Ted’s Place

There has been alot of destruction and loss of life in the past few weeks. The latest figures show that the death toll is over 50,000 from the earthquake in China. Those numbers are staggering. I cannot begin to imagine the scale of devastation that has occurred. In reading the reports about the earthquake in China, I was deeply saddened by the news of the thousands of children buried under collapsed schools. The earthquake occured in the middle of the afternoon when school was still in session. Some of the pictures of the young victims, their small, grey lifeless bodies being carried away on stretchers from the rubble, and their mothers and fathers collapsing in grief when they realized it was their child, really disturbed me. As a new father myself, I can feel my heart crumble under the thought of losing a child. Children are precious in any culture/society. However, in Chinese culture, family plays a much more central role than in the West, with children representing hope, pride and security for a family. So for a family to lose a child, as devastating as it is anywhere, in Chinese culture, especially with a state-imposed one-child policy, this loss carries with it a much more far-reaching catastrophic impact. For many families, they have lost their only hope for the future. Whole generations of children from many towns/villages are now gone.

This past Sunday we celebrated mother's day. May we remember the thousands of grieving mothers in China who recently lost their only child this week. May our hearts break for their loss. May we try to pray and turn to God in our helplessness, and have the faith to believe that our God knows what it means to lose an only child as well.

Most people who know me would say that I'm not a very emotional kindof guy. At my best moments I can be described as unflappable and restrained, and at my worst as cold and callous - but always unemotional. I can count on my one hand the number of times I've ever cried (including what I can remember from my childhood). I view this however, not as something to be proud of, but rather as a character flaw. 

At times I feel so out of touch with my emotions that I wonder what deep part of me is so broken that I'm prevented from experiencing in my heart what others around me are experiencing. At other times, and only under the most moving of situations, I find myself being able to feel some emotion, but it rarely manifests itself in anything more than a sigh.

The few times where I have cried, have been unusual experiences for me. They have always been an odd mixture of the emotion that brought me to tears, and shock at the fact that I'm crying. "What is this running down my face?" I say to myself. "What's happening to me? This feels weird, but good. I wonder how much longer these tears will run for. This is getting embarassing." The mindless running thoughts usually trail off after the initial shock dissipates, and afterwards I'm left surprisingly, feeling somehow more whole - more human.

My most recent tear-inducing experience was at a church service at Redeemer in New York City in late Feb this year. I listened to pastor Tim Keller give another compelling and moving sermon about the beauty of the gospel - "that we are more sinful than we ever dared believed, and at the very same time, we are more loved than we ever dared imagined." I thought about the depths of Christ's love for me, and was overcome by a feeling of thankfulness. After the sermon we sang a familiar song - "Love Song" by Third Day - one that I've listened to many times over the years. Yet somehow that day, the words of that song burst open a dam inside me that started Niagara Falls running down my face - an ugly and beautiful moment that I won't soon forget.

Here are the words from the song:

I've heard it said that a man would climb a mountain

Just to be with the one he loves

How many times has he broken that promise

It has never been done.

I've never climbed the highest mountain

But I walked the hill of calvary

 

Just to be with you, I'd do anything

There's no price I would not pay

Just to be with you, I'd give everything

I would give my life away.

 

I've heard it said that a man would swim the ocean

Just to be with the one he loves

But all of those dreams are an empty emotion

It can never be done

I've never swam the deepest ocean

But I walked upon the raging sea

 

I know that you don't understand the fullness of My love

How I died upon the cross for your sins

And I know that you don't realize how much that I gave you

But I promise, I would do it all again.

Just to be with you, I've done everything

There's no price I did not pay

Just to be with you, I gave everything

Yes, I gave my life away.

