Eden and Starbucks and Control of the Universe!

(Warning: the allusions to Howard Schultz's divinity are somewhat overstated.)

Howard Schultz is Chairman and CEO of Starbucks.  He is a marketing genius, admired leader, motivator, and billionaire.  He is known for strong vision and strong convictions.  Starbucks is an undeniable financial and cultural icon. They provide an outstanding product with an emphasis on a great experience through their people and technology, remaining socially and environmentally sensitive.  And beyond that Starbucks patrons are extraordinarily loyal to the brand, which is thanks to the fact that the employees of Starbucks love working for the company.  From the outside it seems that everyone from the Management to the first day Barista are "all in" for whatever Schultz has coming next.  He has delivered for them, so they in turn trust his vision and are ready to deliver for the company.  And of course, the shareholders couldn't be happier!

With that in mind, imagine if I were a newly trained barista.  Let's say one day I were to head over to Seattle to Starbucks Headquarters.  I walk into the beautiful brick, former Sears and Roebuck building, head into the conference room where members of the board are waiting for Schultz and I plop down his seat.  "I'm in charge."  is my first statement.  For the sake of this thought game, imagine if Schultz's creation were forced to go along with this scenario.  What would be the consequences?  I'm a pretty clever guy, but I fall well short of the qualifications, experience and necessary fortitude to run one of the most successful brands in the world.  Upper management would begin to scramble under the chaos.  Without the security and magnitude of Schultz's presence and the terrifying uncertainty of an unknown restaurant manager at the helm, order would break down.  Some would leave and some would begin to stake their own claim, trying take control.  Every aspect of the company would be affected.  Relationships with vendors and suppliers once held firm in the confident grasp of Schultz and his team, would now come in to question.  Job security at the store level would turn into complete distrust.  People would start thinking more about their own needs instead of the good of the company.  Even if all my intentions were good, my mere act of taking the place that rightfully belongs to the grand architect of the company would mean disaster.  Shareholders revolt!  Starbucks would be broken.  

This scenario came into my head as I pondered the question, "What would you want people that don't know Jesus to know?"  Well, I would want them to know about his great and powerful and redeeming love.  I would also want them to know that he is not who they think he is and there is so much more for all of us to learn.  Ultimately, and the point of this story is that they would need to know that they are currently occupying the seat that is rightfully his.  

This is indeed the story of The Fall as told in Genesis: Man occupying the throne that rightfully belongs to God.  We get hung up on the act of Adam and Eve eating the apple or whatever un-named fruit it was, but the real act that caused Sin to enter the world was the assumption that Man and Woman could know better.  Whether you view the Garden of Eden as Figurative or Literal doesn't diminish the inherent truth of the story.  The story of Adam and Eve plays out again and again throughout time and history:  We think we know better. The reason the world is broken is because we assume control and turn from the goodness of God.  He has constructed every individual particle of every atom and fashioned the universe and then gave us a choice:  Free Will.  Instead of surrendering to God's will for Creation, two chapters in to existence and we broke it.  

Genesis 2:
15 The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. 16 And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil,for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”

God sets Adam up for a life of bliss, yet Adam questions God and makes a choice that says, "I'm taking control!"  If I really did enter Starbucks headquarters with the intent of taking over, I would justly be tazed into submission.  Schultz wouldn't let this happen to his company, but why would God let it happen to Creation?  That is a good question.  I don't know if I can answer it completely.  God is love.  In order for love to be love, there must be a choice.  If we choose to take the CEO's chair, the King's throne, God will let us.  He will all at once leave us to our own devices as consequence.  And yet still provides a way back.  It's a great mystery that God never wiped out his disobedient creation.  It's hard to deny that humans have a way of mucking up the good things we are given.  In his great patience and mercy, and in spite of all the pain that has occurred because of the persistence of Evil, God himself provides the sacrifice that can rectify creation.  

