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Forgiveness is a Decision

This is a response to a recent article by Aly Dee: The Gospel of Cowardice: How Cheap Forgiveness Weakens the Church

Just my thoughts:

There is a lot of good stuff here. Particularly the “Turn the other cheek” part. It was a power shift. By turning the other cheek in that era, you shifted power from the aggressor to you without doing much. The aggressor was left with a dilemma, strike with the “unclean” hand (left hand) or open hand, which implied equality in status. Or nothing and show weakness. One slight move shifted the entire dynamic.

Strength under control is also a good theme here. A man should be capable of danger and wise enough to know when to and not to use it.

I’d like to provide a little nuance here on two main points.

  1. Evangelical Protestantism
  2. Forgiveness

Evangelical Protestantism

“Evangelical Protestantism is the worst form of Christianity available today.”

This is hardly accurate. But when speaking in absolutes, accuracy is rarely found. It’s hard to call a movement that is bringing people to Christ by the thousands that had given up all hope in being forgiven for the atrocities they’d committed in their life the “worst form of Christianity available today.” The worst place for deep spiritual growth? Maybe.

But remember, the people that who are entering these domains often believe, truly believe, there is no hope for them. They believe they have made entirely too many serious mistakes to be forgiven by a perfect God. Not realizing it is in His perfection where the ability to forgive resides. They enter at the request of someone they know, believing there is no way God can love them. Then they hear otherwise and everything changes. I cannot possibly tag them with “worst.” Not even close.

I’d dare say the worst form of Christianity today are the denominations being willfully blind to obvious scriptural instruction for the sake of identity over merit and making sure no one’s feelings are hurt. Starting with the Presbyterian church. That’s the worst form. Absolute false prophets dressed in robes adorned with crosses.

Forgiveness

“Forgiveness isn’t really something reasonable to foist on someone mourning a fresh assassination, whether it be Charlie Kirk’s widow or American Christians who have been persecuted and attacked by Leftists for nearly a decade.”

I totally agree that it isn’t reasonable to push forgiveness onto someone in pain. I also believe that while it isn’t reasonable, it is possible. Because it is a choice. When Erika Kirk chose to forgive her husband’s killer, a few things happened and a few things didn’t happen.

What didn’t happen:

  • She didn’t forget
  • She didn’t accept this guy into her life or public discourse
  • She didn’t stop hurting

What did happen:

  • She removed the weight of justice from her shoulders onto her creator. It’s natural for us to want justice and harbor anger. She relinquished that.
  • Forgiveness spread like wildfire
  • Tim Allen forgave his father for the first time
  • Thousands were driven to Christ as a result.

“I have found that the greater the offense, the harder it is for a person to reach forgiveness.”

I agree that, in one sense, the greater the offense, the longer it takes to embody human forgiveness. But in another sense, not really. Why? Forgiveness is not a feeling. It’s not an emotion. It’s a decision. Divine forgiveness is what we are called to, which we can’t fully understand. Therefore, we need to act on it before we fully understand it. Often in scripture, God called his people to act first and understand later. He understood that action drives behavior.

The story of Moses is one. Three times, Moses is in the presence of God and comes back to deliver God’s word. Two of them, the people state in response, “We will obey.” The last time, they said, “We will obey and then we will understand.” Erika’s choice was a decision. Not a feeling. She chose to act now and heal as she goes.

So I think there’s a balance, which seems to be the undercurrent of Aly’s post, which I respect and appreciate. We can forgive and not restore. They’re not the same. Letting go of the sting while ensuring we don’t lay down and accept evil as normative can be attained.

Lastly, the reason I know we will never be the UK? They’re facing these struggles for a reason. The same reason we once triumphed against overwhelming odds. This country was not built on submission. From the very beginning, we fought as if survival itself was on the line. That spirit, born in the Revolutionary War when an outnumbered people refused to bow, still runs in our DNA. We fight for what we know is right, in the face of cultural deviance. This is why we’re seeing revival, now led by Gen Z!

Stay Classy GP!

Grainger

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Mind-Molders and Life-Savers

It’s Where We Draw the Line

Excuse me for another pop-up post, but the newest events called for it.

If you weren’t aware of the absolute institutional ideological Marxist capture before this week, you’re aware now. It is nothing short of Cluster B-infused moral decay. But before we get too deep, let’s clarify.

Free Speech

I am a free speech advocate. I disagree with almost everything Harry Sisson ever says. But I will openly defend his right to say it. I believe people say hateful, hurtful, and harmful things on the internet. Hiding behind their keyboard shield like the snakes behind comedy and tragedy masks. But I fully believe in their right to say it. In fact, I want them to say it. So we can all see who the tyrants are. Who the psychopaths are. Who the Cluster-B RCT candidates are. I want you to speak so I know what is out there.

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Following the election of Trump, a shift began to take place. People all over the political spectrum were beginning to agree that the far left had gone too far. We had to find normalcy. Peaceful dialogue. Common sense. Biology needed to mean something, especially in sports. Merit meant something, especially in the workplace. With the assassination of Charlie Kirk, not only did that sentiment not soften, it just got louder.

L: Haley Kreidel— Nashville 911 emergency dispatcher; R: Laura Sosh-Lightsy— MTSU Assistant Dean

Death Celebration

There’s a zombie-style apocalypse of people celebrating the death of one man who stood for civil discourse without violence. Reread that sentence and let that sink in. As

Lou Perez said so well,

“I have come across people who believe that

  1. It’s OK to murder you if you express opinions they disagree with and
  2. You should not be able to own a gun to defend yourself against people who believe it’s OK to murder you for expressing opinions they disagree with.”

