How Can We Communicate Better?

What is a word? At the most fundamental level, it is a collection of sounds or letters that have been put together into a string. We then take that collection of sounds or letters and assign it to a certain meaning. It may be used to describe an object, an idea, a sound, a taste or really anything else. However, that collection of sounds or letters has become not quite synonymous with, but at least indicative of something in our minds.

The problem with words is that sometimes they have multiple different meanings, and they can occasionally mean different things to different people. What if I say the word volume? What comes to mind immediately? For some of you, you might assume that I talking about one particular book in a series. For some of you, you might assume that I talking about how loud or quiet the television is. Still others might be more scientifically minded and think that I am speaking about the three-dimensional space within an object.

Context matters. If I ask you to turn down the volume, you will know which sense of the word I am going for because you know that the other two don’t make sense. If I ask you to hand me volume seven off of the shelf, you will hand me a book that probably has that number on the spine. We understand what words mean not only by their own meanings but also the meanings of the words that surround them.

Context is not always enough though. I can tell you that I am a Christian. The word Christian has so many meanings, and it is often times used in such similar contexts that it can be hard to tell very much about me from just that one word. I can tell you that I go to a Christian church. That is a true statement. The people from Westboro Baptist Church will also tell you that they attend a Christian church. I would strongly contend that they are not representing the love of Christ to the world, and I am very confident that my assessment is accurate. However, my point is that they would say they are a Christian church even if I do not believe they are.

Therefore, it can be a little hard to tell what one means with a term like Christian. To dip a little bit into politics (I’m trying to keep the politics off of this site since a friend and I recently started a political website that I think of a better home for those types of conversations), it can be a little bit hard to tell what it means to be a liberal or conservative. Liberal is actually a really interesting word because America was built on political liberalism, but it is far from synonymous with liberal in our modern parlance. I know people who would say that they believe in liberalism, taking the classical meaning, and are also conservatives in our modern sense. However, there are plenty of liberals today who would say that they believe in liberalism, and they are not conservative. They believe in liberalism in the modern sense. However, it is the same word, and it could be used in the same context. You can have modern liberals and modern conservatives saying that they believe in liberalism but meaning quite different things. You can have people say they are Christians but mean very different things.

What are we to do then? Language is a funny thing. There is a ton of potential for misunderstanding. I guess we could get really specific when we start to describe things. Instead of simply telling you that I am a Christian, I could tell you a type of statement of faith complete with my perspective on creation, the fall, the nature of the Trinity and so many other things. That would definitely be helpful, but we don’t do that every time we use a word that has a potentially ambiguous meaning. If you really want to know my perspective on things and the time and place is right, obviously that is probably the best way to go about making sure we communicate clearly and don’t fall into verbal ambiguity.

Short of that type of opportunity to go into a great amount of specific detail to actually pin down these words that are used in a variety of ways, I would like to suggest that there are few concepts that we can employ to try to make our conversation more productive. After all, that’s what we want, I think. We want to be able to say what we mean, and we want people to understand what we mean. We don’t want people to misunderstand our words because they take a different interpretation of a word than we do.

First, I think one thing we need to remember is that there is always a greater context. I suggested that you might not always have time to sit down and hear someone’s entire statement of faith. You might not know exactly what that person means when he or she espouses Christianity. Even if you don’t have time to get all of the details, make sure you understand that there is a larger context. There is more to discover. Maybe you will never get the opportunity to discover all of that, but I would suggest that it is important to remember that just because someone says that he or she is a Christian, I would probably not take him or her as the automatic representation of every Christian for all time in every place.

If you do get the opportunity to hear little bit more about that person’s faith, then you might realize that they are actually a pretty good representation of let’s say Presbyterian theology. From there, you realize that maybe you can get some idea of what a Presbyterian believes by this person’s example. Generalization is always dangerous from small sample sizes, no matter how much you know about that one case. However, if you are going to generalize, at least make sure that you are generalizing from a like thing to another like thing. If you want to generalize about Presbyterians from that one Presbyterian you know, at least make sure that the one that you know is a good representation of the beliefs of that denomination. There is always a greater context, so in those situations when you can’t learn everything, don’t generalize on the little that you know. That’s asking for conflict.