 

We received a near record-breaking snowfall this past weekend here in Toronto. I spent over two hours Saturday night and Sunday morning shoveling more than 50cm (almost 20inches) of snow to clear a path on our walkway and driveway, and to dig out my car while I could still see it. Despite my efforts on the driveway, we only made it about 10 feet outside of our garage on Sunday morning before our car got stuck. The sound of tires spinning in the snow was a common sound that day, as was the grunting of frustrated drivers trying to push their cars out. Thankfully, I didn't have to push too much as we were saved by a friendly neighbor with a handy snow-blower. Within a few minutes we were out on the road and on our way to church.

I'm no different than the next guy when it comes to complaining about winter. I too don't care very much for the dangerous road conditions, the extra-long commutes to/from work, the back-aching shoveling, the bone-chilling temperatures, and the salt-stained/damaged shoes and pants. I sigh and lament with everyone else when a winter-storm warning is broadcasted on the radio. Yet, despite all of our complaints, I suspect that some of us are bluffing - that underneath it all many of us are secretly enjoying the season.

I'm thinking of more than the enjoyment of freshly fallen snow covering the earth like a clean fluffy white blanket on a sunny winter's morning, or the cool crisp air that invigorates and refreshes the lungs - but the joy of winter that can be found at its bleakest and harshest moments. I've noticed for example, that people generally seem friendliest when the weather is the most unbearable - when the air is bitter cold and when long-johns don't make much difference. At bus stops people can actually be found talking with one another. Granted, most of the conversation is usually spoken in a hushed reproachful tone muffled through frosty scarves, and all about one subject - the cold - but at least people are talking. Walk into any coffeeshop and you can immediately start a conversation with just a few words: "It's freezing out there!" If your car gets stuck in the snow, the sound of your spinning tires will likely attract the nearest bystander with an offer to help push. I've met at least four people from my neighbourhood this way.

In winter we all have a common enemy so powerful that most of our priorities are rearranged. Our normal preoccupations are temporarily put aside for us to focus on a bigger issue. Our real opponent is outside. It is us humans huddled together against Old-Man Winter. Even newscasters talk about the weather first before going to other "lesser" news items, like world politics and international conflict.

In addition to our new-found solidarity, I also think we come to a new sense of our humanity. In winter, we find ourselves at the mercy of the elements. No longer can we move about with impunity - doing what we want, when we want. Our unbridled freedoms, of which we have become so accustomed to during the summer months, are reigned in drastically with the first winter storm. We are forced to slow down, and sometimes we are stopped dead in our tracks. With all of our technological and sociological "advances", it is easy not to think of ourselves at the mercy of anything anymore. However, when the temperature outside drops below negative 20 C, and the moisture in your nostrils start to crystallize, you quickly realize that you are not in control, and you come to know something about mercy - whether it be a free hot chocolate given to you at a cafe you've ducked into for shelter, or a warm bus that makes it to your stop on-time.

In short, winter brings us all down to earth in our common struggle to find a way in the cold. It offers us a reminder of our place in this world - that we are not as invincible as we sometimes think we are, and that we are all dependent on the mercies of each other and on the God who gives us life.

 

This past weekend I watched the musical Les Misérables on dvd. It was only the concert version (singing with no acting), but I was still moved by the words of the music almost as much as I had been when I last saw the play live. I have not found a work of art more beautiful and rich in meaning than Les Misérables. I've seen the play six times (twice in Toronto and four times in NY), and would see it again if it were to come back to Broadway. It is a beautiful picture of humanity and redemption told through the story of the ex-convict Jean Valjean, who struggles to be a force for good despite a life of suffering and loss. 

Here's a brief synopsis of the story with selected lyrics from some of my favourite songs:

The story begins in 1815, in Toulon, France. After five years of imprisonment for stealing a loaf of bread for his starving sister and her child, and fourteen more years for numerous attempts to escape, Jean Valjean is released on parole. However, he is required to carry a yellow passport, which marks him as a convict. Unable to find decent work or lodging, Valjean sleeps on the street. Later, a priest finds him, takes him in and gives him food and shelter. In the night, Valjean pilfers through the priest's belongings and steals his silverware. He accidentally awakens the priest, and in a panic he attacks the priest, knocks him to the ground, and runs away. He is caught by the police, but the priest saves him by claiming that the silver was a gift and then gives him two more silver candlesticks (the last of his valuable possessions).

