User:Three Red Cups

Three Red Cups

by Those Called to Share the Message of Love...

with Ann Cain

Part III – When Your Cup Is Full					page 17 Part I - All We Need Is Love

A LOVE STORY

This is a love story.

I have never written a story before, let alone a love story.

All right, so it is not the typical love story. It is not Romeo and Juliet, or anything like that.

It is the Three Red Cups love story. It is how I see God trying to pour his love on us, so that we can in turn pour our love on others, and they can in turn…well, you get the picture. A constant stream of the purest love.

Picture, if you will, Three Red Cups.

Suppose I am the Red Cup in the middle, Feeling insufficient, depleted, aimless, or judged, Trying so hard to be perfect And yet always coming up short, Always wondering what I’m doing wrong.

I simply tilt to the left to receive God’s love As a pure stream pouring down on me.

Filled with his grace, I tilt effortlessly to the right and fill the cups of others. They receive God’s love through me.

Each of us can be that Red Cup in the middle, receiving God’s love in such abundance that nothing will do but that we share it with others.

WHY ME?

Why in the world would you be interested in what I have to say about God’s love?

You would not. I know that. Don’t even bother reading my little biography at the back of this book. You’ll see that I’m an ordinary man without whatever credentials you might expect for taking on one of the most important subjects in the whole world.

But – and this is a huge “but” – God wants me to be a messenger for him. I know this as well as I know anything. I still feel a little presumptuous asking you to read it, but I don’t feel embarrassed. I’m supposed to do this.

God has this message of love that he wants me to deliver for him. It’s not about me, and I wish I could write it without using “I” and “me” all the time. If I could figure out a way of delivering the message without inserting myself, I would do that. I tried. But here I am, so you see how that turned out.

Still, I am thrilled to deliver this message at God’s bidding. In no way do I feel “chosen” or any other kind of special. I just feel “available”. Well, a little more than that. The message of love he has asked to deliver resonates so profoundly with me that I am more excited—more “in love”—than I have ever been in my whole life.

Why did he pick me to write this book? I don’t know. I am not an expert on God’s word. I am not one of those people who can recall just the right Bible chapter and verse for every occasion, although I love those words and admire those who can. I am not a theologian. I am not even much of a writer; I am lucky to know Ann who helped me.

And I’m certainly not perfect. I am a businessman, husband, father, friend, and a reasonably conscientious member of my chosen small communities of people, but I have all the flaws and failings of the most ordinary of mortals.

If I do have a talent, it is what a colleague once told me: “You have made a career out of simplifying.”  I realize he might have been damning with faint praise; maybe I had just said something embarrassingly obvious. But still it is true. I believe I bring at least this to the task at hand—the ability to re-simplify today a message that was simple enough when it was first delivered more than 2000 years ago. Love me; love others as I have loved you.

That’s all. That’s completely all. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son…” And all he asks in return is:  Love me; love others as I have loved you.

The image of the red cups came to me at a party one day as I stood enjoying myself, holding one of those red cups that were (still are?) standard issue at college keg parties. I’ve always associated red cups with the carefree feeling of taking pleasure in the company of others. To me red cups are the icon for “Live Well, Laugh Often, and Love Much.” Today I don’t act the same way I did back when I first appreciated a few too many red cups, but I am still the same man, and I still love the look and feel of red cups. They still stand for what they did back then, but now they have so much more significance. Now I know what “love much” means.

I am writing this book because God is asking me to take this message directly to his people without the being drowned out by society’s competing, undermining messages. According to a recent survey, only five out of 100 entertainment executives are Christians. Only 5% of the people who make decide what to make available for children to see, hear, and learn from potentially believes in the simple message of Christ.

So He is speaking through me, asking me to help start a movement that he intends to take across the world. Could he have chosen a different mechanism? Sure. Could he have sent his son again to restate the message again about what we are to do here on earth? Of course. But he chose me – as he has often chosen ordinary or less than ordinary people to carry out his wishes. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that this book is written by him through me. Period. He desperately wants all of us – Christians, Non-Christians, Jews, Muslims, Sinners, Non-Sinners (oops, there are none) to strip away everything that is not love and open themselves up to the true meaning of his message.

Maybe this book isn’t for you. Maybe you are fully at peace without it or maybe this subject is too simple or naïve. In that case, please return it for a full refund. Otherwise, stick with me here – because He’s with me, and this will be joyful.

WHAT HAPPENED TO CHRIST’S MESSAGE?

What happened to His simple little message of love? He was pretty clear about it then. It’s not like the crucifixion of Christ didn’t make a big splash in its time. He was conveying the love thing all along. Even on the cross he said, “Forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

And it’s not like nobody’s been talking about it lately. His followers have been multiplying all these years, building churches, writing books, singing hymns, saying prayers, and taking the message far and wide. Christianity is the world’s biggest religion with about 2 billion people, or about 33% of the world’s whole population. So the word is out there plenty.

