Spent this last weekend in Asheville, North Carolina. Steph and I were both looking forward to taking pictures, especially of the Biltmore Estate and house, but unfortunately the camera decided to stop working just as we arrived. This is the only picture we could get.
We did get a few others of us goofing around the night before. Click here to see those.
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People often argue that Jesus Christ was not the Son of God, rather he was a great teacher – a man from whom we could all learn.
I never liked that argument, and a paragraph out of A Layman’s Guide to Protestant Theology
If Jesus was not and is not the Son of God, insists (John Gresham) Machen, then he is the very reverse of a reliable teacher of ethics. For Jesus claimed to be divine; he claimed to have authority over men; he claimed to do that which only God can do – forgive sins; he claimed to be the Messiah, foretelling that he would return on the clouds of heaven; he asserted that he was the Way, the Truth, and the Life. If Jesus were only a man and claimed these things, he cannot be our example, for he was either a madman or a charlatan.
Word.
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I took a basic values inventory for class tonight and guess what? I am task oriented and achievement focused. Surprise, Surprise.
Or not.
It’s not a stretch to say that tasks have consumed my entire adult life. In my work and at home I will often lose myself in a task, so much so that I will avoid getting up for anything – even food – until I complete what’s in front of me. Last night I didn’t eat until 9pm. Why? I had to finish what I was doing. It’s 9 right now and I still haven’t eaten. It’s bad, and it’s been worse. Just ask my wife…if it weren’t for her I would go many nights without food.
Finishing something translates into achieving something so I’m not surprised that was a value as well. One of the questions in the analysis asked whether I was more concerned with accomplishment than holding a certain position or title. Easy. I will always take an achievement over a title or position and sometimes am frustrated with those who worry about titles more so than getting the job done.
But there’s where I learned something. Not that achievement and task orientation are things I value highly, but that they are just…values.
Values are personal, and perhaps more importantly, variable. Not everybody shares the same values and is it not better for me to come to this realization than to assume my values are common laws that everyone should follow? I am not sure why that is suddenly clear, but in taking the analysis I knew that each person would have different results. I also knew that my results reflected values that are important to me, and if they are important to me than they are important to others. Perhaps understanding that is the first step to full acceptance of others as they are, even if the step is a small one. At least it’s in the right direction.
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by Michael Pollan