13 Critical Professional Competencies to Learn in your Twenties

Now that I'm safely out of my 20s and rockin' the world of a 30-year-old professional, I feel like I can make a list like this. It's based purely on my own experience and talking to friends. Some I think I did reasonably well at, some took me all 10 years to learn, and others I'm still working on.  What other things would you add to this list?

1. How to Strive for Excellence
You won't turn in an A+ effort on every project, but when it's time to, you should be able to. Learn how to focus in on something and turn in results that are far beyond the bare minimum and you'll gain the respect of your coworkers and supervisors. We all know people who are famous for doing the minimum necessary. Don't be that person.

2. How to Dress for the Occasion
This skill goes for the office just as much as for your personal life. Your twenties is the time when you can start slowly putting away all those t-shirts and let yourself be seen out in public casually in collared shirts. Your wardrobe should be ready for anything from a formal dinner to a night out, and you need to know social dress code cues. In the office, don't be afraid to dress a notch nicer than your peers. It'll set you apart.

3. How to Write Well When You Need To
When you're texting your friends, use whatever grammar you like. But when you need to, you'd better be able to compose a well-thought-out email or letter with impeccable grammar and spelling. This helps people take you seriously.

4. How to Teach Yourself a New Skill
No matter what job you find yourself in, you're doing to be asked to do something that you don't know how to do. Rather than sitting back and waiting for someone to show you how, go out and gain the knowledge yourself. Today with the Internet and YouTube, you can teach yourself to do just about anything imaginable if you're dedicated to it.

5. How to Follow Even When You Disagree
Everybody falls somewhere in a chain of authority, whether you're looking at your boss or thinking about a legal structure. And everyone regularly has the opportunity to obey a supervisor's instruction that they dislike or comply with a policy or law with which they disagree. There are times for speaking out, and there are times for putting your head down and getting done what you're asked to do without question.

6. How to Get the Most out of Excel
Excel is the under-appreciated workhorse of offices worldwide. It's the program that is approachable to just about anyone on a very rudimentary level, but can stretch to handle unbelievable complex systems and functions. If you're a pro at Excel, not only will you be able to do things your coworkers only dream of, but you'll be able to manage your household finances successfully.



7. How to Manage Your Schedule Effectively
We all have that friend or coworker who always seems to double-book themselves or forget about meetings. Having and keeping a calendar is mandatory. Smartphones and online calendars make it ridiculously easy to manage your own calendar and even share it with your spouse or family. Everything goes in there. For bonus points, schedule your own time too - looking ahead even one week to think about what you'll want to accomplish will make you far more productive and effective and give you more time to relax fully, knowing you aren't forgetting things.

8. How to Organize Your Work Systems
Be known as the coworker who never lets things slip through the cracks. Be knowledgeable of your own systems and how they work. Everybody's is different, but everybody needs to have some kind of system for at least their to-do list and for their email. Don't lose emails without taking care of them, and don't miss deadlines because you forgot about a project.

9. How to Take Ownership of a Project
Unless you forever want to be a peon in the workplace, learn how to take a task or project over. Supervisors are always looking for people who can be trusted to take care of something fully without needing to be micromanaged. Be able to take something from concept to completion without excess supervision.

10. How to Build Your Margins
On a piece of notebook paper, the margins give you space if your word goes a little longer than you planned. In your life, margins work the same way. Don't schedule yourself down to the minute unless you want to be perpetually late. Allow extra time for unexpected things. The same goes for managing your capacity - don't run yourself to exhaustion every day or forever try to do an inhuman amount. Just like living without savings for emergencies, if you don't have margins, even small unexpected things can completely derail you.

11. How to Focus on Other People
The art of conversation and networking is all about focusing on the other person. Strive to talk about yourself as little as possible and ask good questions. You'll find yourself the center of attention and the leader in the room without even trying.

12. Know Your Mentors
It takes a village to raise a child, but this doesn't end when you hit 18. We all need mentoring relationships until the end of our lives, and they go in all 3 directions: up, out, and down. Find people who can teach you things, find peers who can journey along with you, and find people you can pour into. There may be professional, spiritual, intellectual, or other types of mentoring relationships.

13. How to Prioritize
Life is really just a series of decisions about priorities. Anything along the lines of "I don't have time" is simply a cover for "It's not a priority for me right now." Know your big-picture priorities, how to prioritize projects, and then know how to be honest about them with people.

