Greetings, everyone! I have no idea how long this “blogging” thing will last but I really appreciate the opportunity to share and visit with all of you and it’s especially nice to get a thoughtful response, whether as a comment to an entry or a separate email. 🙂

Unfortunately, no news to report as far as getting in to see the top guy. We’re still awaiting insurance approval. Not discouraged as we’re well within the window of how long these things take. But, we really hope to hear in the next day or two.

The symptoms continue pretty much the same. I have a consistent headache, mostly centered behind my right eye and in that general quadrant of my head. Around the clock Tylenol is doing a great job of mitigation, fortunately. The other symptom is general fatigue. I feel a bit like R2D2 in the new Star Wars movie, if you’ve seen it. My normal beeping and bustling (that’s droid behavior) has powered down considerably. As much as anything, this is an internal message to just be and not try to do too much. (Shout out to our friend Ryan who talked recently about the difference between being and doing.)  We can all nod our heads and say, “Easier said than done!”

Another shout out to Diane. A few of you know her. 🙂  What grace and heart and love. Thank you, sweetheart. We met on that blind date 34 years ago on the 15th. As my friend Ken told me yesterday, I definitely married up. Not the first time I’ve heard that. I love you.

I woke up and in my quiet time, I waited to see what would be put on my heart. Yesterday it was joy. Today, it’s love.

We’ll see where that leads.

First, a kind of disclaimer. To some, scripture (and in this case, the language contained in the Hebrew and Christian Testaments … although all major faiths have sacred scripture) is the perfect word of God. To others, it’s a compendium of stories, ideas, and advice, some of which is relevant or significant  and some of which is not. In this place, I’m not at all interested in engaging that discussion. Instead, when I refer to passages or pieces of passages, it’s because they ring true to me for some reasons that I hope are obvious to most everyone … whether because you know me or because they just sound true given personal experience. As our friend, David, said last night, my writings are not intended to be preachy but a window into what I believe to be true and, therefore, a way for people connected to Diane and me to participate in our journey. Thank you, David. (And, thank you Pat and David, for dinner, and to Dan and Val and Tim and Anita and Tony and Kathleen, also for dinners and fellowship and for loving us!)

Actually, it’s not a surprise that I have no intention of tackling this big thing in all of its depth. When I was reflecting on this, I recalled a series of passages we’d recently been considering. To summarize an account of Jesus’ teaching in Mark 2:13-17, it’s about how we reach out to those who are cast out. Our friend Neal reminds us that we are very good at creating divisions and religious groups are pretty adept at that. We can be quick to state that those other people are wrong and undeserving of our care and attention. What does it look like to love the unloved?

Whether we follow the teachings of Jesus or of someone else who speaks of love, or whether we just feel some kind of love but don’t really reflect on it a whole lot, we all have a sense of what it is or can be. And, we probably all have a sense of what it is not or its opposing forces.

For the record, I have been loved and I have felt unloved by people who were supposed to love me. I have also felt the difference between conditional love in its many forms and unconditional love. Those are not unimportant distinctions and they affect our lives deeply.

I do know that, when facing something like we’re facing right now and that many or all of you have faced during your lives, that love resonates deeply and is immensely healing.

One of the wisest people I’ve ever come across and the author of the best book (of thousands?) that I’ve read, Dallas Willard, says that love is “willing the greater good of another.” Simple enough on the surface. Less so in careful examination.

Setting aside the cavalier use of the term, such as I love chocolate cake or going to the beach and so on, and setting aside the kind of love we use to describe our feelings towards spouse, children, pet, closest friends and so on … is there any real … and I mean real …role for love in our lives? Should there be?  If so, why and if not, why not? And, if there is a role, what does it actually look like and what does that mean for me, as well as others? I can say honestly that I have struggled with this for a long time, yet feel in so much a better place than I was 5, 10, 20, 30 years ago. I would not wind back the clock for anything.  Maybe, unlike most of you, I’m just a slow learner!!

