On Breathing

by Lane Severson

When I was a child I would sometimes think intently about the process of breathing. When I would do this, it would seem to remove the breathing auto-pilot, so that I had to consciously decide to inhale and to exhale and to inhale again. The manual process of breathing terrified me. It seemed inevitable that I would become distracted by something else, would forget this rhythm of breath, and then I would die of asphyxiation.

We all know that you don't die when you forget to breath; your body just takes over again and lets you get back to eating cheese and/or reading Calvin and Hobbes. Literally everything you've done in life depended on breathing, and most of the time you had nothing to do with it.

Nobody has ever lectured me on the importance of regular breathing. I've done it ever since a doctor slapped my ass in the delivery room. And I don't think that, once I learned how oxygen is moved through the body by the blood, I then decided that I should start doing that rather than just keeping it in my lungs. I think that was already happening. I am fairly certain that the most vital process that is keeping me alive has nothing at all to do with my understanding of it.

I wonder if my soul works the same way as my body. Does it breathe the Spirit of God each moment despite my understanding it? Is it ingesting divinity and growing holy without any brilliant mental insights from the books I read or great experiences from the worship services I attend?

It would be easy to beat this to death and ask about smoking and lung disease and whatever. I'm sure you could have a fun discussion about that. The point I'm trying to make is that maybe God designed our soul to feed on him despite our all-powerful mental faculty supervising it. Maybe more of our spiritual life is out of our hands than we like to think. And maybe that’s a good thing, the same way that having the moment-by-moment task of breathing be set on default is a good thing.

Lane Severson blogs at On Pop Theology and Out of Ur. He likes charismatic liturgy and listening to Kanye West or Jay Z with his wife and five children. Lane can be found at about.me/lseverson or on Twitter @_lxnx.

You can follow On Pop Theology on Twitter @OnPopTheology or like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/OnPopTheology. If you'd like to support what we do, you can donate via the button on the right of the screen.

Image credits:
Image #1 via TiloArte 
  
You might also like:  

• Survival of the Guiltiest
• Your Favorite Movie Needs More Pandas
• How to Get Abs Like Jesus

Solstice

by Lyndsey Graves

Things I have left unfinished this week:
 
Two blog posts about the law
A poem about my body
A blog post about moving away from Syracuse
Several rambling journal entries about nothing at all

I can’t focus, is my point. I have opinions, thoughts, and feelings, to be sure, but they don’t seem very urgent these days.

Today is the summer solstice. I live next door to my enormous church, and the light reflected in the windows shines a rose-gold color. Why bother to cultivate a “life of the mind” with such beauty demanding my attention? This is a sincere question. I tell myself there is time. It is the solstice.
 
The windows are open and my hands are chopping vegetables. I am watching them. I always see my hands with my peripheral vision, but in the last few days I have started looking at them, like really looking at them. My hands pick up an onion and place it on the cutting board - marvelous. This is how two-year-olds have to do everything, I realize. Their hands still require concentration. Their hands still command awe.
 
I will always be a thinker, a reader, a writer, a liver of a life very much in my mind. But for now, I am more a vegetable-chopper, a walk-in-the-parker, a pray through movement and hugger. My faith is twining its tendrils into this world and it feels good and right again - for a while there, it hurt like hell. 

Maybe this is the only antidote for all the pain of opening your life to other people - to stop dwelling inside in darkness, to start cooking vegetables, crocheting wedding gifts, reading books held in your hands; listen to your body longing for exercise and lift your face to the sun. Thank God.
 
Today is the solstice, and I am feeling rather pagan. Those who worship the sun have missed the point, but far less so than those who worship the feeble light of constantly flickering screens.
 
I will be back to our screen-meeting-place my friends. But not until I have existed, fully present, in this place for a while. In Syracuse, New York. Near a cedar and several oaks. Next to one Nate Medford. Among a lot of borrowed furniture, on the solstice. This, for now, is where I have met God.

Lyndsey lives and works in Syracuse, NY. She majored in theology at Lee University, which is like eating cake or listening to thunderstorms - too enjoyable to be called work. Also, no one will pay you to do it. You can follow her on Twitter @lyndseygraves and you can find more of her writing at her blog To Be Honest.

