When smiles hide a world of pain

We celebrated my wife’s 40th birthday on Saturday 27th February 2016, and it was one of the worst days of our lives.  The photo of Sarah and I denies our reality.  We were still shell-shocked from the traumatising events two days previous.  We experienced so much challenge and change in that month of February 2016, none of it were we prepared for, but that was just a taste of what lay in store for us over the ensuing months and years.

Of course, it was Sarah’s milestone birthday, and we’d planned the celebration for her for weeks beforehand, and we had to make the most of our time together with family and friends.

The day before the celebration, as a couple, we felt alone.  We were reeling from news that left us in a devastating place of grief, and there weren’t many people we could share with.  We seriously considered calling off Sarah’s 40th birthday because neither of us were in a mental or emotional state to celebrate.  We were still in shock, unable yet to reflect on what had occurred.

Then, at the party, there was a moment where our eyes locked from a distance away and we both realised neither of us had our not-yet-three-year-old son.  Immediately we were thrown into panic.  We were in a public park, people everywhere, and NOBODY knew where our 35-month-old toddler was!  Immediately, I ran, calling out for him, thinking abduction, then looking over to the pond in the middle of the park, I feared drowning.

My reaction was not only out of the trauma of imagining our son in a dire situation, but it was also in the backdrop of the trauma I’d experienced two days previously.  Very fortunately, one of our guests, a dear friend from yesteryear, found our son in the playground fifty metres away playing by himself.  We’d lost him for only a few minutes but it seemed like an eternity.

To be honest, it was a relief when the party was over because neither of us are good fakes.

The following day was Sarah’s actual 40th birthday and we travelled to Busselton because we were suddenly on two weeks unforeseen leave.  It was a horrible day, where thoughts of what was going on tormented just about every moment.  The following day was the same, as was the next one, and the next one... you get the idea.

During this season of life I was reading John Townsend’s “The Entitlement Cure,” which discusses the concept of ‘pocket entitlement’: we all have pockets in our lives where we can behave entitled.  I was in a season of trying to determine HOW things had gone terribly wrong, and I had a personal spiritual breakthrough that I lived out of for the rest of 2016 and into 2017.  It’s interesting as I look back how I’d taken full responsibility for MY part of issues, but because others didn’t and wouldn’t, it had the effect of us feeling gaslit.

It’s also interesting how, out of four holiday units on that Busselton beachfront, the one we stayed in back in February 2016 still holds such sad and traumatic associations, whereas the other units we’ve stayed in don’t.  It’s indicative of how sticky trauma is.

As I go back to this photo of us posing around Sarah’s cake, I recognise we were at the very core of the pain right there, where smiles hid a world of pain.  As I look back to that time of nearly seven years ago now, I see how far we’ve come since, and how much we had to sow by faith in recovering from that time.  We go back to the photo and others like it, and we want to say thank you to that version of ourselves that kept going despite the significance of the challenges that presented at that time.

What this photo demonstrates is that photographs often lie, especially when smiles are offered when people are in a world of pain.

At that time, we were still only just over a year on from losing Nathanael, and even though I was always saying “we’re fine,” losing our child took more of a toll on me and us than we realised or were even aware of at the time.

I felt sorry for Sarah that her 40th was such a disappointment.  Those days were a shock for us both, but in many ways, it was a vicarious trauma for her.  I imagine we’ll have the chance of a do-over in 2026 for her 50th.

When life takes a turn for the worse, and these things do tend to occur suddenly, it can take years to recover and reconcile matters, as it has for us.  But one thing that isn’t lost on us is the faithfulness of our God throughout.  Our choices to do things right and to do right things are always honoured, just as we’re forgiven for making missteps along the way.

We’ve learned a lot about life, people, ministry, God, and ourselves in the past 7-10 years, and it stands us in good stead as God grows us (or I should say, me) up.

Are you really a “people pleaser”?

Chances are when you’ve read this you’ll realise that you’ve been gaslighting yourself all these years.  You may realise that you aren’t the “people pleaser” that you thought you were.  I can tell you that so many of you aren’t, and this is why:

There are certain social situations, including family situations, working situations, and church situations, where we encounter the narcissist, the control freak, the manipulator, the deflector, the intimidator, the person bent on having their way.  So many of our relationships are twisted in the shape of control, one insisting on control over the other.

