True Life Train Wrecks

Alright, I confess. I watch TV shows about other people's lives. It began as entertainment, but now I watch to see what people are really like. Lately, our DVR has been working hard to record new episodes of MTV's True Life documentary series, and as I watched some of them last week, I recognized a trend. Each episode featured two or three young adults who have something in common, and the common thread was insecurity.  True Life: I'm Losing my Hair. True Life: I'm Uncomfortable with my New Body. Last night, I couldn't sleep, and a True Life marathon was on so I watched True Life: I'm Addicted to Porn. My dad would say that there's nothing but trash on MTV, and he's probably very disappointed in me for watching it, but as I watch with my jaw dropped, I realize how sheltered and naive I really am. It's easy for someone like me to forget that there's an entire world of lost and hurting people outside my circle of Christian friends, and I admire the people who are honest and open enough about their struggles to allow cameras to showcase them for all of America. It heightens my awareness of the real problems people face and the lengths people will go to to find happiness and fulfillment apart from God.

Most of the people on the documentaries use it as an opportunity to "come out" and seek help. It's interesting to see the reactions of friends and family when they learn what's really going on, and it makes me wonder how many people around me struggle with the same things. None of us are perfect. We all have issues and problems that we try to keep secret, but I wonder how different the church would be if we were really honest when people asked us how we're doing. What if we told the truth instead of telling them that we're fine?

All of that to say, True Life may be train wreck TV, but if we're being honest, we know that apart from God, we're all train wrecks.  The show is about real people with real problems, and we would do well to sit up and pay attention. It's the world we live in, and they're the people who need God the most, and they don't even know it. Many of them think that if they could just fix whatever's wrong on the outside, the inside would follow along, but that's not the way it works. Until we are made whole from the inside out, we will never be satisfied. Only God can heal our deepest hurts and calm our most pressing anxieties. How many people do you know who really need to hear that message?

Customer Service

Yesterday as I waited at Wal-Mart's customer service desk, I realized how judgmental I can be.  The Wal-Mart employee behind the counter was holding a check in her right hand and the phone in her left, and I couldn't help but overhear the conversation. "Did you give your grandaughter a check to cash?"

"She's only got a sippy cup, but I noticed the notation at the bottom of the check.  It's for medicine, right?"

"She's gone to get more stuff, because she didn't have enough merchandise for me to cash the check."

"I'll see that she has some when she comes back."

A few minutes later, a woman with a little girl came back to the counter with a package of children's tylenol.

"This is all I could find," she said.  "This will have to do."

Immediately, I mentally berated her for taking advantage of her grandmother's generosity.  She just wants the money, I thought.  She's not interested in getting medicine for her daughter.  I bet she'll spend the rest of the money on whatever she wants.  Who knows what she'll do with it? She should be ashamed of taking advantage of an old lady.

My thoughts continued on that path for the rest of the day, and I'm ashamed to admit that I had no problems looking down on that poor woman.  It wasn't until much later that I suddenly realized how easily had I had snapped to judge her.  I don't know her situation or her needs.  I don't know why her grandmother wrote a check.  Maybe she needed to pay a doctor's bill.  Maybe she needed to buy groceries.  Maybe the only medicine the little girl needed was Tylenol.  Maybe she just needed some grace.

Far too often, I turn my nose up at the people who need help the most.  It's easier for me to cast judgment than it is to actually reach out and help.  If I think that I'm somehow better than them, then I won't feel responsible for helping them in their plight, but the truth is that I'm not better.  I am who I am because of the grace of God, for no other reason.  I lack nothing, but it's not because I deserve the life I live; it's because God has given it to me.  It's my duty to take what God has given me and use it for the good of others, but most of the time, I just use it for the good of myself.

If we Christians are ever going to reach the people who need God the most, we have to get over ourselves.  I'm not exempt from this challenge.  It's time to extend a little bit of grace and open my eyes to the needs around me.  Maybe I can do something to help.

Even Baptists Need Holy Week

Sometimes I wish I came from a more liturgical tradition.  The kind that allows the church calendar to dictate the rhythms of life and set the tone for worship.  Our church usually does a pretty good job of at least changing the fabric draped over the cross in the baptistry, but for some reason, Ash Wednesday came and went without a change in color.  Our cross still sports the bright red and gold colors of Christmas.  We'll celebrate Easter on Sunday, and I know for a fact that the cross will be arrayed in shimmering white, but I have really missed the purple cloth of Lent this year.

I grew up in traditional Southern Baptist churches, and I never knew that there were entire seasons built around Christmas and Easter.  I didn't know what Advent was until my grandmother died and we began celebrating Christmas at my aunt and uncle's house.  They, being good Episcopalians, place an Advent wreath in the middle of their dining table and light the candles throughout the season.  The wreath fascinated me, and from that moment on, I was intrigued by this other world of rich traditions that I knew nothing about.  As a teenager, most of my friends were Catholic, and their observance (or lack thereof) of Lent always grabbed my attention.  We Baptists didn't give up anything for Lent, and I really didn't see how abstaining from chocolate or Coke would have any affect on God at all.

Things have changed a bit since then, and I've come to appreciate and long for liturgical traditions.  The first year we were married, I dragged my husband to an Ash Wednesday service at the local Episcopal church.  The whole thing really weirded him out, but I loved it.  I felt connected to something larger than myself, and that year, I gave up blogging and social networking for Lent.  We light Advent candles at Christmas and read selected passages of Scripture together to help us remember and meditate on the season.

But it's a lot of work to do it on our own.  Sometimes I'm so caught up in myself that I forget to consider the season.  I'm ashamed to admit that Easter has taken me by surprise this year.  I don't feel prepared for Sunday morning.  I need the church to remind me of the season.  I need the purple cloth of Lent to turn my eyes toward the road to Jerusalem, and I need waving palm branches to center me at the onset of Holy Week.  Tomorrow is Maundy Thursday, and although we won't observe it in our church, I know that I need to feel the horror of Jesus' arrest and the trauma of his death on that Friday we call Good.  If I don't stop to feel the betrayal and grieve the death, I won't understand or appreciate the resurrection life we commemorate on Easter Sunday.

It's only through the death of Jesus that we can experience the resurrection.  His death was real, tragic, and painful.  I need to dwell on those things before I can celebrate and appreciate Easter Sunday because, as the prophet Isaiah wrote, "Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.  But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed.  All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned - every one - to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all" (Isaiah 53:4-6).