You forgot I gave these also. Would you leave the best behind?

So Messieurs you may release him, for this man has spoken true

I commend you for your duty, may God's blessing go with you.

But remember this, my brother.  See in this some higher plan

You must use this precious silver to become an honest man

By the witness of the martyrs. By the Passion and the Blood

God has raised you out of darkness. I have bought your soul for God!

As Valjean broods over these words, he decides to abandon his old life:

Yet why did I allow that man to touch my soul and teach me love?

He treated me like any other. He gave me his trust. He called me brother

My life he claims for God above. Can such things be?

For I had come to hate this world, this world which had always hated me...

One word from him and I'd be back. Beneath the lash, upon the rack

Instead he offers me my freedom. I feel my shame inside me like a knife

He told me that I have a soul. How does he know?

What spirit came to move my life? Is there another way to go?

Years later, Valjean, having assumed a new identity of Monsieur Madeleine, has become a wealthy factory owner and is appointed mayor of his town. The town's police inspector Javert had already suspected the identity of Madeleine and Valjean, but this suspicion is momentarily dispelled when another man, mistakenly accused of being Valjean, is put on trial for having broken parole. Valjean struggles with whether he should save the innocent man:

Why should I save his hide? Why should I right this wrong?

When I have come so far and struggled for so long?

If I speak, I am condemned. If I stay silent, I am damned!

I am the master of hundreds of workers, they all look to me

How can I abandon them, how can they live, if I am not free?

If I speak, I am condemned. If I stay silent, I am damned!

Who am I?

Can I condemn this man to slavery?

Pretend I do not see his agony?

This innocent who bears my face

Who goes to judgement in my place

Who am I?

Can I conceal myself for evermore?

Pretend I'm not the man I was before?

And must my name until I die be no more than an alibi?

Must I lie?

How can I ever face my fellow man?

How can I ever face myself again?

My soul belongs to God, I know

I made that bargain long ago

He gave me hope, when hope was gone

He gave me strength to journey on

Who am I?

I am Jean Valjean!

And so Javert, you see it's true,

That man bears no more guilt than you!

Who am I?

24601!

Valjean reveals himself to the court and is once again on the run. Valjean stops to see the dying Fantine, who had once worked at his factory and had subsequently resorted to prostitution to support her ailing daughter Cosette. As Fantine dies, Valjean promises her that he will take care of Cosette, despite his imminent threat of arrest. Javert catches up with Valjean and there is a confrontation, whereupon Javert is knocked out by the much stronger Valjean. In keeping with his promise to Fantine, Valjean goes to find Cosette who has been in the care of Thénardier, a currupt innkeeper and his cruel wife. He pays off Thénardier to obtain Cosette, and flees with her to Paris. Once in Paris, they find shelter in a convent.

Ten years later, as Cosette and Valjean are preparing to leave the convent, the French Revolution begins. Students, led by Enjolras, are preparing a revolution on the eve of the Paris uprising, following the death of General Lamarque, the only French leader who had sympathy towards the working class. They are also joined by the poor, including the young street urchin Gavroche. One of the students, Marius Pontmercy, who has become alienated from his family because of his liberal views, falls in love with Cosette. The Thénardiers, who have also moved to Paris, lead a gang of thieves to raid Valjean’s house while Marius is visiting. However, Thénardier’s daughter, Éponine, who is also in love with Marius, confronts her father and wards off the thieves. The following day, the students revolt and erect barricades in the narrow streets of Paris. Valjean, learning that Cosette's lover is fighting, joins them. Valjean's prayer for Marius:

God on high, hear my prayer

In my need you have always been there

He is young, he's afraid. Let him rest, heaven blessed.

Bring him home.

He's like the son I might have known

If God had granted me a son.

The summers die, one by one

How soon they fly, on and on

And I am old, and will be gone.

