One more Red Cup blog!

My friend Jodie recently posted this on Facebook: “If anyone will design an app that will block red cup stories from showing up on my feed, I will be their first customer!” Bummer too, because I think she would have liked this Red Cup blog post. But I get where she’s coming from, after all, Red Cup reactions and blog posts are showing up like unwanted guests at the holidays. So here’s one more unwanted holiday guest for you to smile at, while trying to be gracious and not say anything regrettable. Good luck.

As far as I can tell, there really seems to just be one video that set this topic ablaze over the past week. Like much of what we react (or overreact) to, one person throws out an idea, a strong opinion or a few “facts” and people brazenly, and passionately take sides. Personally, I think we’re so fired up over the pre-election process that opinions and ideologies about everything are just stronger and closer to the surface than usual. And the thing we all love and hate about social media, is the speed at which ideas and news can spread, and this one has spread far and wide.

If you’ve been on a social media fast the past seven days, you’ve missed the fun. In summary: A man (pastor?) was upset that Starbucks removed “Merry Christmas” from their holiday coffee cups, replacing them with a plain red cup with the company’s logo. He challenged people, that when a barista asks their name (to write on the cup for their order) that people should respond with, “Merry Christmas” so that each Starbucks store will be shouting Merry Christmas multiple times a day.

I’ve seen hundreds (literally!) of responses to this. I’ve seen videos people posted of their “Merry Christmas” trickery in coffee shops around America, and I’ve seen the head-shaking of others who are stunned by this outrage. Some call it a war on the Christ of Christmas, and others wonder why a secular business is being harassed for not celebrating Christmas. One man posted, “boycott Starbucks for their hatred of Christians” and another man posted, “Just drink your coffee and shut up!”

This issue has brought to the surface a few thoughts I’ve had about the Overboard Life in the context of culture. Here are a few ways that I’m processing this event with principles that go way beyond whether or not Starbucks helps me celebrate Christmas.

1. I’ve never heard anyone begin their Jesus story with, “I saw Merry Christmas written on my coffee cup and wondered, ‘who is this Jesus that came and died for me?’” Look, I’m not saying it couldn’t happen, I’m just saying that in 20 years of full-time Christian service, I have never once heard anyone start their testimony with those words (or anything close to it!). A few years ago Lowes Home Improvement was under the wrath of the Christian community for celebrating the holidays instead of Christmas, and ditto...I never once heard of a person coming to Christ because of seeing a “Christmas Tree” in a Lowes catalog, instead of a “Holiday Tree.” Let’s remember that keeping Christ in Christmas has nothing to do with how secular businesses advertise sales for our consumer-hungry culture, but has everything to do with how we show Him to others. Keeping Christ in Christmas should be more about how we treat and respect our baristas, and less about what words are written on our favorite coffee cups. Keeping Christ in Christmas should be more about how we choose not to indulge in pure consumerism, but rather, how we choose to give generously to others and celebrate the greatest gift in history -- God sending His only Son that He might become the ultimate payment for our sins.
2. Merry Christmas doesn’t change hearts even if it makes yours merrier. I love a hearty “Merry Christmas” as much as the next guy. Believe me, I’m not a “Happy Holidays” kind of person, because to me, what makes the holidays happy is that there is significant meaning to them -- life-changing meaning to those who have met the Savior we celebrate. Sometimes I think we fall prey to the idea that if everything said “Merry Christmas” on it, life would be significantly better. But Merry Christmas has never changed a life, any more than moral laws and regulations can change lives. I know in American culture it’s easy to look back at the good ol’ days of a country that reflected traditional Christian values, but those morals didn’t change hearts! Just because a culture embraces a Christian ethic doesn’t mean the citizens are more Christian. In fact, I firmly believe it’s easier to hide in that kind of culture, to go along with the moral crowd while harboring nothing that resembles life-giving faith and belief in the resurrection power of Jesus Christ.
3. In some ways, I think a non Merry Christmas culture gives a chance to truly stand out. For so long it’s actually been relatively cool to be Christian, or at least, to represent convenient Christian values. Almost every politician, including our most recent president and presidential candidates, have tried to cater, at some level, to mainstream Christianity. That’s changing and I think it’s good for those truly living the life of faith, truly living the Overboard Life. The opportunity in America to stand out because of a different life-style, one governed by an unchanging truth and centered on an undead Savior, is greater than ever before. The previous generation stood strong against much of the cultural shifts (and in many cases, for good reason), but today, we have a chance to be for the truth that sets people free. That movement for something will entrench us clearly against a culture where we are no longer the “moral majority,” without us having to utter a single word of opposition. By being for strengthening traditional marriage, ending the plight of the starving orphan and rescuing people from the darkness of pornography and sex-trafficking, the culture will know we stand with Scripture on the issues of homosexuality, poverty, slavery, and sexual values. Our “for” values will strongly imply our “against” values without having to speak a word of opposition; we will stand out in this culture that believes it's normal to discard fetuses, marriages and God-designed sexuality and considers it strange that we don't!
4. The Gospel must be central or our Merry Christmas is meaningless. I’m afraid that a lot of church-goers who are fiery hot about this Merry Christmas issue, reflect little of the Gospel in other parts of their lives. By hash-tagging Merry Christmas they try to make a statement with a tweet or post, or with strong words of “I’m taking my business elsewhere” in an online comment on a company’s Facebook page. Yet after they trick a barista in to saying, “Merry Christmas” they pull out of the parking lot and scream at a driver who cuts them off in traffic or they overspend on life’s luxuries and have nothing left with which to help the widows and orphans in their community or around the world. They view pornography on the privacy of their phones, they raise busy kids who have little time for the Lord, they cut corners at work, lie to their spouses, drown life’s troubles in consumption or they move from relationship to relationship, marriage to marriage, in an attempt to escape life’s emptiness. I don’t care about your Merry Christmas if it’s void of the Gospel, and you shouldn’t care about mine if my life doesn’t reflect the eternal change provided by the Jesus of this holiday. The Gospel must be central in our lives, influencing us everywhere: in our interactions at coffee shops, in the car when we’re in traffic, at home when we’re alone, in our families, in our singleness, in our politics, in our churches, in our communities, in our blog posts, in our study of the Word, in our work to bring justice and water and food to the oppressed, and in living out the truth of a life changed by Christ.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for Merry Christmas, and I’m for moral laws and for promoting a strong Christian ethic in our homes, churches, schools, sports teams, communities and country. History has shown us, however,  that those things don’t change hearts. But if we win the war for the hearts of the lost, we will gain these other matters, too! Russell Moore writes, “The heated and outraged rhetoric of evangelicals in the political and media spheres is often directly related to the ineffectuality of Christian distinctiveness in our living rooms and pews.” In other words, we’re not bringing the Gospel into our homes and churches, so why would we expect the culture around us to embrace the Christ of Christmas?