I did not agree with everything Kirk said, nor how he said it. But I agreed with the fact that we should have more civil discourse without violence.

I am not a fan of “cancel culture.” Never have been. Never will be. People should not lose their jobs over comments made. For years, people have been losing their jobs over saying something pro-American or pro-Western. For instance, schoolteacher Warren Smith conducted a Socratic thought experiment with a student. When he suggested that the student think through facts before assuming and claiming that J.K. Rowling was hateful, and after the student came to his own realization through, what counseling calls Motivational Interviewing, Smith was fired. This should have never happened.

Exceptions To the Rule

However, there are clear exceptions to this concept. One basic exception is economic. If you own a business or provide a product and speak in contradiction to your clientele, expect to be cancelled. Ask Tractor Supply, Harley-Davidson, or the Dixie Chicks. It’s simply not a good business move.

But maybe the more important example is professions where you are either a mind-molder or a life-saver. Educators, first responders, therapists, just to name a few. More recently, here’s a list of professionals who are mind-molders or life-savers and have been removed from their position:

  • Toledo fire and rescue firefighter, “Wish the guy was a better shot…”
  • Nashville 911 dispatcher
  • Assistant Dean of Students, Middle Tennessee State University (MTSU, where I am proud alum)
  • Teacher, Greenville County School District, South Carolina
  • Executive Assistant to Vice Chancellor of Development, University of Mississippi (Ole Miss)
  • Staffer at Ole Miss

Life-Savers

Now ask yourself, if your life was on the line, would you want to worry about dying due to a MAGA hat or Harris/Walz T-shirt? Think of it this way. A firefighter in Toledo rushes into a building, sees a man bleeding out and has the chance to save him. When he sees the MAGA hat, he thinks to himself, “One less scumbag.” Then “fails to stop the bleeding.” Comments about being happy a man died for his beliefs make it entirely plausible someone would do this on the job. Or how about the dispatcher in Nashville?

  • Dispatcher (D) 911, what’s your emergency?
  • Person (P) someone is trying to break into my house screaming something about my Trump flag on my porch!
  • D: Ok. Stay on the line and we will get someone there.
  • Then the dispatcher thinks, “Another MAGA down!” And simply doesn’t send anyone out but pretends she does. Or waits so long, the assailant enters and kills them.

Mind-Molders

The other side is mind-molders. I firmly believe that any educator who trains a person what to think, rather than how to think, should not be educating anyone. There is simply no place for that. This includes teaching someone that they should be republican, democrat, conservative, or liberal. Educators should not be teaching anyone that they should espouse these ideals, but rather that they should learn how to see all sides and explore these ideals. For instance, if you believe it was OK for Kirk to die because he was homophobic or transphobic, do you also feel this way about the Palestinians? Because they are very open concerning their stance on these issues. That is exploring all sides.

Or my industry— counselors, coaches, and therapists. I firmly believe if you say something publicly acknowledging the desire for another’s death, you should lose your license. How can you claim to care for people, advocate for people, and help people achieve stated goals if you are calling for the death of those you don’t agree with? It goes against every code of ethics in the industry. Which one’s you ask? Let’s look at a fellow Substacker’s comments— who happens to be a therapist.

Listen, these MFkrs call for the death of INNOCENT humans on the DAILY.

I will start calling for THEIRS. We don’t have to be some f*ing version of “peaceful”. WE ARE AT WAR.

Or

IT IS OK TO CELEBRATE THE DEMISE OF NAZIS

IT IS OK TO LAUGH AT POWERFUL KARMA

IT IS OK TO ADMIT YOU HAVE ZERO FEELINGS ABOUT MURDERED FASCISTS

IT IS OK TO TELL PEOPLE TO SHUT THE F**K UP WITH THEIR SELF RIGHTEOUS BULLS**T

Directly from the mouth of a therapist. Here are some codes she violated:

  • A.4.b. Personal Values. Counselors are aware of—and avoid imposing—their own values, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors. A statement wishing death on someone clearly shows imposition of personal values, and is inconsistent with respect for client autonomy
  • A.4.a. Avoiding Harm. Counselors act to avoid harming their clients, trainees, and research participants and to minimize or to remedy unavoidable or unanticipated harm. Publicly calling for someone’s death is a form of speech that may create an unsafe, hostile, or discriminatory environment for clients with different views.
  • C.5. Nondiscrimination. Counselors do not condone or engage in discrimination against clients, students, or supervisees based on political affiliation, beliefs, or ideology.
  • NASW 6.04 Social and Political Action. She obliterated this one.

So yeah, I firmly agree with the investigations, unpaid leave, loss of license, and firing of these individuals that show little to no human decency. I don’t want this type of moral infection to be in mind-molders or to have an impact on life and death. Go be a politician. They say hateful things every day and no one cares.

Stay Classy GP! (In the face of classlessness)

Grainger

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I’m Defending My Values Without Apology

The Age of Passivity is Behind Us

Today, I agreed with people I rarely agree with. Kamala Harris, Bernie Sanders, Candace Owen, and many others. We all agreed that the attack on Kirk as senseless, unfathomable, vile, and evil. I even saw the statement, “Charlie Kirk and I have never agreed on one thing, except that everyone has the right to free speech and should not have to die for that.”