~

The truth is we should all be applauded for wanting to please people, for desiring to love others, and we should not be punished for wanting the best for others as if it’s a weakness.  Being generous-hearted is a virtue not a vice.  Desiring to give what we can is a biblical trait, and it ought to be acknowledged as such.  This is a praiseworthy quality.

~

Let’s dig into the heart of what I’m trying to clarify here.

Imagine you’re in a situation where a person requires from you something that you either can’t give or should not give, but they insist upon it anyway, as manipulators constantly do.  They may be underhanded or even overt.

They know your good heart, and they have decided to exploit it.  They’re entitled, and that compels them.  They seek to master you, to turn your strength into a weakness.  And they are determined to have their way, because it’s an intriguing game to many of them.  They don’t care about what it costs you, and in fact some are even delighted when it costs you because they get some sick satisfaction out of it.

The manipulative person gets what they want because you have been coerced and controlled, and you have responded through fawning, which is simply to pacify an impossible situation—because it’s all you could do.  Remember, good people don’t require this of anybody, any time.

The manipulative person gets what they want, meaning they take advantage of your goodness.  This very manipulation is the commencement of a chain reaction of levels of gaslighting.

Firstly, in knowing you’ve been “had,” you gaslight yourself, saying, “I shouldn’t be such a people pleaser.”  In other words, you let them off the hook, because THEY are the ones responsible for initiating the manipulation, not you.  It’s never good to be manipulated, but you didn’t start it.  You were forced to respond at a moment’s notice to something you could not have foreseen.  No wonder you “fawned.”

Of course, there is the opportunity to employ boundaries, and the wise empath does this, but these behaviours need to be learned, and courage is a necessity, but besides, it requires shrewd discernment to anticipate the twisted ways of a manipulator.

Secondly, there are onlookers who aren’t witnesses to the manipulation, or they cannot see it (which is common), and they see it as your fault.  In other words, they have preferred to engage in gaslighting you, intentionally or unintentionally, rather than keep the manipulator accountable.

Whichever way we look at it, it’s always the victim who gets punished and gaslit, and the one who did the manipulation in the first place tends to get away with it.

Have you ever noticed that giving to people who are not manipulative is always a blessing, and reciprocation is the order of the day.  Have you noticed how much trust abounds when we give to others who truly appreciate the gift and recognise the goodness behind it.  Have you also noticed those who have served you, who did so without needing to be manipulated by yourself, who served you by choice.  These are the relationships to nurture, because as one safe person relates with another much blessing is enjoyed.  There’s not a threat in sight!

It's nothing like this in situations where “people pleasing” comes into effect.

~

It’s too much of a cliché that nice people are people pleasers.  We have made the good people bad, just as we have allowed the bad people to get away with murdering the reputations of the good by their malevolent actions.

So I do contend, are you really a “people pleaser”?  Are you really that “weak” that you are a doormat to even the good people in your life?  (Truth is, good people would not allow you to be manipulated.)  Or is it the case that you want the best for others, and you have sufficient humility to serve others and to sacrifice for them, which when I last looked was a virtue, not a vice?

I really want you to reflect on this, because so-called “good people” have been enabling and empowering the wrong people, and I’m sure we have all joined in.

It’s time to discern the motives in others who would coerce and control us to the degree that we would fawn and give them their way.  Others, who we could define as good people, would be mortified if ever they reflected on their behaviour and were able to see that they’ve manipulated anyone—this is where repentance sorts good people from manipulators.  Repentance is beautiful, forgiveness-worthy justice in action.

You might be justifiably angry having read this, because it never feels good to be gaslit, and especially when we have been forced to gaslight ourselves.

If you recognise that you’re fawning behaviour is due to the manipulation and control of others, join the club of those who are forced to behave in ways they would prefer not to be—that’s most of us.  So you’re not as “weak” as you or others suggest.  And now enrol in the club that employs boundaries so wicked manipulators are not fawned to.

We ought to all be on our guard for all kinds of manipulations, and to refuse point-blank to fawn at our own and others’ expense just so a manipulative party can have their way.

The truth is, we are all capable of manipulating people, but it is blessed to be manipulated rather than be the manipulator which is a curse that must be appropriately repented of.