The King Returned and is set to return again.  In the meantime there is still work to do.

In 2000, Schultz publicly announced that he was resigning as Starbucks' CEO. Eight years later, however, he returned to head the company. In a 2009 interview with CBS, Schultz said of Starbucks' mission, "We're not in the business of filling bellies, we're in the business of filling souls."

Currently, I have a job that I really, really love.  No I don't work for Starbucks, but I do work for a company that is driven by an uncompromising set of values.  Although I've never met my company's founder, I see the evidence of the good things he has done.  Even though I don't physically see him at work, I reap the benefits of the work he is doing.  I trust the leadership and therefore my desire to take control is diminished, however it is not entirely absent.  I still tend toward distrust and desire to have my own way from time to time.  This is similar to my relationship with Christ.  I have surrendered my life to him because of the work he has done in me.  He provides every answer I need, although not without mystery.  My trust in him is based on Evidence I have seen and felt and I have reaped the benefits of seeking his will. And like loyal workers of a benevolent leader seeking to help the company,  Believers have the great task of spreading evidence of God's goodness in a temporarily broken world.  We fail time after time, but thankfully the evidence is overwhelming and God is unrelenting in his love for his people.  Some have everything and yet don't believe.  Some have absolutely nothing and yet praise the name of God.  We pray for peace and comfort now, but Hope will be fulfilled upon his return!  We have a choice.  Will we surrender control of our lives to the one who made us, who has better things in mind for us or will we defiantly proclaim, "I am God!"  Will we seek him or seek our own will?

Luke 12:

29 And do not set your heart on what you will eat or drink; do not worry about it. 30 For the pagan world runs after all such things, and your Father knows that you need them. 31 But seek his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well.

32 “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. 33 Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will never fail, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. 34 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

PG: Parental Grace.

My wife and I have experienced some amazing success in our children.  Just amazing. Anything good we have instilled in our children, has come from God and God alone.  It may sound like false humility, but it is the truth.  Jesus in his goodness has allowed us the opportunity to witness his power and Grace in the rearing of our children.  More often than not, though, I fail on subtle and then sometimes grand levels in teaching them.  Sometimes I hear my own voice speaking in terms of Grace, using the language and the divinity implied, yet falling short of the real heart of Grace.  I end up teaching Grace for my own comfort and sanity.

Out of the many things we teach our children, Grace is the hardest.  I guess that is true in general.  True Grace is hard to teach, even harder to exhibit and harder yet to receive.  On one side of the ledger of our hearts, God has imprinted his sense of Justice; right and wrong exist and we yearn for fairness in a world that seems to have none.  On the other side of this ledger is Grace:  an overwhelming desire to be loved no matter what, whether we deserve it or not.  These things are a reflection of the image of God in us.  As humans we contain these imprints, but because the world is in a fallen state (waiting to be redeemed) we struggle to exhibit these concepts of Justice and Grace.  Many turn their backs on the concepts completely, thinking it too hard or rather hoping these Truths don't really exist at all.  Yet they remain and they haunt us.  Our desire for Justice persists, no matter what we believe in.  And our hope for Grace remains, against all odds.  As we wrestle with these lingering concepts they seem in conflict.  I think this is part of the reason people struggle with Christianity.  "How could a Just God allow all of these horrible things happen, to me, and to the world?  If Grace means that he loves me/us unconditionally, then this world and Love itself does not make sense."  Most of us lean towards one or the other.  Either we are really adamant about fairness and justice or we speak in the all accepting terms of Love.  (Parents lean toward Justice and Grandparents lean toward unconditional Love...that's why Parenting is hard and Grandparenting is the best gig in the world!) However the more we come to understand Jesus, and our position in relation to him: the Creator of the Universe and our Savior, the more we realize that true Love needs true Justice.  

