As I sat in the car on the way to the airport, the driver was more than chatty.  He was a running stream of stories – many of them quite funny.  As I enjoyed following along, I realized that several principles I would do well to remember!

Drivers may seem to be focused on the road and driving.  Regardless of the truth in appearances, they are always listening.

Drivers may not understand the details of your conversation, however they are experts in relationships.  They know how to read people.  They get the nuances of your body language.  They can hear between the lines of a story.

Some drivers love to talk.  They are not often heard.  When they find a willing audience, the stories begin!  Personal, business, appropriate and sometimes note, there are so many to choose from.

As I listened to Oscar escapades, a convention faux pas or two, and odd events, I realized I could easily be a character in someone’s story.  I wish I could unwind some of my conversations.  I would love to replay events differently in my past.  Candidly, I wonder if I would be wise enough to do anything differently.  Somehow, I doubt it.

What I realize is that I can be intentional with the time and places in my present.  When asked, I can play the role of Festus.  In his case, he “answered that Caesarea was the proper jurisdiction for Paul, and that he himself was going back there in a few days.”  (Acts 25.4)  Now was not the time or the place for action.  Patience can be good.

What was I going to do with the information?

Was I willing to see someone with hope knowing what I knew?

Could I let others be human while still having confidence in them?

The conversation was challenging.  The context was my relationship with someone close to my heart.  I came into the conversation thinking that I needed the full details of their life.  I was concerned.  I wanted to help.  I thought that by knowing the details I could make a difference.

In hindsight, I can see his perspective.  Knowing the full history about another is not always helpful.  It establishes a bias within my perspective and colors how I see her/him.

I made the arguments then that I hear now.  Knowing protects me from their agendas.  Knowing gives me insights in how I can reach into their lives.  Knowing gives me an edge.

I watch the politics unfolding around me.  The situation is filled with tension.  So much is at stake.  I can see motives within individual actions.  I can see people playing as if on a marionette’s string.  They are on full display and yet I wonder how knowing more would help guide my response.  Even if I knew that they were characters out of an old story, where their action were “a lie, of course—they had revived their old plot to set an ambush and kill him along the way.”  (Acts 25.3)

Perhaps my response can be shaped differently.  Instead of assuming (knowing) the worst, I can embrace the following.

Everyone holds an opportunity to make a difference.  It is the heart of freedom.

If I respect, I can give another freedom with hope.

I can be vigilant, holding all to the commitments we share.  I assume the best while verifying the results.

I walk with openness while striving to be a positive change agent within the present.

I find myself responding to emails, wondering if I am willing to accept the risks.  Some I can see.  Others remain beyond my vision.  I can sense something is not quite right.  I have no hard evidence.  I cannot point to any fact.  Cynically, it is just a hunch.  Real or not, in responding I am assuming some kind of risk.

As I reflect on stories from the past, I can see how agendas fold into simple requests.  In one story, as “the high priests and top leaders renewed their vendetta against Paul.  They asked Festus if he wouldn’t please do them a favor by sending Paul to Jerusalem to respond to their charges.”  (Acts 25.2)  How would I respond?  Would I see the risk if I were in Festus’ shoes?  Do I see the obvious now?

I freely admit that my vision is flawed.  I know I partially blind.  I also know that I have to respond and live.

In walking into the unknown, I would offer you the same advice that I give to myself.

Not knowing is natural.  Even when we think we see everything, we do not.

Life does not demand that we see perfectly.  Life asks us to make a difference in the moment at hand.

In our humanness, we will make mistakes.  Each is an opportunity to learn.  Each reminds us to of the priceless gift that being compassionate to others represents.

I sit on a flight into the unknown.  There is no script to follow.  The unknowns outnumber the known.  Yet, I see Hope’s hand working.  You and I can make a difference.  Living, fully and with hope, is a risk worth taking.

I know I always have a choice.  However, the outcome of certain choices is not acceptable given my priorities.  As a result, I found myself working on tax preparation, organizing files, and making calls to the other side of the world in the middle of the night.  The progress was less than smooth.  There were extended periods that I looked on with wonder; what had I been doing for the past two hours?  Did I have anything to show for my work?