How I encountered radical love for God and neighbour

Where’s this radical love from that Jesus commands us to nurture?  Just how do we love God with all our heart, soul, and mind, and our neighbour as ourselves?  I mean, really.

Let me answer this from my own experience.  There are two versions of me, even though a lot of me has always been the same.  The before version of me was pre-September 2003, pre-36.  The after version of me has been ever since, the last 19-years.

The former version of me didn’t know how to love because I was never in the position to receive love, even though I was loved.  I had never truly received God’s love.  Don’t get me wrong, God has always loved me, just as he has always loved you, but I couldn’t receive his love.

The latter version of me knows how to love because I have finally received the love that God had always purposed for me to receive.  The worst thing that could’ve happened to me—the failure and loss of my first marriage—was the catalyst.  Because it forced me into prolonged brokenness where I had to rely on a strength outside of myself.

In losing just about everything overnight, apart from the retention of the love of my three daughters and of my parents, a doorway was opened to me because of the brokenness I fell into.  That doorway was genuine Christian spirituality offered up initially through the rooms of AA, then later by the local Baptist assembly in Mandurah, Western Australia.

I entered an absolute paradox.  The more I gave away of my material being, my material possessions, and all worldly hopes, the more I gained spiritually.  It worked like a miracle every time.  The more I lost myself, the more I gained the real me.

Because I had lost everything else, suddenly I was in a position of desperation reaching out for God’s help.  Only then did I discover what I could’ve discovered 13 years earlier when I first became a Christian.  But of course the earlier version of myself was not ready to BE the latter version.  I needed to experience that 13-years of failing as a Christian, because it proved to me comprehensively that EFFORT counts for nothing in faith.

The former version of myself hid away in a closeted life, struggling all those years to live as “the Christian” I said I was.  I knew I was a hypocrite in key areas of my life, but I had no power to reverse the habitual trends that had formed my material life.  I was stuck in a rut.

The former version of myself didn’t know how to surrender and in this former version of myself I was uncomfortable in any sort of weakness.  I had limited love to give because I could receive such little love.  I had no idea that embracing weakness was central to faith.

To ground this further, I need to get really specific.  The former version of myself didn’t know how to control my anger.  My responses in family situations were occasionally, and at times often, over the top.  I’d then quickly regret my overreactions and be racked with guilt.  I was ashamed of my lack of self-control.  I drank too much.  I was a hypocrite in other ways.  I wasn’t the person I wanted to be.  I wasn’t the person I felt I needed to be.  I felt like a fraud in my own life.

Then one day when the worst thing happened, suddenly the impetus had arrived to turn 180 degrees and, for the first time of my life, truly FIND God.  And because it was the first time in my whole life that I had desperately WANTED God more than anything else, God gave me his love, and a light switched on, and the love of God which had become mine gave me the confidence to love others with the love God had given me; a very real sense of love for myself, out of which confidence comes.  Suddenly, sacrificing for others was easy, and indeed it was a no brainer, it was all I wanted.  It became the only thing I could do.

What I’d tried and failed to do in my own strength 
was now ridiculously easy in HIS.

The love of God that had come into me had caused me to want to passionately share it.  I wanted everyone to experience what I had experienced, because there is no drug on earth, no higher high beneath the heavens, than the love of God.  When suddenly the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts, everything makes sense, and you know that LOVE is the only thing that makes that sense real.

A radical love for God and neighbour starts with the love of God in our hearts, to know how muchhe loves us, to experience the perfection in this love, and to know that there is no sense in turning back, to know that the power comes from giving away to receive.

Suddenly from this vantage point there is no question that you want your neighbour loved as yourself, because you yourself know how MUCH you are loved of God.

When you know how loved you really are, you suddenly recognise that everybody else is loved just the same.  When you realise this, all the brakes are taken off, and your love knows no bounds.  All of life clicks into place.  It doesn’t mean you no longer experience pain, but with the love of God you accept a whole lot easier that which cannot be changed.

This is the genuine Christian life, and unless we are living this, we ought to wonder what’s wrong.  There is no other way we should want to live, because the supremacy of the love of God is beyond anything else we can experience in this life.

