Isaiah, Merton, Rob

When we lived in Kobe (Japan), our pastor frequently spoke on the theme of the way we live our lives. A big problem we have, he said, is something he called “My Way.” I was reminded of this recently when he posted a photo of a printed prayer, with the caption “If you pray this sincerely from your heart, you will be given eternal life!” (roughly translated).

I expect that Pastor Rob composed that prayer, which reads in part: “I've gotten so tired of doing things my own way” (roughly translated. Actually all my translations are rough, so this is the last time I'll say that). The prayer goes on to describe an earnest desire to live God's way from now on.

I'll include the entire prayer below, but this contrast between “My Way” vs. “God's way” reminds me of another prophet—the Old Testament prophet Isaiah actually. One of Isaiah's famous quotes is from chapter 53, which you may have heard in Handel's Messiah:

All we like sheep have gone astray.
We have turned every one to his own way.
And the Lord hath laid on Him
the iniquity of us all.

Isaiah 53:6 (AV)

Isaiah writes about our ways vs. his ways a fair amount in these chapters. In chapter 55, for example, we read

Let the wicked forsake his way
    and the evil man his thoughts.
Let him turn to the Lord, and he will have marcy on him,
    and to our God, for he will surely pardon.
“For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
    neither are your ways my ways“
                        declares the Lord.

Isaiah 55:6–8 (NIV 1984)

And what does that look like, to go my own way? Thomas Merton, a 20th century Trappist monk, writes very insightfully that

…I do not find in myself the power to be happy merely by doing what I like. On the contrary, if I do nothing except what pleases my own fancy I will be miserable almost all the time.

No Man Is an Island 3.1 (p. 25)

The prudence of the flesh is opposed to the will of God. The works of the flesh will bury us in hell. If we know and love and act only according to the flesh, that is to say, according to the impulses of our own nature, the things we do will rapidly corrupt and destroy our whole spiritual being.

op. cit., 8.3 (p. 134)

According to Merton, the antidote to “My Way” isn't necessarily to join the military or monastery, where we're no longer free to act as we like. On the contrary, he writes that

…we must remember the importance and the dignity of our own freedom. A man who fears to settle his future by a good act of his own free choice does not understand the love of God. For our freedom is a gift God has given us in order that He may be able to love us more perfectly, and be loved by us more perfectly in return.

Love is perfect in proportion to its freedom. It is free in proportion to its purity. We act most freely when we act purely in response to the love of God. But the purest love of God is not servile, not blind, not limited by fear.

op. cit., 8.1–2 (pp. 132f)

So that's the thing: we act most freely by acting most purely in response to the love of God. This is a supernatural thing; it does not come naturally. Consequently, we need help.

Which brings me back to the prayer, which as I mentioned I believe is due to Pastor Rob.

天の神様
私にはあなたが必要です。
God of heaven: I need you
今へりくだって、あなたを呼び求めます。
Humbly now I call on you.
もう、自分のやり方でやって行く事に
疲れてしまいました。
I've totally gotten so tired of going my own way.
あなたのやり方で生きて行けるように助けてください。
Please help me to live life your way going forward.
私は、今、自分の人生の扉をあなたに向けて開きます。
I now open the door of my life to you.
あなたが私の主となり、救い主となってください。
Please be my Lord and Savior.
私の心にぽっかり空いた穴を聖霊で満たし、
私を完全な者にしてください。
Please send the Holy Spirit to fill the hole that opened up in my heart, and make me a perfect person.
主よ、私があなたを信頼できますように、
私があなたを愛せますように、
私があなたのために生きていけますように、
どうか私を助けてください。
Lord, please help me somehow—to be able to trust you, to make me love you, to live my life for you.
あなたの恵みと憐れみ、平安を私が理解できますよう、
私を助けてください。
Please help me to understand your grace and compassion and peace.
主よ、感謝します。 アーメン
Thank you Lord. Amen.