Second, we need to remember that if something doesn’t necessarily make sense, it is not automatically wrong. It might be wrong. People hold contradictory beliefs all the time. I think that is kind of like Christians to simultaneously affirm that all religions are valid pathways to God. Christians claim to believe God’s word, and Jesus explicitly says that He is the Way. It is a singular term indicating that He is the only Way. Therefore, it is contradictory to say that all religions are paths climbing up the same mountain to God, but many people believe that. Some things very well might be wrong.

That being said, not everything will be automatically wrong just because we can’t understand it. If I hear someone talk about something I don’t get, it is possible for me to have a little bit of humility and think that I may have it wrong or simply don’t have enough knowledge in some area. I’m not saying that we give everyone a free pass by any means. Errors must be corrected, but if we don’t know whether or not they are actually errors, then we shouldn’t automatically jump to that assumption. If the conversation allows for it, we can ask clarifying questions, or we may have to file it away for something to figure out later. We don’t excuse error, but I think that we are tempted sometimes to automatically dismiss something we don’t understand simply on the virtue of the fact that we don’t understand it. I just don’t think that should be our default setting.

Finally, it is pretty important when we think about language and properly understanding what people are saying that we practice charity. A lot of times there are a few different ways to interpret what someone is saying. One may be pretty bad, and the other could be not so bad. At least my temptation is to assume the worst for some reason. It is not always justifiable, but if there are two possible ways to read a situation, I feel like we often times take the worst road.

Maybe we should stop doing that. If we assume the best out of people, we are going to be disappointed sometimes without a doubt. Sometimes we will get burned when we think that people have good intentions and they really don’t. I don’t want to get burned any more than anyone else. I don’t want to experience that hurt. However, how much more hurt am I either creating or amplifying by not assuming good intentions? While we can’t always trust everyone, and while we might learn that certain people do not ever or hardly ever have good intentions, by and large, I feel like if we assume good intentions given no reasonable evidence to the contrary, then I think it will help us with these linguistic ambiguities. We interpret as charitably as we can. Again, we do not blindly accept, and we don’t affirm everything. However, in short conversation, I think charity is an important virtue.

Overall then, we have to remember that there is a greater context, even if we don’t know it. We have to accept that things that we do not understand are not automatically wrong. Then we have to approach these issues with as much charity as we can absent of prior evidence. If we do these three things, I think that we can deal with language in a much better way and relate to each other much better as a result.

Embracing the Dignity of Human Life

Dr. Seuss famously wrote, “A person’s a person, no matter how small.” Although he apparently never intended this to be any type of pro-life rallying cry, sometimes the truth resonates with us, even if it is a truth that was revealed for a different end.

I mention this passage for a few reasons. First, abortion has been in the news an awful lot lately. It has kind of been on my mind as well. The tragedy of the procedure itself in addition to the atrocious spectacle of politicians advocating for the murder of young lives has been a lot to take.

That being said though, this is only part of the reason why this phrase has been on my mind lately. Like I said before, it is true. People are people, and no one is less significant than anyone else. This really ought to be rather basic. It certainly doesn’t seem to be too complicated. Each human is endowed with inherent dignity simply by being a member of the human race. There doesn’t need to be any qualification on that statement.

Some people have done really bad things in the past. We all know that. Even though these people undoubtedly have to face the consequences for the decisions that they make and even though justice must be served, there is still the inconvenient truth that these people still are members of our race and therefore deserve a certain level of dignity. It doesn’t mean that they are immune from consequences, but even the worst person in the history of the world maintains the inherent dignity that comes from being human.

We live in a culture that doesn’t seem to always embrace the dignity of human life. I’m not talking about just the obvious value that we ought to place on unborn lives. It really should go without saying that they deserve the respect to not be murdered before they ever take a breath. I’m talking about some of the subtler things that we might not even think about from day to day, but they matter.