I wouldn’t say I lived a sheltered life as I felt very connected, growing up, with many of the destructive forces that make life so difficult or even miserable for so many people. I saw a little of it first hand but did not get full exposure in the sense that I lived it daily until being an assistant principal in a disadvantaged area. There, I encountered a constant stream of brokenness and violence that both repelled and drew me in. The repulsion was in the terrible things that I saw people doing to one another and themselves while the draw was that I may in some ways help at the most basic level of life. And, here I had thought school was about learning! 🙂  Diving into gang conflicts, where large young men were brandishing bats and more, and were intent on hurting one another. Wrestling to the ground people on PCP, lashing violently. Being handed beaten and bruised young women, under the supervision of adults who should be locked up. Holding on to those moments when someone said in their own way, “you saved my life.”

Fast forward to that terrible year as principal when, in an eleven month span, five of my students committed suicide, surrounded in that same time period by the two shootings (and deaths) at two neighbor schools and of the attacks of 9/11.  I grew immensely that year and realized, as a leader, I had not focused on the right priority. I had thought that learning and achievement was our job and that we needed to act in ways to promote that.

No, instead, love was our job and our first priority. A light switch was flipped and I began a sea change from being a head guy that tended to have a pretty good heart to a heart guy that tended to have a pretty good head. For the record again, I still have a ways to go!!

Our faith is grounded in love. Love of God, love of others. Many rightfully can point out that we not only fall woefully short much of the time but there are many who act as if they dismiss the concept altogether. It’s also pretty true that we can’t make ourselves love someone. Or can we?  Can we actually practice love and get better at it?

My friend, Gary, goes to prison every week. I’ve joined him at times although it’s been awhile. Prison could be about the most unlovely place on earth and the prisoners the most unloved and most unlovable. Yet, I would be hard pressed to find too many examples of more abundant love that I have witnessed in that dreary place. Surrounded by fence after wired fence and by inmates who have committed the whole range of bad things, some of them horrific, where chaos and violence is held at bay by a thread, love blooms.

I heard on nearly every occasion I entered that place, stories of men who had never experienced a moment of love in their life until engaging in the kinds of activities and deep relationships offered through people like Gary, who is called to love the unloved. I also heard from those, who have now experienced that love, yet who are locked up forever, that they are really free … freer than they’ve ever been.

What a window into the human condition and a call for how to live our lives.

We are not alone and are enriched in the most beautiful ways when we connect with others, many of whom are outwardly broken or secretly hide guilt and shame.

As our friend, Dawn, recently shared:

“Love requires community. Love cannot be expressed unless we share it with others. We can’t stand at a distance or keep people at arms’ length. We must choose to be in real, flesh and blood relationships with messy people.”

She goes on: “Sharing life in community means other people get to see it all. Others truly know and choose to love me with all of my goodness and imperfections. And, in turn, I love them for all of theirs. This is the kind of love that fills us to the brim because when we experience it, we know that we are living exactly how were created to live.”

She concludes that it is an indescribable thing to be fully known and fully loved.

I can say without reservation that I know those words to be true. And, that I can’t imagine a reality worth living where they aren’t.

Of course, we need to ask who or what makes that possible and how does it really work? But, I’ll leave that alone for now.

Our friend, Delorie, left a little while ago, after generously bringing by lunch. She has the most caring and generous heart. She shared her hopes and struggles as Diane and I shared ours. We prayed and surrendered into the knowledge that we loved one another.

I get asked how I am doing and I try to answer truthfully. There are some unknowns and some of those are not good things. But, I do know this, I am held. Diane is held. We are held by a God and dear friends and family who love us and seek for us a flourishing life. What a blessing! What joy!

Here is my daily prayer (have I shared it before?)

“Lord, help give me the eyes to see the world and other people as you see them. Help my heart to feel for others as you feel. And, please help give me the hands to act upon these things and to be a blessing to all those with whom I come into contact.”