Ask Yourself: God's Glory, or Whose?

Here it is, folks:

When it comes to spiritual questions, cultural disputes, and how we intend to interpret any passage of the Bible, this is how we should do it:  Interpret everything in the Bible and life itself in deference to God, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit.  Everything.

Interpret everything in a way that gives glory to the Holy Trinity.

Straight-up, no-holes-barred, every time.  No cultural exceptions, no circumstantial qualifications.  Ask yourself, "who gets the glory?  God, or me, or humankind in general?

It's as simple - and profound - as that.  Isn't it?  Do we each need to be an expert in Hebrew, Greek, or seminary-speak?  Do we need to get some evangelical celebrity or political guru to weigh in with an opinion?  When we read God's Word, and when we consider how to apply it to our daily lives, no matter the subject at hand, won't the right way to act be the way that best glorifies God?

If we're living for God, instead of ourselves, these won't sound like trick questions.

Nevertheless, as I wander around our evangelical subculture and listen to different people say different things about their interpretation of faith, it never ceases to amaze me how we all - every one of us - approach God's Word from some degree of our own, unilateral, personal perspective.  We view the Bible, faith, God, His Son, and how we're to live our lives through a prism of our own preferences, experiences, assumptions, education, and hopes.

Yes, that's part of being human, and of our sin nature, but it's also part of the sanctification process, through which we're supposed to be progressing, not languishing, or regressing.

Unfortunately, we tend to forget that our cultures - even in religion - can work against our sanctification.  We're taught that since God loves us, and created us each as individual people, we have a right to think however we want to think.  We're taught that God expects us to think for ourselves.  The more liberal we are, the more we're taught to value other people, and how they think, and what they think.  The more conservative we are, the more we're taught that other people should think like us.  Which, if you think about it, is as inaccurate an ambition as letting everybody believe whatever works for themselves.  As long as the humanity for which we advocate has a decidedly lateral and horizontal focus, instead of a vertical one, we're probably not honoring God.

At least, we're probably not honoring God as much as we'd like to think we are.

We're in trouble when we consider our opinions to have at least as much weight as God's do.  We forget that we're always interpreting, because humans cannot create truth.  We can only respond to it.  On the other hand, God interprets nothing, since He is the Source of all things.  He is omniscient, omnipresent, and sovereign.  We're not, so we interpret how God's Word applies to various situations in our lives, whether that interpretation is fairly direct, or vague, or apparently not supported by much of anything.

What should matter more should be our desire to honor God in all that we do, endorse, and believe.

Sure, some of us are more accurate than others when it comes to how we believe God is glorified.  As our society has devolved into an "all roads lead to Rome" sort of universalism, however, and narcissism has ossified our ability to critique our own motives, it's easier to fall into a reverse pattern:  evaluating what faith can do for us, rather than acknowledging what God has already done, is doing, and will do.

Both inside and outside the church, for example, we treat issues like gay marriage as if we're entitled to craft a viewpoint based on variables that are relevant to our experiences.  Instead, shouldn't we be viewing everything in light of how each thing - person, experience, fact, ideology, motivation, emotion, reflex, fear - exists as a manifestation of God's revealed word and will?

In other words, we can argue 'till the cows come home about love, relationships, fidelity, marriage, selflessness, covenants, commitment, lifestyles, wants, needs, feelings, romance, and how we think or believe God would want us to act when it comes to gay marriage.

But what do you think honors God about gay marriage?  And what does God say honors Him regarding heterosexual marriage?  God has given us some pretty specific facts regarding marriage, sexuality, covenants, and purity that, in and of themselves, aren't open to as much interpretation as we often like to presume.  We like to believe that we are autonomous actors in His presence.  We've seen how our ideas about things can change over time, as we experience new people, and participate in new relationships.  So surely, God changes, too!  Right?

Well, He doesn't.  He tells us He's unchanging, and that what He said when each book of the Bible was first transcribed is as relevant and factual today as it was then.

Besides, we haven't yet answered the question:  what is it about gay marriage that brings glory to God?  The ability of people to marry each other regardless of gender - how does that bring glory to God?  Is love bigger than God?  Is commitment bigger than God?  Is human sexuality and gender assignment bigger than God?  Is what we want to do bigger than what God wants us to do?