Thanks to my friend Shuji for checking my transcription, and for his suggestions on my translation. All remaining errors are mine.

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Update Monday morning, May 22: It struck me that this prayer can be a response to Matthew 11:28–30, where Jesus says

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.

LG 34UM58-P, Debian Jessie, nVidia NVC0

Short version: I run this script after logging in (runlevel 5):

#!/bin/sh
# Extract from Xorg.0.log when monitor was connected via DVI/HDMI cable
# (II) NOUVEAU(0): Manufacturer: GSM  Model: 59f1  Serial#: 105956
# (II) NOUVEAU(0): Modeline "2560x1080"x60.0  185.58  2560 2624 2688 2784  1080 1083 1093 1111 -hsync -vsync (66.7 kHz eP)

/usr/bin/xrandr --newmode  "2560x1080_60.0"  185.58  2560 2624 2688 2784  1080 1083 1093 1111 -hsync -vsync
/usr/bin/xrandr --addmode HDMI-1 2560x1080_60.0                            
/usr/bin/xrandr --output HDMI-1 --mode 2560x1080_60.0 

Details follow.

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Remember the bad old days of monitors on Linux? A new monitor meant trying to figure out the modeline, tweaking various configuration files, all the while hoping you didn't smoke your monitor?

It's been a long time since I've had to do anything like this, and so I was out of practice when my brand new LG monitor (2560x1080, 34" diagonal) didn't work "out of the box" with my computer.

I brought the monitor home from our neighborhood Costco, where I had been eyeing it for some time. Because of my temporal separation from the bad old days, I didn't even think of checking for compatibility until it didn't work. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

First thing, I got home and noticed oops, it only has HDMI inputs, no DVI (even I didn't think it might have (S)VGA). No problem; I have a DVI/HDMI cable. Which the quick start guide warns against using. Well, what was I going to do about that? So I connected it up, and after the initial screen, nothing. Fortunately, my old monitor had started working again by then so I could look at /var/log/Xorg.0.log and such.

Eventually I noticed this in the logfile:

[    18.396] (II) NOUVEAU(0): Initializing outputs ...
[    18.424] (II) NOUVEAU(0): Output DVI-I-1 has no monitor section
[    18.480] (II) NOUVEAU(0): Output DVI-I-2 has no monitor section
[    18.482] (II) NOUVEAU(0): Output HDMI-1 has no monitor section

What do you mean, "HDMI-1"? Well, there was a mini-HDMI socket in the video card. I hadn't noticed it before. Keeping in mind that LG warned of (in)compatibility issues when using a DVI/HDMI cable, I sought a miniHDMI/HDMI cable.

With that cable, things started working better, but still I was getting 1920x1080 resolution, which looks ugly. Also not so useful. And the monitor whined about it. After some web searches, I came up with the script you see at the top of this post; I run it after login and it works fine.

There is a way to make Xorg just come up in this mode, but I don't have the motivation to figure out what it is... Just call me slacker.

Whirlpool cooktop repair GJC3634RP03

We've had this cooktop since we re-did the kitchen in 2008. A few months back it developed a crack. Recently, the front right burner stopped working.

I ordered a replacement burner, and thought to install it last Saturday. I'd done this before (with a different burner) and was overconfident; I removed the cooktop from its recess in the countertop and, long story short, it experienced sudden deceleration upon impact. Instead of one crack I now had, well…

7:15 AM

Right. I didn't replace the burner last weekend, because I discovered why it was dead: stuff had literally fallen through the crack, which now was a hole, and interacted unfavorably with the burner element. More on this below.

Anyway, the first thing to do is turn off the power:

7:43 AM

After flipping the breaker off, I ensured there was no juice by turning on a burner and verifying that the power indicator didn't illuminate.

Next, I pulled the cooktop from its recess in the countertop. I opened the drawer (knob(s) visible in the picture below) and pushed up on it, then manhandled it out of the hole, placing a piece of scrap wood under it. You can see in the photo that the crack is especially pronounced.

