Is there anything you believe, that is worth putting your life and reputation in jeopardy for?

At what point will you object to moral corruption being forced upon your children?

Will you object if babies are killed in hospitals AFTER they are born, like they are now in the weeks prior to their birth?

Will you object to cultural indoctrination of overt homosexual ideology?

Will you object when clear teaching from the scriptures you hold sacred is classified as hate speech?

Will you risk being labeled as politically incorrect?

At what point will you risk to speak?

Will you defend what you believe with your life? Your sacred honor? Your reputation?

At what point will you stand and speak up?

When I was growing up, I was always admonished to “use good judgment.” But it seems like judgment has fallen on hard times. More and more I’m hearing people speak of “not being judgmental.” It sounds good at first, but if you think it through it doesn’t ring true. Growing in knowledge and wisdom should result in the development of one’s judgment, and once developed it ought to be used.

In recent decades our culture has grown soft. I wonder if avoiding judgment isn’t just a way to sidestep uncomfortable truth. It’s become fashionable to “suspend judgment,” especially if using your judgment might be deemed to hurt the feelings of another. And, in the softening culture, anytime we express our disagreement its seen as an opportunity to exhibit hurt feelings. Maybe we should toughen-up a bit.

I advocate “hardening” of our feelings—-not to the point of insensitive oblivion, but to the point that we can navigate through daily life without our emotions being hurt by the littlest slight. Get the chip off your shoulder. Life is tough. People say things. Not everybody agrees with you. But that’s doesn’t necessarily mean you should change your opinion. Maybe you are right and should stand on your conviction. However, if unchecked the  softening culture will tempt you to give in so you don’t hurt anyone’s feelings. That’s weak-mindedness. Don’t let it overtake you.

You can be judgmental without being ugly. In fact, you can be overtly gracious and kind, and still be judgmental. But even then, you’ll offend because weak people don’t like truth accompanied by strength. Don’t let that dissuade you. There is life in truth.

Think deeply. Train yourself to think soundly. Develop your judgment. Then don’t be afraid to use it! The world needs your sound-minded judgment.

I’ve just returned from a wonderful vacation in Mexico. The closer you get to the equator in February, the more clothing becomes optional. So, at a Mexican beach resort you see some interesting things. There are middle aged guys like me wearing trunks pulled up past our navel (except when we go out to eat at night, then we wear leather dress shoes and white socks); middle aged European guys over 30 years beyond the expiration date on their Speedo; and their European wives/girlfriends/consorts who…..well, the girls at my southern Missouri swimming pool weren’t allowed to do that when I was a kid. Oh, and then there are the thongs. You’ve gotta love butt floss.

Whatever.

The most interesting things I saw on the beach were the tattoos (and, that tattoos were the most interesting thing may actually be a bit telling about my advancing age, but I digress). Wow! People are painted up. Alot. And, it’s not pretty. Usually.

I saw one guy who had a huge tattoo across his back—-literally looked like a billboard. It said “Only God will judge me, and he doesn’t exist.”

If he’s right, then he’s right. But if I’m right, then he’s gonna have some ‘splainin’ to do.

Wouldn’t that be a cool talking piece if that guy became a follower? The amazing thing is that Jesus can forgive idiots who paint stuff like that on their body in permanent ink, and idiots like me too, of course.

“Our inability to deal with unpleasantness in life all goes back to the invention of the flush toilet.” That was the thesis of a great book entitled The Undertaking: Life Studies from the Dismal Trade by Thomas Lynch, a Milford, MI funeral director. Lynch notes that in the old days when people died, their family took care of preparing the body at home, and that the unpleasantness of death was buffered by preparing the  loved one’s body for burial. Life included death. 

With the advent of the flush toilet, came a shift in the human psyche, Lynch posits. The flush toilet got rid of life’s unpleasantness with the push of a lever, and thus began the softening of our ability to deal with the many unpleasantries that are part and parcel to the human experience.

People laugh, or look at me weirdly when I tell that story. However, I think Lynch is on to something. I grew up around a funeral home; drawn their by a young lass with whom I was smitten. My first kiss came on the doorstep of a funeral home. Didn’t seem weird to me. She was very much alive! Through the years I occasionally helped to move a body or to deliver the daily dead to another town. I remember when the congressman I’d grown up hearing about as a hometown hero came home in a casket. We opened it and found that when they prepared bodies in Washington D.C. they posed them with their heads turned to face out of the casket. I remember watching as Gary (the funeral director and father of the lass) grabbed the congressman’s head and proceeded to turn his neck until he was facing the direction that dead people were supposed to face in our little town.

I grew up on the farm, and value the lessons I learned there greatly. Death, life, sex, hard-work, economics, it was all there on the farm. It created in me a “rootedness” and a sense of “balance” and understanding of the rhythms of life that I value greatly and am attempting to pass on to my kids through the same farm experiences. But my learning didn’t end on the farm, and it extended past the funeral home. I remember being a Medical Explorer at Cox Hospital when I was 16 years old. Suddenly I was thrust into the delivery room with wailing mommas seeing things I’d never seen before. I remember standing by the bedside of an elderly woman as she took her last breathe. All of these things mixed into the milieu that was my growing up and that have served me well as a pastor, an advisor and counselor, a teacher, a Dad and friend.

So, why do I bring this all up? Unpleasantness, that’s why. In soft America we’ll go far to avoid unpleasantness. We lie and don’t tell the truth to each other because it’s more comfortable to tell the lie than to risk the outburst that the truth might elicit. We tolerate underperformance from our peers and disobedience from our kids because we value faux peace over the clarity and accomplishment that truth and discipline would produce. We don’t fight for truth, because the fight is unpleasant. Case in point: I heard a guy from Minneapolis today on CNN talking about how wars can’t be won, so we shouldn’t fight them because the costs are so high. Hmmm. Let’s think about that a moment. If we used his logic we’d still pay allegiance to the King of England, Obama would likely be a slave instead of the President, and all of Europe would be under control of Hitler’s offspring. Detestable as it is, I think there’s a place and a time for the unpleasantness of war. And confrontation. And moral absolutes.

My house has seven flush toilets. I wouldn’t take for my indoor plumbing. I’m infinitely glad there’s no chamber pot under our bed. But I’m not afraid of unpleasantness. When I know it is lurking, I seek it out so that it can be resolved.

Embrace the unpleasantness. Make the best of it. Learn to deal with it. If you need help, take a look in the toilet. But don’t forget to flush.

A generation ago my statistics professor at the University of Missouri explained “average” this way: If you put one foot in a bucket of ice water and one foot in a bucket of flaming gasoline, on average your crotch is just right.

Yeah, but………

And that’s the thing about stock market averages, they are worthless except as marketing propaganda.  I’ve quoted a lot of averages over the years and regret it. But, at least I’m willing to admit it. There are still educated idiots on CNBC who continue to blather about such drivel. They haven’t learned yet. My guess is they never will. The TV lights, the big important sounding words, and the ego trip of being an “expert” on international television is just too much to give up in order to tell the truth.