“Buckskin” Jesus

A few months ago, at women’s Bible study, an insightful godly man (and co-chaplain of the Washington Redskins), Jerry Leachman spoke about why men don’t like church. There’s been much talked about on that subject in recent years, and as a woman, I have to say, I’ve felt a bit on the outside of this discussion. (And, rightly so, in part, because much of the rhetoric of the books on the subject blame women for the “feminization” of the Church.) Jerry described to us a man he called “Buckskin Jesus.”

Buckskin Jesus takes risks, lives on the edge, and doesn’t fear what’s to come because He completely trusts His God. He helps others along, pulling their wagons out of the ditch in the rain so they can get back on track. He goes ahead of the party to scout out danger and He mysteriously reappears to give them direction and to reassure them the road ahead is good for travel. Jerry said men like “Buckskin Jesus,” and I don’t know if it was Jerry’s enthusiastic imagery or his passion for the subject, but by the end of his lecture, I was liking Him myself.

What Jerry didn’t say (but many in the modern “masculinity movement” do) is that Buckskin Jesus is just for men. According to many of these authors women prefer the tamer, and in my opinion, lamer, pacifist Jesus who sits around hugging little kids all day. And this, they say, is why the Church is full of women and old people (as if old men have somehow lost their masculinity along with their teeth and hair, but then again, that’s another post entirely…).

These authors, most notably John Eldredge of Wild at Heart fame, argue that men need to get back to their natural, wild lives. Eldredge begins his thesis by examining the Garden of Eden, and notes (extra-biblically, I might add) that Adam was “made” in and for the wilderness, not the Garden. This line of thinking suggests that leaving Adam in the Garden, not throwing him out of it, would have been a more punitive result of original sin. Not only that, but apparently, we’ve all been relying too much on Jeremiah 27:9, despite the fact that a deceitful heart is a concept reinforced throughout Scripture.  But besides this fallacious hermeneutic, I have other problems with the modern masculinity movement.

I’ve long had a problem with the reinforcement of the flesh in today’s masculinity movement.   As Brandon O’Brien writes in an intelligent article at Christianity Today:

[A] man’s natural inclinations may prompt him to be “Boss, Bold, Brash, Bully, and Blunt,” as one of GodMen’s sayings suggests. But most of these are qualities of the old self that are destroyed when one is transformed into the image of Christ. A man’s urge for battle—with fist or pen—may well be natural, but that doesn’t automatically make it godly.

No one called Jesus a wimp for going to the cross, and for “turning the other cheek,” yet many church leaders would have Christian men “swing back” in some attempt to prove their machismo. Being a man is no more about grunting and scratching oneself than being a woman is about vacuuming and wearing high heels.

Men like Jerry Leachman model Christ-likeness.  Just looking at the man reveals he is confident, generous, and gentle.  He also has a pretty brassy wife, Holly, who is a gifted teacher in her own right.  Their marriage is one that exemplifies teamwork and accountability.  There is no explicit or implicit battle over whose turn it is to wear the pants.  Jerry models respect for his wife (something that certain authors would say is wasted on women and best given to husbands) and Holly demonstrates her loyalty and admiration for her husband.

In my own life, I have a husband who stands up for his family, washes the dishes, can fix almost anything, and hugs and kisses his son—a lot. Moreover, he encourages his wife to be brave and to do the things God has called her to do (even when it might cost him something he wants), and he doesn’t shy away from putting her in her place when she gets too big for her britches. The combined humility, strength and tenderness of a man like that are the same characteristics that draw all people to Christ.

There Must Be Some Kind of Way Out of Here

Historically speaking, I am a pretty good quitter. Because of my tendency to sign up for everything that ever interested me, being a good quitter is a survival skill. At 15, I got a job at Office Depot. I love office supplies, and it didn’t seem like a hard job, so I started working at the counter. After a month, I’d worked my way up to the copy center, taking orders for business cards and spiral-bound presentations. I even had a cool celebrity encounter with a local anchorman. Then I had to work Halloween when all my friends were out having fun. So I quit.

In college, I quit a job at the U.S. Attorney’s office after I’d spent months interviewing and getting a background check for it. I had been eager to start that job and thought it would be my first big break into the world of Justice. I was there for about two weeks. The other college girls working there were mean and made me do grunt work like walking documents I wasn’t allowed to read over to the courthouse. They tried to intimidate me as I learned to answer the 5,000 line telephone system. I also had to wear pantyhose and painful 1.5-inch heels. When I quit, most of my disappointment was shared during my exit interview (though I did leave out the sole-crushing part about the shoes).

After that, I got a job at Blockbuster. They told me that the polo shirt I bought for my “uniform” was the wrong color blue. “That’s the manager’s blue,” they said. I didn’t care so much about that, but when they told me that despite my arthritis I’d have to be able to carry twenty VHS tapes in one arm and load them on the shelf in fistfuls of five, I quit. I actually called in twice, then quit, and started renting from Hollywood Video.

I worked at a movie theater in college, on and off, naturally. But, when I got a real job after college, I actually stuck with it for a few years. Teaching was probably the only career I’ve ever been committed to seeing through. And I did see it through: for three years. The only other work I’ve shown that dedication is the work I’ve done in the pro-life movement the last three years.