7:47 AM

The glass top is held on with eight (8) "Phillips" head screws, three on the long sides and two on the short sides. The picture below shows two of the screws (well, one hole and one screw) on the rear edge of the cooktop:

7:52 AM

Fortunately, the glass isn't all that heavy. I lifted it off and set it aside. Here's what the range looks like without the top. Note the small dish in the foreground, where I stashed the screws.

7:53 AM

Here are the two damaged burners. "Wait," you may be thinking, "you only mentioned one bad burner!"

You're right; we hadn't noticed the rear burner was bad. Well, it wasn't all bad; you see, the rear burner is a sort of dual burner; you can heat up only the center part, or you can turn on the whole thing. It was the outer, torus-shaped part that was damaged. Details of the damage are shown later on.

7:55 AM

Then I removed the front burner. Notice that no fewer than four wires are connected to this thing! That's because it has a temperature sensor in addition to the heater. When the surface is hot, an indicator lights up to warn you.

Anyway, I took a photo so I could be sure to put the wires on the right place when installing the new burner:

7:55 AM

Once the wires are disconnected, the burner basically lifts out; it's held in place by these, umm, brackets?

Anyway, here's the old one.

7:57 AM

And here's the new one, which doesn't come with its own brackets; I moved the old brackets onto the new one.

Since I moved them one at a time, a photo wasn't strictly necessary (as I thought it was for the wires), but still:

7:58 AM

The next two photos give some detail of the damage to the burners. The damage to the front burner is extensive.

8:00 AM

Damage to the outer part of the rear burner isn't quite so bad, but methinks it's enough to make the outer burner not work:

8:00 AM

The wiring for the rear burner is a little more complicated than for the front burner:

8:01 AM

Undersides of both rear burners. Same deal: the "brackets" need to be moved from the old burner to the new.

8:04 AM

Here's a pic of the two new burners, installed.

8:10 AM

The new glass top is black, for two reasons: first, I could find one in stock at appliance parts pros (I think repairclinic.com also had one), whereas a white one would be back-ordered.

Second, as you might guess, the white glass top is very hard to keep clean-looking. Some stuff just doesn't come off. This one might not be any easier to keep clean, but it won't look as bad when it's not.

Here it is, before I screwed it on. Dad always told me to start all screws before fastening any, but I made an exception for the toughest-to-reach screw on the rear edge. From this picture, you can imagine how annoying it is; I only wanted to put the screwdriver in that position once. (I suppose I could have started the other 7 screws, and done that screw last, but I didn't think of that 'til now.)

8:12 AM

The new glass didn't come with the rubber grommets/washers/bushings/whatever for the control shafts. I transfered them from the old glass:

8:13 AM

It also didn't come with knobs. I could have bought new black knobs, but maybe the white-on-black look won't be so bad.

8:20 AM

Here it is, with knobs on and eased back into its recess in the counter. It doesn't look half bad, if I do say so myself:

8:22 AM

And now, turn the power back on:

8:23 AM

Beating Loneliness

From “John Cacioppo on How to Combat Loneliness” in the Atlantic weekly:

Khazan: Is there something lonely people should be doing proactively, like going to a book club or soup kitchen?

Cacioppo: Do volunteer service in something that you enjoy. I've developed the acronym EASE—ease your way back into social connections. The first E stands for “extend yourself,” but extend yourself safely. Do a little bit at a time. The A is “have an action plan.” Recognize that it’s hard for you. Most people don’t need to like you, and most people won't. So deal with that, it's not a judgment of you, there's lots of things going on. Ask [other people] about themselves, get them talking about their interests. The S is “seek collectives.” People like similar others, people who have similar interests, activities, values. That makes it easier to find a synergy. And finally when you do those things, “Expect” the best. The reason for that is to try to counteract this hyper-vigilance for social threat.

