Engage

In the wake of two celebrity suicides last week (designer Kate Spade and foodie Anthony Bourdain), the topic of suicide is back in the limelight. I wrote this post in April 2013. 

Over the weekend, Rick Warren (pastor of Saddleback Church in California, author of The Purpose Driven Life) and his wife Kay revealed that their son Matthew had taken his life after a lifelong struggle with mental illness. In an email to his church, Pastor Warren wrote, "[O]nly those closest knew that he struggled from birth with mental illness, dark holes of depression, and even suicidal thoughts. In spite of America's best doctors, meds, counselors, and prayers for healing, the torture of mental illness never subsided."

Every morning when you approach the mirror to get ready, do you long to be more beautiful? Do you wish that you could simply put on one thing, or do just one thing, that would present you to the world looking just the way you would like to look? 

You can do that! Each and every day, you can adorn yourself with godliness.

The exit ramp for souls starved by activism is slowing. Slowing? How will I get anywhere if I do that? How will THE LIST get completed if I don’t work as quickly as I can?

My high-energy, multitasking, activist self used to driving in the fast lane pushes back…slow down? My soul responds, “I’m dying in here…I need some rest; I need some space; I need to be replenished - if you don’t slow down, your list may never get completed.”

I end up there, but usually after some procrastination. It’s that section just beyond the get-well-soon’s and wishing-you-the-best’s. It’s the spot where all the cards are covered with polka dot ties or daddies and daughters holding hands. I sift through my options, but none of the words apply. Nothing religious or humorous or from all of us. I stare at a blank inside, its starkness reflecting my mood. Father’s Day is difficult for the fatherless. But, what Hallmark doesn’t say is God will make a way.

My daughter-in-love recently sent me a video of my son introducing their new Golden Retriever puppy to a swimming pool in which he coaxes little Judah, "Don't be scared! Bohlins don't get scared!"

. . . While I've been working on this blog post about being scared. Well yeah, sometimes we do.

For four years I've been living with the pain of severe arthritis and the late effects of polio (muscle weakness, pain, and fatigue). In a few weeks, Lord willing, I will have hip replacement surgery. When my husband had his hip replaced, he was in excellent physical condition and his experience was as close to perfect as you can get.

Are you familiar with the toys called “Transformers?” Each one starts out looking like one thing, then various parts move so the whole thing becomes something totally different. Some parts stay the same; others change to take on the appearance of something with a different purpose—a powerful robot. But, it’s not rightly named. The toy gets transformed by me—not itself. It should be called “transformable.” This toy makes a good visual of how, in real life, I am not a transformer either, but one who is transformable in the hands of the living Christ and His transforming power. And, while this toy won’t resist me because it has no will of its own, we can resist our transformer out of fear of the unfamiliar, because of stubbornness—not being convinced that we need transforming, or out of ignorance—not knowing it’s available to us. So, how do we cooperate with our transformer? By faith, like everything else in our Christian life, we can Dare to Be Different—knowing it’s for our own good. To dare means to “have the courage to do something.” The Holy Spirit (through Paul) tells us how we can be transformable in Romans 12:1-2.

For more than a decade, I’ve taught a course on gender in the church. And especially since #MeToo and #ChurchToo combined with Christian leaders saying women have to endure abuse to be biblical and also that women shouldn't teach in seminaries, I’m seeing a shift in attitudes. Some of the more moderate folks are saying, "Stop already. That misrepresents us." I'm hearing pastors get up and say, "I was wrong" in slut-shaming Bathsheba. I've been told by radio hosts, "If I had talked with you a year ago about this, I would not have heard you, but now. . . ." Something has changed. I've been inundated by requests from churches and parachurch organizations wanting guidance on how to revisit the very nature of womanhood along with its ramifications for women's public ministry. . . especially those verses in the Bible about women’s silence.

In the wake of recent events in Christian sub-culture, I am grateful to have guest blogger Dani Ross share how wrong theology leads to destructive consequences. 

I’m not going to assume to know what exactly brings a man to find pleasure in the sight of a black-and-blue-faced woman whom he instructed to endure violence at the hands of her own husband.  

“I hope you’re happy,” she said to him.  And he responded, “Yes ma’am, I’m happy.”

Honestly, something breaks inside of me when I think on it too much. 

But maybe it’s not thinking about the reality of this toxic teaching that has brought us to where we are today. This type of counsel isn’t what is shocking; we all know he is not the only pastor to teach along these lines. He is certainly not the only one who teaches this warped view of Scripture. No, what is disturbing is it has been an acceptable response within Christian sub-culture.

The headline I just read says, “Sinkholes leave Florida neighborhood looking like cratered wasteland.” Apparently, residents of a Central Florida neighborhood are stuck in a nightmare after a dozen sinkholes opened, forcing the evacuation of a bunch of homes. Residents said the holes burst open as water started exploding into what looked like a geyser shooting out of a now-empty pond. Central Florida is sinkhole alley with porous limestone resembling Swiss cheese close to the surface. The holes in the limestone existed long before the neighborhood was built. Apparently, no one called in geologists to extensively examine the underlying soil and rock before all those houses were constructed. What strikes me is that Florida sinkholes are notorious yet people bought those houses and moved in any way, probably expecting the solidness of the housing construction to keep them safe. One resident said that he’s hoping they (city engineers) fix it so he doesn’t have to “worry about those sinkholes happening anymore.” It’s limestone! Limestone dissolves. Porous limestone dissolves faster. I learned this in geology classes in college. Those expectations of a permanent fix need to be released, or the residents will be continually disappointed.