What right do we have to decide whether or not marriage honors God in the first place?  That right comes from God Himself, correct?  What right do we have to decide whether or not gender matters when it comes to marriage?  For that matter, what right do we have to decide that even heterosexual marriages can be terminated simply because one or more spouse has tired of it?

People get divorced because they want to get divorced.  Meanwhile, where does God ever say that divorce honors Him?

Don't we make these conversations much more complicated than God intended them to be?  Of course, conversations about gay marriage aren't complicated to people who don't want to honor God with their view of it.  And they're not complicated to people who deeply desire to honor God with their view of it.  To be frank, the only people for whom conversations like gay marriage are complicated are people who struggle with imposing their own personal sense of superiority upon God, Who will not share His holy superiority with anybody or anything.

Actually, it's probably a good struggle to have, as long as you're willing to realize that, ultimately, you're not in control of your life.  You're not able to change God's view of sexual perversion.  A society can vote to allow gay marriage, but such a vote doesn't change God's will.  But that reality doesn't mean much when we concentrate more on what we want, than on what honors God.

No, living lives that honor God isn't necessarily easy for us, but being purposeful about honoring God shouldn't be a difficult desire for us.  To the degree that it is, that's the degree to which we haven't given Him the Lordship over our lives that He desires - and deserves - to have.

Every child of God's has been bought with a Price.  And that Price is His holy Son, Jesus.  Therefore, we are to honor God with our lives.  We are to live in deference to Him, out of thankfulness for Christ's sacrificial death on our behalf.

If any of us aren't living this way, then perhaps He's not yet our Lord.

And if you find that last sentence particularly offensive, then it's probably because you know He's not. 

Meanwhile, we can never err on the side of God's honor.  But we can certainly err on the side of ours.

Trophy Bathrooms, Manhattan Style

A bathroom with a view at Midtown Manhattan's brand-new 432 Park Avenue

Trophy bathrooms.

You've heard of trophy wives, right?  And trophy homes?  Well, when it comes to trophy homes, just about every room gets blinged-out and hyper-accessorized.  New rooms also get added, such as media rooms, gift-wrapping rooms, and even miniature religious chapels.

For a long time, however, the most private places of any home - trophy or not - had been kept in the shadows.  These rooms were usually small, and were ferreted away into the bowels of a dwelling, tucked out of sight, with discrete views, if any, and absolutely nothing to celebrate.

Well, not any more!  The inner sanctum of personal - and often undignified - physical maintenance has now become one of the most celebrated rooms in a trophy house.

That humble ceramic-tiled shower with an opaque curtain?  It is now a glass-sheathed, marble-walled "wet room."  The impolite toilet?  It has now been practically re-visioned as a sleek throne.  Instead of being secreted into a corner or closed off by its own louvered door, toilets can now command prime bathroom real estate.

Uninhibited.  Out there.  Brutally honest.  Nothing to hide.  And leaving nothing to the imagination.

Indeed, it's imagination overboard with today's trophy bathrooms.  And the trend isn't just for today's McMansions and upscale exurban tract homes, where bay windows flank sunken bathtubs. 

A few restaurants, bars, hotels, and other commercial establishments have been tinkering with the concept of unconventionally visible public bathrooms for a number of years, but even public bathrooms expect their patrons to remain mostly clothed.

But not so for a number of prime new ultra-luxury residential towers in New York City.

For generations, the New York City residential bathroom has been designed for cramped, discrete utility, and if they had a window, it was tiny, and faced a back alley.  Today, however, privacy is for commoners.  If only the little people pay taxes, Leona Helmsley's infamous quote could be reinterpreted today as being "only the little people have little windows in their bathrooms."

Witness the pictorial essay compiled by the New York Times of some very immodest, very glassy, and very view-filled bathrooms currently being offered in the city's most expensive residential projects.  At what is perhaps the city's newest celebrity tower, 432 Park Avenue, you can purchase a brand-new apartment with at 10' x 10' plate glass window centered in front of your pod-shaped bathtub, and a glass wall hiding very little of your shower space and toilet area.