Or as Isaiah wrote: If you pour yourself out for the hungry and satisfy the desires of the afflicted, then shall your light rise in the darkness and your gloom be as the noonday. And the Lord will bless you continually and satisfy your desires with good things, and make your bones strong… (Isaiah 58)

Impressions - HIM 2017 conference Honolulu March 16

The lovely Carol went with me to the Hawaiian Islands Ministries 2017 conference. The conference started Thursday evening 3/16, which felt like drinking from a fire hose. I took a couple hours Friday morning to digest Thursday evening's notes...

Thursday's general session and the Jeff Vanderstelt "Gospel Fluency" session reinforced the centrality of the gospel in the life of the church, both for leaders/teachers/preachers but for every disciple.

So I've read Romans 1:16 (I'm not ashamed of the gospel, for it's the power of God...) and 1 Corinthians 2 (I was determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ crucified) and 1 Corinthians 15 (gospel that saves you... that Christ lived and died and was raised according to the Scriptures... OK, it's 1 Cor 15:1-5), but I think yesterday's sessions (particularly David Choi and Jeff Vanderstelt) gave me a clearer understanding of Paul's mindset than I'd had before. Or reminded me of it.

In other words, I was somewhat surprised that we'd need a conference focused on a concept so basic to the faith, but upon reflection it shouldn't be surprising at all, because the idea of mercy is one that repels the mind. It crucifies pride and vainglory, and this is hard for flesh and blood to bear (with apologies to E.M. Bounds, but the idea's the same).

A video from Thailand, "Giving is the best communication," illustrates the theme of mercy. Here's the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XADBJjiAO_0 That was shown Friday morning.

EXTREMELY long notes follow. You have been warned. Editorial comments shown like this

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Dan Chun: Today's youth see Christians as hypocritical, judgmental, anti-homosexual [etc.], unfortunately for good reason. Indeed, would Jesus say Mt 23:23 to us today? How much like Jesus are we in his outreach to the Gestapo of his day (the centurion), the Syrian refugees of his day (the Syro-Phoenician woman), the AIDS patients of his day (lepers), etc.?

"Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices--mint, dill and cummin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law--justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former.

-- Matthew 23:23, NIV [1984]

We must remember what we've forgotten: that we've been shown mercy and we must show it to others (1 Ti 1:16).

But for that very reason I was shown mercy so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display his unlimited patience as an example for those who would believe on him and receive eternal life.

-- 1 Timothy 1:16, NIV [1984]

David Choi: The Greatest Challenge. It's not evangelism, prayer, or Bible study, or even loving our neighbor. The greatest challenge is to believe that I'm truly the beloved of God, and that for only one reason: the finished work of Jesus Christ, in his life, death, and resurrection.

(Reminds me of John 6:27)

"What must we do, to do the work God requires?"

Jesus answered, "This is the work of God: to believe in the one he has sent." [vaguely reconstructed from memory.]

The point is not: To do the work, you must believe. Rather, the point is: Believing is the work itself.

We want someone to know us with all our mess, and love us anyway, like Beauty loved the Beast. This makes it uncomfortable, so when Beauty comes to us, we push her away

Thus do smart women make foolish choices wrt nice guys. (Reminds me of the verse that says the gospel is a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense.)

Therefore, we we try to earn love. We are driven by the desire to earn applause: by getting good (perfect?) grades, by being funny and athletic, by having correct doctrine and preaching well. But unbelievers can do ministry: Matthew 7, Lord, Lord, didn't we drive out demons and prophesy and work many miracles in your name? Why does Jesus call them evildoers? Because they tried to justify themselves by their works.

(I want to check this interpretation with commentaries.)

Antidote: the prayer from Ephesians 3:14-21. Power is mentioned 3x. Is it power to prophesy, to evangelize, to do miracles? No, it's power to believe in Christ and be rooted in love and know his love.

For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge--that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.