Let’s say that you have children. Your children ought to respect you as their parent. That is good. However, you also have to show respect to your children and treat them like people with the dignity they deserve.

You might run a business. Your employees ought to respect your position as their manager or boss. That is good. However, you also have to treat your employees with the dignity they deserve.

It can even be as simple as seeing someone on the street who dropped something on the ground because his or her hands were full. You don’t have to help that person, but there is a certain level of honor or respect that you can show someone when you go out of your way to show them that they have inherent dignity and worth, even as a random stranger.

You may have noticed I shifted the discussion a little bit. You might say that children should respect their parents in an ideal world. However, I don’t know your story. Your parents may have been about the worst people ever. You don’t respect them, but they never gave your reason to respect them in their role as parents.

You might have a job where you don’t feel like you are valuable. You might know it is good to respect your boss, but your boss also needs to step up and lead in a way that inspires you to respect him or her. You don’t respect this person as a boss.

I get it. I have heard stories like these as well. I don’t know where you are coming from today as you are reading this. However, I shifted the discussion because it is really important for us to differentiate between the inherent dignity of human life and dignity in other contexts.

The dignity of human life is given to you by default simply for being alive. We all should have that. You deserve to be treated decently as a human being because you happen to be a human being.

Other types of respect may have to be earned. You want your employees to follow you at work, so you lead in such a way that they respect you. You want your children to be obedient, so you parent in such a way that you earn their respect.

It is really important to differentiate because I think our world has mixed up these types of dignity. We have all but forgotten the inherent dignity that simply should accompany being a member of the human race. Think about how people treat each other. We really are not good to each other. This is not a new problem. Humanity has never gotten along all that well. We fail to recognize that there is a certain level of dignity that every person has, and they are worthy of being treated with respect.

On the other side of the spectrum, we have people who simply expect followers to go along with their whims. They want respect, but they have never done anything to deserve it. Politicians may be the easy example here. There are plenty of people in powerful positions who expect people to follow them everywhere, but they have never done anything in that position. They then get really confused as to why the people are frustrated. They think that they are entitled to a different kind of dignity that goes well beyond the basic level of human dignity.

It is kind of backwards if you think about it. We disregard the one that we should have by default, and we expect the one that has to be earned. However, should we really be surprised? How many times do we fail to appreciate what we have, but we are always trying to get a hold of whatever it is that we don’t have?

A person is still a person, no matter how small. People are not insignificant, no matter where they seem to fall in our meritocratic hierarchy. We measure value on so many other things, but until we get back to this understanding of the fact that inherent human dignity does not have to be earned, we are going to have problems. We are going to be left with people either trying to grab respect they don’t have or trampled underfoot because no one recognizes the inherent dignity that they ought to have simply by being members of the human race.

I guess that is the application then as we go ahead into this week. Consider the role of human dignity. Beyond that, consider what you can do to help develop a culture of dignity and respect. I’m not suggesting that we always have to agree about everything, support everything, affirm everything, but I am suggesting that we have to remember that if we are ever going to solve any of the dilemmas that face us a culture, we are going to have to start from the basics. Start to believe that all people have dignity. Once you get back down, then you will realize what people have earned additional respect in the roles they fulfill. They still have the inherent human dignity, but they also have other positions where they have earned that respect. That is the way ought to be. Let’s work towards that.

Does Everything Have To Be a Zero-Sum Game?

I have been thinking a lot about zero-sum games lately. There are a lot of situations where someone has to win and someone has to lose. As a sports lover, I personally like some types of zero-sum games. Athletic competitions would not be the same if there was not some type of incentive, some type of target. You play hard because you want to emerge victorious at the end of the day. You want to add the additional victory in your win column, and the inevitable result of your increase is that the other team has to increase the total in their loss column by one.

Even in my day job as an insurance underwriter, I see elements of zero-sum games. If I end up selling an insurance policy, that means that someone else did not. My utility increased, but someone else did not increase their utility by an equivalent amount. This is not really a perfect example because that person’s decrease in utility is not necessarily identical to my increase, and the whole point of a zero-sum is that the increase and the decrease are equivalent. One has to lose in order for the other one to gain, and in theory, as the name implies, those should be exactly the same.

