I must take a break from our regularly scheduled programming and either congratulate or extend sympathy to my wife for putting up with me for 55 years as of today. I was such an immature kid, can’t believe she survived. (Some people say I haven’t changed…)
Anniversary
June 12, 2025Titles or Actions?
June 11, 2025I’ve interviewed many CEOs, some of which led multi-billion dollar corporations. I’ve met and interviewed and worked with many people with degrees piled upon degrees. I’ve also worked with electricians on the factory floor and workers on the assembly line. They’ve almost all been good people, smart in their own way.
Jason Fried, CEO and entrepreneur, wrote this in an email newsletter recently. Something which I wholeheartedly agree.
Titles, tenure, and paths don’t matter. The work does. Always look at the work.
How is your work?
Where Have We Missed the Point?
June 10, 2025I asked yesterday, Have we missed the point?
Maybe I should have asked, Where have we missed the point?
I looked at two surveys—one about young women leaving the church and one about young men returning to the church.
And I wondered about missing this point from Paul written to the Galatians, “There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”
So, where did we miss this point?
Was it missed 1,500 years ago and carrying forward until today?
How can churches become communities where everyone is accepted, no one is put down, as they work toward common goals of service? That is how Paul ended his letter on spiritual formation to the Romans. That is how the early church grew and changed the world.
We don’t proclaim inclusivity; we practice it.
There is a difference. In the end, people are known by what they do.
Have We Missed The Point?
June 9, 2025A Tale of Two Surveys. Taken together, I wonder where the American church has missed the point. Perhaps using the term “church” speaks too broadly. There seem to be myriad churches with myriad theologies.
But, let us consider two recent surveys.
Young women are leaving church in unprecedented numbers, according to the Survey Center on American Life’s research. The center learned that young women are particularly concerned about churches that don’t welcome all people; that discourage women’s leadership; and don’t attend to community, justice, compassion, and loving one’s neighbor.
Young white men are coming back to the church because it’s one of the few places that accept them (undefined, but a logical assumption would be those “evangelical” churches that condemn homosexuality and women leadership).
The Apostle Paul, loved by some conservatives and scorned by some liberals and misunderstood by most, famously wrote to the churches of Galatia, “There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”
I ask, why are we still so intent on divisions? Why do we champion one group and put down another? Why don’t we organize our churches with this vision—you are all one in Christ Jesus?
Drip by Drip
June 6, 2025Inch by inch, row by row, gonna make this garden grow. All it takes is a rake and a hoe and a piece of fertile ground. — Folk song written by David Mallett
A series of caves populate southern Ohio’s Hocking Hills region. Thousands visit Ash Cave, Old Man’s Cave, and others every year.
Drips of water formed these limestone attractions over the course of centuries. Patience, persistence, unending.
This era has been captured by the hype of sudden change. The organization, be it business or church or non-profit, will grow suddenly as if overnight.
Organizations, and yes, even our lives, are actually built slowly over time like those limestone caves.
Like the Garden Song, we hoe a bit by bit and over time we realize how much we have grown.
Love Your Enemies
June 5, 2025Love your enemies. Even the pagans love their friends.—Jesus
I’ve been on vacation in Virginia visiting sites that played roles in America’s formation. Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello. Williamsburg where Virginia’s delegates debated siding with Massachusetts in separating from England. Jamestown, the first permanent English settlement in America. Yorktown, where Cornwallis surrendered to Washington leading to the end of the “Revolutionary War.” Also bringing my wife and her sisters together again.
The trip fed many thoughts into my personal blender. Here is one:
Standing on the pier in the James River at Jamestown, I spotted a T-shirt on an upper-middle-aged man:
If this Fleig offends you I will help you pack.
My first thought—why has the flag become so politically divisive? Only conservatives are supposed to honor the flag? (I should note that our country has done many things of which I’m not proud. But still, it is my country. I hope I’ve done at least a little to support it. No one ever called me conservative.)
A second thought—Why be so pugnacious and in your face? Perhaps I have been too influenced by Jesus. Or, perhaps I’m not “feeling/judgmental” enough on the Myers-Briggs Types Indicator (I’m thinking/perceptive, which must be a minority).
I see this “in-your-face” use of language even from people who purport to be inclusive and loving (any United Methodist bishops reading this?). OK, I probably slip also at times. Feel free to call me out.
There’s a church loosely within my geographical area who had a slogan once, “Love everyone…always.” I’m not sure they did. But that sentiment obviously reflects the teaching we Jesus-followers are supposed to be practicing..always.
Practicing Conscious Ignorance
June 4, 2025Conscious ignorance, if you can practice it, expands our world.
Imagine approaching study, say of the Bible for instance, consciously ignorant. We would be open to learning something new. We would be open to the infusion of the Spirit.
We might even become renewed.
Confession
June 3, 2025James 5:16, Therefore confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, so that you may be healed.
Language can sometimes become an obstacle to understanding. I try to avoid words that may carry emotional baggage that interferes with understanding. Confession and repentance are two of those words that contain important meaning often lost in the mental picture of a crazy guy with a beard and a sign on a street corner yelling at passers-by.
I have been thinking on this passage from James searching for guidance for spiritual formation and also for healing from emotional and spiritual wounds.
Let us consider a process.
Sometimes our emotions are ruling our day; sometimes we lash out in anger without cause.
The first step is awareness. Something happens in my life that makes me aware of my life, my hurts, my bad choices.
Becoming aware, I search out someone for conversation. Perhaps a guide or a small group would lead me using some intelligent questioning to become aware of my situation. I can name it. Naming it, I can begin to deal with it.
Now I am ready for what James called “confession.” That is, awareness that leads me to see the source of my grief or anxiety or wrongly chosen path. I talk about it with my small group.
Awareness, leading to understanding my role in the situation, leads to changing my thoughts and behaviors.
This process can take a month. It can take a year. No one knows going into it.
Awareness, talk it through, use the support of a small group. Experience has taught that this is an effective agent for changing a life.
Realizing Who Is God
June 2, 2025Religion is not so much telling man there is one God as about preventing man from thinking he is God.—Nassim Nicholas Taleb
Somewhere buried in my library is a book by Erich Fromm, You Shall Be as Gods: A Radical Interpretation of the Old Testament and Its Tradition.
Contrary to what Fromm wrote, when a human begins to believe they are God, good things never occur.
Argument or Discussion
May 30, 2025I see that C-SPAN is trying a talk news show that is designed as discussion rather than confrontation. Imagine in this era a Democrat and Republican sitting on a TV set having an intelligent discussion? Can they get anyone to participate? Will anyone watch?
Even many of the sport shows I’ve seen on ESPN are more argument than discussion. The belief is that the more outrageous and confrontational the better for ratings (and therefore the better for ad revenue).
Let’s try this on our personal life. Say at a table having coffee after church. Do you discuss or argue. How is your language? Confrontational and provocative? Probing, respectful?
An argument isn’t a discussion.
Faith Venture 