But consider how the message is conveyed by so many who profess to believe most ardently in his teachings. The message gets buried under layers of dogma; THIS is how God is to be loved, and in no other way. This formula for worship, these prayers, this hierarchy, those apostates.

Or it arrives loaded with judgment and guilt; you are not good enough, you don’t deserve God’s love. When he said “everybody’s” sins, you didn’t suppose he meant yours if you’re gay, or on if you’re gay, or on the other side of the DMZ, or behind bars, or

It may arrive subordinated to the biases of believers; Love THIS God, and that neighbor – and shun others. It might be corrupted by the power hungry; Love God, kill those who don’t.

My heart sank when I read about a study recently. “A decade ago the vast majority of Americans outside the Christian faith, including young people, felt favorably toward Christianity’s role in society. Currently, however, just 16% of non-Christians in their late teens and twenties said they have a ‘good impression’ of Christianity.” (http://thegreatrealization.wordpress.com/2008/01/17/young-people-rejecting-christianity-view-it-as-homophobic/)

Disheartened, I read further and learned: Fully 72 percent of “unchurched” Americans see churches as places full of hypocrites. And 79 percent think that Christianity today is more about organized religion than about loving God and loving people. (Christian Post Reporter, Jan 8, 2008)

How, I wondered, could so many have come to those conclusions about following a religion named for someone who died for love of us?

Clearly, the pure simplicity of the message has been lost. In Lord, Save Us from Your Followers, Dan Merchant writes, “Christianity is turning into a bad word with dubious meaning in American society because we (Christians) don’t care how we sound to those who don’t agree with us. He boils it down to just one question and poses it this way as he pursues the answer in interviews across the country: Why Is the Gospel of Love Dividing America? It’s shocking to see how many of Christ’s follows have hijacked his message for their own agenda.

He tells a heart-rending story of apologizing to gays for how they have been reviled by some Christians. One gay woman responds to him this way. “I want to thank you for speaking this to me. I appreciate hearing the words. It does a lot to heal my heart. I was just thinking the same thing, How could Jesus’ followers hate us so much? So it’s lovely to hear this from you and know that all of you don’t hate us.”

Lovely to learn that Jesus’ followers don’t hate her! Do you think the message might have gone awry somewhere?

EARNING LOVE

It’s not just Christians scolding other people who make a mess of the message. Sometimes it’s the way we talk to ourselves.

We make ourselves miserable by striving too hard and flailing ourselves for our inevitable failure. Our pride tells us we must be perfect, and when we are not, we forget the message and indulge in guilt. Many of us come by that trait honestly, guilt and shame being twin pillars of many Christian groups, where forgiveness is eked out by a stingy God who, they claim keeps score and reserves his love for the “perfect” believer.

It kills me when I see good, decent, striving people, so weighted by guilt, shame, and anxiety that they can hardly remember why they believe in God in the first place. I want to say, “Look, he’s God, you’re not. He didn’t say be perfect, and he didn’t say be miserable when you’re not. Give him your troubles, and let his love flow over you.”

Being a follower of Christ isn’t supposed to be a free pass to perfection. It’s supposed to be hard, else we would not value it. Of course we will be tempted – that’s why we have free will. We’re expected to make mistakes – that’s how we learn. It doesn’t change the world or us – it guides us to be in the world.

In Anna Karenina, Levin undergoes a profound and joyous conversion to faith. Tolstoy writes of Levin moments after his conversion, “It seemed to him that his relations with everyone would now be changed. “There will be no disputes; with Kitty never any quarrel again; …I shall be amiable and kind; and with the servants, with Ivan, everything will be different.” And yet three paragraphs later he snaps at Ivan his coachman. “He immediately felt how wrong had been his conclusion that his spiritual condition could at once alter his manner when confronted with reality.”

We are confronted with the reality of our lives every moment of the day. Perfection is not only unrealistic. It wouldn’t even please him.

I picture God saying to us, “Hold on, PEOPLE. I know it’s more than 2000 years since I sent my son to earth to forgive sin and show each of you the path to me. But aren’t we a tad off-message here?

“I didn’t send him so that you could see a perfect person in the flesh and strive to be more like him. That’s impossible. Really, it is. You can’t do better for me by striving for perfection. You need to make your efforts less about you and all about others.

“I sent my only son and what did he do? He died for your sins. All of them. All of you. So what is all this guilt and anxiety I see? His was the ultimate sacrifice. I don’t want sacrifice from you. I want to love you. And I want you to love others as I love you. I want that flow of love to replace all the other bitter flows I see around the world. Please, just give me your troubles, and let me love you.”

When I hear him saying those words, the image of the Three Red Cups is vivid. I see him begging me to tilt my cup his way. But I know that I had a hard time learning to do that. Self-sufficient people shouldn’t have to working at turning to God, should they? Shouldn’t it be easy to just say, “Take my troubles, Lord, and fill my cup. Your will, not mine. Your way, not mine.”