I don’t care how much you own, how rich or talented you are, what your prospects are, how admired you are, or what you’ve done or where you’ve been.  None of this really matters, and the only time you really understand is when you understand the concept of God’s love—for YOU.  This one principle puts everything else into its proper perspective.

The concept I am discussing is the secret to life that so many of us chase in myriad other whirlwinds of sensationalism that ultimately produce the same thing: a dull prolonged despair of pretending we’ve got our lives together with a seething frustration that we haven’t.

This secret to life is the contentment that has been nestling in our hearts since before we were born.  And all through life we have searched for this way of peace only to stumble and fall every time, because we thought we could buy it with time, attention, or money.

The only way we can possess this secret to life—the receipt of the love of God—is by giving up what we cannot keep to gain what we can’t lose.  It’s really as simple as that, and when we understand this, it solves our anxiety problems, because we stop worrying about everything we cannot control.

To love how only God could empower me to love, I had to receive God’s love, which meant I had to love me.  Only when I could love myself could I love my neighbour with a “love neighbour as myself” kind of love.

IMAGE — of the little New Testament Bible I received in 1990 from the pastor who helped bring me to faith.  He is still a mentor today after we reconnected when I became a pastor in 2013.

With acknowledgement to my friend, Tim, who got me thinking.

A marker of spiritual progress for empaths

“Do not try to avoid upsetting people:
just make sure that you are upsetting the right ones.”
—Dr Henry Cloud

When I first read this quote, it jarred.  But it got my attention.  I wondered whether it was overreaching to begin with: surely we don’t want to be encouraging people to upset others?

But when you think about it, just about every empathic person cannot help but protect others so often to their own detriment.  We call it “people pleasing” or “fawning”.  It can be hard for an empath to stand their ground when others are getting upset.  They would rather “keep the peace.”

Empaths feel more than others do; they feel more of their own emotion than non-empaths do, and they discern others’ emotions, which can be both a gift and a burden.

When I dug a bit deeper into the Henry Cloud post, these extra words help contextualise the initial meme:

“If you are successful in life, you are guaranteed to upset some people in your life.  If the loving, kind, responsible, honest people in your life are upset with you, you should take a hard look at your choices.  But if the controlling, unstable, irresponsible, or manipulative people are upset, then it could very well be a sign you're moving in the right direction.”
—Dr Henry Cloud

We don’t want to upset people.  That’s understood.  But there are times in life when it’s only when we’re doing the right thing that we definitely will upset certain people.

That’s what these quotes are getting at.

When it’s a situation when we must acquiesce to another person’s demands, we’re actually not doing the right thing by complying.  We’re rewarding their bad behaviour with our compliance.  They will learn nothing about how to maintain a relationship, or the value of respecting boundaries and social norms, if we keep doing that.

Indeed, as it was pointed out to me recently, our “sin” in a particular conflict situation if we were abused is to accept their responsibility—to own some or the whole of their contribution.  Now you may think that unfair.  But what it’s really saying is we all have a role to love others, and sometimes people need the love of the truth that is just left there, with them, and it is their choice to reflect or not.

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN “PEACEKEEPING” AND “PEACEMAKING”

There’s a sharp divergence between the two concepts “peacekeeping” and “peacemaking.”  The divergence occurs in the first word, peace.  Peace is not attained by “keeping” it when it’s not actually there.  If we think we’re keeping the peace by avoiding conflict, we’re deluded.

The difference between peacekeeping and peacemaking, in an individual relationship context, so we’re not talking about international and global missions here, is peacekeeping is the avoidance and mitigation of conflict, but peacemaking is about confronting and resolving conflict.  Peacekeeping is a holding pattern.  It’s about keeping a status quo.  Peacemaking on the other hand is about reconciliation and the restoration of relationships wherever possible.

Peacekeeping is essentially about poise, whereas peacemaking is essentially about courage.

The Henry Cloud quote at top is jarring to empaths because they don’t want to upset anyone.  And that’s a wonderful God-blessed heart to possess.  It truly is.  And that heart is definitely blessed when that love is reciprocated.

The Henry Cloud quote is also jarring to those who would exploit people, but they’re less likely to be bothered about it.  And of course, it jars with our sensibility around loving people.

But we cannot truly love people when our love is devoid of the truth.

But we cannot also truly love people if we turn on them, either.