What Star Wars May Have to Teach Us about Terrorism

I re-watched Return of the Jedi last night in preparation for the upcoming release of The Force Awakens.  The original trilogy was George Lucas' masterpiece of analyzing the relationship of good and evil, giving a valuable statement to the world as great art does.

"Anger, fear, aggression - the dark side of the Force are they.  Easily they flow, quick to join you in a fight.  If once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny, consume you it will." - Yoda's dying words to Luke

Could Yoda have something to say to us about our world today?  Somewhere after World War I the world began to change, from a place where nations warred against nations to a place where ideas warred against ideas.  We like to portray it as good versus evil, and while this is a generalization and "all generalizations are dangerous" (Alexandre Dumas), how does good overcome evil?  Good becoming evil in the process of trying to overcome evil is one of the oldest literary themes.

"He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become a monster.  And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee." - Friedrich Nietzsche

Daesh (ISIL), al Qaeda, Boko Haram - these types of forces in the world feed not from a religion, but from hatred.  It's what they breathe and live on.  It's what they seek to instill.  Whether it's hatred of other Muslims or hatred of Westerners or hatred of Christians, it's an extremist viewpoint that ultimately seeks the destruction of the world, of unifying the world by purging everyone who is different.

"The hate is swelling in you now.  Take your Jedi weapon.  Use it.  I am unarmed.  Strike me down with it.  Give in to your anger.  With each passing moment you make yourself more my servant." - The Emperor, goading Luke

The answer to terrorism (I dislike this word but it's the most convenient at the moment) may be quite a bit more counter-intuitive than we think.  What if going to war is exactly what the enemy wants?  After all, Daesh's taunting social media videos sound a lot like the Emperor's taunting Luke when you think about it.  If your enemy keeps trying to get you to do something, there's a good chance you shouldn't do it, even if you don't quite know why yet.

Terrorism breeds on hatred, so what if the answer to terrorism is to stop the hate?  We know by now that killing terrorists and bombing their forces doesn't stop them because it doesn't do anything about the hate.  Killing bin Laden didn't destroy al Qaeda any more than killing the Emperor didn't destroy the Empire or the Dark Side (taking a guess at the upcoming plot of the new Star Wars release).  More pupils will always rise to take their places in evil as long as there is hatred to build on.

There's another source of terrorists, other than hatred, that we've also known about for a long time.  It's poverty.  Just like we knew in the Cold War that poverty breeds communism, now we know that poverty also breeds terrorism, even if only because it's a paying job that purports to give dignity and a purpose to those who have none of the three.

"A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger." - Proverbs 15:1

Perhaps our fearful, angry responses leading to xenophobia, intolerance, and hatred are exactly what the enemy is trying to produce in us.  What if those responses are actually fueling our enemy?  What then?  If that's the case, our response should be as exactly opposite as possible.

Could it be that the best response is to welcome the refugee and overwhelm them with our love and compassion?  Could it be that the answer to devastated and conflicted states isn't an army of soldiers but an army of doctors and civil servants?  What if, rather than "nation building" at gunpoint, we practiced "nation building" with a flood of diplomats and engineers?

"Do not repay anyone evil for evil.  Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everyone. If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.  Do not take revenge, my dear friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: 'It is mine to avenge; I will repay,' says the Lord. On the contrary: 'If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink.  In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.'  Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good." - Romans 12:17-21

I don't have all the answers to complex political and global current events.  They require a nuanced view from professionals who study the issues.  But I know that we've rarely tried to overcome evil with good, and rarely responded to hatred with love.  I wonder if doing so might be how the world can defeat the hatred and poverty that lead to evil, rather than forever being doomed to striking back each time evil pops up.

When we praise God....

Have you ever noticed that people tend to throw out the phrase "Praise God" pretty regularly?  It's often a sigh of relief when they hear some good news from somebody, or an exclamation at the end of a story about how something really great happened to them.  It's the everyday-life version of the sports superstar pointing to heaven after doing something amazing, as if to minimize all the hard work and involvement he or she had in it.

We use it in big things as well as in small things: "My spouse got a job finally, praise God!" or "I found a parking spot, praise God!"  I'll be the first to say that God cares about the little things every bit as much as he cares about the big things, but I'm a bit troubled by this phrase.  Not, of course, because I don't think God deserves credit for doing good things.  It's more because I think we're shortchanging God when we do it.