The shooting of Charlie Kirk has shaken the country and parts of the world. But you have to ask yourself why? People get shot all the time. And he was just a young, family man living the American dream. So why did this rattle the country and get polarizing political opponents all in agreement?

Because he was civil. Because he sought to have civil discord with those he disagreed with. Because he never once called for violence. Because he stood on convictions and could intelligently articulate them. Because he made the bold statement that the country cannot move forward until people who disagree have genuine, difficult conversations with the goal of understanding each other, in hopes we can find shared fundamental ideals to live our lives around.

Some want to be angry. And that’s a warranted response. “They hit us, we’ll hit back harder.” Unfortunately, Kirk would never have approved of that. He, like Dr. Martin Luther King, always declared to conduct peaceful interactions only. They both declared that violence was never the answer. So if not violence, then what should be my response? Well, first, I’m not about to tell you how to respond to a tragedy. But I will say the age of passive conviction is dead. The time for sitting back, wishing the psychopaths would pipe down and the problems would vanish, is over.

We’ve stepped into a new era. One that demands we give voice to our convictions. When something feels deeply wrong, silence is no longer an option. As the saying goes, “Well-behaved women rarely make history.” I’m not calling for misbehavior. I’m calling for courage. The kind of vocal, unflinching fortitude that protects values that you will defend.

What I Will Defend

  • I’ll defend my right to free speech. Along with that freedom comes the right to reject compelled speech. I will not be forced to call you anything I don’t want to. I will not be forced to call you a kitty cat because you feel like one today. I will not be forced to accept that you are using diagnoses as crutches to justify oppositional behavior. Especially in the counseling room.
  • I will defend ideas around biological sex.
  • I will defend family values and the obvious benefits that come with it.
  • I will defend men and boys.
  • I will defend girls, being that I’m a girl dad.
  • I will defend being a good person in every situation.
  • I will defend my right to carry.
  • I will defend integrity. Doing the right thing even when no one is watching and no one will find out.
  • I will defend ideas surrounding the benefits of religiosity. An upward aim at an ineffable telos. And my right to practice of such an aim.
  • I will defend a woman’s right not fear being around a man. That being around men should be the safest place for women to be. Therefore, men should work harder to be that guy.
  • I will defend stronger penalties for sexual offenders, particularly against children.
  • I will defend making the federal government smaller and smaller.

I will stand on convictions. And I will no longer be quiet. I will no longer sit back and hope things change. I will work to be the change I want to see. I will set this date as the day I defended values. The values that this country was built on: Faith, Freedom, and Families with strong men. Without apology. You can’t avoid being offended. And I won’t dance around your feelings. If your feelings get hurt, that’s your problem, not mine. If I belligerently set out to harm you, different story. Anyone that knows me knows that’s not my speed. But I’m not worried about your feelings anymore.

Defended Concern

  • I’m worried about the child that doesn’t know how to tie his shoes but somehow knows he was born in the wrong body, set up for castration because he has a mother with Cluster B-style FDIA. I’ll defend that.
  • I’m worried about the males that are told they are toxic just for being male, leading to committing suicide 4 times more than females. The ones that hear they are the problem. The ones that are targets of victim blaming. Like the ones who said it is Kirk’s “fault for being shot because he is so divisive” (This was on a major news network). I’ll defend that.
  • I’ll never sit on a train and watch a man stab a woman to death and do nothing. That man (really he’s a little child) in Charlotte would likely have been carried away in a zipped-up bag had I been on that train. Because I know the justice system won’t come through. I’ll defend that.

If Kirk’s shooter wanted to wake people up, he just did. Just not the people he hoped would wake. There are certain people in this world that I have never agreed with, not one sentence. But I will defend their right to say it.

Lastly, Kirk was right. He was right to be on a mission to get people in disagreement to talk. To sit, civilly, and discuss opposing ideas about how to achieve, what is mainly a shared goal: Human flourishing. But until we relearn the lost art of speaking with conviction without violence and without theatrical rage, brace yourself. That same gut-sinking feeling you had watching the Kirk video will sit on repeat, like a curse we refuse to break… #becausetribalism.

Stay Classy GP!

Grainger

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The Dark Side of Creativity

When the Gift Consumes

There is something that they all have in common, and it’s not just what you think.

September is Suicide Awareness Month. No better time to talk about such a horrific epidemic we find ourselves in. Before you bounce right out of here thinking this is going to be too heavy, I won’t go into those types of details. I intend to address a specific facet of suicide – creative people. Yeah you, Substacker, writer, visual artist, musical artist, culinary artist, you are who I’m talking about. I am who I’m talking about. To ignore our inclination toward suffering is to invite it to govern, rule, and ultimately destroy us from the shadows.

With the relatively recent suicide death of Anne Burrell, I began digging a bit deeper into literature that reflected the connection between creativity and an increased proclivity to suicidal ideation (SI). And what I found was, at the very least, alarming.

Culinary World

In the culinary world, it is a very fast-paced, high-stress, and at times, toxic environment in which to work. High demands are flying at them in a rapid-style fury. The consequences often include imposter syndrome – a feeling like they don’t belong because they’re not perfect. Such perfectionism undermines what joy the industry could bring. Additionally, intense environments, camaraderie masking dysfunction, long non-social hours, and high-pressure expectations in kitchens contribute to mental strain among highly creative chefs.