You can follow On Pop Theology on Twitter @OnPopTheology or like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/OnPopTheology.
 
You might also like:  

• A Place in Sedona
• Prayers to a Dark God
• Waiting on Emmanuel

Life is Like Baseball (and That Sucks)

by Mitchell Richards

I really don’t care for baseball much. I love sports in general and I stay informed of the headlines with most sports, but when it comes to sitting down and watching an entire baseball game, I can’t say I've done that in years.

Baseball is boring to watch. Not a lot of action spread out over a great deal of time.

Today I realized that life is a lot like baseball, which is probably why I’m not a big fan of either one.
 
Baseball seems like the only job in America where if you succeed about 30% of the time (see batting averages) you’re the best at your job. In my job at the paper, I’d be fired if I only did 30% of an article. Elite baseball players are paid millions of dollars to succeed 30% of the time and often less.  

But then again, baseball is a lot like life. 

I remember playing baseball as a kid and the only thing I enjoyed about it was running the bases and catching pop flies. Unfortunately, to run the bases you had to get on base and that meant batting, which I hated.  

I didn’t really understand as a kid how the odds of getting a hit were not in my favor. I remember crying almost every time I struck out. I just wasn’t used to not being able to succeed at something every time.  

Baseball, like life, is about how you deal with the failures and struggles. Odds to succeed are stacked against you in both things, and I suppose it’s about getting back up to bat and seeing if you’ll strike out again. Baseball is about bouncing back.  

Baseball is a lot like life because the possibility of failure is always there and imminent, and the odds of succeeding are less than the odds of failing. 

I believe that life isn’t as much about succeeding as it is about failing. I don’t think you can truly appreciate success without the inevitability of failure. In fact, I don’t think you can truly have success without failure. Failure is the necessity, the cause and the effect, of desire. I’ve heard the opposite of love isn’t hate, but rather indifference, and accepting failure is the evidence of not being indifferent.  

Baseball is also a lot like life because there is just so much time spent standing around and waiting for things to happen. You never really know when a ball is going to be hit your way and you don’t get to bat every inning, but success is determined by how you respond when these moments come your way. 

In life, we will not always meet these moments and incidents with metaphorical great plays and proverbial spectacular catches, in fact we may fall on our faces, but the beauty of baseball and life is that you’re still in the game. If you drop a pop fly, your job is not done. You still have to make the most of the opportunity that life has dealt you. You still have to throw the ball in. You can still make a play.

I used to cry when I struck out in baseball because I thought I was terrible and striking out was proof of that. From all the years I played baseball I remember two things specifically. First, there was the time when I caught a ball in the outfield that made me flip over, and the other was when I slid into home plate and collided with the catcher, resulting in an injury to my knee that still clicks and cracks on cold days.

 
Like life, we win some and we lose some, but we have stories to tell regardless and an obligation to tell them. Stories of victories come and go and you won’t hit a home run every time you are up to bat. Often times you have tales of pain and hard times, but they are still a part of our story.  

I assume the better we are at going through life, the more opportunities we get to succeed and fail at it. Some days I’m out in right field, looking at the empty seats in the stadium, and other days I’m pitching and my arm is about to fall off, but I have to keep going.  

Life isn’t about hitting a home run every time, it’s about how we deal with it when we don’t. It’s about how we deal with striking out, dropping the ball, and slamming into the catcher. Life is about striking out and batting again when it’s your turn. It’s about dropping the ball and picking it up and still trying to salvage the play. It’s about slamming into the catcher and stomping on the plate because you made it home.



Mitchell writes at mitchellrichards.com. He tweets a lot and has a weird fascination with John Tesh. You can follow him @MitchellWords. He also wrote a book called Definitive Blurs which you can find it here. 

Also, you can subscribe to On Pop Theology via RSS feed or email on the top right corner of the main page. 

The Election Chronicles: Why You Should Vote for Mitt Romney

by Ben Howard

Last week I began a series called The Election Chronicles. The main goal of the series is to try and bring about a healthier, positive tone to the conversation about this Fall's presidential election. I'm sure this is an idea that's been tried by many; some I'm sure succeeded, others most likely failed, but either way I hope it's a useful endeavor for us.