Today I had one of those quitting days. Everything went wrong or took twice as long as expected. Almost everyone got on my nerves. I tried to keep things under control.  I tried not to tell at my colleagues. But I yelled at the dogs. I yelled at my husband. I yelled at my son. And between the yelling, I considered peeling off the manager-blue shirt I was wearing and throwing it over the counter once and for all.

I may yet do that. It’s hard for a quitter to break the habit. Yet, one thing I’ve learned these last few years of short-term persistence is that when I’m “through” with something, when I’ve spent all my expectations and abilities, when I’ve become bored or pushed past endurance, that’s when something amazing can happen. It may be that I will continue further down this path and figure out what it’s like to hold a job for three or four or—yipes—five years in a row. It may be that a new adventure awaits, and I should be watching the horizon for an opportunity to escape. I really think it may just be time for me to sit down, stop all the yelling, and just give up for a while.

I guess what I’m trying to say is, as for all my efforts here, “I quit.”

There is a time for everything…
a time to search and a time to give up
a time to keep and a time to throw away
Ecclesiastes 3:2,6

SweeTarts

I have a good pal in our writers’ group who has, on occasion, blogged about her obsession with Pop Tarts. Therefore, I feel no reluctance as an aspiring writer to take a few blog lines to rant about SweeTarts. (For the record, SweeTarts is their goofy, copywrited way of spelling Sweet Tarts. I am rejecting their spelling for the remainder of this post as a symbolic gesture in my rebuke of the Wonka company and their parent group, Nestlé.)

During my pregnancy with Henry, I experienced a typical season of food cravings. For the most part, I wanted cheeseburgers, but for about a month somewhere in the middle of my pregnancy, I shifted into sour candy mode. I bought bags and rolls of Sweet Tarts weekly. I ate so many one week, that I actually deadened the sour part of my tongue and had to give it a rest for a few days while my taste buds regenerated. That hurt. Thus far in this pregnancy, I’ve had few cravings. But last week, the Sweet Tarts yen returned.

This is a great season for Sweet Tarts because the “chicks, ducks and bunnies” bag is available. I grabbed a bag, intentionally peeping through the clear window to make sure it was adequately stocked with purples and pinks. I drove back from CVS, savoring the moment I could tear into the bag and resisting the urge to do so in the car (after all, you could spill them into the floor if you are too eager opening the bag).

When I got home, I was appalled to find that the majority of my bag consisted of blue tarts! Blue bunnies, blue ducks, and blue chicks: none of which exist in nature. There were no green tarts, no yellow. Just a few pinks and purples and an exorbitant number of nasty blue ones. It made no sense to me that the other classic colors were omitted. Yellow is the actual color of chicks and ducklings, and green is the springiest color there is.

My friend Amanda was recently disappointed in her own blue-packed chicks and ducks and bunnies bag. She theorizes, “I blame it on the blue raspberry trend of the 1990s. BTW Sweet Tarts Inc., there is no such thing as a blue raspberry! Green=Lime, Yellow=Lemon, Purple=Grape, Pink=strawberry, Blue=crap.”

I have seen this trend ever since they introduced the blue ones. Slowly, the rolls you buy have lost their greens and yellows. Blues have taken over. And forget about eating the two-fer packs you give out at Halloween. I’ve opened packs of those to find double blue after double blue. In all those years of trick-or-treating, I don’t remember ever getting a double purple.

I’m not sure why the blues are so abundant. Most people I know don’t like them. Dave eats them, but only because they are the only ones I’ll let him have. And they aren’t his favorite. Perhaps there is something less expensive about the blue dye. Maybe the Wonka people (who have historically made excellent candies like Nerds and Gobstoppers), haven’t throughly taste-tested the blue ones. I am willing to give them the benefit of the doubt here, but given that half of my Sweet Tart money goes to blue tarts that I end up throwing away, I’m pretty peeved.

I think I will write to the Wonka folks and let them know my frustration over this. My craving will probably soon subside, and it’s already giving way to a very delicious appetite for Girl Scout cookies. But, this is a wrong that must be righted, so I urge any readers I have to join me in this cause:
Nestlé USA
Office of Consumer Services
PO Box 2178
Wilkes-Barre, PA 18703

High School Musical 2

I guess in the vacuum of political satire on TV (see writers’ strike), the press has decided to make the funny (as if their reporting doesn’t provide enough laughs). Yesterday, the AP reported the coffee preferences of the leading candidates–Republican and Democrat. What’s really pitiful here is that I heard about this on The View. The gossip girls/part-time pundits made the results a key part of their “hot topics” discussion this morning.

I once heard that DC is Hollywood for ugly people. There’s truth in that, but I think both LA and DC have something in common. Whether you’re on the ugly power coast, or the gorgeous fabulous coast, both cities are home to the “cool kids” in our society. It’s like high school all over again. They are the ones that run the clubs, plan the best parties, and get to spend their parents money on travel or cars or political quid pro quo.

I guess that makes the AP the lunchtime ambassador to the masses that keeps the rest of us apprised of what the cool kids are up to, or in this case, what they like in their java. I wish the studios would go ahead and pay the writers. Then Jon Stewart and the other defenders of the playground could come back and give the press a well-deserved swirly.

Skool Dayz

First I found a funny story on The Onion:

 

Underfunded Schools Forced To Cut Past Tense From Language Programs
WASHINGTON—Teaching students how to conjugate verbs so that they can describe events that have already occurred is a luxury many schools cannot afford.

Then I found a place where the children could be freed from the constraints of hindsight thinking: