You don't know how often I find myself laughing at the tone of my own politically-infused blogs.
When I was young, I was practically a socialist: a long-haired, anti-establishment, and intellectually arrogant (embarrassingly so because I wasn't that smart).
I believed in things like the Zero Growth movement, which said we should stop the creation of new things until we make full use of the stuff we already have. My prime example was railroad tracks: I knew how many miles of tracks there were in this country that were rusting, and would argue against building bigger and faster highways and expanding airports when we could modernize existing railroads and introduce high-speed rails.
I believed in ideas that compensation for top executives should be tied to a scale based on the lowest-paid employee. That scale, I remember distinctly, was that the top executive should not be allowed to make more than 20 times that of the lowest paid employee, believing that a rise at the top should also elevate those at the bottom.
I was something of a libertarian, too. I believed our freedom meant I shouldn't have to stand for the Star Spangled Banner or the Pledge of Allegiance, that refusing to show that respect honored the Independence our country was founded on and lived up to the idea that "all men are created equal."
I was a Jimmy Carter fan long after even most Jimmy Carter fans had fled. I was a Southern Democrat, a "Dixiecrat'' or "Yellow-Dog Democrat" or whatever you wanted to call it.
So even now, to admit I've been voting Republican is kind of like, as a journalist, having to admit I've become a public relations flak. I'm still a little self-conscious about it, particularly around some of my oldest friends.
At the same time, I'm self-conscious and a little embarrassed at some of the things I used to believe.
Here's the thing, though: even though I've changed, there are still traces of the old me present in the new me. I still believe that the things I buy should be used up before I discard them, which is why I drive used cars until they practically fall apart, and I walk at night with an old 'disc-man' rather than an iPod (or whatever is the thing now) .... and of course, some people would say it's just an excuse for being cheap, but I'd like to think part of it is my old "Zero Growth'' ideas that are still with me.
Yet I have changed. We all do. Because we're all different, we all change in different directions and in different ways at different times.
I thought of this as I read the Apostle Paul, who lived in a time of great change.
Paul, as you can tell if you've read his letters, lived in a fledgling, emerging Christian culture where people worshipped God in different ways. Some worshipped on Sunday because that was the day of resurrection; some people still worshipped on Saturday because of Old Testament tradition of "remembering the Sabbath and keeping it holy."
And some "rested" on the seventh day, as God did, and worshiped on Sunday, the day of resurrection - for which I'm thankful, because it led to the compromise that gave us the idea of the weekend to bridge one week to another. (although there is very little 'resting' on Saturday and not nearly as much 'worshipping' on Sunday as there used to be).
Some Christians in those days were basically vegetarians, because the only meat they could get were left over after being sacrificed to idols and then sold (because, well, those 'gods' didn't consume them) and they didn't think it right to eat meat offered to gods. Some Christians didn't give a rip about false gods, they just wanted to eat meat and believed offering meat to gods was like offering meat to a tree or a stone - it wasn't going to be consumed, so why shouldn't they consume it? (Plus, it was cheap).
These kind of differences are throughout Paul's letters, and you can't help but get the feeling Paul rolls his eyes at so many of them, saying "Stuff like this - do it however you feel best, I don't care. Just do it for the Lord."
And he said, "Quit arguing over who is doing it the right way. Do whatever you do to honor God, not to look like you're 'holier' than the next guy and that you have some special insight into how God wants to be worshipped."
Just as Jesus is able to save people different from me, Jesus is able - over time - to change me into a different person. I know, because He has, and I'm sure (I pray) He's not finished.
But this isn't just about changing. Paul taught us that the power of the Gospel is in that while it changes us, it also causes us to care about people who are different than ourselves. It happens at different times and in different measures for different people, but I know it happens.
And we have to allow people to change - even if we may not like or agree with how they've changed.
My wife and my daughter are very aware of other people, very sensitive to them and their insecurities, their embarrassments, their feelings. I have had to learn that, and it hasn't been easy. As people who knew me in my youth probably remember, I could be cruel - funny, but in retrospect, cruel. And I regret that.
But I'm changing.
Thank God.
Not me.
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