Notable Losses to Suicide in the Culinary World

  • Homaro Cantu: Chef, inventor, restaurateur
  • Anne Burrell: American chef and TV host
  • Anthony Bourdain: American chef and author

Entertainment

Then there is the entertainment industry, particularly the movie business. Acting requires deep understanding of other people. Deep levels of emotional empathy, experiencing emotions as if they are happening to you even when they are not. They are tasked to portray an array of emotions, attitudes, linguistic styles, physical attributes, and more. Often, what one finds in this industry is they spend so much time being someone else that they do not know who they are. This lack of identity often produces confusion. The industry also produces isolation because of being harassed by media and fans. Confusion with isolation is a lethal mixture.

Notable Losses to Suicide in the Entertainment Industry

  • Robin Williams
  • Margot Kidder
  • Dana Plato

Literary Landscape

Now to most of you reading this. Writers. You. Me. Writing involves a thought process that requires deep, intrinsic exploration. When you explore that deeply, you find things you forgot about. You find a mental box that was stashed away in hopes it would disappear, but it hasn’t. Writing also involves feeling another person’s depth of emotion. Writing displays this emotion, whether through a fictional expression, a self-help offering, or a liturgical grounding, with an aim to better the psyche through simplicity and ritual. The mind goes on an adventure, and the creative process fosters it in hopes it discovers some treasure trove of depth to unlock great mysteries that plague us.

Notable Losses to Suicide Among Writers

  • Ernest Hemingway
  • Yasunari Kawabata
  • Albert Camus
  • Pulitzer Prize winner Sylvia Plath (The “Sylvia Plath Effect” is a concept that poets are more susceptible than other creative writers.
  • (Please note that the first three are Nobel Literature Prize winners)

There’s one thing they all have in common, neuroticism. In psychology, the Big Five personality scale is the most widely used and cited as the most reliable method for understanding personality. The Big Five is comprised of Openness to experience, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism (OCEAN). Standard knowledge within this discipline will tell you that on average, conscientiousness is an excellent predictor of success, agreeableness can have positive correlations with anxiety, and women score higher in all five personality traits, including neuroticism. But what does that have to do with creativity?

Research on Creativity and Neuroticism

  • (Peters et al., 2018) Neuroticism not only increases suicidal ideation (SI), it also significantly increases actual suicide. This same study found that men are particularly at greater risk of SI if they are unmarried, recently unemployed, or recently divorced.
  • (Brezo et al., 2006) Neuroticism and openness to experience showed elevated risk of suicide. More specifically, extraversion had the strongest negative correlation to suicide and social introversion had the strongest positive correlation to suicide.
  • (Blüml et al., 2013) Neuroticism and openness to experience showed elevated risk for suicide, especially in females. In males, extraversion and conscientiousness were significant protective factors against suicide.
  • (Preti et al., 2001) People involved in creative professions have suicide rates three times higher than those in other professions. As far as the three domains mentioned here, in a study reviewing suicides, 84% of the total suicides in creative professions were literary professionals.

To be clear, Correlation ≠ Causation. There is not a guarantee of someone creative having high levels of neuroticism. Also, neuroticism doesn’t reliably predict creative achievement, but highly creative people often score high in neuroticism. Creative individuals, particularly in artistic fields like writing, acting, music, and culinary arts, frequently score high on neuroticism, especially when combined with high openness to experience, which is a reliable predictor of creativity.

While neuroticism alone does not predict who will become a successful artist, writer, or chef, creative people, especially those who channel personal emotion into their work, tend to be more neurotic than average. This is the conundrum for people like us. Creativity often arises not despite emotional instability, but because of it.

Where Do We Go From Here?

So what do we do about it? If I know someone is going to push me, I can brace for it and find ways to lessen the impact, hoping I don’t fall. Knowing that we are prone to this is a good step toward mitigating the effects. Think of fire. If I walked into your living room and set a fire on your coffee table, you would not be very happy about that. But if I walked about eight feet over and started one in the fireplace, you’d be fine with it. Why? Because it’s contained.

If we learn to control the force of our creativity, guiding it rather than becoming enslaved by it, we discover its true brilliance. Creativity, when unbounded, can blaze out of control like a wildfire, consuming without discernment; yet, when given structure, direction, and purpose, it becomes illumination rather than destruction. To harness creativity is not to diminish it, but to transform it into an ally. One that uplifts, builds, and heals. In this way, we honor the gift without surrendering ourselves to its tyranny. We partake in its radiance while refusing to be undone by its flames.

This comes through calibration. Community. Conversation. The antithesis of isolation. Isolation leads to being on the lists above. Please, for all that is beautiful, do not let your creativity be the very thing that annihilates your potential to better the world around you with your gift. Guess what? I hoped you gained something from this, but I wrote that entire piece to me.

Stay Classy GP!

Grainger

References

Blüml, V., Kapusta, N. D., Doering, S., Brähler, E., Wagner, B., & Kersting, A. (2013). Personality factors and suicide risk in a representative sample of the German general population. PloS One, 8(10), e76646. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0076646

Brezo, J., Paris, J., & Turecki, G. (2006). Personality traits as correlates of suicidal ideation, suicide attempts, and suicide completions: a systematic review. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, 113(3), 180–206. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1600-0447.2005.00702.x

Peters, E. M., John, A., Bowen, R., Baetz, M., & Balbuena, L. (2018). Neuroticism and suicide in a general population cohort: results from the UK Biobank Project. BJPsych Open, 4(2), 62–68. https://doi.org/10.1192/bjo.2017.12

Preti, A., De Biasi, F., & Miotto, P. (2001). Musical creativity and suicide. Psychological Reports, 89(3), 719–727. https://doi.org/10.2466/pr0.2001.89.3.719

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“How Many Times” Should We Say We’re Sorry

This aticle is written for Christians about Christians. If you do not share this fundamental belief, that is fine. Just know that this is the framework from which it is written.