Ephesians 3:14-21, NIV [1984]

(Reminds me of Col. 1:9-12, power to have endurance and patience)

Jeff Vanderstelt, Gospel Fluency (see the 2017 book): Big point here is that the good news of Jesus (cf. the greatest challenge) has something to say about everything in life. So when we talk about premarital sex, we shouldn't use purely hedonistic or public-health arguments; instead we should talk about the groom who pursued his filthy bride for years, who by his blood purchased a perfect wedding dress for her, and still waits for her.

(This is a valuable perspective, but I'm not 100% on board with it. When Jesus saw people jockeying for the best seats at a banquet, what did he say? Not some theological paradigm; his appeal was directly about avoiding embarrassment. In other words, it was practical/hedonistic... Luke 14:7-11)

When someone complains about being underpaid and unrecognized and poorly treated at work, we mustn't just empathize; we must also remind each other of Romans 6:23 and Paul's exhortation to work "as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving." (Col. 3:23f, NIV [1984])

(Key words above are "just" and "also": we must show love by truly listening and understanding, validating their feelings. But we must not stop there.)

What must we do to be able to do this?

1. Know and believe the gospel for all of my life. Do I love the gospel? Do I love Jesus? Has the gospel changed my life?
2. Regularly take thoughts captive (2 Cor. 10:4-5) When a stray thought comes, give it the Acts 17:11 treatment. Four helpful questions:
   • Who is God (what am I believing about who God is)?
   • What has he done (what am I believing about...)
   • Who am I? (ditto)
   • What do I do?
   The answer to the last reveals my thoughts about the first three. If I'm anxious, it might be because I think I should be in control but I'm not. And I think I should be, because I think God has lost control or isn't watching. And *that* I think because he's uncaring or inattentive.

   I may need someone to help me overcome my blind spots here. We must gain a hearing and show we understand (James 1:19f) but we must also speak Jesus and the gospel into their lives (Acts 20:26f, "I am innocent of the blood of all men, for I haven't hesitated to proclaim the whole will of God.", cf. Pr. 24:11f)

   It's not enough to say "God loves you," because that could be any old god, and besides what's love anyway? But if we say Romans 5:8, that's more definitive. Likewise, "God is powerful" isn't nearly as good as remarking on the resurrection of Jesus (Romans 1? yeah, 1:4). Or "God is present" isn't as good as saying that he's present in the Holy Spirit (2 Cor 3..., ah, Romans 5:4).

3. Immerse myself in a gospel-saturated community, where in every testimony we should ask ourselves, "Is Jesus the hero?" and after every meeting we should ask ourselves, "Was Christ proclaimed?"
4. Tell it to each other regularly

Those are steps toward gospel fluency.

Following are questions to ask myself... ourselves.

1. What about the gospel do we not know or are we unaware of?
2. What about the gospel have we forgotten?
3. What about the gospel don't we believe
4. How does the gospel speak to this situation?

If somebody cuts me off on the freeway and acts like I'm cheating, and I want to yell at him that I just came from the on-ramp and therefore was just doing what I'm supposed to... why am I so excited about that? I'm pursuing a righteousness that's predicated on this random guy's opinion of my driving? There's a lot about the gospel I'm forgetting!

Can counseling actually help a marriage?

Some marriages, yes. If you love each other (as Carol and I do), and if you genuinely want your marriage to work better (ditto), and you’re willing to ’fess up to your own shortcomings so that you can learn and grow (which we do, somewhat), then yes. I’ll give an example of how this can work, from the life of an anonymous young couple:

The couple loved each other very much. Yet, when the wife spent a weekend at a women’s retreat (away from her new husband) she realized that she felt freer and happier at the retreat; she did not look forward to returning home. Her husband wanted/expected her to do XYZ (or so she thought), and although she didn’t like it much, and he knew it (or so she thought), she felt she should.

(XYZ isn’t relevant, though it’s not anything you couldn’t tell your kids.)