You can check out last week's articles here:
An Introduction
Love Drives Out Fear
Top 5 Presidents That Look Like Jesus
Song of the Week: A Savior on Capitol Hill by Derek Webb

This week, I'm going to explore the reasons why a thoughtful Christian person should/would vote for Mitt Romney, Barack Obama, a third party candidate, and finally, why they shouldn't vote at all.

So, why should you vote for Mitt Romney?

First and foremost, voting for Mitt Romney promotes fiscal responsibility. If you've been in church long enough you've heard the phrase "good stewardship" tossed around rather loosely. Typically, in a church setting it's simply a euphemism that means, "Give more," but there is a solid argument that the proper and responsible allocation of one's resources is a virtue. In fact, Dave Ramsey and others have made a cottage industry out of the "Christian virtue" of fiscal responsibility and living without debt.

This may not be the sexiest reason to vote for a candidate, but it is a prudent and pragmatic one. Overwhelming debt and financial constraints can also promote political instability which often comes along with dramatic social upheaval. Voting for a candidate who promotes fiscal responsibility lessens this unlikely, but possible outcome.

Second, I would argue that a Christian should agree with Mitt Romney's position on limiting abortion. Please notice that I did not, and will not, use the phrases pro-life or pro-choice. I think both phrases ring hollow in a Christian context. For instance, the argument that being pro-life applies to the beginning of a life, but not to the rest of it (war, healthcare, social support, death penalty) is simply misleading and untrue. A Christian supports life to it's fullest, and while that includes dissuading the use of abortion, it includes many other things as well.


Also, I would argue that a "right to choose" is a misnomer as well. In fact, all rights language makes me highly uncomfortable. As a Christian, everything we receive whether it be food, shelter, or even our very bodies, is given to us a gracious gift from God. As a result, what is given is not ours and to assert that we have control or dominion over our it, "a right" to it, is to neglect the gift that has been given to us.

I think a Christian can vote for Mitt Romney because he is in favor of limiting abortions, which I think we can all agree is a good thing, but not because he is pro-life.

Finally, I believe that a vote in favor of Mitt Romney is a vote in favor of local authority over national authority. I'm not convinced that this is a global Christian value, in fact, it isn't. There is nothing in the Bible that says local is better than national. However, local is more responsive than national and the church does its best work in its immediate community, the community that it knows.

I think a vote for local authority allows churches to work alongside projects of government aid and to provide the best opportunity for helping people not fall through the cracks. I don't think it's perfect, but a locally oriented plan run by the community is something that the church can support and even partner with in pursuit of a better world.

Let me add a word of caution to all of those who agree with what I've said and will vote this way in November. If you want to limit government spending, then you and your community must be ready to support those in need, for they will still need support. If you want to limit abortions, then you will need to be there in support of the mothers and children and when necessary you will need to adopt and care for these children as your own. If you vote for local authority over national authority, then you must work with these people to help the poor and the marginalized, the sick, the hungry, and the orphaned. 

You are still called to do these things as a child of God, even if you think the government should not pay for them. You should vote the way you think is right, but do not forget who you are when you're done.

I look forward to your comments.

Peace,
Ben

You can follow Ben on Twitter @BenHoward87 or email him at benjamin.howard87 [at] gmail.com.

Also, you can subscribe to On Pop Theology via RSS feed or email on the top right corner of the main page.

My Seventeen Magazine Tells Me...

by Mitchell Richards

Scanning around social media the other day, I came across someone’s picture of the Seventeen Magazine they had just purchased. It was your stereotypical magazine-geared-toward-teenage-girls cover: a couple of young attractive girls, neon colors, way too many headlines promising tips for perfect hair and “825 ways to look pretty.”  

I have no problem with any of this; it’s the social norm. However, plastered at the bottom of the cover, the main headline reads in all caps: Get everything you want this year (and in smaller print right under that) great body, tons of $$$, amazing clothes + mega confidence.