With each pause, the cause for worry increased.  The browser for one project was not working.  The pile of receipts that I needed to document was endless.  To make things more fun, the ink on several receipts was fading.  I wondered if things would come together.

There was logic in it all.  I knew there was a sequence of steps I needed to take.  Just like “three days after Festus arrived in Caesarea to take up his duties as governor, [then] he went up to Jerusalem,” (Acts 25.1) I could only start one step after another was done.

What was the highest priority?  Could I do things concurrently?

Looking back on the week, I would observe the following.

We always have more choices than we realize.  We may think there is only two choices or even one.  There are more if we are open.

Relationships trump everything else in the immediate.  This week I found myself pausing to help Carli with her taxes.  Whitney’s took priority shortly after, at the expense of my comfort that our taxes would be finished.  As I worked on the other, I found myself with ways to work smarter on my own.

Commitment and dedication are linked.  The last step took me past midnight and into the early hours of Friday morning.

Relationships and values will shape today’s sequence.

Even as I recognized my bias, I could see my reflection.  Was I any different?  Were there secret longings within me that were playing themselves?  Was I merely an echo of an long past governor who, in the middle of a healthy conversation “was secretly hoping that Paul would offer him a substantial bribe.  These conversations were repeated frequently.”  (Acts 24.26)  As critical as I was, could I see the real me within?

My history suggests that this is a difficult process.  Yes, I can write about it with ease.  Yes, I am willing to discuss another’s challenges, open pushing them towards more.  Yet, when it comes to being open myself the challenge begins.  The reminders that I find helpful include the following.

Life does not come with a specific path we must follow.  We hold freedom within.  We get to choose.

Being human means that we have weaknesses and flaws.  Denying that they exist does not change reality.  If we want to improve, recognition is a first step.

We live in a community.  There is more than one.  I have meaning in the context of we.

When I pull all three reminders together, I find myself seeing a fresh revelation.

“I” do not have the answers in advance.  They come through the process of living.

“I” hold the opportunity to work with others with my strengths and weaknesses.  By being open to both, a bridge begins.

On this evening, we found a shared perspective.  I walked away richer for the experience.  Hope takes us to places beyond our imagination.  It is a gateway available to anyone at anytime.

With time (time and gray hairs), I no longer hold change as I once did.  I still believe we have an opportunity to learn and grow.  I am hopeful that institutions and individuals, myself included, will seize the windows that come their way.  I also know that not all change is helpful.  At times, we need to survive.  On other occasions, we are simply not ready.  Change opens up a vulnerability that can cripple.

It is easy to look with a critical eye.  Project leaders should want to strengthen their programs.  Good managers are be looking for ways to improve.  Change will be a given in our lives.  However, the reaction of a historical figure is often the same as mine.

“As Paul continued to insist on right relations with God and his people, about a life of moral discipline and the coming Judgment, Felix felt things getting a little too close for comfort and dismissed him.  ‘That’s enough for today.  I’ll call you back when it’s convenient.’”  (Acts 24.25)

A raw nerve met the hand of change.  It was instantly painful.  It was immediately difficult.  It was difficult to metaphorically open up this box.

I do not have answers on how to deal with change.  I offer the following as suggestions.

Change flourishes best in the presence of compassion and empathy.  Unless we are sensitive to the idea that change can be difficult, it is unlikely to happen.

Change is always easier for the other than it is for the self.  We can see in others what we refuse or are unable to see within ourselves.

Change happens best in a community that knows trust.  Change takes more than one.

Living invites change.

The intersection between knowing, being aware, and acting is often confusing.  I know texting while driving is illegal.  I am very aware that it is unsafe.  On occasion I text while driving, though never on a bicycle.  Why I do this, I do not know.  I cannot rationalize my behavior.  I have no explanation for the conflict between action and belief.

The gap between being aware and having consistent action is belief combined with conviction.  I believe, but I am not always convicted.  Awareness is not enough.  Knowledge helps, but it alone will not lead to belief.  Belief required that I embrace without reservations.  Conviction is when my soul demands that I follow without hesitation.

When I watch this play out in my life, I see a dance.  My awareness makes me curious.  I am like a historical governor what did not believe but was aware.  Even in his professed disbelief, “Felix and his wife, Drusilla, who was Jewish, sent for Paul and listened to him talk about a life of believing in Jesus Christ.”  (Acts 24.24)  This was fine until it pushed him beyond knowledge and into the question of belief.  At that point, everything stopped.

