Are you all of the sudden trying to figure out why, as you read that title, you sang it? Did you start humming a tune? While I am a child of the 90’s and I enjoy a good one-hit-wonder from the boy band decade; ever since I was in middle school, maybe high school, the 80’s has been where I look for music to tell a story and use as an analogy for life.
Maybe it was because my dad liked and played some growing up. Maybe it’s because there is just so much “soul?” or depth in the songs and lyrics from the decade of my birth. Maybe it’s because secretly I wonder what my hair would look like long and with a perm…. Rest easy though, I only wonder that one. And of course, the 80’s brought us Prince. The all-around performer. He could sing, dance, play, and write music like almost no other.
So, yes, that title is from a Prince song. But, as I thought about the topic for this blog, that song kept playing in my head, and it is probably going to be stuck in yours the rest of the day!
Here is the passage from a book that brought these lyrics to mind and serves as the basis for this blog.
"We are giving our lives for it. Every day we go to work, every meeting that bores us, everything we do just for money or out of obligation, all the time we kill, we are giving our life for it. So, it better be worthwhile. Whatever we do in life, we’re giving our life for it, so we best be sure it is worth it."
- Legacy: What the All Blacks Can Teach Us About the Business of Life
This is a book about the New Zealand Rugby team, leadership, and culture. And yet, the principles not only apply to everyday life but have biblical truth in them as well. When I am reading, I write down quotes in a little brown notebook that fits in my back pocket so I can find them easily. I wrote the above quote down and then spent some time just thinking about it. The chapter was called Sacrifice: Find Something you would die for and give your life to it.
While the author talked about how the players would finish games bloodied and broken, this core principle for the All Blacks is much deeper. It’s one we see in Matthew 6:25-34 and James 4:13-17. It’s the reminder that life is short, and we never know when that last moment is coming.
We don’t like death. We keep funerals and memorials short and brief, no matter how long and full the life was. We don’t like to talk about it, and I’d venture to guess there’s more than a few of us who haven’t processed loss and grief well because of the fear of death. Christians, of all people, should have no fear of death since we will not taste the sting of death. We will find ourselves with eternal life. But, in order for you to grasp this All Black principle of Sacrifice you must be willing to accept and consider death, not just daily but moment by moment.
Here is what Matthew and James want us to grasp, and what I think is the foundation of Sacrifice: every minute we live is another minute we die. There are certain resources we have that we can get more of – almost all of them. But time is the one resource we have that we cannot get one second more. No matter how hard we work, how efficient we are, or how much you treasure each second. Once you spend it, that time is gone, and you are that much closer to death. Now, sometimes, that death is far off and sometimes it is closer. The problem is that we don’t know how close death is, but we do know that every second that passes is one second closer to death.
Every minute we live is another minute we die.
So, when the All Blacks talk about sacrifice and finding something worth dying for, they don’t mean go work for the secret service or fire department, although honorable and worthy. What they mean is that anything in this life that you are willing to give one second of your time to, intentionally or not, is one second you cannot get back, one second you have died just a little more. Allow me to continue sharing wisdom and truth, that while not inherently Christian, is clearly drawn from Biblical truth:
“We begin to die from the moment we are born, for birth is the cause of death. The nature of decay is inherent in youth, the nature of sickness is inherent in health, in the midst of life we are verily in death.”
So now I must, because it is in my nature, confront you with some questions. Maybe you shrug them off, maybe you ignore them, or maybe you take them to heart and consider them deeply. Either way you really only have two courses of action: you can keep living and dying without any intentionality or thought as to what you are dying for and if it is worth it. Or…. You can evaluate and consider all that you give your life to, that you are dying for, and decide if it is indeed worth it. And if not… well that is the real challenge: what will you do about it?
What are you dying for? Is it worth your life?
Is it intentional, or are you just giving your life away to the unworthy?
If you were to make a change, what would you do that is worth dying for?
Now, let me briefly share why this has been tumbling around my heart as of late. There is no doubt that God has called our family to El Salvador. Over the last year and a half, we attended language school full time. At the same time, I still lived out my calling as a husband to Hannah and father to Harris, Paul, and JonOliver. No need to ask them; yes, I messed up miserably many times in all these things: Spanish, husband, and father. But these are worth dying for. I did not fail because I did not quit. I kept striving because I see these as worth my life and the struggle and the pain.
But after that, it was not the same. I did not feel that what we were being called to do as a part of the church planting team here was worth dying for. Now, this isn’t a condemnation of that team or what they are doing. This is a recognition of who I was created to be and what I was created to do. The connection just wasn’t there. And, it wasn’t until I read this book after the first of the year that I was able to articulate in words what was missing, what was wrong.
Find something you’re willing to die for and give your life to it.
Skip ahead to the second week of January, when Shelter held their annual leaders week here in El Salvador. I spent the whole week in the communities we build in, with our Shelter team, and with the leaders and board members who are so passionate about what God is doing through Shelter here in El Salvador. Thursday, we attended a community celebration event in the community we were building in. Including all the staff and leaders and folks from the community there was probably well over 100 of us. We ‘chelitos’ (that’s the Salvadorian word for gringo) were spread out amongst the Salvadorians worshiping together and receiving God’s word together.
Towards the end there was this moment where the pastor was finishing up praying and I was looking out over this eclectic group of people gathered together, solely because of Jesus. And in His grace and mercy God gave me this moment of clarity and levity where it just hit me; this incredible calm and peace. I knew I wanted to be a part of what God was doing through Shelter, I had already accepted the job! But in that moment, I knew, I am willing to die for this cause. This is worth dying for. And, while I didn’t weep, I did tear up because I was overwhelmed with gratefulness in that moment in the mercy and grace I received from the Lord through that affirmation.
But in that moment, I knew, I am willing to die for this cause. This is worth dying for.
I have a growing list of things I have found that are worth dying for. Most of the list is people, but that Thursday morning I added the job I am transitioning to. What is it that you are doing day in and day out? Is it something that is worth giving your life for? If not, you might be wasting your most precious resource. Look to the wise words of David in Psalm 103: 15-16
As for man, his days are like grass;
he flourishes like a flower of the field;
for the wind passes over it, and it is gone,
and its place knows it no more.
I know for many of you this transition in our lives and ministry focus has been a bit of a surprise. Some of you have even expressed that in those words. Let me tell you that we were also surprised at where the Lord is leading our family. We came here with one great certainty; that God was calling our family not just to the mission field but to El Salvador.
If you asked me to write the script for our last year and a half, I promise I wouldn’t have written it the way it has played out. I also want to acknowledge that what I just shared sounds like rainbows and butterflies (why is that the picture of happiness? how about bacon sizzling?) but it has been anything but whatever your picture of happiness and tranquility is.
It has been rather difficult and we still have lots of details to figure out. But, just like when Moses was called by God to fulfill his purpose for the Lord, his calling was clear but so too was the fact it was going to be difficult and painful. We cannot find ourselves in the place we are meant to be if we aren’t willing to give up the ideas of who we thought we should be and what we thought we should do.
Often times, in order to get to where God is calling us to be we have to pass through the valley to reach the mountain. And, I am reminded of some lyrics from a worship song I like called Graves to Gardens:
‘Cause the God of the Mountain
Is the God of the Valley
There’s not a place, your mercy and grace
Won’t find me again