Part II – Turn to Him. Tilt Your Cup to the Left

Sometimes I’ll ask a close friend, “What does God look like to you?” You’d be amazed at some of the answers. But I think of one friend in particular when I think about why it’s so hard for some of us to tilt our cups to the left.

Think about that for a second here. By tilting to the left I mean saying, in effect: “My own cup is empty, Lord. I can’t do that loving others thing because I’m too depleted and too weighted down by troubles. So take my troubles, and pour your love on me. Fill my cup. Fill me.” With perfect assurance that he will indeed do that very thing.

Now why should that be so hard to do? That doesn’t make sense, does it? That’s all you have to do to make you so happy that happy doesn’t begin to cover it – to get peace so deep that it’s indescribable, and yet it’s -- excuse me -- too hard to do?

That’s like hearing a Powerball winner complain, “Now I have to take this lousy piece of paper to a lawyer. I’ll have to drive to the bank. I’ll have to tell the family we’re rich. Oh, it’s just too hard!”

What’s the difference between the lottery and the Lord? Maybe this: People know that winning the lottery will fill up their bank account. But many people – including devout, believing Christians – in their heart of hearts don’t truly believe that God will fill their cup – that there is nothing he desires more than to see that cup tilting over and to fill it with his merciful, infinite, healing love.

Anyway, when I wonder why it’s hard for some people, I think of this one friend and how she answered me when I asked, “What does God look like to you?”

“Well,” she answered, “The hem of his robe is trimmed in gold – how’s that? Not sure I’ve looked up past that – not sure I need to see one more stern, disapproving look. I know when I’m not living up to snuff, and it would frankly be a lot easier to self-correct if he weren’t up there glowering.” She said it with a smile and some irony – but still, she meant it well enough. For her, raised to be god-fearing, she had – surprise! – learned to fear the all-seeing and all-judging God. Now, as an adult, she is over the fear but resists the indignity of criticism and judgment.

“My friend!” I wanted say – maybe I did say. “He is not judging you. When you are ready to skip the hem and look all the way up to his eyes, they are the warmest, most loving eyes you have ever seen! I know because I’ve seen them. That’s the gift I got when I finally learned to tilt my cup to the left.”

And it’s true. God is not judging her day in and day out. She’s judging herself because that is what she learned. Intellectually, she knows exactly what’s going on, but instinctively, when her cup is low, and she glances to the left and sees that golden hem, the last thing she wants to do is turn her cup to the left and have it filled with judgment. So she averts her eyes and continues to try to do God’s will without his love. How sad is that?

And sadder, how common is that?

In Finding the God Who Is Love, an essay by Fr. Andrew Kimel that moved me almost to tears, we learn how that happens. First, he writes, there’s a narrative goes something like this:

“God is angry with us, and he’s been angry with us since the day we were born. But if we repent of our sins, he will change his mind, forgive us, and give us eternal life, as long as we continue to believe in him and avoid mortal sins. But we need to be careful, because if we trip up, God will turn on us at a moment’s notice.”

By way of example, he goes on:

Look at the parable of the prodigal son… (who) acknowledges how his sin has altered his relationship to his father: “I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me as one of your hired servants.” But what precisely has changed? Has the father ceased to love his son? Has he become the angry patriarch the son now fears him to be? On the contrary, the father has been waiting for his son to return, and upon seeing him in the distance, he jubilantly rushes to greet and welcome him home. No, what has changed is the son. Because of his sin, the prodigal is no longer capable of seeing the father as he really is. It is hard to tilt your cup to the left when you expect to find only punishment there.

SACRIFICING FOR LOVE

“Try harder.” So many people, seeking to fill their own cups, try so awfully hard. It can be heart-breaking to watch them. They try as though it is all up to them – as though God wants them to go through a lot of misery to earn his love.

And let’s face it, there’s plenty of precedent for that kind striving. Just look at the Old Testament and all the sacrifices expected of people. Abraham sacrificing his son Isaac in the mountains of Moriah. The entire population of Jericho annihilated for the purpose of appeasing an angry God.

The people in the Old Testament thought they had to make sacrifices to gain God’s love and forgiveness. That’s a lot of pressure – feeling that you will be in trouble with God if you pick the wrong goat. That you’ll fall out of favor and be banished to the wilderness if your altar isn’t up to snuff.

Okay, maybe they did have to do that. There was a lot of smiting and condemning going on back then. But the last thing I want to do here is get in a scripture war. I’ll probably lose it, but that’s not why. It’s because I know, as well as I know I’m supposed to write this book, that I’m not supposed to make a sacrifice of my son or anything of that sort.

Neither are you. That was then. After that, God gave his only son for us, who suffered and died for our sins. This is now. This time around, his message is about love. No more burnt goats, no more beheadings in his name. This time it’s a message of pure, infinite love for us, asking in return only (I just wanted an excuse to say it again), Love me; love others as I have loved you.