Bring him peace, bring him joy

He is young, he is only a boy

You can take, you can give

Let him be, let him live

If I die, let me die

Let him live

Bring him home.

Éponine also joins to protect Marius and ends up taking a bullet for him and dying in his arms. During the ensuing battle, Valjean saves Javert from being killed by the students and lets him go. Valjean carries off the injured Marius, but all others are killed. Valjean escapes through the sewers, carrying Marius on his shoulders. At the exit, he runs into Javert, whom he persuades to give him time to return Marius to his family. Javert grants his request, and then realizes that he is caught between his belief in the law and the mercy that Valjean has shown him and others. Unable to cope with this dilemma, Javert commits suicide by throwing himself into the Seine river:

Who is this man? What sort of devil is he?

To have me caught in a trap and choose to let me go free? ...

All it would take was a flick of his knife

Vengeance was his, and he gave me back my life! ...

How can I now allow this man to hold dominion over me?

This desperate man whom I have hunted

He gave me my life, he gave me freedom.

I should have perished by his hand! It was his right.

It was my right to die as well

Instead I live, but live in hell!

And my thoughts fly apart. Can this man be believed?

Shall his sins be forgiven? Shall his crimes be reprieved?

And must I now begin to doubt. Who never doubted all these years?

My heart is stone and still it trembles. The world I have known is lost in shadow.

Is he from heaven or from hell?  And does he know

That granting me my life today, this man has killed me even so? ...

Marius and Cosette are soon married. Valjean confesses to Marius that he is an ex-convict, and secures Marius' promise to not tell Cosette for fear of hurting her. Convinced that Valjean is of poor moral character, he steers Cosette away from him. Valjean loses the will to live and takes to his bed. Later, Marius learns the truth of Valjean's redeemed past and that it was he who had saved him. Marius and Cosette rush to Valjean's house, where he lies dying. Valjean makes his last confession to Cosette, and is welcomed into the afterlife by Fantine, Eponine, and a chorus of voices.

Valjean (to Cosette):

On this page, I write my last confession

Read it well, for I at last am sleeping

It's a story of those who always loved you

Your mother gave her life for you, then gave you to my keeping

Fantine:

Come with me

Where chains will never bind you

All your grief at last at last behind you

Lord in heaven, look down on him in mercy!

Valjean:

Forgive me all my trespasses, and take me to your glory

Fantine and Eponine:

Take my hand, and lead me to salvation

Take my love, for love is everlasting

And remember the truth that once was spoken

To love another person is to see the face of God!

 

I was in Washington DC recently for a couple of days on a business trip and made some time to meet up with an old friend while I was there. It was good catching up with him, but we also spent some time talking about a mutual friend of ours who we've become pretty concerned about. We've both been friends with him for over 10yrs and had come to know him as a faithful brother in Christ. He had once helped me get connected with his church and fellowship when I was new, had been on short-term missions trips in the past, and had always been a model to me of graciousness and prayerfulness. However, this friend of ours has recently abandoned his faith in Christ. Learning about this has been disheartening and bewildering to me at the same time. He is one of the smartest guys I know - the kind of person who sails through school without studying much, and one who achieves excellence in everything he puts his mind to. He has been exposed to many of the same preachers/teachers and has befriended many of the same friends as I have that have significantly shaped my walk with Christ. He is also one of the more gracious and generous people I know. Yet, he has turned his back on the God whom I have come to know and love with my whole life. His situation is complicated and he has reasons for his decision that I either can't get into or don't fully understand. However, there is one thing I do understand: no matter how rational we can be in our minds, or how much we have been equipped with good gifts and resources around us, our lives are guided by our hearts, and our hearts are deceitful and unknowable at their very core. Looking at my own heart, I'm reminded that my sin, by its very nature, is irrational and constantly seeks to justify itself in the face of reason. I'm convinced that no amount of knowledge, wisdom or good counsel can force a heart from turning. I can read the best books, listen to the most convicting sermons and surround myself with the most loving friends, and yet I still may choose to reject what I know is good and beautiful. The heart, once set in motion, cannot be bridled by our mortal efforts. In the end, I believe, it is a spiritual issue. Although I'm motivated now to be a better friend and to love and pray for him even more, I also rest in the knowledge that my friend's heart is ultimately in my loving saviour's hands. 

"Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life."

- Prov 4:23

 

 

With the growing commercialization of just about every season of the year, I've always tried to keep Christmas simple and meaningful, and the holiday shopping to a minimum (It might get harder though in the years to come as Benjiman gets older). Nevertheless, there are some customs that I don't mind keeping. I like getting gifts for children - the recipients who usually can't reciprocate the favour and who don't always show their appreciation. It reminds me of how God must see me as a recipient of his grace.

I also like to write Christmas cards. Every year Jeanie and I take time to reflect back on the year and share some thoughts with our family and friends around the world in a Christmas letter. Although it's always alot of work (we sent out around 70 this year), we enjoy spending the time to reflect, to go through our list of friends/family and think/pray for them. It's also a way for us to remember the grace of God in our lives - the truth that I believe in one way or another all of us want to hear - the story that brings light to all of our tired stories - that the Son of God became a son of man to enable us sons and daughters of men to become the sons and daughters of God.

May the grace of God who came to us in Christ Jesus continue to draw you close to Him. Merry Christmas!

I recently lost something that had me turning the whole house upside-down in search for it. I'd lost a set of office and house keys. I was obsessed with finding it, partly because they were important to me, and also because I knew that they were somewhere in the house - within eyesight and probably right under my nose (I had used them to enter the house and subsequently discovered they were missing while I was still at home). This in combination with my slightly neurotic personality had me going crazy for the past few days. I was on my hands and knees going through just about every nook and cranny in the house - inside closets and drawers, underneath furniture and carpets, in between the sofa cushions, inside coat and pant pockets, and all the garbage cans. I must have frisked myself a dozen times and spent as much time crawling around on the floor of the house as Coco our dog. I even interrogated my friends who had visited me earlier that day and asked that they frisk themselves (sorry Anna and Aaron). I had Jeanie rummage through the house with me and would've solicited Benjamin's help too if he was a little older and able to crawl better. I was hell-bent out of shape in my determination to find what I had lost.

In contrast to my self-determination, Jeanie in faith looked to God and prayed a simple short prayer for help in finding my keys. The thought had never crossed my mind - of petitioning God for something as trivial as this. I was reminded by Jeanie's prayer last night that Jesus once said that unless we become like children in our hearts, we will never find God.

This morning when I woke up, I had a strange prompting/impression on my mind to go downstairs to the basement and take a look. It was strange because I couldn't get the thought out of my head despite my belief that it was a highly improbable place to find the keys (I hadn't spend much time down there the day I'd lost them); and also because I had already searched that area numerous times. So just as I was about to leave the house for work this morning, I went down to the basement to take another look. I didn't see anything, so I went to grab my boots to go. And then I heard it ... jingle. It was coming out of Jeanie's boot that I had knocked when grabbing mine. I reached inside the boot and pulled it out, and there it was - my keys! I held them in my hand in amazement and wonder. They had now taken on a new sense of preciousness to me.

After celebrating with Jeanie, it occurred to us that there might be another perspective on which to view this whole incident. Could God have answered Jeanie's simple prayer to show us something about his heart? Could this be something like how God feels when he finds one of his lost sheep? When one of us prodigal sons/daughters finds the way home to our father's embrace? The gut-wrenching feelings of angst at the separation and the subsequent exhilaration at having found it - eclipsing all the prior angst and anxiety, became newly real to me. As Frederick Beuchner put it: What's lost is nothing to what's found, and all the death that ever was set next to life would scarcely fill a cup.

 

 

Having a child this year has made me see many things in life differently, one of which is time. It seems that not only do I have less of it, but time itself seems to be flying by so much faster now. Days, weeks and months are whizzing by me in a blurr. And I feel like an old man constantly wondering where all the years have gone.