All of this being said, there are a lot of things that do not necessarily have to be zero-sum. There are times when outcomes can be mutually beneficial, and both people can benefit. For instance, I think about the child that my sister and I sponsor through Compassion International. We have done this since I was a teenager, and she was younger than that. On the surface, it may seem pretty much zero-sum. We donate money, she receives money. However, there are intangible benefits that I think both parties receive from this transaction that make it actually mutually beneficial instead of zero-sum.

For us, we get the knowledge that we are helping someone in a tough economic situation. The child we sponsor is from Central America, and donating money makes an actual difference in her life. It feels good to know that you are helping someone else. It is obviously not a financial benefit on our end, but it is a benefit that we receive through this process.

In fact, I would argue that in fact the benefit of this intangible, emotional feeling provides us with a net positive in this situation. After all, if the money every month could give us greater happiness in another way, then rationally, you would expect us to redirect our money to other causes or other uses. That’s what the rational consumer does. According to the laws of economics, we do what we can to maximize our utility or satisfaction.

Even in these situations where one party seems to bear all the costs while the other receives all the benefit, that is not necessarily a complete picture. It doesn’t have to be zero-sum when we take into account the broader picture of the situation. Yes, we do bear all the financial cost, but our emotional benefits increase our utility to the point that it is worth it.

That’s the difference between these situations though. The first ones are competitive. A soccer game or winning a new business account inevitably have winners and losers. That’s the nature of what they are. Charity on the other hand could be perceived to have winners and losers. However, there are different criteria when thinking about these kinds of noncompetitive scenarios. It is instead a cooperative effort. All of us benefit from a child sponsorship. We are not in this venture to beat each other.

What happens if we start mixing up these situations though? What happens if we start to cooperate in competitive situations or compete in cooperative situations? What types of dilemmas do we run into?

In the first scenario, it is not going to work out very well for me if I am trying to cooperate with someone who is trying to compete with me. If I think that my grocery store can coexist with the grocery store next door because there are enough people for each of us, if they start to roll out a competitive tactic like advertising, I am going to lose. There are a fixed number of potential customers in our area, so any increase for them must necessarily be a decrease for me. If I want to stay in business, I can’t just assume that we are going to cooperate and somehow coexist. That’s not the nature of how this situation works.

In the second scenario, if I try to compete in a cooperative situation, I am going to miss out on maximizing the utility of the situation. To use a different business example, consider manufacturers who produce computer parts. They all specialize in different parts, and while each manufacturer could try to produce all of the parts in the house, they do better when they cooperate. Each manufacturer does what they do best, and they put all of the parts together to build the computer. If any one of them tries to make it competitive, there is going to be a reduction in efficiency and no one will benefit as much as they otherwise could have.

Identification is therefore the key. We need to make sure we understand what kind of situation we find ourselves in. Is it the type of situation where we have to compete, or is it the type of situation where we can actually gain more benefit from cooperating?

I think our temptation is to compete. Competition can be hard, but at least we feel like we are in control. It easier for us to think of everything as zero-sum because then I have incentive to keep working hard. Not only do I want to get more, but if I perceive the situation as competitive, I also have to protect my own because I believe that people are coming after my stuff. If I’m competing, I assume they must be competing as well.

Cooperation requires a degree of trust. I have to be willing to hope that the other person understands that we can both gain more by cooperating and we can by competing. I have to believe that they are going to do their part as well. If they don’t, I’m going to be in trouble. I think that’s why it is a little hard sometimes to cooperate. Bottom line, we do not want to trust other people. Maybe it is because of bad experiences in the past, or maybe it is just because some of us are a little bit more doubtful than others. It is a challenge to think about anything other than a zero-sum game.

