I passed someone sitting at a sidewalk cafe, and their baseball cap said, “Stay Down, Man.” So on the bus I queued up the three songs I know with that title:

“Stay Down Man” by Dan Reeder. Money quote: “I should have known this night would end this way.”

“Stay Down” by Dawes. Money quote: “All the profane that you thought profound–it’s time now to stay down.”

“Stay Down” by boygenius. Money quote: “It takes so long for me to settle down.”

Evidence is everywhere. There are still abundant sources for news and information that follow the conventions of fact-based reporting: tell readers what happened; tell them what you don’t know (yet) about what happened; explain how you know what you know about what happened, i.e. your sources–even if you can’t name them, tell us you have them.

If we want to an accurate, evidence-based, understanding of what is going on with, for example, immigration enforcement, we could hardly live at a better time.

The problem is that we don’t want that as much as we want a story about villainy and heroism, where we and people who think like us are the heroes. Too often, we start with the story and fit evidence to it.

But that’s not the gift that evidence offers us. Every day, if we want, we can discover evidence that adds layers and texture and personality to our story and that makes us a more empathetic (and thus more reliable and persuasive) story teller.

I need to figure myself out first, then I’ll focus on my relationship.

I need to focus on who I am in the core of my being before I focus on what I want to do.

I need to grow in my relationship with God. Relationships with people come second.

Being human doesn’t happen in stages, though, mainly because we can’t really know when we’re in which stage and when or how to move to a different one. Also, stages are constructs. They’re useful for understanding things like development in very broad terms, but they’re very unreliable guides for deciding how to spend our time today.

Focusing on relationships is figuring out ourselves and growing in our relationship with God. What we want to do is part of who we are.

If we’re putting something off for the sake of a stage, there’s probably another reason.

Protests, marches, and demonstrations welcome a very broad range of participants. These people, like you, show up for diverse reasons: a personal invitation, membership in a coalition, a sign on a light post. Some of them didn’t know anything about it until they saw it for themselves, and then they decided to join in.

From your vantage amidst that crowd, then, you will note signs conveying messages you don’t fully endorse, often conveyed with words and images you would never use. Yet for your time together those are your signs too. You choose to identify with them for the sake of a larger movement and its aims.

Dogmatism kills resistance.

Hell, part I:

I wrote something about the soul in an email devotion, and someone from the congregation replied with a citation from Paradise Lost. Shortly followed an invitation to read it and discuss it together. Book one is all about Hell.

Hell, part II:

Matt and I recorded an episode of the podcast on “10 Biblical Passages about Heaven and Hell.” I think I laughed more than I should have during the Hell verses.

Hell, part III:

“Let none admire/that riches grow in Hell; that soil may best/Deserve the precious bane.” (Paradise Lost, Book I, 690-692).

“Suppression tends to obscure evidence of its own failures, since fear is as likely to inspire ingenuity and stealth as it is compliance.”

“Repression discredits law, after all, and dignifies resistance.”

In the palaces of kings we often see men of brutal disposition holding high rank, and we need not go back to history for this. In these days kings are often gross and infatuated, and more like horses and asses than men! Hence audacity and recklessness obtain the highest honors of the palace . . . we ought to weep over the heartlessness of kings in these days, who proudly despise God’s gifts in all good men who surpass the multitude in usefulness; and at the same time enjoy the society of the ignorant like themselves, while they are slaves to avarice and rapine, and manifest the greatest cruelty and licentiousness. Since, then, we see how very unworthy kings usually are of their empire and their power, we must weep over the state of the world, for it reflects like a glass the wrath of heaven, and kings are thus destitute of counsel.

John Calvin’s Commentary on The Book of Daniel, 1561

I’ve known two people who had serious health scares and made significant life-change decisions in the window of time that followed. Neither of their changes “fixed” things about their life that led to the health scare, though. Rather, the scare very suddenly changed their view of their life and their priorities.

It doesn’t have to be a stroke or a heart attack. Events we don’t expect come into our lives as we are going about our day-to-day with our heads down, just trying to stay on top of all we have to be busy with. Those events turn the lights on.

Chucking everything in light of some such event is probably not wise; our eyes need time to adjust to the new light, and if we jump into action before they do we’re likely to run into a wall.

But they can be gifts, these scares: a rare opening to ask fundamental questions about what we want to be doing and the impact we want to have.

Show me a person who has conceded a point and I’ll show you a person of persuasion.

“10 Liberals Destroyed by One Conservative” and “Watch This Conservative Argument Get Annihilated” are video titles that get more clicks than “Watch These Opposing Viewpoints Acknowledge What Is True and Useful about One Another’s Arguments.” Conversation as conflict.

The true gift held out by conversation with another person is discovery, though, isn’t it? Not victory. Discovery of a connection, of joy, of empathy. Conversation-as-discovery is more enjoyable to practice and less stressful, but it’s probably also more effective if our aims for the conversation include changing peoples’ minds. Because it’s practically impossible to be persuaded from a defensive position.

If you don’t experience me as curious about your point of view, you’re probably not going to hear much of what I have to say.

If what I say can be taken out of context, then perhaps I should be mindful of how anything I say will sound absent its context. If this sentence or phrase sounds inflammatory or irresponsible without the words and phrases on either side of it, then perhaps I should change it.

It is easier than ever for bad actors to selectively edit. We get to edit first, though.

“Coffee is on me if you want to walk to Halstead this morning.”

This is my way of bribing Daughter to spend a few minutes with me at the beginning of the day at the beginning of the week. Bribery is in the foreground of a background invitation, and the invitation is the important part.

We must be good at inviting people to share life with us if we are to flourish. One half of this is for them–the spouse of a new colleague who just moved here and needs to meet people–and one half of it is for us; we need to invite people because we need people. That an invitation proceeds, partly at least, from our own need does not diminish it as an invitation.

That’s why I call my invitation to Daughter bribery: I need it. She does too, though she doesn’t know that as well as I do.

She could say no (she most often does). In order to have integrity an invitation must be unacceptable. The invited must be permitted to refuse without any fear of negative consequence.