Our praise of God shouldn't have any connection to things that happen to us.  If we claim to love God and worship Him, then He is the Lord over every moment of our lives, regardless of what we're doing.  So we should be praising Him whether we are celebrating a good thing or sitting and watching TV.  We should be praising Him whether we're in church or peeling potatoes.  Our acknowledgement of God's involvement in our lives is completely independent of our circumstances.

But there's something even a bit more sinister at play when we throw out a "Praise God" or a "Thank God" after good news.  If we praise God for good things that happen, then by implication we're not praising Him for things that we perceive as bad.  When a friend has been struggling through unemployment for months and finally gets a job, we act as though God finally came through, when He never stopped being involved.

God isn't a god who only gives us things that are "good."  He hasn't failed when things don't turn out nicely.  We aren't meant to struggle through the hard times and party when times are good.  We're meant to seek God in all things, praise Him in all times, and press onward steadily whether we feel like it or not.  It's better to take the bad with the good than to ride the roller coaster of success and failure.  It's better to tread onward than to alternate sprints and falls.

There's nothing wrong than saying "Praise God" when good things happen.  But if we can't say it when bad things happen, then we're subtly missing what God is looking for in praise.

Parenthood, From a Non-Parent

Yeah, I'm not a dad.  I've been married a little shy of 4 years, but we don't have any kids yet.  It's been a pretty intentional decision on our part, for a variety of reasons.  We've both got interesting and exciting careers.  We've got a thriving life together full of friends, hobbies, travel, and family.  And it's also, unfortunately, a subject around which we both feel some negative emotions.

Part of the reason why I feel negative emotions when I think about having kids, and it's something that my wife and I have discussed in depth, is that I feel a stigma around kids when I'm around some families with children.  Our American culture kind of revolves around kids, and they have a script for young families like us.

The script started with dating.  You were supposed to plan a kind of extravagant engagement, then a really special wedding.  Then you were supposed to get a pet and buy a house.  Then you are supposed to get pregnant, and plan a unique and exciting gender reveal.  Next you decorate a cuter baby nursery in your house than any of your friends. Then you have the kid, give it a creative name that not many other kids have, and start posting monthly pictures on Facebook.  Starting with the first birthday, each birthday party needs to be more extravagant and memorable than the last.  Repeat the kid thing, then fast forward 18 years.

For one thing, my wife and I kind of feel out of touch with that script.  Sure, we've walked part of that road already.  We had a wonderful engagement, but it was kind of a private affair for us, our families, and her friends.  We loved our wedding, because it strongly reflected our values and who we are (but a lot of our guests may have found it weird).  We are total dog people and we love our house.  It's the next steps that have us really uncomfortable, though.  I totally get parents who walk it - you're super proud of your kid, love them like there's no tomorrow, and want everyone to know it.  It can just have something of a negative impact on people with different values.

For years, we've both heard enough stories of extreme themed birthday parties to make us poke our eyes out.  We've been barraged with the "Just wait until you have kids" and "I remember when we used to have free time" and "I haven't slept in months" and "You don't understand because you don't have kids" until we feel unworthy to stand next to parents and wonder if we actually do want to have kids.  Perhaps it's our basic human need to feel like we're better than others that can cause us to make our lives sound super tough, but sometimes it seems like parents want to make it sound unappealing.  I've even heard parents who had challenging kids disparage parents whose kids slept through the night and didn't have colic, as if they did something wrong!

If you've seen this movie you know why it's relevant here.

Look, it's not that I think kids are some kind of annoying distraction from life.  I certainly don't intend to neglect my family or become a workaholic.  That's selfish.  Parenthood has a lot to do with making sacrifices for your kids, and I doubt that many parents regret any of it.  We have some wonderful friends who have a great attitude toward parenting and are inspirational to us.  I'm just not sure that some of our American kid culture doesn't contain a few too many elements of vain parental boasting in front of our peers.  Parents who can't afford or don't want to rent a bounce house, a snow-cone machine, and a band for their 3-year old's birthday party aren't any less parents than those who can.  Parents who can't afford or don't want to stay home and enroll their kids in 4 sports each aren't less capable than those who do.  How much you do or don't do for your kids doesn't necessarily make you a better or worse parent.  I figure it's got to be more about the values you pass on and the love that you show.