In God's perfection and in his plan for bringing his beloved people back to him in this temporary and fallen world, Grace and Justice play out huge in the parent-child relationship.  Among my own siblings I see those who are fierce guardians of what is right and fair and those who calmly distribute both love and justice.  I see me own temperament as I look back through childhood, only wanting love and acceptance and circumventing right and wrong all together.  I even experienced glimpses of God's Wrath and Judgment as my sister pushed me down the stairs.  Parents are given the task of sorting through this quagmire of personality and emotions with little creatures who bear the image of God and yet contain no small amount of crookedness in the very same flesh. 

My version of Grace as a parent is often just an attempt to keep the peace and I fail to go the full measure.  "If you are nice to your sister, she will be nice to you!"  Not only is that untrue, but it makes the act of Love conditional.  Instead I should be teaching to "Be nice to your sister.  God made her and made you to love each other.  Be nice to your sister to reflect the Grace that God has given us, that we may enjoy each other because of his work and not because of our own.  And the fact is, she may still be mean to you.  But be sweet because that is who you are, who you belong to, not what you can get out of it."

Matthew 5:
43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor[i] and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? 47 And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? 48 Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. 

Because God Loves us, he administers Justice.  If he accepted all the evil we have wrought on this earth, he would not be very loving.  But if the only way to be with him was to be perfectly just and fair without failure, then even the best of us would have no shot.  This is how Grace evens the equation.  God loves us and he wants us to be with him.  But what does he do with our sinful nature?  He can't just accept it.  I love my children, but I can't just accept their occasional rotten behavior.  They can't kick each other, wipe boogers on the wall or run into the street.  I must make a way for them to be loved by me.  It is up to me to administer Justice in such a way that we can all be together.  I am a sinner, just like my kids.  Good and Bad, we figure out this Grace thing together.  I often fail by the way, but by God's Grace he makes it work if I submit my own desires and failures to him.  On a cosmic scale,  God has to do all the work, and he has made a way for us to be with him.  Grace is the Death of Christ.  The Death of Christ takes the place of the punishment that we were to receive.  Justice is served, we feel the conviction, but condemnation is avoided.  We get to be with Jesus, even though we don't deserve it.  If he let us do whatever we wanted, he wouldn't be good.  While my child is turned away in rebellion and anger, I still love them, but cannot really be with them.  This child does not have the capacity to rectify this situation on her own.  I must make a way for them back.  I must make a gesture of Grace, that still is Just.  However, it is up to them to choose to receive it.  Can they let go and turn a contrite heart back to their father so that we may be together again?

The Bible tells parents to teach children about the ways of the Lord, instructing them in his word, provide for them and correct them.  It is a relationship built to failure.  It just is and the Bible prepares us for that.  In Deuteronomy, God says:

4 Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.[a] 5 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. 6 These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. 7 Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up.
and in Proverbs 22:6
Start children off on the way they should go,
    and even when they are old they will not turn from it.


God urges parents to make sure their children have a relationship with him, for he is the one that truly Loves, truly administers Justice and ultimately truly Saves.  As parents, our jobs become less about being the savior and hero for our children and more about pointing them to their true savior.  Without exception, every parent and child relationship will fail.  It is good and it is painful for the child and the parent when the child starts to see dear Mom and Dad as human beings, full of error and sin, just like everyone else.  This directive from the Bible becomes all the more important.  While we parents are our children's first impressions (the Good and the Horrible) of the nature of God, at some point we must be willing to let God be God.  We must decrease so that He may increase.  Children are meant to leave their parents, to put away childish things and to form new unions.  As parents, if we display Love, Justice and Grace, then our kids will have an opportunity to truly understand them.  However if we can point them to the Author of these things and indeed the Author of everything, then they can not only understand them, but live in them!

So I leave you with a little piece of the Bible from Paul that I thought was written for my father, but as it turns out, was written just for me.

Ephesians 6
4 Fathers,[b] do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.

Beauty.