From your bath pod, you'll be able to peer down the corner
of 215 Chrystie Street

If such a spectacle isn't enough for you, there's the pod-shaped bathtub - no rectangular tub-and-shower combos at these price points - tucked into the corner of another celebrity building being literally erected with glass corners.  Which, yes, means that you can take your bath practically peering over the corner of your apartment building.

Yet another luxury building in Manhattan is remodeling its bathrooms to have two toilets facing each other behind glass walls.

It's as if exhibitionism has become the next rung on society's elitism ladder.  Talk about conspicuous consumption!  Still, if you've got twenty, forty, or ninety million dollars to spend on an apartment, there's only so much marble and African wood that can be purchased to outfit such skyscraper palaces.  At some point, these apartments have to provide the biggest "wow" factor architects and interior designers can imagine.  And when it comes to "wow" factors, how much better can it get than showcasing Manhattan's dazzling skyline?

Enter Manhattan's take on the trophy bathroom, which outclasses anything you'll find on the ground in suburbia, simply because you need the verticality of these sky mansions to pull off the desired effect.  Like a Realtor quoted in the Times article says, wealthy homebuyers in Manhattan have always wanted a view from their living room; now, they also want a view from their bathroom.  And when it comes to views, Manhattan can certainly deliver.

So what if the bathroom offers some of the best views?  Remember, only the little people would be intimidated by so much glass when they're getting into and out of a bathtub.  Or off of a toilet.

Besides, it's not like these glass bathrooms are going to be on low floors, where the only view will be of other buildings - and their occupants.  It's also not entirely clear how many of these new apartment towers are being constructed with such transparent trophy bathrooms.  It could be that the market for such exhibitionistic elitism is smaller than developers and Realtors say it is.  Then, too, how many of these glass-walled bathrooms are going to have designer shutters over them anyway, after their naked novelty wears off (which will probably happen by the third night in the homeowner's new apartment)?

According to the Times piece, if this is a bona-fide trend, it can actually be considered quite beneficial for the homeowners of these see-through bathrooms:  considering how self-conscious so much visibility could make the people using them, a rise in physical fitness among Manhattan's penthouse population may be forthcoming.  In what other room in your home are you almost always nude, with lighting that accentuates everything you don't want accentuated, and plenty of mirrors so you can't avoid it?

What's more likely, however, is that the type of people purchasing homes with such bathrooms are people who already possess a personal confidence that has either propelled them into pursuing physical fitness.  Or theirs is a personal confidence that says their personal looks don't matter.  What matters to them is being able to own an apartment where one's bathtub can command a view replicating the vantage point of a ship's captain piloting the mighty USS Manhattan down into New York Harbor.  Looking south from high above Manhattan island, its pointy tip makes the borough look like a nautical vessel plying the waters represented by the Hudson and East rivers.

Of course, that ship effect is lost on any north-facing bathroom.  For buildings near Central Park, there's hardly any northward skyline in which to revel, either.  Besides, what happens when other buildings of equal - or greater - height eventually get constructed near these luxury buildings currently under construction?  Hardly anything ever stays the same in Manhattan's skyline.  Will owners of today's crop of trophy bathrooms have to start going to court against future developers who either want to obstruct views - or, perversely, take advantage of them?

Hey - a boom in trophy bathrooms is one thing.  But a boom in high-powered portable telescopes may be forthcoming as well.

Purchased not only by people living in these skyscraper palaces.  But also by folks living within sight of them.

Need More Happy?

"Do you write happy stuff?  I need more 'happy' in my life."

A friend of mine from church was being honest with me, like friends should be.  He's read some of the things I've written, and noted my penchant for pessimism.

And he's right, isn't he?  You know what "happy" is - something cheerful, optimistic, smile-inducing; in other words, everything everyday news is not.

So, do I write happy stuff?  No, not a lot.  I know that.  And it's a reality that tends to bother me.  I can write all day about stuff that saddens me.  But I have to rack my brain for personal memories that are happy.  I have to scour the Internet to find happy news, or topics that spark my imagination in a lighthearted, uplifting way.