It's also not that I think I've got a better recipe to parenthood than all the current parents out there.  It's exactly the opposite, in fact.  I have no clue how to be a parent, and I feel that acutely from all the stinging comments about how I am clueless.  I have great respect for those who are out there doing it 24/7.  Someday I'll be there and I'll be figuring it out on the fly, too.  It's just that when non-parents like myself hear all about how being a parent is the hardest thing ever and look at this perfect hand-painted Mickey over all my brand new furniture, it doesn't really make us look forward to it.  Facebook allows us to share these little windows on our lives that give an incomplete picture.

Katie and I will have kids some day, I'm sure.  And I have no doubt that we'll get a little over-sharey with a picture or two of them on Facebook, and adjusting to a new rhythm of life will be challenging.  But what if we don't decorate a baby room?  What if our kid's first birthday consists of us and our family over with a cake?  What if our lives continue to be about ministering to people, building community, and serving the ministries we love, but with the addition of a child?  We'd like to bring a child into our world so that they learn our values and vision, not go into the child's world and use them to show off to our friends.  We're not so sure that we want our kids growing up in a family where they are the Center of All Things.

Can we please, for the sake of young married couples like myself, stop making parenthood seem daunting and unappealing?  Can we get a little less advice, a little less peer pressure, and just be part of your lives along with your kids?

But then again, what do I know?  I'm not a parent yet.

Where Does It Go?

Anyone can be disturbed by the state of America.  Most people are dismayed at the gridlock and ineffectiveness of government.  Everyone except the donors and the recipients are outraged at the outsize effect of money on the political system.  The military and intelligence forces seem to alternate between spying, torture, and civilian drone casualties.  Corporate greed seems to be unchanged by the recent Great Recession.  Every time someone is killed by the police, mass riots get larger and more violent, whether or not the police were justified in their work.  The socially conservative among us also aren't shy about pointing out the continual slide of morality in the nation.

Democracy and capitalism have a great deal of upsides to them.  Democracy, at least theoretically, gives the people a voice and establishes numerous checks and balances against abuses of power.  Capitalism allows for the accumulation of wealth unlike any other system and encourages competition, innovation, and rewards success.  However, the systems themselves, if unchecked, can have harmful consequences.  They both need to be held tight within a society that values the good of all rather than self-interest, the doing of what is right rather than what is expedient, and the respecting of minority voice rather than the unlimited rule of the majority.

It's not hard to see the rise of the "protest" age of America.  Everyone has something to protest - for/against gay rights, the potential abuses of police power, corruption in government, and so forth.  Our incredible connectedness makes this possible, and our tendency toward argument and anger makes it increasingly vitriolic.  Whether our indignation is aroused by the idiocy of some store clerk or a government action we disagree with, we're all-too-ready to fight back in some way.  Some level of this is valuable - without standing up for something and against something else, we'll never move forward, and that store clerk will never improve.  Taken to the extreme, however, we continually see riots in the street.

The world is moving toward revolution.  The Arab Spring may have only been a precursor to a larger worldwide movement.  However, whereas the popular uprisings in these Middle Eastern and African nations were largely unsuccessful, the next round may be successful.  Many people in democracies feel increasingly fed up with their governments.  Some people believe that people in governments that tend toward censorship, such as China, North Korea, Turkey, and others are on the road toward revolution as well.  Can these governments continue to hold power by controlling the media?  Can democracies survive the increasingly bitter divisions within their populations?

Thinking specifically of the United States, it seems to me that the nation is approaching a crossroads.  Either the political system will have to unite behind a charismatic statesman (as sometimes happens in wartime as well), or the increasingly divided people could eventually come to the need of revolution.  I also wonder what other system of government would be effective other than democracy.  Sometimes I'm fascinated by the thought of an open-source experiment in constitution-making.  If the people of the United States were, through some massive online process, to write a new constitution, what would it look like?

We can't underestimate the significance of the Internet for democracy and capitalism.  I think it's possible that we'll look back in 50 years and see that the advent of the Internet was the force that created a new system of government.  On one hand, Internet makes it possible to reduce the distance between the government and the people in the representative system, but the founders of our republican democratic system were wise to create the distance because there's no way that the entire citizenry could be informed enough or wise enough to vote on everything.  We need to ask the question, however, whether our elected representatives are informed enough or wise enough.