There’s a great phrase out there – “Red Letter Christian.” It refers, of course, to the words in the Bible that Christ actually spoke which are rendered in red in many Bibles. I like that. While the Red Letter Christian movement was actually started by several religious leaders to transcend the partisan political maneuverings that threaten to hijack Christianity, the phrase works equally well in the broadest way. Being a red letter Christian means letting Christ’s words of love and forgiveness stand on their own, without the agenda-laden interpretations of others or even ourselves. I’d like to be a red letter Christian.

The rough stuff isn’t confined to the Old Testament. It seems like the desire to sacrifice and appease harsh gods runs strong in most culture and most religions on all continents. People try to appease the gods with pain and sacrifice rather than doing good for one another.

Let me tell you about my father. Andy, maybe we don’t want to use this – or else maybe we make it “a man you were close to”? Thought of that when I heard Obama expose his grandmother … He was raised a Catholic in the strictest sense, trained to be a Catholic priest but left the seminary to marry and have a family. His training, coupled with his own sense of having failed to live up to what had been expected of him, left him almost crippled, it seems to me know. Unable to express his love – perhaps unable to love himself. Let’s talk about this before I write any more…

I have another friend, reared attentively, thoughtfully, purposefully by devoted Catholic parents in the close embrace of the Catholic Church. Went to Daily Mass and weekly Catechism, took the sacraments and observed all the rituals. Her home life was suffused with daily prayers, regular novenas, nightly rosary, religious music, and almost daily celebrations of saints’ feast days. Her own “Feast Day” – the special day of the saint for which she was named – was as celebrated as her birthday.

Her parents were loving and no doubt meant to impart a love of the Catholic religion to her. But the formative part of her childhood religious experience was the anxiety and fear of offending an easily angered and punitive God, not a loving one. In matters of God, her parents’ loving nature became judging and fearful. As adolescence dawned her nature resisted the lovelessness of her Catholic experience. A gulf grew between her and her church, her and her parents. While kindness, love, beauty, humor, hope graced much of her life, it was for years shadowed and punctuated by guilt, anxiety, shame, punishment.

She withdrew from religion, and in doing so withdrew from God for many years. Now, only in middle age is she enjoying the peace of seeking out the loving nature of Christ.

Not to remotely suggest that Catholics have a corner on harshness. I doubt there is a religion in the world that does not have its overzealous interpreters, its sanctimonious practitioners, or those who preach and practice their religion out of fear and guilt, shaming people and leaving them feeling like failures. My only point is that even among the best-intentioned, like my friends’ parents, when people subordinate God’s message of love and harken back to the days of sacrifice and punishment, they create pain and suffering.

SUFFERING AND THE AMERICAN DREAM

Why do so many people seem to suffer so, even in the middle of doing exactly what they choose to do? Why is happiness so elusive even while their lives seem to be so good?

I think I know at least part of the reason. They feel empty and desire to be filled. They have been taught that to be filled, they must strive to be like God, to be like Jesus. "What would Jesus do?" people ask. That's worth pondering, but to me it's the wrong question, if what you really want to know is "What out I to do? Not to be rude, but, you're not Jesus.  He was God, and God knew it.  God is perfect today, and he was brilliant when he created heaven and earth. And when he lived on earth, He was flat awesome!  He spent his life on earth loving and showing us how to love.  Not to be exactly like him!  But to love God and love one another.  I believe he sent his son to die for our sins and to show us that his love of his father and of others is THE message.  The question is not, “What would Jesus do?” but, “How would Jesus love?” Remember what he did on earth?  He spent time with people, truly with them and not in some Biblical-age headquarters or palace.  He coached those he met.  He taught them.  He loved them.  Even when He got mad, it was tough love-mad, not you're-bad-you're-a-failure-mad. He walked from town to town pouring out love. Especially, He loved those who had no one else to love them. He made disciples to help carry His gospel of love. And when He was running on empty, he slipped away and restored himself with time alone with his father. He didn't judge those who judged Him. He didn't refute what people said He was. Even sentenced to die on the cross, He didn't fight the sentence. He knew this was the plan – that by being fully available to His father, His father's love would fill Him and THEN enable him to pour that love on others.

This is not to say that we should not strive to be like him, but to say that we will always fall short of being like him. I’m saying it’s time to re-think and re-absorb the main message he left us with after his short time with us on earth.