What is blessing?  
The beauty of a sunset or a tree.  
The sound of a lovely tune, chords striking heart strings making us ache and rejoice at the same time.  
The savory, sour and sweet.  The satisfaction of a cheeseburger and milkshake.  The complexity of a fine wine. 
The vast expanse of stars pin pricked against the velvet of the night.  
The Order: the poetic nature of math and the order that exists in the very large swirling fiery galaxies down to the impossibly small un-observable particles that are dwarfed by atoms.  

These things are a blessing.  But they are a blessing that flows quite simply out of the nature of God.  It is simply who he is.  

The greater blessing for us is the ability to perceive these things.  Beauty would exist whether we knew it or not.  What does the worm know of these things?  In his great love, God has granted us the means by which to discover him, his nature, his goodness, his complexity.

My eyes behold impossible colors of the sunset.
My skin sighs with relief in the shade of a tree.
My ears marvel at the progression of a C chord to an A minor chord to a G chord and back to C, plucked by my own fingers.
To taste, oh to taste!
To drink in the sky!
To see symmetry, to see equations resolve, to look at the sun in all its rage and know that it is bound by the mind of God and the order he set forth at the beginning of time and all creation.

Lord, give us eyes to see and ears to hear.  
Jesus create in us a heart that can receive your greatest blessing: Your Love.

Matthew 13

“Though seeing, they do not see;

though hearing, they do not hear or understand.

14In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah:

“ ‘You will be ever hearing but never understanding;

you will be ever seeing but never perceiving.

15For this people’s heart has become calloused;

they hardly hear with their ears,

and they have closed their eyes.

Otherwise they might see with their eyes,

hear with their ears,

understand with their hearts

and turn, and I would heal them.’^a

16But blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear. 17For truly I tell you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.

Psalm 51

Create in me a pure heart, O God,

and renew a steadfast spirit within me.

11Do not cast me from your presence

or take your Holy Spirit from me.

12Restore to me the joy of your salvation

and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.

Water.

Once a year or so, you see a story on The Dead Sea, usually on CBS Sunday Morning or something of the like.  Tourists go there for the novelty.  Some go for what they believe to be the healing waters, which strikes me as odd since it's call The Dead Sea.  Here are a couple things I know.  It's a wasteland.  Nothing can live there.  It's freakishly salty water (8 times saltier than the ocean) gives it a density that allows bathers extreme buoyancy.  They just float right there on the surface.  The Dead Sea is also the lowest elevation point on earth, nearly 1300 feet below sea level.  Water is amazing, a life-giver.  But here, the water just isn't able to be what it's supposed to be.  People go to The Dead Sea.  They go to find something or receive something.  But they cannot be submerged.  The water has lost it's life.  And what of the salt.  We, the Children of God are called the salt of the earth.  Salt is meant to preserve and also to give flavor.  But if it is surrounded by death it loses it's purpose.  

Matthew 5
13 “You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.

Water is such a beautiful metaphor for the Grace of God.  It is refreshing, cleansing, and life giving.  Water gives meaning, and is appropriately used as the symbol and vessel for re-birth in Baptism.

Last week, my wife, my 3 daughters and I went to the pool for the first time this summer.  It was an overcast day.  Rain felt possible at any moment.  It was warm though and not actually raining.  My wife in her wisdom urged us on and we went to the pool and took our chances.  It is a great pool with multiple playing areas: slides, lazy river, diving boards and a big lap pool.  The kids got in right away, despite the chill.  They shrieked at the cool water, but immediately were having fun.  My wife began the slow descent down a long pool entry ramp.  The ramp is for coming and going, but my wife is a painfully slow pool enterer.  Foot.  Ankle.  Mid-ankle.  Below knee-cap.  Near knee-cap.  Retreat to mid-ankle.  As for me, I decided that it was too overcast and I wasn't feeling like it.  The kids played and eventually my wife got in.  I just milled about.  Sitting on the deck loungers, but never getting comfortable.  I smiled, but was turned inward.  I started to think of all the things I'd rather be doing.  But then I would realize I was sulking and very dutifully I got up and edged near the pool to be some sort of presence as a father figure.  My wife was up to mid thigh and playing with our youngest, still on the ramp.  I thought about getting in a couple times, but couldn't get out of my own head.  Then a drizzle came, but not for long.  