Taken as a whole, the democratic system largely invented in the 1780s for the fledgling new United States of America has not evolved significantly in the past three hundred years.  It's worth asking whether the accelerating pace of human and technological development necessitates some substantial new evolutions in democracy.  For example, what if the lower house of the bicameral system were abolished in favor of a new method of frequent referendums and voting by all people?  I'm no political scientist, but it'd be interesting to see such conversations play out.

The people are starting to stir for something.  Why do people riot?  Because they feel unheard any other way.  The Occupy movement wanted to bring a change, but it wasn't entirely clear what change they wanted.  Both are changing the conversation, however.  The upcoming Presidential election is very interesting - we're developing into a three-party state (Democratic, Republican, and Tea Party) which I'm actually not entirely opposed to.  A viable third party could be a very interesting addition to our governmental system.  Regardless, the two most "interesting" candidates right now, and two of the most rapidly-ascending, are Trump and Sanders, who also happen to perhaps be the most "extreme" in either direction.  What are the people saying?  Where are we as a nation going?

Confession of a Messed-Up Christian

Different people have different things they are good at.  Some people are great at seeing the big picture, others better at figuring out the details.  Some people start things but never finish them, and others can't come up with any new ideas but can make somebody else's work beautifully.  Me?  I'm good at asking questions that I can't figure out the answer to.  I see things as if from outside them, ask an impossible question, and then I'm messed up completely.

Take all the international trips I've taken, for example.  I grew up thinking in terms of mission trips.  You travel, share the Gospel, help build a house, and then return home changed by the experience.  It was powerful, and fun, and I don't regret a single trip.  But I started to get confused.  What makes a trip a mission trip?  I was exposed to many of the questions around short-term mission trips, and realized I agreed with them.  I couldn't figure out what it would mean to be a "missionary" or go on a "mission trip."  It was, at once, a category both too broad and too narrow.  I ceased going on mission trips, though I never stopped traveling with ministries.  I have volunteered several times overseas now, as a construction volunteer, a volunteer leader, a business volunteer, and so forth.  My wife and I are traveling again this summer to visit friends and family in two ministries and encourage people.

A similar sort of thing is happening with the so-called "Christian" life at home.  I used to have a clear conception of what a Christian life was.  I used to raise my hands in church, I used to have regular quiet times with my Bible, I used to be in small groups.  But somewhere along the way, I think I lost track of what these things meant.  They became facets of the life I was supposed to be living, kind of like how when you propose you're supposed to have a super-creative idea and post it on YouTube, or when you announce your pregnancy you're supposed to one-up the last couple that did it.  These were just things that you were supposed to do as a Christian.

Somehow along the way, I just kind of stopped doing most of these things.  Even though my wife is the music leader at our church, I'm more often found building a relationship in the back or serving in some little way that needed doing.  Especially since getting married, I've just never quite found out when you're supposed to do a 45-minute quiet time every day.  I don't think I've been in a small group Bible study since 2011.  I discovered that I really feel at home in life when I'm spending my evenings with my hands in the dirt in the backyard or running my miter saw in the garage.  Between hosting people in our home, enjoying life as a married couple, working on our house, and trying to get at least one really good international trip in per year, it's amazing how regularly my wife and I look at each other and just sigh, "Our life is so awesome."  We're busier than ever, but just loving all the things we're involved in.

In the midst of it all, I've discovered some different rhythms of life.  My mind is constantly on the weather, how long it's been since I watered our flowers, how the sun is going to move with the seasons and affect our growing, and so forth.  My budgeting seems to look more like finding out just how much money we can give away, and using our money in the most valuable ways, rather than saving it for later.  I can't shake thoughts of how it's just been way too long since we had such-and-such over for dinner, and rather than picking up the latest inspirational Christian book, I battle to make time to read classics of literature.  I quit listening to Christian rock radio and opt instead for classical music (I get super excited when one of my favorites comes on).  I go out of my way to build relationships with neighbors and constantly think of how my wife and I could minister to them.

I often wonder if I'm in a bad place spiritually.  I wonder if God gets angry with me for never finishing that inductive study of Isaiah, or if I've just forgotten Him in a life that is far too busy.  Then I go back to that really awful skill that I have of asking ridiculous questions.  Why is our definition of a Christian life patterned like this?  Who says church is supposed to look like this?  What did a Christian life look like through the ages, during times when Bibles weren't readily available or church was something you did in your home a few times a week with your closest friends rather than on Sundays?

