was bigger than life. He was the golden boy that we’ve watched from a child grow into the king of the sports, and advertising, and celebrity world.
No doubt he’s now facing a personal storm like he’s never encountered. The question everyone wants to know and ponder is – what will happen next? What will his life, his career be like now?
He was the golden child too. Good looking. He too felled giants at an early age, literally. Also bursting on the scene with great flair, and because of it, everybody wanted to be around him. He could do no wrong. He was the heir apparent to the throne. He soon bested all of his opponents and in no time at all he was in fact, the King.
And boy, he was a great guy. Who wouldn’t want to be around him? He could sing. He was a poet. He was a warrior. He was a champion. Even God wanted to be near him – he was after all a man after God’s own heart, an acknowledgement that God was somehow pulled towards him. He had the whole world. Everything. Beautiful family. Beautiful house. Folks who would jump at his every word. All the world’s wealth. The billion dollar man of his time, times ten.
He too tried to hide his sin after he also fell for one of the devil’s most powerful traps to a man - enough said. The trap that started with a stare and that most men in our modern show-it-all world have fallen into, if you judged by Jesus standard. “I tell you everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart,” Matthew 5:28. If you even turn on a TV or look at a billboard, you’re confronted with the temptation.
I appreciated Jerris pointing out Job 31:1 about making a covenant with our eyes not to stare at women, helpful to me because it also points how to keep from crossing Jesus standard – don’t stare in the first place. Be careful little eyes what you see is so, so true. It’s also one reason modesty is so important because the lack of it opens the door for people, especially men folk, to start thinking thoughts we ought not to.
How do we train ourselves to not stare? How do we get past this problem? How do we pick up the pieces when we’ve fallen, visually or physically, and rebuild our lives spiritually? What will become of Tiger’s life, what will become of ours?
The answer for David relied on two things. The first was fessing up. I did it. It was me. No more cover up. The second, and the real key, was turning his heart over to God. My favorite Psalms is Psalms 51 when the consequences of David’s actions have caught up to him. Where David at the depth of his despair, when the hen has come home to roost, says this in my favorite verse - verse 10. “Create in me, a clean heart, O God.” He has nowhere else to turn, and he knows it, and he quits fighting and says, I can’t do it God. It’s up to you. I turn it over to you. Create in me a clean heart, O God.
Seems funny, almost a violation of free will to say “God, you do the work” - doesn’t it? But it’s only when of our own free will, do we turn it over to Him to the point we are begging Him to create us anew, can He begin to actually do so. That’s the point where God can train us, and make us, and rebuild us.
I’m thankful for Tiger’s mess. Not that he’s having to face this. But yes, that he’s having to face this. Because he’s at the point where he’s got nowhere to turn to. I hope someone shares Psalms 51 with him.