Every parent most likely has had this happen. You are supposed to be at a certain place at a certain time to pick up your child. And you forget. It happened to me. I was supposed to get my daughter from school, and I forgot. I wasn’t running late or stuck in traffic. I forgot. My mind was stuck on the tasks at hand and it just slipped my mind. My daughter was just hanging out with the teachers by the car rider line. She began wondering if I was ever showing up. I finally get a call, “Dad, you coming to get me?” This is one of the worst feelings as a parent. For a couple of reasons. You feel stupid for forgetting your own child. But you also feel terrible for your child who probably is dealing with some sort of embarrassment that their own parent isn’t on time. She gets in the car, and I begin apologizing incessantly. She listens carefully. When I’m done groveling, she just smiles and says, “It’s ok dad, I know you didn’t mean to.” And now you feel worse!

This wasn’t the last time I would have to apologize to her and hope she forgave me. And she did, every time. I often wonder how it was so easy for her to forgive me. How did she cognitively understand the genuine sorrow I felt when I had to apologize? As an adult, I see the difficulties in accepting apologies. You wonder if it’s sincere. You wonder if it means you need to just trust them in the future, but you don’t think you can. You don’t want to get hurt again, so you keep them at bay.

There is a clear difference between human forgiveness and divine forgiveness. Divine forgiveness is unconditional and designed to restore. God forgave me in order to draw me back to Him. Human forgiveness is simply removing the burden. I can forgive someone who is deceased. Because with human forgiveness, there is only one necessary participant, me. Forgiveness requires only me, restoration requires two parties. I can forgive you and not want to restore to you. There are many valid reasons why someone might not want to restore to a previous relationship. But what should we do with those apologies when they show up?

John Crist

Comedian John Crist found himself on the wrong end of a scandal a few years ago. He had built a brand of being the Christian comedian. But his lifestyle was revealed to not align with Christian teachings and values. Crist went public with his apology. He was genuinely sorry for those he hurt along the way. He understood that, for better or worse, fans of a celebrity get hurt when that celebrity breaks the trust of the fanbase. Should they hold celebrities in such high esteem? No. But they do. And they get hurt in the process. I’ve been around celebrities my whole life and they are aware of that pressure. It is part of what makes their life somewhat lonely, in spite of what many think.

Following Crist’s apology, many came out destroying him online. Saying that he wasn’t truly sorry. Saying that it didn’t matter if he apologized, he’s still a monster. Saying that he can’t change and that he’ll always be evil. These were the sentiments of many. I watched the apology video. It seemed genuine. But to many, it didn’t matter. I wondered how many times he would have to say sorry before someone believed him. And why is it necessary to repeat himself?

Michael Tait

Insert Michael Tait. Allegations circulated of sexual misconduct by the Christian singer. This began in 2024. Then in January, Tait abruptly left Newsboys and somewhat disappeared. His statement has recently been released and we now know where he has been since January. Rehab. He was abusing alcohol and abusing illegal drugs on a regular basis. Primarily cocaine. He released a full statement of admission, shame, and sorrow. Towards the end of the statement, he made a very well put and fair assessment of reality:

“To the extent my sinful behavior has caused anyone to lose respect or faith in me, in understand, deserve, and accept that. But it crushes me to think that someone who would lose or choose not to pursue faith and trust in Jesus because I have been a horrible representative of Him- for He alone is ultimately the only hope for any of us.“

-Michael Tait

I’m not going to get into the fact that I knew more than 10 years ago that Tait was conducting himself this way. I’m not going to address why he felt it was ok to do so then. I’m also not going to minimize his struggles with sexual propriety. We all have our own struggles. My dad says, “I sin differently than you.”

The real question here is, when is an apology enough, and when is it not enough? John Crist was not found of any legal wrongdoing, but he still hurt many people emotionally. I have no idea what Tait’s legal troubles will be. But regardless, he has hurt many people. Do we accept Tait’s apology? If so, why? If not, why not?

My personal belief here is that we should accept his apology, in the context of what our Bible says about forgiveness, and in light of the aforementioned human forgiveness vs. divine forgiveness. We should take Tait at his word. We should allow him the room and time to heal. One may have no reason to ever want to listen to his music again or be his friend again. And that’s a personal decision. But that person still needs to forgive him and move on. Maybe we need to act like my 7-year-old and get better at forgiving.

He said he’s sorry. We have no reason to believe he’s being insincere. He should not have to repeat himself ad nauseum. He should simply show us that he has truly changed and let his life be an expression of such change. As Believers, we should extend the same grace we were given in our darkest moments. Hurt people hurt people. But forgiven people forgive people.

Stay Classy GP (God’s People)!

Grainger

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10 Truths to Live By

I have had a couple of people that I hold in high regard recently all but chastise me, citing that there is no one way to do certain things and there’s no right way or wrong way to do other things. What those are will be for another day. Today I’ll list 10 verifiable, objective truths that everyone on planet earth could and should live by.

1. One should always aim high enough that the goal is unachievable while simultaneously making one better for taking steps towards such an ineffable aim. When you take one step towards the highest aim, the dopaminergic system kicks in and rewards you for doing so.