My faith and Christian life is a bit unusual, but whose isn't?  The hallmarks of mine include such unusual things as having my phone interrupt me at regular liturgical hours of prayer (and usually angrily dismissing God's interruption of my busy plans, then feeling bad about it later).  I found a few devotional books that I really like and I read them over and over again.  I work at a Christian ministry and it makes some people happy to call me a missionary, but I'm pretty sure I'm just an operations director.  Some people probably look at me and say, "You don't have good small group and quiet time habits now, what are you going to do when you have kids?"  Answer: probably still not be in a normal small group or do a daily quiet time.  It's been a long and ongoing process to remind myself that this actually doesn't make God angry with me.

I ask these sorts of questions and tend to deconstruct things until there isn't much left.  I'm not very good at putting it all back together into something coherent, so I usually end up just living a life that is inexplicable to others around me.  I can rarely defend my sometimes self-contradictory viewpoints, or formulate a good alternative to what I'd like things to look like if I don't like the way they are now.  I have, however, regularly been able to find things in life that I thoroughly enjoy, and I've regularly been able to build deep relationships with people around me (Christian and not).

One thing I think I have put together, however: I don't think God scripted out a "Christian life."  It looks to me like He created a bunch of unique people and called them to be Christians.  As somebody said, "Christian" makes a great noun but a terrible adjective.  Living my life as a Christian rather than trying to live a Christian life has been a challenging and confusing journey, but one that I'm enjoying traveling.  I'll let you know someday if I figure out the answers, but don't hold your breath - that's not something I'm good at.  I'll be happy to ask unusual and impossible questions with you, however.  Give me a call anytime.

Good Guys Wear White, And So Do Bad Guys

Last month, I was deeply troubled by the report that the CIA tortured prisoners during the decade since the 9/11/11 attacks on the United States.  I can't say I was surprised, but I was troubled.  Primarily so, I think, because although they admitted that some practices may have been illegal, the primary defense from the top was that it was fair because it led to the capture of top Al-Qaeda leaders.  Since when was "the ends justify the means" a valid moral argument?  If this is becoming a valid and acceptable moral argument, then we as a people are in deep trouble.

Of course, the argument isn't a new one.  After all, our own United States joined the group of nations who have used weapons of mass destruction against civilians when they killed between 129,000 and 246,000 people in the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.  Of course, the primary argument was to end the war sooner.  This may have been true, but does it justify the bombs?  Regardless of the outcome, an enormous number of noncombatants, including of course women and children, were killed and maimed.  I have a fundamental problem with the argument that the ends justify the means.  If the process of getting to a goal is tainted, is not the goal tainted as well?

Integrity is a notion that can't be overstated.  We think of integrity in terms of doing the right thing, but the base meaning of the word has to do with consistency and a whole mass working together as a whole.  Integrity means that the outer shell of a spacecraft doesn't have the smallest seam in it.  It means that the prison doesn't have a single unlocked door.  And it means that all of the actions taken to get to a goal are just as praiseworthy as the goal.  The ends do not justify the means.  First, because we never know the exact ramifications of our actions - what if no good comes of our evil means?  Then we're stuck with evil.  Second, because just how evil are we allowed to be in pursuing a good?  Who is to judge at what point the good outweighs the evil?  Third, because it's probably more accurate to think of life as a constant journey, not as a series of ends...where do you draw the lines between means and ends?

It didn't terribly surprise me that there was a lack of morality in the decision to torture prisoners.  It's a common misquote that "America is good because she is great, and if she ever ceased to be good, she would cease to be great" (Tocqueville is claimed as the author, but he did not write it).  Nevertheless, I think it's telling that the quote continues to be so prevalent.  People want the USA to be a "good" and upright nation.  They want to look to America as a bastion of freedom, liberty, and good morals.  Unfortunately, they're looking in the wrong place.  Please don't immediately assume that this is an America-bashing post - that isn't the point.  If you don't believe me, read to the bottom.

America isn't exactly the standard-bearer for the ethical high road.  While the point of this post isn't to accuse the USA of all sorts of moral failings, it requires a great deal of amnesia to ignore them.  Here in Texas we can't forget 1846, when American troops forcefully claimed a disputed territory with Mexico after the Mexican government refused to sell it.  After claiming that the Mexican army had attacked them on American soil, a declaration of war allowed American troops to invade and capture all the way to Mexico City.  Of course, we also can't forget how in 1776 we declared that "all men are created equal" and eleven years later declared that black people only counted as three-fifths of a person.  It took us 21 years to ban the slave trade, 78 years to officially end the practice of slavery, and 133 years for women to get the right to vote.

