Mervey signed us up for a two week free trial of Netflix, the movie rental program in which they ship you requested movies as quickly as you can watch them and ship them back. She said, "Someday people might stop sending us free trials," that is if they notice we consistently partake and then cancel promptly. It is part of her surpassing mastery, as the wife of noble character, over living cheaply in America. I hope one day we write a book about it, not unlike the beatnik classic "Steal this Book," except perhaps titled "Wait for This Book to Go on Sale" or "Buy this Book at a Yard Sale." Our motives have not always been perfect; there is after all only one perfect motive: that "Christ's love compels us" (2 Cor 5:14). Nevertheless, in God's grace, we continue to grow toward great gain as He teaches us true contentment (1Tim 6:6). As for movie renting, it is difficult to set aside time for viewing, only slightly less difficult to justify. Four to five movies, for example, in the course of one month is many hours dedicated to almost complete non-productivity. Granted I have been invigorated, inspired, and educated by an assortment of movies, but they are mostly diversions from the discussions, contemplations, studies, relationships, prayers, work, play, and sleep that make life beautiful, and conducive to divine abundance.

Ultra-Elite Athlete

We experimented with a computer program supposed to customize a physical fitness program for a person. It calculated my resting heart rate at 48 beats per minute and concluded that unless there was a mistake or I was on medication, I am an "ultra-elite athlete." That's what I like to hear. I should reach my target age of 120 no problem. I started bicycling to work six years ago motivated by something like misery, hatred and guilt. Even after Jesus stepped in, I would still scream at people who honked at me, invite motorists to stop and fight, and try to chase cars down occasionally. Now, after five years of learning under His yoke, my outbursts have become a non-occurrence. Granted, I've found a more remote route to travel, but avoidance of temptation is far more essential to godliness than feigning some pious disinterest in worldly pleasures or carnal passions. My motives for commuting by bicycle are different now, in fact my motive is mostly singular: Joy. God's having set my heart at peace actually enables me to enjoy life, because I no longer have something to prove. All the other incentives, though profound, such as ecological responsibility, economic necessity, or achieving ultra-elite athleticism, are subsequent, even merely collateral, to the exuberance of abundant life in Jesus.

We had waterfront property for a little while. We rented a small storage unit for a month, and just across the chain link security fence was a pond. Retrieving the few pieces of furniture we had stored, I savored the quiet view one last time before closing the account. It appears that we will not be moving as quickly as we, in our finite reasoning, had determined we should. The storage unit compound is on a gentle slope with smooth pavement and lots of little drop-offs built in, and I looked up and down with my skateboard in hand after loading up the Explorer. I really wanted to skate the place on my final departure, but the security cameras intimidated me. Had I thought better about it, I'd have realized that surely no one is employed to stare at a huge storage unit complex on screen. That would be intensely boring, and probably useless. Still, I didn't want any trouble before I got my deposit back. I suppose that was a violation of Resolution number three: fear less. I slipped my board back into the back of the Explorer, beside my great-grandfather's delapidated red vinyl chair, and left quietly.

Sunday, 31 December 2006

My three New Year's resolutions are to give more ruthlessly, love more intently, and fear less. It may seem that giving is the only resolution I have any control over, while love and fear are contingent on what God enables me to do. In fact, everything is contingent on soveriegn God's enabling, so an act of giving is no more in my ability than an act of loving or an act of not fearing. Conversely, decisions to love or to be more fearless are no less beyond my range of responsibility than is a choice to give. God is in control, and our greatest and most underesimated power is prayerfully seeking Him in worship, study and meditation, for without Him, as Augustine said, we cannot will to will. All of these-- giving, loving, and fearlessness-- are so closely related as to be intertwined. Ultimately, I want more than just what's right. Doing what's right is for religious people. I want to learn self-sacrifice from the King who endured a cross, and who calls to us, "Follow me."