2. What one aims towards should never be another human being and should always be greater than anyone on earth, as people will let you down at some point. One must aim towards one that will never let you down. Aristotle once said:

Everything that is in motion was moved by another being in motion, but that this could not have begun by anything in motion. The very beginning of motion had to have been started by an eternal unmoved mover.

This is where our aim should be.

3. Anything you do for a child that the child is capable of doing for themselves has just delayed the development of that child in that area. Resilience and achievement are pillars for human flourishing.

4. Suicide is always preceded by isolation. We are social beings. The only thing that prevents us from becoming mentally insane is meaningful social interaction.

5. The greatest meaning in life is found at the crossroads of order and chaos. The greatest meaning for a man can be found at the intersection of productivity and generosity.

6. Life is about the journey. Not the destination. The destination takes care of itself through the manifestation of the journey’s steps.

7. To truly find meaning in life, make your life about others. Stop focusing on you and focus on others.

8. For children, self esteem is not the primary goal, but rather the secondary byproduct of the goal. If self esteem is the goal to aim for, it will be attained falsely and will not sustain without manufactured achievement. If personal self-achievement is the goal, self esteem is obtained through the successful merit of such achievements. Self esteem is the result of something else, not the primary goal.

9. If you marry because you feel love for the other person, you will divorce because you no longer feel love for them. The reason for marriage must reside on a much more sustainable foundation of compatibility, reaching beyond the fleeting nature of feelings into the cognitive process of knowing this person is right for you and you are right for this person, even and especially when times get difficult.

10. Pineapple ruins pizza (Ok. I had to put one funny note in here. But really, yuck. Don’t do that).

Stay Classy GP!

Grainger

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Where Two or Three are Gathered to Witness

We have all heard people say, “Where two or three are gathered in my name, I will be with them” (Matthew 18:20). We have all most likely said it in our lifetime. “Father, I know you’re here because you said where two or three are gathered…” Having said that, I have rarely, if ever, heard this verse quoted in its correct context. I have been guilty of misquoting it myself. I think we all have. But learning to read the Bible in context helped me with many things I was struggling to understand. Think about it, if it takes two or three, does this mean God isn’t there until then? So when I’m by myself, God doesn’t show up? I can easily find verses that say He is there when I’m by myself. So that would be contradictory.

This verse is mostly used to imply that when two or three people are gathered, you now get to enjoy the presence of God. It is also used to justify “forsaking the assembly, as so many are in the habit of doing.” Yes, they justify not being part of a local church with this verse, taken completely out of context. In order to get the true context, we must read Matthew chapter 18, verses 15-20.

First, these verses have absolutely nothing to do with the church. He does use the word Ekklesia, but He is not referring to the “two or three” people mentioned later. The church was only mentioned as a way of handling conflict. So “two or three” is not referring to a local church or a church gathering of any type.

Next, it is not referring to the presence of God. The presence of God is ever-present, according to Psalm 46:1. So you don’t need two or three in order for God to be present. He is omnipresent, according to Psalm 139:7.

This leaves us with what Jesus is actually talking about. He is referring to conflict and discipline. It is a very practical matter for a practical people. His audience was most likely people who understood the Torah, because he was referring to it. Jesus says that if someone sins or falls, we are to go to them and point it out to them. Now wait, I thought we were to never judge? Another misconception. We are only to never judge non-believers. But other fellow believers, we are certainly to judge each other, according to this verse and many others.

Jesus then continues and says that if they won’t listen, take one or two others along so that every word that is said is said in the presence of witnesses. This was very practical and not new to the listeners. Again, Jesus was quoting the Torah. The passage is from Deuteronomy 19:15. This was the law handed down by Moses. It was put in place to prevent someone from being prosecuted by one person. It would be unfair and unjust for one person to hand down judgment. So they put this practice in place to prevent an unjust prosecution from happening and Jesus was echoing this law. Jesus then says that if they still won’t listen, take them to the Ekklesia (derived from two words meaning called and out of, the gathered people of God- the church) and if they still refuse, treat them as a tax collector (or someone who just does not know God).

One thing to keep in mind in all of this, treating someone as if they do not know God means, according to Jesus’ other teachings, that we are to love them, accept them where they are, teach them through our example of living, but not allow them to be in leadership positions. That’s how non-believers were to be treated. They are to be taught and loved but not to teach in the church. This is important because recently, someone took to social media to chastise a church for not letting them be in a leadership position because they were knowingly living in a life of consistent sin and not letting the very verses we are discussing play out. She was told of her sin. She has chosen to deny that she is living in such sin. The Bible then teaches that we are to treat them as thought they do not know God. They can no longer be in a position of leadership or authority. When this church did exactly what the Bible teaches, she took offense. And many came to her defense. The real problem was that she was already in this place of leadership and they recently decided to remove her. And for that, this church was wrong.

So after Jesus says all of this about pointing out sin, taking it to them, then with two or three witnesses, per the Torah, then to the Ekklesia, then treated as a tax collector, Jesus then says that “whatever they agree on and ask for, It will be done for them”, meaning that the conflict at hand has been resolved. He then says, “Where two or three gather in my name, I am with them.” The two or three Jesus is speaking of are the witnesses to the conflict and discipline. Jesus is basically saying, “Follow the Torah. This law is good. Once you have followed what God has commanded, I will be there to deal with the consequences, whether positive (“they agree on”) or negative (“They still won’t listen”).