Why did he say that the two most important commands are to love God and to love others? Think of all the other commands he might have made. Why those two? Why did he spend all of his adult life as he did? He could have spent his time with the powerful, teaching them. He could have – well, why even finish that thought? He could work miracles so he could have done anything, and yet he chose to walk from town to town, pouring love on ordinary people. Not that it was easy. It was hard – even for Him. But he knew that the plan was for him to die for our sins – all of them. Not only to free ourselves from sin but to free ourselves from perfection! All of us! Each and every person. Not just Christians. Not just the virtuous. Not just the hale and hearty, but the venal, the leper, the unbeliever – every one of us. Thanks to his sacrifice we can each choose to be free of perfection, free of guilt, free of anxiety. We are free to do the only thing he wants from us – to love. For that he suffered a brutal, painful death on the cross. All for one thing only – for love. So, in light of what he did, look how our pitiful strivings for perfection compare. What heroic act can we conjure to outdo his? Exactly. None. So let us relinquish the guilt and anxiety. I want to say: Tilt to the left and allow him to take over your life. He made each of you in his image, and his love is unconditional. My friend whose view of God is his golden hem? The message of Jesus is not about what he would do but rather how would he Love. A woman fearful of looking in the eyes of the most loving person to walk on this earth is left striving to be like him but without feeling the mercy of his love.

DREAMING SHARED DREAMS

But it’s not just guilt or fear that makes it hard to tilt one’s cup to the left. We’re hardwired with another kind of striving. We strive mightily to live up to society’s expectations and to our own dreams of the life we are supposed to have.

I think of that Ecclesiastes passage about the weary man. “So I hated life, because the work that is done under the sun was grievous to me. All of it is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.”

If you’re normal, you may have dreamed of a certain kind of life every since you were a child. That’s the life you’re supposed to have now, isn’t it? I know I myself spent many years in that dreaming and striving mode. All my life, society told me what was important – success in school, success in athletics, success in business. Having certain things. Living a certain lifestyle. Playing a certain role.

Is society so wrong? Is it foolish to follow one’s dream? I would ask, is it only your dream, or is it also His? (Yes, He dreams, I think. He could, after all, make us do whatever he wants, but he doesn’t.  He gives us free will and hopes we choose His way.)  If at some point your strivings seem pointless, maybe your dream and His are different.

We dream of prosperity. His dream is for us to enjoy and the richness of his love. We dream of happiness here and now. He plans on using our pain to show that pain, with Christ, is tolerable. We dream of a beautiful home. He plans that we live in a mansion to show that the socio-economic position of some means nothing to who and what they are. (Andy, I struggled to understand this paragraph…)

(Should we here be debunking the myth of pain and anxiety here? Not saying that your life should be without them – that you should see to escape them.  But neither are you to embrace them as your desserts – maybe like Mom does?  Pain and anxiety are how we grow…not what we suffer like martyrs…)

How remarkably proud we are – to believe that our position on earth is all up to us. That we are in control. That we can just vow to tackle the next adversity in pursuit of OUR dreams. How barbaric, really, to suppose that He made us, but then left us alone to fight for our position on earth. As though he would make us and then leave who we become entirely up to us. He made us but now we have only society to turn to for approbation.

I think of Jason Upton’s poignant lyrics in Dying Star. With all our striving, if we only turn the light on ourselves, we are missing the point. If we act for others, they will see Him, shining through me:

Star how beautiful you shine You shine more beautiful than mine You shine from sea to shining sea World-wide is your strategy But shining star I hope you see If the whole wide world is staring straight at you They can't see me...

It’s not like we were leading a life of crime, or doing anything shameful. We try to be good and do good. We try to make our parents proud, run a good business, be a good boss, good employee, good parent, good spouse, good friend.

Maybe that’s why at some point, in the lives of so many of us, our strivings seem pointless and our dreams lose their charm. Such moments can be terrifying for some. A life suddenly without anchor, without purpose, without satisfaction – full of striving but empty of satisfaction.

We can react by desperately seizing a new dream. We can ramp up our expectations. We can take refuge in nostalgia. Or sink into despair. Fight or flight.

Or how about another way? What if we simply said, “Your turn, God.” I tried it my way. I have I tried hard, and even in my successes I seem to have failed. I’ve been driving this life bus hard, whiteknuckled and speeding, and here I am in the ditch. So it’s your turn.”

That’s hard. You’ve been “leading” your life and now you’re saying, “You lead, I’ll follow.” But what does that mean? What choices are you to make now? What are you to do?

Makes you pine for the Garden of Eden, doesn’t it? Back then, when we were perfect and content, we didn’t have choice. But then that stuff happened and we ended up with choice. We get to choose how we will live our lives. Sounds nice on one level, but in reality it’s hard.

God desperately wants us to choose His way, but he leaves it to us. And when we give up on our own dreams and turn to him, he could not be happier. When we take him all our failures and all our disappointments – all our sins, he doesn’t exact a price – he welcomes them. Are you a cheater? A conniver? A hypocrite? He doesn’t care – he’s seen it all. He’s not judging you, he is welcoming you. Any little judging voice that you hear is probably the echo of your own old worries. He wants it all, no exceptions. He takes it all. He empties you of your shortcomings. He’s glad to have you back. And He rewards you by filling you up with his love.