“Merry Christmas” will not be influencing my holiday joy this year, because the Gospel has already won the day. May your Christmas be fixed on Him, too, so that even your Red Cup barista knows you belong to Jesus.

Go ahead and take the plunge, even your Christmas is better on the water!

Mistakes leaders make (8/10)

I’m working my way through a book, The Top 10 Mistakes Leaders Make, by Hans Finzel, and I’m really enjoying the challenge. So for the next ten Saturdays I want to work through these ten mistakes, knowing that they apply to CEOs, ministry leaders, parents, teachers, coaches, pastors and just about anyone in any kind of leadership role. I promise to keep my summaries short(ish), and I would love to interact with your thoughts as we go along. These mistakes are listed in order of how they occur in the book, not necessarily how I would arrange them. Overboard Leadership requires an honest self-evaluation of each of these shortcomings (sins?) of leaders. Looking for missed posts, click here: Mistake #1, Mistake #2, Mistake #3, Mistake #4, Mistake #5, Mistake #6, Mistake #7).

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Mistake #8: Missing the clues of corporate culture

Hans defines corporate culture as “the way insiders behave based on the values and group traditions they hold.” In other words, the changes (some subtle, some not-so-much) you and your spouse, or you and your roommate, made in order to live in the same house without wanting to beat each other senseless...is learning to live within a corporate culture.

As you look around at your life, you are probably part of several cultures, many without you even being aware! Sports team parent? Definitely a soccer mom culture! Married? Definitely bringing two family cultures together into one (and creating a third culture in your own family!). Are you employed? Then you know there is a culture at your office! Do you attend church? Then you definitely know about organizational culture! Every town, every state, every region has a culture and we learn to live and work and build relationships based on what those cultures value.

Finzel points out that culture is at the heart of success for a business (and I would say for a relationship, family or ministry!) and that top performing companies have “strong cultures [that] support the mission, goals, and strategy of the organization.” For believers, our culture should promote excellence in every aspect of our lives, living out 1 Corinthians 10:31 and Colossians 3:17. Those verses remind us to do everything to the glory of God, even mundane every-day-tasks like eating, drinking and speaking should be done with our very best effort!