Now that we know the context of this, it makes sense with the description of the church in Acts 2, Ephesians 4, Hebrews 10, and Hebrews 13. It also makes sense with the verses in Psalm 46 and Psalm 139. It all fits. But only in context. And it teaches a good lesson on how to deal with conflict and discipline with love.

So next time someone says, “Where two or three are gathered…”, you can respond by asking what they witnessed. Stay informed. Read the bible in context. Taking scripture out of context only hurts us and those around us. In context, it displays truth, and the “Truth shall set you free.”

Stay Classy GP!

Grainger

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Is There an Objective Morality?

Is there such a thing as objective morality? This is one of those questions that requires perspective. One could make a case that one’s sense of objective morality is in fact rooted in subjectivity, making it subjective morality and no longer objective.

For instance, if one says God is their objective morality, someone else could say that this is a belief, which is, in itself, subjective. There’s a strong case for this. So I’ll take a slightly deeper dive into this.

The term objective morality is the belief that there are morals and values that can be true and exist completely irrespective of individual opinions or cultural norms. As you’re reading this, you’re thinking that everyone disagrees on certain issues of values and norms, so they have to be subjective. For instance, it is immoral for a woman to get an education in some parts of the world. But in others, it is welcomed. They don’t agree.

The reality in this argument has two places of interest. Verbiage and Perspective.

In verbiage, we find that many believe that everything is subjective. No two people agree on absolutely everything. Therefore, there cannot be an objective set of values and morals. But the verbiage is off. The term objective morality never says that two people must agree on everything. It merely states that values and morals can exist outside of individual opinion. So, for example, there are no cultures in which you can steal someone’s property and it be widely accepted. It is objectively wrong to harm another human (outside of defense).

I once read some philosophy on this subject and saw two good points of view. First, let’s look at slavery. While there are still areas of slavery in the world today, no one will openly state that it is a good thing or a moral thing to be a slave owner. Everyone inherently knows it is wrong. Therefore, the objective morality around slavery exists. And if it exists anywhere, then it exists. It is the common sense theory. There are certain common sense areas where there is objective morality.

Another point of view is that when two people disagree over something, it is something subjective. But people won’t disagree over something objective. I love listening to Merle Haggard. My wife does not. The idea that he’s a great singer is a subjective principle. The idea that he has won Grammys is an objective principle. We won’t argue over whether he won Grammys. This is objectivity. This notion alone brings about the reality of an objective morality. If we can’t steal without causing harm, and we can’t enslave without causing harm, and we won’t argue over this being immoral, then it is based on an objective morality.

The other place of interest is perspective. This one is as simple as the first. If you have the perspective that there is no possibility of an objective morality, then there is nothing to stop you from taking what you want and doing what you want without limitations on your behavior. You have no guide, no standard, no measuring stick. Nothing is off limits. This will inevitably produce strife, recklessness, chaos, pain, heartache, and suffering of all sorts. Anyone that’s lived for any amount of adulthood time knows this. Therefore, the perspective must be that there is a standard by which we all live. There must be an objective morality. Or at least there must be the perspective of an objective morality. The only real question for many is where this objective morality would derive from. My favorite psychologist, Dr. Jordan B. Peterson, once said, “I live as though there is a God.”

As Christians, we believe this objective morality comes from God and God’s word to us. But again, there is this perspective thing that creeps its head into the church. For instance, Calvinism. Calvinism is the belief that God already knows everything, everything has already been determined, and your life is a predicted outcome of circumstances and events that will not change God’s predetermined mind as to who enters the kingdom of heaven. The premise was that one should live hoping to be that soul. There is a case to be made that this is factually true. However, the problem with this line of thinking is obvious. If your perspective is that God has already chosen who enters heaven, then it doesn’t matter how you live. There again, you find yourself having no limitations on your behavior, leading you right back down that hole of despair and brokenness. I must say that if there is not a single source of objective morality from which you pull your belief system from, you are bound to be misled into a way of thinking that is not grounded in fact or anything helpful to society. Again, for me, it is God. The system of God and Christianity leads me to a place of being the best version of me if I follow the teachings. I firmly believe the denial of an objective morality is the denial of evil, and we all know evil exists. God has never steered me wrong before. I don’t expect Him to anytime soon.

Stay Classy GP!

Grainger

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Is Love All We Need? Not Even Close

Why is Christmas many people’s favorite time of year? Even non-religious people, it’s their favorite time of year. What makes this time of year different for those that aren’t actually celebrating Jesus’ birth? I have a theory.

We have all heard the songs, “love is all you need” or “you are all I need” and we have all chosen to believe this. Celine Dion, Rodney Crowell, and The Beatles sang about this. The problem is, it’s not even close to the truth. If you said, “God is all I need” you’d still be wrong. Here’s why:

We were designed to be social. We were created to have social interactions. Without these social interactions, we begin to lose our minds. Let me explain from a psychological viewpoint.

The Stanford Prison Experiment: In 1971, a psychology professor at Stanford University led a research team conducting an experiment on human behavior given pack mentality versus isolation. Everyone involved was a willing participant in the research and was told they could leave at any time. They split the group into guards and prisoners. They told the guards to keep the prisoners in line. Eventually, the guards took their jobs as power-wielding tyrants seriously and began using psychological tactics to keep the prisoners from escaping. The experiment was supposed to last 2 weeks. It only lasted 6 days because both the guards and the prisoners had all but forgotten they were willing participants and felt forced into their current positions, which caused extreme psychological stress to the prisoners, and later the guards as well. The isolation caused their minds to lose their grasp on reality. The reality was that they were just college students pretending to be something else for an experiment but instead they had grown to believe they were actually prisoners.