And that is a feeling like nothing else I have ever experienced, I have to say. I like to say, “He will wear you out” because that’s exactly how I experience it when I give it all up to him, and his love pours over me. But that doesn’t mean it’s always easy. I was surprised to discover how much strength it takes to give up. Sounds perverse, but it’s true. All our lives, we congratulate ourselves on having things under “control.” Control is why we’re winning. Never, ever give up. We’re tough, that’s why we’re winning. And so on.

Now suddenly I’m expected to…. GIVE UP? Explain this to me, I said the first time. Why precisely should I let go of what has been serving me pretty well, thank you? Why should I put my faith in something I can’t see?

Good question. I couldn’t answer it for myself, and I can’t really answer it for you. But here’s how I did at least satisfy myself on the matter, thanks to my brother. He said, “It’s the Internet and the ant, Andy. You could explain the Internet all day long to an ant or a whole farm of ants. Would they get it? Nope. Is the Internet real? Yep.”

So, it’s not just faith we’re talking about, but a leap of faith. You wouldn’t take the leap, probably, if your bus weren’t in the ditch or at least swerving down the road. But when you’re at that point – when your dreams appear to be only yours, when your strivings are not taking you closer to happiness, then the leap is easier, I hope.

Let’s say you don’t. I’m close to someone who doesn’t – at least so far she hasn’t.

I’m not saying it will be easy. And if you’re already doing fine without it – if you already have this thing called “life” figured out and perfected, just give this book away or send it back to me for a refund. But if you’re like most of us, then let’s get really, really serious for a second.

GOD wants you to tilt your empty cup to him. He wants, desperately, to fill up your cup. In fact, he wants to be a huge part of your life. He just needs your heartfelt, humble invitation. CHOOSING LOVE, NO MATTER WHAT

I was walking back to my hotel during a business trip to Washington D.C. I saw a homeless man sitting against a wall. I felt God pull me over to him. I sat down, we talked, and this homeless man changed my life.

I asked him where he would spend the night. He told me hoped to find a bench on 17th Street where there would be enough other homeless people that they could band together, fend off harassers, and feel safe.

He went on to tell me that he was “a normal guy” like me. He had held a good job until something had happened that he did not describe. “I have bouts with mental issues. I’d like to be normal again.”

As sad as his words made me feel, I could not help noticing that he spoke with such peace. No rancor, bitterness, or anger—or even resignation. Just a wistful peace. He desired better, and I felt the glow of that desire when he smiled and laughed. I felt his love. Before we parted, we prayed, and he asked to be lifted up by Jesus.

As I left him I marveled, and it hit me when I reached my hotel. This man had nothing! Nothing, that is, but the love of Jesus (and the price of a meal from me). But that was enough. Jesus’ love sustained him and filled him with peace.

That’s when I felt the strongest call to write this book – to convey that message to those of us who have so much more: A man stripped to nothing still has love, if he so chooses.

We human beings, in our continuous quest for perfection, have so overcomplicated that simple fact. God didn’t make us to be perfect. He made us to love him and to love others. In trying too hard to be what we cannot be, we fail to let him pour his love on us, and we fail to pour his love on others.

What a waste! With all that we have, all that we’ve been given, and all that we’ve achieved, how many of us have the peace of the homeless man who only had God’s love?

KEEPING IT FRESH AND PURE

Okay, so you have tilted to the left and God has filled your cup. What an awesome feeling. Cherish it. Feel his love overwhelm you. You’re set now.

Simple, right? Of course not. Let me get to my story in a minute, and while it’s not your story, or anybody else’s on the planet, there are bound to be enough similarities to make my point here – my point being that keeping it fresh and pure is not easy. (It’s not supposed to be easy, but we’ll get to that later.)

We all came into this world, exactly the same as in “made in His image”, but then not so much. We get born, then our cup starts filling up with stuff. How we are hard-wired. How our parents raised us. The choices we make year after year after year. Our earthly wins and our earthly failures. All the stuff of life. We become what we become, we are what we are, it is what it is. Your cup gets full of whatever you fill it with. Some good, some bad. Maybe it’s working for you just fine. Maybe it’s not. But at some point, for most of us, “something happens.”

In my case, my “something” came out of left field. I really never saw it coming. Here’s my story. (Andy’s story here – raised one way, wired a certain way, success in sports, what filled my cup was a W on the scoreboard, had some career success, success should equal happiness, right? Got hit by a 2x4, anxiety/depression, and the rest is history…

So that’s my story… (Andy, I’m sure this will need to be re-written after I hear a little more about your story, so what follows here is just to move the narrative forward and make a transition…)  Until that moment, I had never fully got it. I had never fully understood that the only way to truly open up your life and allow God to pour in is to make yourself available to him at all times. What I mean by this is that by every morning asking him to do his will through you, and to wear you out for his use. He will mold you into a vessel of worth for his kingdom. ……more on this

Not that it was so all fired easy. Not that it’s easy now. I’ll be honest. There were times when I thought, “If this is His way – if this so right – if I’m so sure that this is the path I need to follow, shouldn’t it be a little easier?” Like when you’re lost on the highway, and you finally get turned around and know you’re going in the right direction, you relax and just drive, don’t you?

