The Friday Update - Attractive and Dangerous

Happy Friday,

In Philippians 1, Paul promises that "He who began a good work within us will complete it.” In Jude's doxology, the news is even better. Not only will the one who justifies sanctify, but He delights to do so. The "great joy" mentioned at the end of verse 24 is His, not ours!

Seeing = Believing

Three graphs grabbed my attention this week. This one shows that more Europeans are dying than being born. This one shows how much more time young people are spending alone. And this one — which went viral, but I can’t confirm is true — shows the decline in the percentage of 30-year-olds reaching two of life’s goals: 1) getting married, and 2) buying a home. It feels true, but remember, Abraham Lincoln cautioned us about believing everything we see online.  

Without Comment

1) According to Pew, 74% of U.S. adults favor banning cell phones in middle and high school classrooms.

2) The world’s median age is projected to reach 42 in 2100, up from 31 today and 22 in 1950.

3) Per the Encyclopedia of World Problems and Human Potential (yes, that exists), in the last 5,500 years, 14,513 wars have claimed the lives of 2.6B people.

4) 1 in 5 students at US universities formally identify as disabled.

5) The price of some McDonald’s Big Mac combo meals is now north of $18.

Speaking Of

If true, the claim of 14,513 wars suggests that human history is a series of wars interrupted by peace, not seasons of peace interrupted by pockets of war. I say, “if true,” because by my count, the last 5,500 years have seen only 14,511 wars.

WOTW

Honorable mention goes to gigil — the irresistible desire to squeeze things that are cute (e.g., "This puppy is so gigil”); euouae — the longest English word composed solely of vowels (it’s found almost exclusively in Gregorian chants and games of Scrabble); and delulu — which means delusional. (Delulu earned a spot in Cambridge’s online dictionary - alongside skibidi, tradwife, broligarchy and lewk - after Australia's Prime Minister claimed the opposition was “delulu with no solulu.”) Full honors go to moral fatigue — the psychological toll accompanying “constant decision-making in a context with few ethical guideposts.” BTW, I considered giving honorable mention to beclaire — a hoity term meaning “to clarify a complex idea,” but it reminds me of bespoke, which I’m glad to say, appears to begone. Besides, I fear those casually dropping beclaire into dinner party banter might get bepunched in the nose. One would certainly hope so.

Quotes Worth Requoting

1) "It was known — and for this reason seen as both attractive and dangerous — as a worship-based, spiritually renewed, multi-ethnic, polychrome, mutually supportive, outward-facing, culturally creative, chastity-celebrating, socially responsible fictive kinship group…generous to the poor and courageous in speaking up for the voiceless." — N.T. Wright, defining the early church (lightly edited).

2) "If I learned one thing in my time working with the CIA, it is this, everyone believes they are the good guy." — Amaryllis Fox, an undercover CIA operative.

3) “Everyone is screwed up, broken, clingy, and scared, even the people who seem to have it together. They are much more like you than you would believe. So, try not to compare your insides to their outsides.” — Anne Lamott

Question of the Week

Has your definition of success changed over the last ten years, and if so, how?

Overheard

1) For many, the modern workday has no clear start or finish.

2) In a leader/leader organization, the governing principle is to push authority to those with information, not to push information to those with authority.

3) After dying, God granted a man one question. The man chose, “Who killed JFK?” God responded, “Lee Harvey Oswald. And he acted alone.” At which point the man replied, “Wow, this goes even higher than I thought.” 

TWT (This Week’s Theory)

Hanlon’s Razor states that we should not attribute to malice that which is more easily explained by stupidity.

Resources

1) Click here to listen to last week’s sermon on the Parable of the Lost Sheep.

Closing Prayer

“O Lord my God, teach my heart where and how to seek You, where and how to find You. You are my God and my Lord, and I have never seen You. You have made me and remade me, and You have bestowed on me all the good things I possess, still I do not know You. I have not yet done that for which I was made. Amen.” (Anselm of Canterbury — 1033-1109)