How much did the husband want his wife to XYZ? How aware was he of her feelings about it? There were other issues, but as I heard the story, someone at their church recommended a certain counselor, and they went for a series of visits. There they learned a technique for resolving an issue; it worked like this:

You agree on some object—this salt-shaker, say. One person, say the wife, goes first: while holding the salt-shaker, she is allowed to share her perception of events, her feelings, etc. As long as it’s the wife’s turn, her husband is not allowed to speak, except to clarify and confirm his understanding of what his wife said, for example:

So you’re saying that when I spend $_____ on a new ________ without discussing that with you first, you feel ________—is that right?

Once the wife is satisfied that her husband understands her concern, she places the salt-shaker back on the table, and their roles are reversed.

The technique brought better mutual understanding, peace, and happiness to this couple. Could they have read about the technique in a book or magazine, or on a blog? Sure they could have, but there are about 30,000 such techniques out there. The counselor didn’t give them 300 or 30 or even 10 techniques; they got one technique to try, and it worked well for them.

Several years later, their marriage is much stronger and happier. Whether they use that particular technique today I have no idea, but I’m certain they could, should the need arise.

Another example comes from our own lives, and I’ll try to summarize. Carol and I got into a huge fight. It was hurtful and demoralizing for both of us. She felt hurt by something I said, then she said something that made me crazy, and I said things I should not have said… we saw our counselor a couple days later.

Penny asked me to explain what happened from my perspective, to share my perceptions. So I said how we had decided upon something a few weeks earlier, and on Saturday Carol said something related to it, and I answered thus and so (based on our earlier decision).

It later came out that she felt unhappy about this, for other reasons that I didn’t understand. But when she expressed her feelings to me early Monday morning, I felt sorely vexed and said things that were unhelpful, and she felt even unhappier. I was getting more and more upset, I said, and I saw this was going nowhere, so I apologized loudly and repeatedly, and fled to work. En route, I listened to the daily prayer from pray-as-you-go.org and asked God for help. (As I recall, the reading was from Genesis 1, including “Let there be light,” and I prayed for light to shine in my dark heart.) There’s more, but I think that’s enough to give a general idea of the conflict.

How does a counselor help? The first thing is that we were under adult supervision, and we also wanted to make the session as productive as possible. Consequently, we did our best to be calm and rational. After I recounted my perception of events, Carol explained a few things. (When at Penny’s, we try especially hard not to interrupt each other.) Penny suggested some changes in the way we say certain things. Carol asked if a particular wording change would help, and I said it probably would. I requested that certain things not be said, and Carol agreed. (She really had no idea of the effect some phrases have on me.)

Penny encouraged me to tell Carol that I never intend to push her out of her comfort zone. When I did that, I added, “and I know, when I remember to think of it, that you never intend to do that to me.”

It’s important for Carol that she hear those things; it’s also important for me that I say them. As Merton writes, “we become real by telling the truth.”

We left Penny’s office with hopeful hearts, and have got along more smoothly since then.

The Bible tells us in Proverbs 20:5 that The purposes of a person’s heart are deep waters, but one who has insight draws them out. (2011 NIV)

So a trained counselor has insight that can illuminate what’s going on. She or he may have techniques that can be conveyed. The office provides an environment where all parties do their best to be calm and rational (the clock is ticking and money is being spent). Another thing about the office is this: once you have a few successful talks there, your mind will think of it as a place of hope and calm.

For all those reasons, a counselor can indeed be very helpful for a couple who desire to love and understand each other better.

a disturbing parable

The following is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

What do you think? A man had two sons. One son said, "Biggest crowd in school history at my speech today!"

The other son said, "How could that be? A third of the students were home sick with the flu."

The first son said, "And as soon as I started speaking, the rain stopped!"

The second son replied, "But I saw the video; rain continued to fall during your speech."

If these were your boys, what would you do? If one of them were running for political office, would you vote for him? If he won the election, what would you think and feel?