When it comes to leading people, a good leader seeks to learn the culture of his environment, and then operates and strengthens the organization from within that culture. When cultural shifts need to be made, a good leader has done her homework to understand the existing culture, and makes careful, calculated moves before instituting changes.

The culture of your family or ministry or business, can be discovered by exploring the non-negotiable beliefs that drive it. Everyone has preferences that come and go, sometimes connected to a particular person, sometimes a particular trend or the latest book, but those preferences won’t help your organization sink or swim. The values under those preferences, the do-or-die beliefs that drive the organization, those are the items that define your culture.

Some churches value, not changing. Whether it’s expressed or not, the leaders of this particular type of church are always suspicious of change, and typically like the “old way” of doing things. Some businesses value quality over quantity, and others mass-produce parts and value production numbers over anything else. Some families value a tight-knit unit with very little outside influence, others open the house doors wide for anyone or anything to enter! Some dads value their work over their families. Some moms put their children first, even above their spouse. All of these beliefs represent the underlying culture of a particular group of people.

A good leader seeks to understand that decisions her organization is making, come from these underlying core beliefs. Finzel (quoting Joules and Posner) writes, “Leaders who understand their own value, and can articulate them well to their organization, have proven to show superior performance in their roles.” Here are six benefits to leaders who learn to embrace an organization’s culture:

1. Strong feelings of personal effectiveness
2. Promotes high levels of company loyalty
3. Facilitates consensus about key organizational goals
4. Encourages ethical behavior
5. Reduces levels of job stress
6. Promotes strong norms about caring and working hard

(From the book: The Leadership Challenge)

When leaders don’t learn their organization’s culture, they create conformers (just do what you must to survive), complainers (completes work without enjoying it, and impacts other employees with negativity), Innovators (let’s change things!), ritualists (going through the motions), retreatists (running away from every situation) and rebels (angry non-conformists).

Good leaders spend time learning the culture, embracing the culture that promotes the vision and goals of the organization and carefully changing the parts of culture that need adjustment. If you’re leading an organization and running into constant conflict, check out chapter eight of Hans’ book for some great tips about understanding the culture.

Go ahead and take the plunge, your leadership will be better on the water!

Mistakes leaders make (9/10)

50 Shades of Grey...and 37 uses of the word "Sex"

[warning: This blog post contains a frank discussions about sex, and is really intended for married couples and adults] I don’t know if you’ve heard the news or not, but apparently there’s some movie coming out this weekend that involves gratuitous sex, sensualized erotic violence and a fair share of graphic nudity. Apparently it’s a movie that is from a wildly popular book containing the same content (without pictures) and apparently a record number of movie goers are expected to attend the weekend premier. Apparently sex still sells, thus I'm hoping 37 uses of the word (or its variants) in my blog will keep you reading to the end.

There’s a lot of hype about this film of which I only know details from blogs I’ve read, and articles I’ve seen on my Facebook feed. I haven’t read the book(s), and I haven’t seen any particulars about actual content apart from the summaries mentioned above. I have been surprised by some of the people who are vocally boycotting this film, and equally by those who are eagerly planning to attend. (Almost ironically, I’m sitting in a coffee shop writing this blog post, and an add for 50 Shades of Grey just played on the radio.)

Whenever something like this grabs the attention of our culture, I’m always surprised by the responses of people on either side. Supporters of this particular film refer to it as a “redemptive love story” (from one blogger), and the graphic sexual depictions as “just sex” not much worse than you can watch on your television at home. Opponents call it “pornography” and an “appalling display of violence against young women.”

I don’t know why these reactions keep surprising me, they shouldn’t. And truthfully, they shouldn’t surprise you, either. We live in a world, and especially a culture, that loves to glamorize and sensationalize sex. This weekend’s movie sounds offensive on a lot of levels, but it’s really not much worse than so many other weekend offerings. Apparently, 50 Shades of Grey pushes the envelope significantly, but that’s what we should expect from a movie culture that thrives on hype, shock and pre-release buzz in order to sell tickets.