As Christians, I can’t help but think of the multitude of references to Christians being one body, a family, brothers or sisters. All of these terms indicate a kind of closeness and a spirit that points us towards the idea that not everything is a competition. There are times when we need to come together as a body and work for the benefit of other people. It is a cooperative endeavor. Each one contributes what he or she can to God’s mission.

This attitude that we find with other Christians should remind us that there are other areas in life where we can apply these cooperative skills as well. Like I said, it can’t necessarily happen everywhere. Good luck trying to convince basketball teams that they should go for a tie every game instead of going for the victory. And, it shouldn’t happen everywhere. Some things are by nature competitive, and that is simply how they have to be by virtue of what they are. That’s not a problem.

However, some things can be cooperative, and we need to get better at identifying them and resisting the temptation to turn them into a zero-sum game. Instead, let’s turn them into the type of game where we are actually able to work together for mutual benefit. Yes, it takes trust, something that is lacking in our world today. We have all been burned by other people who we put our trust in. However, let’s think back to our Christian worldview, and we can’t help but think of all the times that we are called to come together for the benefit of other people. Yes, most of the time the New Testament is speaking about the body of Christ and coming together with other believers. However, I do think this attitude should at least encourage us to think outside the church walls in the same way. Where are those opportunities where we can be especially effective when we work together? That’s the challenge for this week.

Always Winter, but Never Christmas

Narnia was a land trapped in a kind of supernatural polar vortex. Because of the dark magic and immense power of the White Witch, the land remained in a perpetual state of winter. However, winter in Narnia was somewhat different than ours because Christmas never came. Despite being someone who really does not like winter very much whatsoever, I love Christmas. It brings joy and light to a season that is otherwise rather unpleasant, cold and dark. Although we do not hear very much about Narnia from the end of The Magician’s Nephew until the beginning of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, it is at least evidently clear that the creatures of Narnia do not like to live under the rule of their cold dictator.

Imagine the relief, surprise and unencumbered joy when St. Nicholas himself is finally able to make his way into Narnia. A kind of magical being in his own right with supernatural powers of warp speed, he had been unable to make his way into Narnia because of the Witch. Only once powers far beyond himself began to act could he actually deliver always gifts he wanted to. Winter was still in Narnia for a short while, but Christmas had arrived.

I was thinking about this portion of CS Lewis’ series because in my home state of Vermont, Christmas is near the beginning of winter. Naturally I am the first one complaining as the weather continually drops through October, November and December. Being entirely honest though, I realize and admit that October, November and December are really not all that bad. We very rarely get terrible weather until after Christmas. Our coldest temperatures are typically in January and February.

I’m not simply comparing the meteorological reality of a parallel universe to our universe out of scientific curiosity though. I think that we all have experiences like what we see in Narnia. We are trapped in some kind of difficult situation, and we see a tremendous breakthrough. St. Nicholas flies in if you will and brings us a great deal of comfort. Once we recognize that breakthrough for what it is, the reality that Christmas has indeed come, then we know that there is light at the end of the tunnel. The change was almost immediate, and the snow started melting practically instantaneously. For the balance of this article, I am going to call this a Narnia Experience.

Other times, we have that wonderful breakthrough, and things do not change that quickly. Christmas comes here in Vermont, and it is a wonderful time of joy. However, the majority of winter and our coldest temperatures are still ahead. We may have that temporary comfort, but we also understand that there is still a long road to go before we get to the ultimate warmth of spring and summer. It doesn’t always happen as quickly as it does in Narnia. I am going to call these Vermont Experiences going forward.

We want everything to happen like a Narnia Experience. We want to be able to find a solution to our problems and immediately see the results. We are tired of winter, and we just want to see everything better. All our problems should disappear, and we move onward to bigger and better things. If there is something I know after talking to a lot of people though, our lives are a lot more like Vermont Experiences. Things don’t always come easily for us. It is not that we are ungrateful or don’t appreciate the great parts of our lives, but we simultaneously realize that we still have battles to fight. Yes, we are moving towards better things, but we still have a long way to go. Vermont Experiences test our perseverance and patience.