Today, we still have 122 inmates at the Guantanamo Bay prison, of which 46 are slated to be detained indefinitely because they are dangerous but there isn't enough evidence to bring them to trial.  Clearly, habeas corpus only applies within the United States.  The USA also provides unconditional support to Israel, despite their continued apartheid against the Palestinian people (opinion), possible illegal occupation and settlement, and possible war crimes.  This support angers nations worldwide that either support Palestinian statehood or are more impartial.  Americans have long been active in meddling in foreign affairs, to questionable moral standing.  Politifact analyzed 20 instances within 30 years of American military intervention and found that 3 clearly qualified as invasions because ground troops entered another country without international backing.  The number of apparent CIA attempted assassination attempts has been claimed to be as high as 50, and a number of them are public record.  Of course, we also know today that the government spies on its own citizens and even those of friendly nations.

It's beneficial for many to claim that the United States is either a "Christian nation" or that it was founded on "Christian values."  If these values included the forceful taking of land from the native inhabitants in the name of God, then I suppose that could be true.  After all, we're still taking and consuming everything in our paths today, but it's for ourselves rather than for God or destiny (quote).  We were founded not as a Christian nation, but as a nation of religious freedom.  However, it's helpful for Christians who are waging a culture war to claim a central place in American society, and it's helpful for political figures to claim that they are fighting to restore America to a Christian, moral place.

These arguments, however, are not only based in fiction, they are troubling.  Equating America with Christian values would mean that the rest of the world would view American actions as Christian, from those listed above to media lewdness.  Furthermore, waging a culture war to claim America as a Christian nation is a fundamental misunderstanding of our place in society as Christians.  One of Martin Luther's less-known doctrines, but one that apparently underlay his entire theological structure, is that of two kingdoms.  He argued that we are simultaneously citizens of two kingdoms, which he called the "right hand" and the "left hand."  In the left, it's a realm of active righteousness (doing good through works), government, law, and society.  In the right, it's a realm of passive righteousness (being good through grace), spirituality, and worship.

How do these three items fit
together, again?

We live in both of these realms at once.  As an author blogged recently, "Why on Earth would a Christian at any moment of history expect anything other than difficulty at combining faith and citizenship?"  Our role has never been to live in perfect harmony with society, and to expect that is to misunderstand the Bible.  I've always taken great meaning from the role of God's faithful in exile as Jeremiah exhorted - seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which God has sent us.  Not to consume or copy society, but also not to uselessly condemn and critique it.  Cultivate it, just like God originally commanded us in Genesis 1 (Andy Crouch).

My objective in working through this post, where I consider American moral failures, is to make the case that our proper citizenship is to stand with one foot on both sides.  It's not unusual for people to accuse me of being un-patriotic, but I'd like to think it's because I only have one foot in American citizenship.  My other foot is in God's kingdom.  From that perspective, I have no qualms about criticizing the actions and attitudes of my own nation.  America is not a Christian nation, it is a nation.  There's no doubt that she has done an enormous amount of good in the world, and that she has often stood for the right things.  There's also no doubt that she has often messed up big time.

When it comes to my citizenship in America, I choose to fight for and support the nation even though I often have sharp differences with it.  This is the nation of my birth, and I will defend it.  It's not a defense that overlooks wrongs, it's a defense that looks to right wrongs, make amends for mistakes, and go on a path for good going forward.  Sometimes it seems like we're moving the right direction, sometimes it seems like we're falling backward.  Regardless, however, my hope is not in the American government.  I want the nation to do right, but it's only half of my citizenship.  I don't expect the nation to become a place that I am in perfect alignment with.  I won't even fight for that, because this nation is about "e pluribus unum", not my way or the highway.  My more important citizenship and home is in the kingdom of God.

Ultimately, my freedom is not found in the stars and bars of the American flag, it's found in the cross of Jesus Christ.  He alone is freedom, and when I exchange His freedom to cling to American freedom, I'm exchanging something of true value for something that will let me down.  America screws up because of sin - the same reason people shoot up schools and commit acts of terrorism.  Our world needs a hope that comes from the Gospel found in the Bible, not the hope that comes from the white stripes that stand for "peace".  An earthly kingdom will always disappoint, but a heavenly kingdom will always save.  Come, Lord Jesus.