Both my friend and I know the reason why "happy" is elusive.  He readily admits that he needs more happy in his life, and so do I.  And, I suspect, so do you.  But we neither need nor truly want the type of happy that is fleeting, or trite, or based on illusion that everything's right with the world.

To be clear and Biblical, we need to understand that happiness is not joy or peace.  Joy or peace can be present even in the worst of circumstances, whereas happiness is more of an emotion that is dependent upon pleasant, if not fulfilling, circumstances.  The Apostle James says we should "count it all joy" when we're suffering, but he says nothing about being happy with it.

My friend, a born-again Christian, knows that everything isn't right with the world, and so do I, and I hope you do, too.  In fact, that's why he - and I, and you - would like to see more "happy" in our lives.  We know that in this fallen world, there's far too much pain, despair, and plain old unhappiness that we deal with every day.

I had lunch today with somebody who'd just lost a job we'd celebrated him getting only a year ago.  Every day this week, my father, who suffers from senile dementia, has had miserable spells in which he couldn't remember anything about Mom, me, or our family.  I imagine you have news from your family and friends that could be even worse than mine.

Happiness?  No!

A lot of my Republican friends are elated with the results of this past Tuesday's elections, but political euphoria has to be one of the most transitory, temporary, and easily-destroyed sensations on the planet.  Just two years ago, Democrats were giddy at what appeared to be the prospect of a severely crippled GOP.  Tides can turn quickly in a democracy, but pundits on both sides of the aisle tend to forget that.

As quickly as it stormed our national consciousness, Ebola appears to have suddenly evaporated as a major crisis for America.  Even in Africa, experts say the number of new Ebola cases appears to be declining.  Yet it's hard to get happy over that, because 99.99% of us don't know anybody who got sick or died from it.  The only people who may be happy about Ebola's apparent downturn likely are the ones who let the media make them panic about it in the first place.

You want happy?  Real "happy"?  So do I.  But I'm not going to over-drink or over-eat to get some sort of pseudo-happy thing going on in my body.  I can't bring myself to read celebrity websites so I can indulge in a bit of schadenfreude when reading about the romantic misfortunes and fashion flubs of famous people.  I don't have the money to go out and splurge on clothing, technology, or exotic travel that may not be bad for me, but that could only give me a brief high of consumeristic gluttony.

Happy?  Happiness is what so many people want, and spend their lives searching for.  Happiness is one reason people invest their time, energy, and money on religious pursuits, or following a favorite sports team.  The search for happiness is something that can drive athletic people, since endorphins are created naturally by our bodies when we exercise.

Meanwhile, aside from my faith, I tend to find my happiness in things that can't really be purchased, or even earned.  I'm no environmentalist quack, but I can honestly say that big trees with broad canopies make me happy, especially on sunny summer days here in Texas!  Any summer day is usually a happy kind of day when I'm in Maine.  Laughing at a good joke makes me happy.  Admiring classic cars, listening to children play nicely with each other, and listening to really good music can also make me happy.

Sometimes, I write about these experiences with happiness.  But, no, not that often; I know.  Most of the time, I write about things that could make us happy, but that have somehow gotten corrupted by our human penchant to abuse otherwise good things.

So, in a way, I'm still writing about happiness, but I'm writing about it in its absence, rather than its presence.

Okay, that's taking the whole thing too far, isn't it?  Of course, there's no happiness in reading about how happiness is corrupted!

Which brings us back to needing more "happy" in our lives.

"Be ye happy" is not in the Bible.  But that's not a good enough reason not to write about happy things more.  Nevertheless, I can honestly say that when I see "happy," I'll try to write about it.  But it won't be fluffy, or cute, or hollow.  I just can't do fluffy, cute, or hollow.

And when I don't see "happy," I'll be writing about that, too.  Not to be depressing, necessarily, but to point out where we might have had "happy" instead of whatever we got.

Let's say that most of the happiness about which I write is a work in progress!

As for getting more "happy" in your life, the next time you pass by a big tree, slow down and admire it. 

Unfortunately for him, Ronald Reagan has been quoted as saying that "a tree's a tree.  How many more do you need to look at?"

I prefer Martin Luther's take on trees:  "Every green tree is far more glorious than if it were made of gold and silver."