In the context of our faith, I think there is an obvious level of application. Obviously there are times when being a Christian is rather easily. A lot of pastors have talked about the mountaintop experiences, but sometimes we find ourselves in the valleys.

However, I think there is a deeper level to this type of dichotomy as well that maybe is not so obvious. I would like to propose that the deeper level to this dichotomy that it is actually a false dichotomy. You may have been agreeing with everything I have written so far about how there are major differences between Narnia and Vermont Experiences. However, they are not fundamentally different. The only difference is the time between the encouragement and the ultimate deliverance. In Narnia, it happens quickly. In Vermont, it is not quite so quick and seems endless at times. However, that does not make them fundamentally different kinds of experiences. They are the same experience just on different timelines.

We become unhappy when we don’t get what we want right away, but we need to remember that there is always hope. There is always the promise that the warmth will come. Spring will always come and bring about new life. It is not like the promise of spring diminishes because it is two months away any more than it does when spring is two minutes away.

If the promise is trustworthy, then we have no reason to worry whether it takes a little time or a long time. The fact of the matter is that the promise will still be delivered. We do not need to doubt. We do not need to fear. We don’t need to stress over anything. Instead, we can continue to know that everything will be fine because the promise is secure.

Just because spring is two months away does not mean that spring is not coming ever. Sometimes it comes earlier, and sometimes it comes later, but it never fails. Our planet is designed for it to come.

That is all the encouragement that I can provide you. It is not because I don’t want to, but it is because I don’t have anything greater to say. There’s a Book, and that Book is full of promises that guarantee that we are not alone. This Book promises that there is Someone who is always looking out for you. It promises that Someone always will love you and has already demonstrated His love for you by sending His only Son to die on the cross for you and your sin.

I think we can get so wrapped up in what type of experience we are facing, hoping it will not be a Vermont Experience while praying for a Narnia Experience. It is understandable that we do that. We focus on what is right in front of us. However, we can’t forget the truth that time is really an irrelevant dimension here. Do we know that we are in the hands of God no matter where we go? If we know that, then we had nothing to fear, no matter how long that winter draws out. We will enjoy the encouragement whenever it comes and use the encouragement to remind us that there is hope. However, the hope itself is what is significant here. We cannot forget that, and we should not forget that. If we do, then we are simply not living the lives we were meant to live.

There Are No Unimportant Players

We now know the two teams that are going to be heading to the Super Bowl on February 3. They have been working for the entire season, hoping to put together enough victories to find their way to the ultimate stage, complete with a pop music halftime show and some wonderful commercials (hopefully).

Football is a sport that is based on preparation. Coaches develop pretty complicated playbooks, and it is the responsibility of each member of the team to know his job in every possible situation. Even when it seems like a particular player is irrelevant during a certain play, he has a job to do in that scheme. You could be the wide receiver in the left slot, and the play is to send the halfback to the right, but you still have a job to do. It may not be the most important job and not play, but it is an important job. After all, the entire purpose of running plays is to coordinate the members of the squad towards the predetermined end. Even the wide receiver who will never receive a pass to the left on a run to the right may need to pick up a blocking assignment. If it is a halfback draw, he might have to begin to run a route as a type of bluff before the quarterback hands off the ball.

The coordinated effort of 11 people on the field makes all the difference, and if they all don’t do their jobs, it is not going to be successful. There are no unimportant players on the field.

Therefore, they need to prepare ahead of time. There may be those times when the seemingly unimportant player actually has the most important job on the field. That slot receiver on the left might not have immediate interest in a halfback run to the right, but as the play develops and if the running back is able to proceed into the secondary, that wide receiver might be still moving down the field. He might be in a position to make a key block that turns a 10 yard run into a 25 yard run. Those types of things make a difference even if they do not seem to be immediately applicable.

How often do we feel like that slot receiver on a running play? We might not feel like our job matters very much. I’m not just talking about our day jobs. You may feel this way about your day job, but this is a much more wide-ranging conversation. It can be really simple. We can be talking about things like whether or not it makes a difference that I smile and say hi to the person I walk past on the street. We can be talking about things as major as whether or not I should bother trying to go back to a particular college because I feel like I am just a number there.