Benjamin is 9 months old now, and he's very good at making his presence known. It seems like only yesterday when it was just Jeanie and I lounging on the sofa in front of the tv. Now, things are very different. A small hand reaches up and smacks me in the face - it is Benjamin, reminding me that he is here. I look at him in amazement at how much he's grown. "How time flies" I say to myself, as I remember the time when I was close to Benjamin's age sitting with my own father at home - reaching for him and calling out for his attention.

It sounds cliche, but I firmly believe it now - life is precious. Our time together is precious.

Something I used to say when I was bored was "I've gotta go and kill some time." Now I cringe at the phrase. Even in the midst of my daily 2 hour commute from work when nothing good is playing on the radio, I resist the thought of "killing time". Time is all I have, and when I "kill time", in a sense, it's my own life that I'm killing. I suspect that I'm most alive when, instead of "killing time", I take time - when in the midst of my busyness in trying to do things, I pause, and take the time to hear and see the person that's calling for my attention - to let myself be, and notice the gift of the world around me, even if it's only the sight of cars cutting me off on the highway or the sound of rain falling on my windshield - and just listen. All moments are precious - my time at home with Jeanie and Benjamin, as well as the time trying to get home by myself in the rain.

One life is all that I get. Lord give me the heart to live it as fully and bravely and beautifully as I can.

Defeat

"That night Jacob got up and took his two wives, his two maidservants and his eleven sons and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. After he had sent them across the stream, he sent over all his possessions. So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak. When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob's hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man. Then the man said, "Let me go, for it is daybreak."  But Jacob replied, "I will not let you go unless you bless me."  The man asked him, "What is your name?"  "Jacob," he answered. Then the man said, "Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with men and have overcome."  Jacob said, "Please tell me your name." But he replied, "Why do you ask my name?" Then he blessed him there.  So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, "It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared."  The sun rose above him as he passed Peniel, and he was limping because of his hip." - Genesis 32:22-31

And then it happens. Out of the deep of the night a stranger leaps. He hurls himself at Jacob, and they fall to the ground, their bodies lashing through the darkness. It is terrible enough not to see the attacker's face, and his strength is more terrible still, the strength of more than a man. All the night through they struggle in silence until just before morning, when it looks as though a miracle might happen. Jacob is winning. The stranger cries out to be set free before the sun rises. Then, suddenly, all is reversed.

He merely touches the hollow of Jacob's thigh, and in a moment Jacob is lying there crippled and helpless. The sense we have, which Jacob must have had, that the whole battle was from the beginning fated to end this way, that the stranger had simply held back until now, letting Jacob exert all his strength and almost win so that when he was defeated, he would know that he was truly defeated; so that he would know that not all the shrewdness, will, brute force that he could muster were enough to get this. Jacob will not release his grip, only now it is the grip not of violence but of need, like the grip of a drowning man.

The darkness has faded just enough so that for the first time he can dimly see his opponent's face. And what he sees is something more terrible than the face of death - the face of love. It is vast and strong, half-ruined with suffering and fierce with joy, the face a man flees down all the darkness of his days until at last he cries out, "I will not let you go, unless you bless me!" Not a blessing that he can have now by the strength of his cunning or the force of his will, but a blessing the he can have only as a gift.

Power, success, happiness, as the world knows them, are his who will fight for them hard enough; but peace, love, joy are only from God. And God is the enemy whom Jacob fought there by the river, of course, and whom in one way or another we all of us fight - God, the beloved enemy. Our enemy because, before giving us everything, he demands of us everything; before giving us life, he demands our lives - our selves, our wills, our treasure.

Will we give them, you and I? I do not know. Only remember the last glimpse we have of Jacob, limping home against the great conflagration of the dawn. Remember Jesus of Nazareth, staggering on broken feet out of the tomb toward the resurrection, bearing on his body the proud insignia of the defeat that is victory, the magnificent defeat of the human soul at the hands of God.

- Frederick Buechner