Well that wasn’t happening here. I still had to…. (Andy, I’m thinking that when we keep saying it’s not easy, we should be specific about the kind of hard it is… at least specific examples.) I would still find myself slipping back into striving for X, and judging Y, and using the language of _______ instead of the language of love. I would still find myself looking at other people as ________ and not as precious examples of blessed chances to ____________.

(Is this the place to talk about Andy and Martin, a little club of two, everything black and white, and then starting to think, maybe it’s not so cut and dried?)

Yes, the simple image of the Three Red Cups couldn’t be simpler. Tilt to the left for God’s love. Tilt to the right to share it. Flying is simple. Shape a wing to deflect airflow and generate more lift than gravity. Simple, but not easy. Flying takes rigorous engineering and still is hard and dangerous.

Living the Three Red Cups life isn’t supposed to be easy. Ever since Eden, freedom from earthly pain has not been an option. Nobody gets a pass on suffering. But that’s not the only reason. It’s not supposed to be easy because that is not how we grow in wisdom. We grow by enduring tough times that challenge how we think and how we act. We grow when we change, and we change when we must.

All my striving for success – no, make that all my actual success – shielded me not at all from pain and anxiety. No matter how hard I battled against them, I only made them stronger. My only option (and believe me, I tried a lot of other more options that I thought were more “respectable” – that showed me in better light, that didn’t take humility) – my only option was to stop trying to beat back my troubles and instead just offer them to God. Not just once – not just the day I finally broke and said, “All yours, God – here they come.” Not just every morning when I recommit (that’s too easy – nothing’s gone wrong at 5:00 a.m. I’ve had no encounters at all, let along ones that try me). But all day long, every time. Every time a trouble arises. Every time I make a mistake. Every time someone else does what others do….

Every time, God takes my troubles happily. Every time, he sends a clear stream of love to me. And every time I am reminded that for me to keep that stream flowing pure and clear, I needed to create my own stream…. All day, every day. Part III – When Your Cup Is Full

Okay, so you have turned it all over to him, and he has filled your cup with pure love. You are halfway there. “Love Me.” You’re doing it. “Love one another as I love you.” To keep returning to him and letting his love to wash over you, you must pour yours on to others. Family, friends, colleagues – all those made, like you, in His image and likeness.

Love resting still in your own cup is love denied to others. Like a pristine lake, once fed by one stream and feeding another but now closed off and still, love stagnates if not shared. When you stream God’s love to you on to others, you are keeping it fresh and pure. You are emptying your cup in order to fill it again

POURING IT OUT UNJUDGINGLY

(Is this where we should talk about The Five People You Meet in Heaven – mentioning how it’s possible to make such a powerful difference in someone else’s life and not even realize it – by way of pointing out how crucial and huge and unrelenting is our responsibility to keep the flow pure and pour it out all the time on all….

Remember the picture of the Three Red Cups? That’s your cup in the middle – God fills your cup from the left, you pass it on to others on the right. Sounds like this is all centered on you, doesn’t it? But I’m afraid that’s mistaken; this is not about you. It’s about our ability to serve as a direct connection between God’s love for us and the people around us.

And you know, most of us try to do that in many ways. There are all kinds of societal norms that cause us to be thoughtful, charitable, and generous. From basic codes of etiquette, to laws of private property, to the Golden Rule, to simply staying in your driving lane, in so many ways are we guided to be good to one another. You give to charity. You say something nice to the cashier. You cover for an overworked colleague. You go to the funeral. You say please and thanks and do your best to treat others as you wish to be treated.

Fine. But still, isn’t most of our striving about self-interest? Aren’t most of our worries about making sure that bad things don’t happen to us? When I’ve been smote one way or another by life, it often feels natural to ask, Why me? Look at all of those cars sailing by my wreck here – Why me? Look who got the good job in the merger while I got the door – Why me? This illness, this roof leak, this tax audit – Why me?

Who hasn’t sat watching the local weather, praying that the advancing storms veer a little more north or a little more south or whatever it takes to spare MY neighborhood? Why me?

Why not me? Why should the storm miss me? Why should any of life’s painful events miss me? Where’s my hall pass that let’s me skip the whole class in pain?

A close friend of my brother has cancer so bad – so invasive – that it basically ruptured inside of him. They had to open him up and have his whole body chemo’d. Nothing abates his pain – nothing. He’s young yet, with young children. Yet he is at peace. “I don’t ask why, and I don’t ask why me,” he says. “I just try to bear it well.”

I have a very good friend who had a distant mother and a father who left them when my friend was very young. Like others deprived of parental love, she went into full perfection mode – constantly seeking the perfect relationship, the perfect job, perfect friends. A truly good person, she is never comforted because she is never perfect. It doesn’t take much of a setback in any area of her life to bring her to bitterness or self-pity. I’ve told her about my relationship with Jesus, and she teases me – calls me Moses sometimes.