A few weeks back I was watching a movie with a friend, and all seven previews shown before our movie, included some sensualized image to draw in movie goers and sell tickets. Scantily clad women dancing at a party being crashed by secret agents, a gorgeous model wearing “Shorts” (I think the belt from my pants would have hung lower on her body than her shorts did!) was suggestively starting a car race, another woman disrobes and climbs into a bath tub with her boyfriend, a horror film preview showed more naked bodies than clothed ones (the whole horror genre reeks of sexualized violence!), and an upcoming “comedy” included the naked backs of a dozen women in an apparent attempt at making an orgy seem, funny. All of that was in the previews for movies!

I haven’t heard about any boycotts concerning those movies, and several have already been released in theaters. Why not?

Here are a couple of thoughts: First, in our sex-saturated culture, we aren’t shocked by “normal” displays of immorality. My wife and I have enjoyed a few TV shows that we watch on Netflix, and over the years have been shocked by how often immoral relationships are glamorized and normalized on the screen. Scantily clad women seducing married men is just another day at the office. Crime scene investigators solving a mystery at a strip club just happens, and two wildly beautiful women making out in the back room of a hospital just doesn’t shock us. We’ve become conditioned to believe these things are “normal” and “ok”. 50 Shades of Grey sends shock waves because it supposedly takes acceptable perversion to a new level. Personally, I hope it helps point out how conditioned we’ve become to all forms of perverse entertainment.

Secondly, “intimacy” has become so public, we’ve lost sight of the beauty of sex. Any of the opponents to this weekend’s movie who cast a shadow of doubt on the beauty and sanctity of sex, are just as guilty of destroying intimacy as the actors and directors of the movie (or any of the movies described above). SEX IS AWESOME and is a magnificent expression of intimacy and oneness, given to us by God, to be enjoyed in the richness of marriage. Suggesting that sex (implied) shown on the big screen, is “courageous” or “the true meaning of erotic” flies in the face of the intimacy that should be shared between a husband and wife in their sexual lives together.

Traci and I have been married for over 18 years, and I can tell you that our enjoyment of sex hasn’t waned a bit, while our capacity to engage, satisfy and fulfill each other has improved dramatically. There is nothing boring about our bedroom, and the moments we share raptured in physical intimacy are frequent, thrilling and incredibly intimate.

In fact, I’ve come to believe that the sex-saturation of our culture has struck at the central nerve of sexual expression by destroying that key component: the intimacy that was meant to be shared between two married people. When sex is reduced to a show, to physical pleasure shared in a raunchy bar, to uncontrolled animalistic urges between two (or three or four ...!) out-of-control college students, to day-time frolicking between a stay-at-home mom and the neighborhood pool boy or a desperate business man preying on the availability of young naive female employees, it becomes nothing more than an urge like hunger, sleepiness or anger. And like those other urges, it is satisfied immediately in any way possible.

By contrast, intimate sex is one of the greatest gifts any two people can give each other in the context of marriage. Hebrews 13:4 states, “Honor marriage, and guard the sacredness of sexual intimacy between wife and husband. God draws a firm line against casual and illicit sex” (The Message). Sex is honorable, beautiful, sacred and when it’s treated like that, it will become fun, satisfying and intensely intimate. That kind of intimacy is what has led to a deeper understanding and oneness between me and Traci, and has become a spiritual picture of our relationship with God. When sex is seen in its proper light, no book, movie or web site can satisfy the sexual longings like true, God-ordained intimacy.

Instead of partaking in someone else’s sex life this weekend (or any weekend!), indulge in yours, and work on your marriage-bed intimacy. Don’t let this culture rob you of the great joy of true oneness. Men, don’t give in to the temptation to believe that onscreen (movie, TV, phone, tablet or computer screen!) sex has any valid claim to your thoughts, or will ultimately increase your sexual pleasure. Women, don’t romanticize the sexual experiences and “love” of characters created to exploit your emotions. 50 Shades of Grey is just one example of a nearly endless barrage of attacks aimed at destroying the intimacy for which sex was given to us. Next week there will be another movie, another book or another TV show attempting to do the same thing.

Let’s root out the sources of sexual perversion in our lives, and work hard on our marriages. Overboard author, Steve Etner, has a great book and has developed a ministry particularly aimed at helping men who struggle with sexual temptation. At the bottom of this blog, you’ll see several other tools and resources available to help you (men or women) reclaim the true purpose and meaning of sex.

Choose to enjoy YOUR valentine this weekend...and next week...and next weekend...and...

Go ahead and take the plunge, life -- including your sex life! -- is always better on the water!

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I love the guys at www.xxxchurch.com, offering great help for men and women with sexual purity.

http://www.purelifeministries.org is another great site aimed at helping people work through their struggles with misplaced sexual values.