These two above are to be held in tension in the Christian faith, truth and love, and we do not love people against the truth.  Love doesn’t work that way.

It’s important to recognise that some people getting upset, under certain circumstances, isn’t always a bad thing.  Especially when it’s about us standing responsible ground and not being coerced into doing things we shouldn’t.  These are our responsibilities under love.

There’s nothing wrong with being a genuine nice guy

Notice what I did with the title compared with the last article?  That’s right, I took out the quotation marks, vis-à-vis, “nice guy.”

The real issue is there’s nothing wrong with being a genuine nice guy, but there is a stack wrong with pretending to be one, curating the image of being one, all the while being the opposite.  The world needs more nice guys, and of course I’m being gender inclusive.

So let’s turn this toward the good for a moment:

Honesty – the nice guy has no other motive than honesty.  There is no cavorting with machinations.  The straight way is the best way.  Virtuous people know it in their heart that dishonesty not only betrays people and situations, but it also complicates things, and why on earth would you do it if you have nothing to gain?  Genuine nice guys have no interest in gaining anything that isn’t already theirs or theirs to access.  And their honesty is a priceless gift first and foremost to themselves, then to others.  The cost of dishonesty is vast as far as soul-scourging is concerned.

Control – any desire for control is an attitude of a heart that comes out of insecurity.  Why would a genuine nice guy seek to control anything or anyone?  Seeking to control anyone or anything complicates our lives, and a genuine nice guy knows this.  Like with honesty, why would anyone do this?  It makes no sense, unless you’re trying to get something that isn’t yours.  Genuine nice guys have no desire to have what isn’t theirs.  They know what it feels like when others have endeavoured to control them, and they’d be mortified if anyone felt they controlled by them.

Manipulation – again, it’s more of the same.  What motive is there for manipulation when you are content with what you have?  It’s the antithesis of integrity, and when a person has tasted the blessings of integrous living, they don’t turn back and putrefy an oasis.  What is beautiful ought to never be sullied.  Indeed, any genuine nice guy would call such a thing madness.  Not only is there no need of manipulation, there’s an aversion away from that which is detestable.

Secrecy – like honesty, secrecy is dishonesty, and not only does the genuine nice guy know that secrecy will be found out, just as dishonesty will, they still have no reason to be secretive.  It is far easier to be honest because there is no effort in backtracking over what has been said and done.  Nobody who is disingenuous is smart enough to remember all their secrets.  For those given to secrecy, it is only a matter of time before the manipulation is revealed.  The genuine nice guy knows this, and respects it, and it is part of their discipline.  Nobody gets away with falsity.  And that’s how it should be.  And this just adds to the genuine nice guy’s contentedness.  Such contentedness is borne out of acceptance that the honest and transparent life is the best life.

Passive Aggression – for the genuine nice guy, there is no need of aggression, whether passive or overt.  They know that passive aggression is a slap in the face for those they relate with.  Why would anyone intentionally upset another person?  Or allow that person to remain upset once they found out about it?  Surely, they know that sense of hostility will boomerang.  The difference with the genuine nice guy is there any sense of passive aggression must be accounted for and repented of, because in exercising harm, the genuine nice guy FEELS the harm in the other for the harm they cause.  This is how empathy protects us from hurting others.

It is far easier living as a genuine nice guy than it is trying to present that persona.  Presenting personas is fraught with failure because nobody can put on a show in a sustainable way.  We can only be who we are—at heart.  Sooner or later, the real you and me comes out.

There’s nothing wrong with being a genuine nice guy, and indeed I’d argue that it’s the only way any of us should live.  There is an integrity and a congruence between the values we hold and how we live.

Humble, empathetic people are not dishonest, they do not control people, manipulation is beyond them, they don’t keep secrets that would hurt others, and they’re not typically passively aggressive.

The nasty side of the “nice guy”

We’ve all encountered this sort of guy, and some of us have even tried it on, but the nice, endearing, funny and charismatic external persona hides an insidious, dark side, that is full of secrecy, passive aggression, manipulation, dishonesty, and control.  Inevitably all this is from a base of insecurity borne out in shame.

This is why it seems too good to be true to be in a relationship with someone who is so warm and winsome, and yet give the relationship a few months or a year or two and they “become” completely different.  The warmth and winsomeness were a façade.  Their back of stage comes to the prominent fore sooner or later.  Their disingenuous nature begins to reveal itself.

