Snapshots and Synapses

One of my mentors in the workplace used to open certain meetings with the phrase: “Everyone has an agenda. Let’s not have any hidden agendas here.” He would then find out what people were hoping to get out an initiative, why they were participating in the meeting, and how we could possibly all work together toward a common end. I believe this is a great way to get people working together, and while I imitate my former mentor in helping others to collaborate, this is not the way we should love others. Our love should reflect God’s love and be without selfish agenda. Now it’s true that everyone has an agenda, and it’s good to strive toward worthy goals, but when it comes to loving others our agenda is simply to love.  But what is love? In English, we only have one word for love. We use it to describe how we feel about our spouse, parents, children, pets, toys, food, activities, etc. In many cases, we use the word love to describe what we lust after. Lust is the desire to get so...

When I went to college, I had never heard the term “frenemy”, but it definitely described people in a group I joined as a Freshman. It wasn’t exactly a fraternity, but it was a co-ed club where first year members went through a hazing period. After the first year, I had no desire to treat others the way I had been treated, and not having close ties to my acquaintances in that group, I found other interests and mostly kept a distance during my second and third year. A young man joined the group my second year (we’ll call him “Guy”), and I would often hear about his flaws whenever I attended the club events. From what little I knew about him, the criticism seemed legitimate, and so I mentally grouped him with the everyone else, keeping a healthy distance and judgmental attitude. As I entered my senior year, the leadership over that group asked for my help. The hazing had become abusive, with several of my Freshmen peers being the greatest perpetrators. The abuse had become so severe, t...

I have written about the Kingdom of Heaven in a previous blog . It is God’s rule in our lives and by extension through us it moves into the world around us. His love changes us (2 Corinthians 3:18 and other verses ). Our response to His love is to love in return, loving others as we have now learned what love is (1 John 4:19). Love is the prevailing characteristic of Heaven. In contrast to the Kingdom of Heaven, C.S. Lewis wrote the Screwtape Letters as a description of hell, where a major demon coaches a minor demon. I read where Lewis said that this book was the easiest for him to write, and yet it was the one he enjoyed writing the least. He modeled the culture of hell after corporate America, and as someone who has worked with many global enterprises, I understand why. In most corporate cultures, people are encouraged to be “nice” without being kind. They are driven by their personal agenda over the needs of others, often succeeding without thought to what is right. I believe...