The girls got out of the water and headed to the picnic tables for some lunch.  After lunch, our youngest was ready to get back in the water.  I was ready to go home.  I quietly tried to urge my family in the direction of the door.  The older girls and my wife didn't seem to want to get back in the water anyway.  But the youngest was tugging at me and anyone to get into the water.  I wandered over with her.  I tried to convince her to play on the shallow ramp area by herself.  But then, something changed. I just gave in, for lack of a better term.  I took off my shirt and jumped in.  Joy, Water, Splashing, Shouting.  I gathered my little girl in my arms, put her on my back and took off swimming.  She squirmed, giggled and shrieked with a combination of fear and delight.  I threw her.  She started swimming from the edge to me and back again and she didn't even realize she was learning to swim.  I was so caught up in delight and play that I didn't even consider my self.  I was all the way out of my head and all the way in love.  Our middle daughter joined in.  Giggle, shriek, delight.  Soon I looked up to see my wife and our oldest giggling pointing and laughing too.  My wife was so happy to see me so happy.  I was immersed.  I was absorbed by the water.  I was adorned by wriggling children.  I was submerged under the flood of God's goodness.

Why, why, why does it take me so long to jump in?  The story above is the story of my reaction to God's Grace.  He is offering me forgiveness and freedom if I will just believe that he is who he says he is.  All I have to do is get in.  His Grace is a vast body of inviting water, yet I sulk on the hard concrete edges unwilling to surrender myself to something that might be shocking or uncomfortable.  I am unable to give up my own control and my own assertions.  But God uses others to guide us to the water.  He leads us beside still waters, but it is still our choice to get in.  It is a display of my impulsive nature that I jump in.  My wife's slow entry is indicative of her nature, but we are each resistant to grace in our own way. 

“All human nature vigorously resists grace because grace changes us and the change is painful.”  Flannery O'Connor

Jumping in is the only way I have ever entered the water.  And almost every time I've entered the water it is after waiting too long.  I waste time.  I forgo the joy of being in his Grace until I can't take it anymore.  And such is the nature of his Grace that even though I should regret the wasted time, I am just so happy.  I am so happy to be in.  I wasted so much time in my life and yet I am just so happy to belong to Christ that I don't suffer the grief.  And while I wasted much of that day sulking on the deck, all I can think of is my wife's smiling face as she gazed on at those moments of pool time joy.

John 4
13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

Sticks.

Sticks.

The King walks outside of the Garden,

Among the forest trees.

It’s different: damper, darker,

In the Garden, nothing is broken.

But The King has left the Garden.

Still, the forest echoes his own perfection,

His intended perfection.

He gathers up the broken sticks.

He holds them in his hand.

He rubs them, removing dirt, decay and broken bark.

He smoothens them.

He marvels at how far they have fallen.

He smiles knowingly at their weakness.

He looks up at the trees and takes in the beauty of his creation.

The contrast of the dark, fruitless, dead branches 

Against the vivid forest canopy above is beautiful to him.

Against.

Against is a reality.

The snake slithers away up ahead.

His Majesty smiles again knowingly.

But he aches.

He aches for the broken branches, 

They do not know where they came from.

They do not know what they are made of.

They do not know where they belong.

Still they lay there, comically defiant: 

A stick raging against the Universe.

He takes the broken, decaying branches,

He sears against the death lying within.

He burns at the destruction of his perfection.

He gathers the kindling for a final funeral pyre.

But he fashions a Cross instead.

A Cross is not a tree.

