How our we suppose to remember?

One of the books I am reading by Mirslov Volf makes a profound statement and that is as people, and especially Westerners have a habit of remembering wrongs and making them out to be bigger than what they are. The author also notices that we also like to build memorials to how we were wronged. Whether it is something on a national, community or on personal level, we tend to erect things to help us remember and hold on to bitterness, anger and even helps us to plan out revenge. I think this leads to several dangerous habits and character issues.

The first character issue is that our remembering often makes the situation bigger or smaller than what it really is. How often to we accuse people of doing this and turning mole hills into mountains. One of the things that helps distort this reality is time. As we get farther from the event, our memory tends to get a little fuzzy and we make things out to be better or worse than what they really are. So do we just stop trusting our memories, or recall them with self awareness and integrity to the best of our ability.

The second character issue that could come up is when recalling memories, we often make ourselves one of three things. We either become the vilian, hero, or victim. Each one of these has serious issues when taken to the extreme, but more often than not, we tend to live in the victim or hero mindset. The victim mindset is that we have been wronged and we need to seek revenge. Another aspect of playing the victim card is that we have done nothing to provoke what was done to us, or if we did do something, the retaliation done to us for what we did was out of bounds. It would be like I taking your piece of chocolate and then you giving me a black eye. The victim mind set often makes us better than what we really are. If we play the hero, we tend to come in and either fix problems or try and fix everything and it actually makes things worse. This mind set thinks that we need to be in everyone’s business and that they need us. This is known as a Savior complex and it is not healthy or Godly.

The third character issue that I see is when we start building those memorials for how we were wronged, it can hinder the forgiveness and healing process. It is not that I am against such things as the Pearl Harbor Memorial or things like that, but when we build those type of memorials, it often turns into a us versus them mentality. Doing this can help us hold on to our hurts and hangups without moving on towards forgiveness. It gives us a reason to hold on to bitterness, hatred and it allows us to stay in the past without moving on. Completely forgetting these events is not healthy either. Making events smaller than what they are or forgetting abut them are just as dangerous as making mountains into mole hills because those events will not go away buy themselves and will often lead to some form of addiction or unhealthy attatchment. Here is a side note, time does not heal all wounds, only Jesus can do that. When we experience these things, we can heal, but we wont be the same. We can either wallow in our misery, or find ways where we can put things into their proper context and learn how to take responsibility for and seek forgiveness and give grace and forgiveness to those who both deserve and don’t deserve it in our eyes because thats what Jesus does for us?

Whats in a Gift?

For those of you who are fans of the television show The Big Theory, you know that the character Sheldon Cooper is a genius with zero social skills.  The show plays up this fact in the interactions with his friends and coworkers on the show.  One episode he was blackmailed into throwing giving his roommate Leonard a surprise birthday party.  As he was contemplating what to get Leonard, he was perplexed, because the nicer the gift he would give, it would be expected that Lenard would give the equivalent price gift on a later date.  So this got me thinking, what’s a gift?  I have a gut feeling that most of us give gifts with strings attached, whether we realize it or not.  We give a gift in hoping to get something done for us in return on a later date.  Or, we use it to repay someone who has done something nice for us. 

            One of the books I have been reading by Miroslav Volf in his book Free of Charge.  Through out the book, Volf makes the argument that when we give gifts with strings attached; at best we are coming across as self absorbent people who only give gifts to get something.  These type of people tend to run people over to get what they want.  The only way they do something, is if it benefits them.  If we go to the other extreme, we are thieves, stealing what does not truly belong to us.   Our motives in giving our time, money, giftings isn’t to benefit the other person, but it is for self gain.  The only reason we give these gifts is to make ourselves look better and because we are greedy.  The other persons benefit becomes secondary to what we want or what our perceived needs are, or how it can benefit us in some way.  The benefits could be money, promotions, to cast shame on a not so delightful coworker or family member. 

            So the final question is, what is a gift and how is one suppose to give and receive one.  I know this is easier said than done, but I think the first item we need to consider is what is our motivation for giving the gift?  Is our motivation for self promotion, or scratching their back, so our back can get scratched at a later time.  Gift giving with strings attached will always s eventually lead to bad consequences. It is buying the spouse flowers so we can get out of a predicament later.  The second idea, does this gift build the other person up, or bring them down.  Does the gift help them with their relationship with God or does it take it away from God.  The third thing, is that giving good gifts and grace is the same thing.  Both gifts and grace is something that is given that the receiver does not achieve through works, but is based on the character of the one who gives those things.  God is the giver of all good and perfect gifts, and its not what we have done to earn those things, but it is who He is.  We can never earn God’s love, but He gives it because He wants to be in right relationship with us.  Now this love has boundaries for our own protection and even boundaries are a gift.  The net time you give a give a gift, is it with strings attached, or is it for the betterment of the other person and to see them grow and mature..  The gifts with no stings attached are the best gifts to give and to receive, but also the hardest to give and to receive.  Because we get nothing in return and we did nothing to earn that gift.