There were all kinds of times when we wonder if we are important. Does it really matter if I am nice to that cashier? She has probably seen hundreds of people today, and some of them were nice while others were not. Does it really matter how I treat her?

Does it really matter if I stay at this particular college? Even though I feel like God is called me here, I just don’t feel like I am important to the college or anyone else. Is it really the right spot for me?

I would like to suggest that there is a connection in between preparation and significance. An important part of any useful preparation is an understanding of the significance that a particular task possesses. It is important to be nice to people because it makes a difference to them. I should smile and say hi to that person because it may improve his or her day. That is significant. That means that I need to go into that store with the right attitude. I need to prepare ahead of time to make a difference in that person’s day.

On the bigger questions, I need to think about why perhaps God might have me in a certain place. I might be at a particular college for a particular reason. However, I need to make sure I have prepared myself to even think about such difficult things. Have I considered why I might be here and what significance I may have on campus? After all, even if I might not feel great about something at the time, maybe I am just upset. Maybe it is just an emotional time. Maybe I need to prepare to make this decision by preparing to think about how serious it really is. It is a heavy decision, and it is one that I should not make lightly. I need to think ahead of time and prepare so that I am ready to make a potentially life altering decision that no one would argue is insignificant.

When I think about this issue of significance, I can't help but think of the Old Testament. Why did God give us all the back story? My salvation is not based on doing the history of the Judges. It is a wonderful book of the Bible, but Judges tells me a lot more about the history of Israel and it tells me about Jesus Christ. We say we are Christians, so what does the background information of the Old Testament really do for us?

It provides us with that preparation. It helps us establish the type of world that Jesus Christ decided to enter. It points us towards the people group that God had His Son born into. When we read the Old Testament, we are prepared from Messiah. We see a world looking forward toward that Messiah and suffering the consequences of human sin. We see a conflict, and we desire a resolution. We are prepared for that resolution because of what we know.

Naturally that is not the only purpose of the Old Testament, but it is an important one. Much like John the Baptist was a forerunner to Jesus Christ, the Magi found Jesus because the scribes of Herod pointed to it Old Testament prophecy about Bethlehem. Even when the Old Testament is not prophetic or directly related to Jesus Christ, it establishes the groundwork.

Going further though, it is not just about laying the groundwork, but because of the obvious sinfulness of humanity and the hopelessness of the human condition, we see the significance of Jesus Christ all the more clearly. When set against the background of so much darkness, the light seems all the brighter. Why does the one star in the night sky seemed so bright? It is surrounded by black.

Jesus coming to earth would be significant anyway because He is the Son of God, but it seems all the more beautiful and important exactly because of the myriad of ways that we have failed to save ourselves. In fact, the more we try, the more we make our condition worse. Therefore, there may seem to be parts of the Old Testament that don’t seem to matter. Who really cares about some of the obscure characters we meet in one verse?

The fact of the matter is that every part of the Old Testament matters. Some parts don't seem to make a difference on the surface, but like that wide receiver making a block down field, they are there for a purpose. God was preparing a story, and He was preparing that story that ultimately pointed towards the most significant life to ever walk the face of our planet.

These are just a few examples, but I think you can kind of see my point here. Preparation points towards significance. Like the Super Bowl, these guys have been working all year for this game, and they all have an important job to play even if it doesn't always seem as important on the surface. We can never forget that in our individual lives either. I think that we can easily be tempted to feel like we don't matter or what we do makes no difference.

Don't fall into that trap. I'm not some kind of self-help guru, but there is one thing I do know. No one is an important. Therefore, we need to get down to business and do our own jobs. We need to do what we can with what we have to make a difference. We may not immediately see the impact of what we do, and we might never even see within our lifetimes. However, it is important to pursue our God given calling. If we do that, we will be where God wants us to be, and we will be doing what God wants us to do. There is no better place to be than right there. Not just better for us, but it will be better for all of those around us and, of course, the advancement of God's kingdom.