Kalief Browder: Now if that was the effect after 6 days, imagine being isolated from reality for 2 years. This was the case with Kalief Browder. Browder was a common kid, getting into small theft trouble in the streets of New York. One day he was arrested and charged with a crime he did not commit. Without any evidence, he was charged and sentenced, based on his prior history. He was sent to the Rikers Island jail system. There, he was being bullied. So he fought to defend himself. In doing so, they put him in solitary confinement. He spent 800 days in solitary confinement. Studies show that if one is in solitary confinement for more than 30 days, they will suffer severe psychological damage.

After his release, the case gained national attention. Browder appeared on The View with his lawyer. Rapper Jay-Z reached out to him. He was gaining national support. Nothing but love. But love was not enough. Upon his fifth suicide attempt, Browder was finally successful in 2013. The isolation had destroyed him permanently. Love was not enough.

Oxytocin: There are four “feel-good” chemicals that flow through your brain. Endorphins, Dopamine, Serotonin, and Oxytocin. Of the four, oxytocin is the only one that does not have a negative side. Endorphins mask pain, but the pain comes back. You can easily become addicted to dopamine. Serotonin can be tricked into being released. But oxytocin requires generosity and/or physical touch.

So the way oxytocin is released is when there is physical touch and when there is a random act of kindness or an act of true generosity without expectation of reciprocity. So when you pat someone on the back or shake their hand or hug them, oxytocin is released. When you do something kind for someone, you get a release of oxytocin, they get a release as well, as well as anyone who witnessed it. Oxytocin fights addiction and boosts your immune system. We are DESIGNED to be generous, social beings. Love is not enough. I know, “But you said God is not enough?” Hear me out.

Adam and Eve: God created everything in the world, every living thing. Then He created Adam. At this moment, there is no sin. There is no competition for God’s attention. There is only Adam and God. Adam literally had everything he needed in that moment. And somehow, in the midst of such perfection, God still said, “It is not good for man to be alone.” Why?! He had God. He had love. If that is all we need, then there was no need for anything else in that moment. That’s just it, we needed more, because of how God made us. It’s the relational aspect of how we are created that causes us to want to be close to God, which was the original design. I don’t want to force my kids to hug me. I want them to want to hug me. That aspect of us requires more than love and more than God. It requires each other.

What we find is that when we are separated from each other, the enemy begins to tell lies that we begin to believe which destroy us. When we are isolated from God’s other creations, we lose the ability for rational thought. But when we do something for someone else, we better our own physical body and brain. We unlock what God created for us by being socially interactive.

So, is love all we need? No. Is God all we need? Apparently not. We need God and God in each other. This is the only way we thrive the way God intended. I know it doesn’t sing well, but it’s just the truth. So this Christmas, embrace the time of giving generously and joyously but with a new outlook on it. It is what we all NEED. And maybe we can start acting like it’s Christmas year round.

Stay Classy GP!

Grainger

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The Only Shape That Fits

Most of us have enjoyed the beauty of a painting. Artists spend their time crafting what they believe to be a good painting. When they are done, they sign the painting somewhere on the canvas. The creator makes a mark on the painting that only he can make signifying it is his. Our Creator did the same thing. I’ll explain.

I was in the doctor’s office waiting room with my daughter watching a few kids play. One kid concerned me a little. She kept trying to put the square piece in the round hole. Over and over she tried. She finally threw the square piece. Then she picked up the triangle piece and put it in the round hole. Again, didn’t fit. She threw that one too. It seemed no matter which block she picked up, if it wasn’t the round one, it wasn’t going to fit.

Then it hit me. This is exactly what we do in life. We go through life trying to find something that will fill the hole in our inner most beings, but it never seems to fit perfectly. We look up and wonder why we are still miserable.

I recently watched the Johnny Football documentary. He had achieved everything he had ever dreamed of and more. He was a D1 star. He made more money than he knew what to do with. He beat Alabama. Ha. He won the Heisman as a freshman. He was drafted in the first round of the NFL. Then, sitting on his couch in Cleveland, he was miserable. All of that still didn’t equate to fulfillment. He tried taking his own life. The only reason he’s alive is because the gun malfunctioned.

Then there’s the time Deion Sanders attempted to take his own life after winning the super bowl 3 times. Or how about the time Dennis Rodman contemplated taking his own life. He had won championships. But he was miserable.

Robin Williams was a living legend. Kate Spade had more money than I’ll ever see. Anthony Bourdain had his own show traveling the world doing what he loved. It wasn’t enough. There’s a reason.

There’s a hole or void in our souls in a certain shape. It’s the shape of God. We have all tried to put things there that don’t fit. Money, substances, fame, cars, friends, careers, our spouses, our kids. They don’t fit. But we try to make them fit. Then we look around and wonder why we are miserable. We are miserable because we are trying to make a square block fit in to a round hole.

When it comes to the creation, the Creator was clever. He made you almost whole. But he left one piece out. And made sure that it was only in the shape of Him. After all, He did say He made us in His image.

So if you are in a place where you can’t figure out why you are miserable, apathetic, sad, frustrated, lonely, full of anxiety… it may be that you still need to fill that void with the right shape. If you will just give up trying the other things, that don’t seem to be working, and fill your void with the shape of God, you will find that there’s peace and relaxation in this. Try it. What do you have to lose?