The hallmarks of the beginning that starts off so well is the propensity to please people, to offer excessive apologies, and to make unreasonable concessions, and when you think about it such concessions are not sustainable in the longer term.

The insecurity that prompted the behaviours of concession springs from a sense of dishonesty with oneself and with others.  It springs from the need to control one’s environment, to procure an image.  Of a sense, it’s manipulation, to procure a reputation that isn’t truly theirs. And when a person’s truth starts to be borne out in their behaviour, the passive aggression and anger is easily seen.

The nasty side of the nice guy comes out in due course, once all those earlier red flags are revealed in the full course of time.  The nastiest side of the nice guy is their unwillingness to party with the truth.  The more a person pretends they can get away with a lie, the more they delude themselves and punish others with their reprehensible behaviour.

The nice guy isn’t beyond repair, and if only a person who struggles with these propensities will be honest, they can recover.  It is just as easy for a nice guy to discipline himself to be honest and to embark on a journey to that end.  But he will need help, either from an accountability partner or a counsellor.  He will need to be open to the truth others observe.

The cause of all this is anxious attachment, where a person, a man in this case, has insecurities around who he is.  His identity is fused to others, and situational factors, because there is no solid sense of self.  A solid sense of self is possible to develop, however, if a person wants it.

These are the steps a “nice guy” needs to take:

Honesty – this man needs to be honest at every point and juncture of his life, especially regarding the things that he thinks, says, and does.  He must become ruthlessly accountable.  Then he will see the upside.

Control – any sense of control that a man takes must be repented of.  This is because control is the very behaviour that comes out of insecurity.  Why would anyone seek to control anything or anyone?  Such motives can only be borne out of lack, out of insecurity.  Therefore, control is a sign that insecurity is operant.  The person who has no need of control shows they’re not insecure.

Manipulation – if a man isn’t honest and cannot see his manipulation, the person he’s manipulating will soon tell him if they’re allowed to be honest.  Men need to learn to listen, and to take heed of what they’ve been told, because all this is great intelligence, and I do mean “intelligence” in the way of critical information about themselves they can’t prosper without.

Secrecy – like with the foregoing, a person safe in their own skin doesn’t need to manipulate anything, and they don’t need to either keep secrets or act in secrecy.  Rigorous honesty is what must be pursued.

Passive Aggression – when control won’t work anymore, and manipulation is seen for what it is, anger is the result, but passive aggression is the stubborn will that still refuses to give up control.  All passive aggression needs to be given up – surrendered – and placed before the foot of the cross.

Each of us at every moment stands at a precipice.  We can grow if we want to grow.  It must come from within.  Help is possible and recovery is a possibility, but we will get nowhere until we’re centrally involved in embarking on such a journey.

What Mum’s faith taught me and teaches me today

I can’t recall the moment or even the time that Mum professed to love Jesus, all I know is she always received my faith with mirrored enthusiasm, loved it when we prayed together, and she loved reading her Bible.

A little over three years ago, I wrote a Bible Reading Plan for Mum, and she followed it, reading the Bible from cover to cover before she died in August.  In her Bible, there are two bookmarks, two passages marked, part of David’s Song of Praise in 2 Samuel 22, and later, Psalm 23 is marked (this was a passage I recited at the end of many of our phone calls in Mum’s last two years of life).  Mum dutifully listed all the passages she read.

Interestingly, she has a sticky note stuck under “David’s Last Words,” and the Footprints bookmark in the page-spread shown was given to her by Kathryn, one of her daughters-in-law.  Mum has a son, my brother, named David.  Family was everything to Mum.  For Mum family was how she showed her faith.  First, if you were family, you knew unconditional love from her (and Dad).  Mum and Dad’s marriage shined with unconditional love.  But second, if you were in Mum’s orbit, like if she knew you and you knew her, you were family.  She loved everyone.  No matter how people treated Mum, she always had an attitude of grace toward each person.  I’m so glad of her example; it often forces me to reflect and repent when I’m not as gracious as Mum was.