A Cross is not perfection, but a declaration

Among the broken branches.

A Cross is fashioned,

The broken branches held fast by the splintered man,

Iron driven into the extremities, spanning the Cross. 

The sky is broken.

Death is broken.

Wrath is satisfied.

The Cross is not a tree,

The Cross is for thee,

The Cross declares, God from the Garden:

“You belong to me!”

Waiting.

I wait here, thinking I'm patient.  I'm waiting on the Lord I tell myself.  Things will be better soon.  I list in my mind all of my worries and tell myself that they won't always be there.  I think of how the world needs to be in order to accommodate me.  These are sincere thoughts and desires and yet they seem so silly as I write them out now.  I know better don't I?  Do I?  Apparently not.

I wait.  But even in my waiting I stop short of the Glory of God.  Almost immediately after I feel God's work in my life, his presence and revelation, I start to think about what it means for me.  This isn't what I'm built for.  I'm not here to work on my career, my family, my rapier wit.  I'm here to work for, Love and be Loved by the Creator of the Universe.  In finding my true place, I find myself blessed beyond all measure.  That's just who God is: Good.

But still I wait.  And I think it a noble sort of waiting.  But here is what I realized today: I'm praying and waiting for God to reveal something about me.  The better portion would be to ask God to reveal TO me, something about himself.

"Hey Mozart, man did you compose some amazing music.  Instead of learning more about you, I'd like you to hear the three chord song I wrote on my guitar."

I have chosen the lesser portion.  I have chosen myself.  Jesus is infinitely more interesting than everything else in the Universe combined.  And yet I thought I had known all of him.  I was getting frustrated trying to apply his teachings without desiring to know him.  I was plucking away at the Turkish March hoping to impress Mozart.  But when you have an audience with Greatness, it is better to sit and learn.

When we wait on the Lord, we should expect more than learning an interesting tidbit about our spiritual development.  We should expect nothing less than the Great and Might King to overwhelm us and teach us about himself.

Mary chose the good portion.

Luke 10:38 As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him. 39 She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said. 40 But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!”

41 “Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, 42 but few things are needed—or indeed only one.[a] Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”

Hands up: Surrender, Obedience and Worship.

Obedience, at its core, is simply a step in the right direction.  It needn't feel like you are required to move the mountain, pick and ax.  Instead, think of it like being buried alive and deciding to reach your hand out of the soil.  That is obedience, and it is God's good pleasure to lift you out.  But he cannot do so if you decide to remain in the dark, thinking yourself too bad or too good to make an effort.  Maybe you don't think enough of Him to hope that he will rescue you.  Faith is evident in the action.  Though efforts are not the same as believing, you can hardly express the simplest of beliefs without some sort of effort.  Belief stirs to action, even the beginning of belief.  A seed laying dormant pokes it's leaf out of the soil and to the light to grow.

Much like the Mustard Seed of Faith, it only takes a small amount for Christ to work.  In some cases, obedience is simply to stop moving in a direction that you know is leading you to destruction.  Let yourself be found!  Give him a chance to rescue you!  

You are being called, his Spirit is crying to you, into you, reverberating throughout your bones, rattling you from the inside.  His voice is calling you out of the darkness, raising you up to something greater.  There is an evil voice at work as well.  This condemning spirit of Satan bids you to stay put, to dig yourself deeper.  He tells you that you cannot be loved, you are not worthy or worse yet, telling you God is not Good.  

Which voice will you respond to?  It is not easy to take that first step out of darkness, out of comfort and seemingly out of control.  But in that moment which you realize you cannot do this alone, reach for him in hope and faith and you will not be disappointed.  Simply calling on the name of Jesus is enough.  An out-stretched hand will find the warmth of the Savior who has been there waiting for you all along.

James 2:15
Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. 16 If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? 17 In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.

18 But someone will say, “You have faith; I have deeds.”

Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds. 19 You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that—and shudder.