Live Until You Die

Don't be deceived by comfort and ease; life is a challenge. It is also worth meeting with hope.

I enjoy observing people. It is a byproduct of walking among teenagers in halls, classrooms, cafeterias, and gymnasiums for more than three decades. These days, I find myself in churches, supermarkets, and restaurants, watching strangers around me, and one thing I witness all too often is people who have forgotten they are alive. You can see this in their eyes, the way they eat their food, and talk to their companions. It isn’t quite the same as being dead; people are simply disconnected from the things that might excite any passion they have to be engaged with the world.

We, particularly in the United States, have surrendered ourselves to the pursuit of comfort, and in so doing, have lost any sense of the value of struggle. This is not a message, of course, that is destined to have mass appeal. Most people see the American dream not only in a two-story house with a picket fence and a two-car garage, but also in the alleviation of day-to-day struggles, pain, and challenges. Essentially, we want to live lives as the walking dead while still getting to enjoy our cake.

Life is defined by challenge. We struggle to emerge from the womb, and we struggle to fit into our families and friendships. We navigate our ignorance as we become educated, and most of us settle for entry-level positions that urge us to climb the ladder of ambition so that we can eventually reduce the number of cares and challenges we face. While our cultural messaging focuses on acquiring wealth, what we really seek is the ability to live a life unburdened by bother, let alone catastrophe.

I would posit, though, that a “carefree” life isn’t a life at all. Indeed, we seek artificial replacements that fulfill our emotional need to overcome tests without any actual risk to our comfort. We tune in to watch others maneuver through the challenges of living with housemates (Big Brother) without thinking of the tens of thousands who live in tents and cardboard boxes…let alone get filmed and paid to do so. It is much easier to seek our own isolation while watching the faux stresses faced by others, I suppose. We watch nubile 20-somethings prance around “Love Island” having extraordinary sexual escapades while a great many of us go to great lengths to avoid putting ourselves forward for any intimacy at all; rejection is too great a risk. We can even watch “Survivor,” living vicariously through the participants who give their all to avoid being voted off the island. The stress of it all! Hard to believe we endure this, until you consider we do so while sitting in a recliner with our bag of Cheetos at hand.

This desire for risk-free tension in our lives is coupled with an aversion to anything resembling real hazard. We see fewer and fewer people marrying because, after all, who would want the struggle of loving (let alone liking) the same person for the rest of one’s life? For those who are foolish enough to enter into such a wild gamble, nearly half will give up along the way, cutting their losses and choosing either to live without the burden of commitment or looking for another opportunity, supposing that what doomed a marriage was simply a one-off mismatch or coincidence that couldn’t possibly happen again. Right? At least this second group still clings to the hope of romance rather than surrendering to the cynicism that declares “happiness” and “comfort” to be the ultimate goals of our existence.

Across the world, birth rates are declining to historic lows, below the replacement rate of two children per couple. The Free Press reported recently that nearly one in three pregnancies in England and Wales ends in an abortion. This is a clear submission to the belief that our continued existence is less important than the comfort we can produce for ourselves during our three score and ten years. We are surrendering the most basic tenet of human life–being fruitful and multiplying–because we are afraid, too busy with the less important things, or too lazy to care whether we build a future for humanity or not.

To this, I say in the most grandfatherly way possible, “cut that shit out.” And kids (Millennials and Z’ers), I’m not blaming you. I am blaming us–my generation–for not instilling hope and zeal that inspires you to want to live. Life, the abundant kind Jesus calls us to, is full of challenges and rife with reasons why we might question whether to bring more humans into the mix. And it is okay to live for the moment and disregard mating and procreation if you cannot embrace faith. Of course, I encourage you…I want you…to trust the creator God, because built into that belief is a faith that things turn out the way they are supposed to, that there is a plan at work even if it isn’t ours. Even if the planner didn’t consult us, our participation isn’t made any less meaningful or important.

At the bottom of what might pass for the guiding philosophy of modern (postmodern) living are two pillars of belief that stand in opposition to the Christian worldview. First is a supreme selfishness. The world is concerned with self-esteem, which is impacted by our self-image, which we enhance by self-care. We believe–at least we are taught and led to believe–that we are the center of the universe. Our happiness, our “truths,” our comfort take precedence over all competing values that suggest that caring and working for the good of others is more important.

This self-idolization has been dangerously partnered with an increasing sense of nihilism. Why should we strive for the good of anyone apart from ourselves if we all simply vanish in the end? The notion of heaven and hell, salvation and damnation, even the idea that there is a God at all, is increasingly absent from families, from society, and from the hearts of individuals. While this shouldn’t surprise anyone who has read the bible–Israel repeatedly loses faith in their God, even to the point of sacrificing their children to Molech (the ultimate nihilistic act)--I am still filled with sorrow as I watch hope and faith repeatedly forsaken out of fear and the inability summon the strength to believe in a better future created by a loving creator.

Defeating this self-centered nihilism is why I am obsessed (there, I said it!) with the kind of legacy you and I are leaving. This is why I write here for my children and grandchildren, and for you and yours. Legacies are built one person, one mind, one heart at a time. The memories we create with others, the way they can call our words and actions to mind, as they might need those memories, are the foundation stones of what we leave behind.

Time shared with others comes first. No legacy has ever been fashioned without the expenditure of time. To elevate the meaning of one’s endowment to the future, we must be intentional in the way we spend time. Not only do we need to spend time intentionally doing the things that align with what we desire our bequest to be, but we must direct that time into relationships we hold as important. The time I spend with my grandchildren is, for this reason, far more important to me than the time I might spend with others. This is not to say that my actions and words are not important as they have been witnessed by friends, acquaintances, students, colleagues, and even strangers, only that the full impact of my legacy will be realized in the lives of people I love deeply and for whom I have sacrificed.

Then, of course, the things we do with our shared time, the questions we ask, the gift of listening we share, and the occasional wisdom that escapes us are the surprising anchors for memory. I am perpetually astonished by the memories we hold on to that shape our attitudes. Our perceptions of others are often cemented within the first few minutes of meeting them. These perceptions go on to color every other experience we have with them. This is why teachers, especially, need to be very careful in how they meet and respond to their students. One bad moment, one off day, can do tremendous damage to even the most gifted teacher’s impact on their students, especially the most vulnerable ones. I can certainly remember the way my own teachers treated me, the atmosphere they created in their classrooms, and the idiosyncrasies that made them noteworthy human beings; these recollections give weight to the impact they have had on me, far more than any lesson they taught me in their subject area.

And that is just it, isn’t it? Live a life of action, of meaning, perhaps of idiosyncrasy. Be the parent, teacher, boss, or grandparent whose zeal, kindness, love, or passion makes you unforgettable. Live a life that speaks through the memories you create. Don’t die before you die–fend off the shadows of despair and apathy as long as you can, as long as breath fills your lungs and God’s grace paves your way.