Occasionally Mum would disagree with how I expressed my faith, especially when I was a zealot and it looked like the church was getting the lion’s share of my focus and my family was missing out, which is fair enough.  As I reflected, I would be thankful that she would have the love for me and my family to call my attention to my folly.  The good thing was she always spoke up and we would always talk about it.  What Mum taught me during these discussions is what to value, what had value (family), and the value of speaking your heart and mind.  Love is the courage to speak the truth kindly.  Mum lived this way faithfully every day of her life.

Mum had many health and medical challenges, but she was not afraid of death, even though she did not want to leave us when the palliative care team talked with us as a family in the hospital less than two days before she died.  Mum was always a positive presence, even when she was uncomfortable or in pain—and many were those days.  The way Mum lived, resilient and always for others, is such an example to me of how to live by faith, not by sight.  How to trust God for the strength you don’t presently have.  And that’s the case for so many of us, whether it’s physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual, or a combination.

Living by faith is about choosing joy, remaining as hopeful as possible, living at peace with everyone, notwithstanding the distractions of conflict, pain, anxiety, fear, or sadness that we bear. Mum had a lot to be thankful for, but she also bore conflict, pain, anxiety, fear, or sadness very well.  This is because she lived honestly and cherished honesty in those relationships she had that could bear the truth.  But to be honest, her commitment to honesty meant some relational pain was inevitable.  Mum had the courage of her convictions, however, and that too is an example.

Mum was a listener.  She loved to chat and to share her heart, but she always sought to understand what was really happening.  She could read people empathetically.  She would give each person the time they needed.  There were no limits to Mum’s love or the amount of intimacy she could give.  Mum could be trusted with anyone’s cares because she never exploited anyone.  She was my chief example.  Not mentors, supervisors, more experienced pastors, and counsellors.  It was Mum’s character that spoke most loudly—for joy and kindness.  And Dad (though not a professing Christian) is my chief example of gentleness, patience, and humility.  The fruit of the Spirit exemplified most in my parents.

For some of these reasons, losing Mum leaves a real sting.  I know there are others in the family who really feel her loss so keenly, and time, as it meanders on, doesn’t bring the relief it can seem to promise.  Yet, as a family we’re so thankful for the woman Mum was.

Mum, thank you for being a wonderful teacher your whole life.  Thank you that you were humble enough to be open to exploring faith in Jesus.  But most of all, thank you for the practical example you were of how to live by faith—which principally is a life of love.

The hardest thing to do that cannot be avoided

I wonder if you’ve ever thought about what the hardest thing in life is to do. I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. And I think the hardest thing to do, particularly in a continual sense, is to do the right thing.

Think about it for a moment.  Not only does doing the right thing rely on a good heart and good intentions (motivation)—and we must admit we don’t always have the best intentions or heart on matters—but it also requires great discernment, because we don’t always know what the right thing is to do.  And a third matter is having the courage to do the right thing, which involves a balance of honouring the truth, but doing the truth in love, that is with grace, gentleness, patience, and kindness.

Let us tackle these three matters, the right heart, the right discernment, the right courage, in turn:

1. THE RIGHT HEART

The right heart, in other words, the right intentions, relies on humility enough to acknowledge our unconscious biases.  Paradoxically, it is knowing that our heart can be deceptive that puts us in a more powerful position of awareness, and if only we can be honest, we can assess the state of our own hearts in terms of what is right and wrong.

The only problem we have is we can control only our own motives, for we have little or no control over others’ motives, and whether they choose to become aware of them or not.

2. DISCERNMENT BETWEEN RIGHT & WRONG PATHS

Discernment in this day, or in any day for that matter, with the nuances involved in many “wicked problems,” involves incredible wisdom.  This kind of discernment is only available to us when we have sorted our hearts out—that first step.  And still not everybody has this kind of discernment, to be able to detect the complexity of their motives, then to understand the complexity of others’ motives, then to correctly assess the nuances of the situation.  Discernment seems the most valuable of spiritual gifts when it comes to doing what is right.

3. COURAGE TO DO RIGHT

And if being honest about our intentions and motives, and discerning the way, weren’t hard enough, now we come to the third step which involves courage to do what is right.

I say courage because invariably and inevitably doing what is right will be hard, it will be costly, it will create conflict, and it will bring stress.