As I listen to the waves crash on the shore, I can see the beauty of last night’s sunset.  I know beauty is all around me.  As I walk the streets of Sea Cliff, I know I believe that you and I can make a difference.  Somewhere between the space between awareness, knowledge, and belief, there is a call to conviction.

The light of dawn is just beginning to show itself.  Everything for today is unwritten.  We have an opportunity to step into life, bringing awareness, knowledge, and belief into action.  What it will look like is up to us.

The radical or contrarian likes to be seen as the rebel.  The lead trait is one of being different.  The individual often positions difference as a strength.  In contrast, those around her/him often see an attitude of indifference and arrogance.  Individuals playing this role are often sources of new ideas and different ways of thinking.  Communities tend to embrace or reject, rarely anything in the middle.

Contributors value getting along above all other values.  Goals can be secondary to harmony.  Smooth relationships define the success of any method used.  Often considered boring by others, every community needs hard working contributors if it is going to be successful.  While key, contributors also tend to enable behaviors.  For managers, the benefits outweigh the negatives, however these individuals require more attention than most are willing to give.

Agents are playing to win.  Depending on the individual, the behavior others see can be viewed as manipulative, double sided, or slick.  While I have a natural tendency to assign a moral scale to what I see, there are many examples that are seen as simply playing with the rules that one is given.  One example is how a judge behaved.  A historian notes his words and behavior.  “‘When Captain Lysias comes down, I’ll decide your case.’  He gave orders to the centurion to keep Paul in custody, but to more or less give him the run of the place and not prevent his friends from helping him.”  (Acts 24.23)

On any given day, I can play any or all of the roles.  The question I wrestle with is why?  What is my intent?  How do my motives and actions play out in the lives of community?  Am I willing to be accountable?

If has many permutations.  Unfortunately, none of them applied in this case.

As my emotions swirled, I took a deep breath.  Taking the right action is often my second choice.  In multiple situations, one man’s action reflects a common model.  “Felix shilly-shallied.  He knew far more about the Way than he let on, and could have settled the case then and there.  But uncertain of his best move politically, he played for time.”  (Acts 24.22)

I would like to say that I have never walked this path, however that would be far from the truth.  It is natural to consider the politics of the situation before making one’s choice.  It is easier to be expedient than it is to always stand for what is right.  Rationalizing what is best often trumps what is correct.

The exception comes with what I call heart.  Heart means that one strives for truth in the face of obstacles.  Heart calls one to mountaintops knowing that the path up will take its toll.  Heart is the willingness to pause, reflect, and still take the tough decision.

I wonder about the times I have played for time.  Was I looking for a better answer or the easier one?  Did I let the easy path trump the harder one?  Am I willing to stand for what I say I most value?

As my breathing became more regular, I found myself reaching for Hope.  In the effort, I found myself surrounded by a Spirit of the possible.  It may be hard, but it is worthy.  It may not be obvious; I know I am looking for this answer.

When I see myself as I am, I find myself caught in the moment.  It is an unusual moment because I am looking at the present from multiple perspectives.  The past, the eyes of others, and what I imagine the future to be.  As the perspectives swirl they become increasingly real.  My imaginary reality becomes the moment.

I would like to suggest, to you as well as to myself, that there is an alternative.  As I listened to a man looking back to a specific moment, I realized there are many ways others can see but only one way for the person at hand.

His defense was simple; “The only thing they have on me is that one sentence I shouted out in the council: ‘It’s because I believe in the resurrection that I’ve been hauled into this court!’  Does that sound to you like grounds for a criminal case?”  (Acts 24.21)

He did not offer a personal opinion, merely asked the obvious question.  He did not change the facts, simply recounted them with the willingness to be present in the moment at hand.  He was not trying to change what he saw.

The face in the mirror can be riddled with flaws.  Welcome be being human.

The face in the mirror will not have all the answers.  S/he may not have any answers.  Welcome to being real.

The face in the mirror may be frightened.  Welcome to a real community.

Today’s mirror showed me more than I expected.  I can do anything with it.