I’m so glad the Bible isn’t made up like a preteen girls magazine, but I often feel as though we treat it that way.

Usually at some point in the calendar year, I really sit down and wonder what I want from my current chapter of life. Years ago, these self-reflections involved finding jobs that paid me more money and finding a wife. These goal-setting sessions often used terms like “settling down” and “I want [this] to happen.” 

Life for me was once all about acquiring. Life was about wanting and the pursuit of acquiring those wants. Life was about getting what I thought I wanted. Now I handle all that quite differently.

Apparently, a year and a half ago that mentality changed. On a whim, I decided to coach little kids soccer and it has been such a blessing. It’s not easy though. 

If you would have asked me two years ago, in all seriousness, what my thoughts on young children were I would have told you I wanted nothing to do with them. Kids freak me out. I always just imagine young kids with spaghetti all over their mouths, defiant to everyone around them, and still wetting the bed. So when I volunteered to coach 6 and 7 year olds, I wasn’t really sure why I even wanted to.

 

Now, after multiple seasons with a lot of the same kids, everything has changed. The change has nothing to do with soccer though and everything to do with the acquiring mentality…

Life was not meant to be acquired…life was meant to be given away.

Since I've started coaching, I’ve realized my life is actually worth something. I’ve realized that I have something to offer to the rest of the world, and that something is NOT soccer. I used to sit in my apartment and do nothing all day. I wasn’t in school; I just worked and did nothing else. My life had nothing to offer because I was busy trying to acquire. Now, it's worth something because I’m giving it away.

Since coaching, life has not become any easier; in fact I’ve made it a lot more difficult. I started school again and I’m a full time student. I work two jobs. And soccer season is just about to start up again and so is school and my finances and time will be stretched to the limit. But one thing I won’t do is stop coaching these kids.

Since coaching, I’ve also become an uncle again two times over. My brother and his wife adopted their son Rance from Ukraine and they just recently had another son, Carden. Meeting them all for the first time, with the new outlook that life is to be given, not taken, changes my entire vision of what it means to be in a family and to be an uncle. 

I got to hang out with Rance a month or so ago at a camp and all I could think about was how much I wanted to be a better man for this kid. He’s 8 years old, and conscious of what I do, as opposed to say a baby who doesn’t even look at me or know my name. 

This idea that I have something in my life to offer to the world applies directly to my nephews and the rest of my family.  If I want them to know me in only one way it's as their uncle who would lay down his life for them because that’s what life is all about; that is what love is all about. They would never get that vibe from me if I were sitting in my apartment all day experiencing boredom firsthand. They’d think that their uncle was just a quiet crazy man who only came around on holidays.

But I’m not that person, and the only reason I know this is because I have something to give…my life. When your life becomes about acquiring and taking, when it becomes “what can I get from life” that means you’re doing it all wrong. 

I’ve learned in the last year and a half that you can have nothing and laugh more than you ever have in your life. I’ve learned what it means to be broke and what it means to have everything. I’ve learned that my life is not only to be shared with everyone around me, but also given to them. The more I hold back for myself, the less I have to give to the people I love. The difference between villains and heroes in movies and comics is that the villain wants to acquire, the hero wants to give.

The last 6 months of my life were some of the hardest and busiest months I’ve ever had, but nowhere in the Bible does it say anything about life being easy. The Bible doesn’t have neon headlines telling that you can get everything you want in life from God if you follow these simple steps. It doesn’t tell you that if you look hard enough at the red words you’ll find the hidden meaning to life and the way to stop sinning.  

The difference now is that I understand that this busyness is a good busyness because it has nothing to do with me and everything to do with the people around me. Life isn’t easy right now, but I don’t care because it is good. I’m living the best years of my life right now, and nothing has changed from two years ago when I was depressed and angry at life; nothing except my outlook on acquiring and giving.

The Bible says that you shouldn’t worry about the acquiring mentality, but instead to concern yourself with Jesus and follow his example; his example that only says one thing: give yourself away.

Mitchell writes occasionally at mitchellrichards.com. He also tweets a lot and you can follow him @MitchellWords. He wrote a book called Definitive Blurs and you can find it here.