It can feel as if in doing the right thing we’re doing the wrong thing.  There are many, many situations where the majority will turn on us for doing the right thing.  Perhaps this is the case most of the time when the stakes and emotions are high—when there are many different views.  Courage can be a lonely place.  Recall Jesus teaching in John chapter 6, and many “disciples” leaving after he delivered what is termed a “hard teaching.”  (Verse 60)

~

Truth is often hard.  It can’t be avoided.  When we do avoid it, things go awry.  But when the truth outweighs love all sorts of abuses are possible.

Doing what is right always involves a good mix of truth and love in appropriate portions.

Doing what is right always involves a good mix of humility and courage which is wisdom.

Doing what is right is the key to life itself.

BUT.  Doing what is right is the hardest thing in life to do.

Making an honest assessment for now and future

Our entire lives are lived as a series of seasons, and as one season gives way to the next, it is healthy to reflect on what we’ve been through.  Every November I sense the end of the year approaching, and I begin my mental winding down process.  This is my season for strategic withdrawal.

It’s a season of taking account, a mental, emotional, and spiritual stocktake.

Personally, I reflect on a career in the fire and emergency services, part time pastoral ministry, and being available as a part-time Christian counsellor for those who wish to utilise me — I don’t advertise and don’t need the work.  I am also involved as a core team member in the Christian men’s ministry, Momentum Australia.  Family are the priority beyond what I otherwise need to do.

I want to share with you some tips that are running through my mind at present, but first I want to share with you that it is losing Mum in August together with being saved in the car accident I was involved in earlier this month that impels me even more than ever to live the purpose of my life.

A sense of gratitude has filled me since escaping injury on October 17.  And a sense of purpose to make the most of every day fills me since Mum died on August 27.

These are the things I want to leave with you as I invite you on a moment’s reflection:

1.             I wonder if you’ve had a “lifetime critical incident” (LCI) this year like I have?  Most people only endure a few of these during a whole lifetime, but the power of these incidents that we survive is they challenge our purpose and philosophy for life.  Gratitude for life is what we need.

2.             In reflecting, there is a danger that we will stop there.  Instead of stopping there, reflection needs to be a momentary activity, perhaps a season, but with the full intent of moving on into the next season of action.

3.             In reflecting, we give our body, mind, and soul time to recover, time to allow our cortisol levels to stabilise, time to take stock and re-prioritise.  If we never slow down, if we never take time to reflect, we risk burning ourselves out.

4.             We must ward against trauma, vicarious trauma, and even moral injury that would compromise us mentally, emotionally, and spiritually.  But if we are exposed to trauma, vicarious trauma, or moral injury it is good to, as Marcus Aurelius put it, “Get active in our own rescue.”

5.             If we are to define resilience as a “better than expected outcome given the adversity faced,” perhaps we can look at the hardships we have faced, appraise these appreciatively, and give ourselves encouragement for how we faced our adversities.  Is there an opportunity to take stock of the good feedback received instead of just dismissing it as “anyone would have done that”?

6.             In fire and emergency services work, we often talk about “situational awareness” or “meta-awareness,” which is synonymous for engaging all the senses in the presentness of being, especially in the presence of hazards or danger.  In this, we’re prepared for, even anticipating what may come.  As we reflect, what of our recent past informs the unknown immediate future?  How can we enjoy more presentness of being?

7.             How stressful has this year been for you thus far?  If it’s been more stressful than you’ve liked, more overwhelming, or more chronically taxing, there’s the opportunity to plan for change.  Living with chronic stress means abnormally elevated cortisol levels in the brain, and unless there are protective strategies employed, it’s not good for our health longer term.  Those protective strategies are sleep, rest, exercise, good diet — at the very least.

8.             Finally, now, as the end of the year approaches, we have the opportunity to assess if our lives are on track.  What are we grateful for?  What changes do we need to put in place to live according to the purpose we feel is on our lives?

Taking a few moments out, spending a bit of time in nature, getting into a state of flow, where we have an essential symbiosis with ourselves.  All this is good when done periodically, to take control of our lives, assess how we are going, as input to change.

Feeling like we can influence change in terms of what occurs in our own lives is an important step that only comes from sufficient reflection.

It is good to take those moments, seize them, and be honest about what we think and how we feel.

Any of us, at any time, can make the opportunity to reflect on how to live the life we want or need to live.  It’s our life.