One day when she was at the “why me” point in almost every facet of her life, I suddenly asked her, “Why NOT you? Who or what ever made you think that you would have a perfect life? Why shouldn’t woes come to you? There was only one human who was perfect, and look what pain he went through?”

I went on to describe my faith to her. It’s not about the cessation of pain – it’s about turning it over to him. Give him the steering wheel, slide over to the passenger seat, and see, for a change, how things look from there. Quit trying to keep pain and trouble at bay. Quit measuring your life on such harsh measures. When you make mistakes, when trouble finds you, when you feel pain, hand them over to him, and continue on in peace and love.

It was like a wall tumbled down for her – or like she let go of something that gave her She is a changed person – not in ways that I can’t tell you enough what has happened in her life. Not the humanly ‘visible’ stuff, but the peace and love she has. It’s almost like a wall came tumbling down that day. To this day she is in a better place…all by giving it all to him.)

In our self-centeredness we not only seek to escape pain, but we also find ourselves passing judgments. How often do you find yourself sitting there observing something about someone when you could just as easily be looking in the mirror, observing the same thing about yourself? A colleague’s excessive ambition, perhaps. A church member’s controlling ways. Your child’s insistence of having her own way. Another driver’s aggression. I’m embarrassed how often I find myself doing that – studying the sawdust in someone else’s eye, oblivious to the plank in my own.

Or I catch myself playing a little game of sin ranking. Okay, I maybe I have committed this or that sin – but I don’t do what he does! My sin is minor and harmless, but his – now that’s way up on the sin scale – I’d put it top five, while mine is down in the teens. I could do mine twice more and still not be as bad as he. In fact I think I will – but he had better change his ways.

And so we excuse ourselves blithely, judge others by our own flawed measure, and come out on top. Imagine that!

So we are neither all bad nor all good. We do many good things toward other people, but we also value ourselves just a little bit more than we value all those others out there. That’s why tilting your Red Cup to the right can be tough. We have to forget about what makes us comfortable or proud or satisfied or admired and give it all away again.

That’s right – sounds a little crazy, but that’s right. First you give away all your problems, and now you give away all that makes you happy. That’s what keeps the stream flowing. That’s how you will fill your cup again and again – by freely emptying it to the right – by pouring your love on others.

You are indeed in the middle, but it’s never just about you.

When I talk about this to others, I’m often asked, “But, Andy, what do you really mean when you say ‘pour your love out on others’? Is there something specific you have in mind? If we do it, will we know it?”

I’m going to disappoint you here, if you’re looking for a specific answer, but my answer is big and general: Figure it out for yourself, because I only know what I mean for me.

But here’s one way I’d approach it. Looking back on your day today, enumerate the opportunities you had to show someone that you loved them and that God loved them. How many did you seize? If you’re like most of us, most of those moments sped by unnoticed while you went about your ordinary business. No, you didn’t bite anybody’s head off, or kick the dog, or raid the petty cash drawer. But did you give people a chance to see God’s love in you pouring out on them. Did you do it as often as you could, or just with the people who are really special to you?

I don’t know what day you’re reading this, but I guarantee I didn’t do all those things today, either. I’m getting better at noticing all the opportunities that come my way every day, and I’m getting better at honoring them, but again, it’s not supposed to be easy, and it is not easy. Tilting your cup to the left brings many blessings, but cessation of temptation is not one of them. I’m still as prone to pride as I ever was. I’m still tempted to value my time more than it’s worth – to stick to my agenda when others’ needs loom in its way.

That’s why we get to make a fresh start at it every day. “Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.”

But back to the question, what does pouring it out mean? Here’s what my son does to pour out God’s love on others. I only found this out because his teacher told me, and I about lost it when she said, “Your son makes a point of playing with kids who don’t seem to have friends.” I never asked him to do that. Neither did his mother. But that’s what he does, and his teacher noticed and told me. I don’t know when I’ve ever heard something that made me happier. He doesn’t know, and I’m not going to tell him, but that’s going to get him off scott-free from a lot of trouble he hasn’t even caused yet. He’s going to come home with a dent in the car, scared to show it to me, and he’s going to wonder later, “Is the old man getting soft? He’s not even mad!” And I’ll be dwelling on those magic words, “Your son makes a point of playing with kids who don’t seem to have friends.”

Here’s what pouring it out doesn’t mean. It doesn’t mean turning in your resignation and heading for the monastery. Life as we know it should go on. I’m in the potato chip business, and potato chips still need to get sold. Busses need to get driven. Books need to get written. He designed a world to need potato chips makers, bus drivers, writers – so he made them. If that’s what you do, be good at it. He has a plan for it all.

But through it all – maybe I’m coming up with some answers to the question after – through it all, take the focus off yourself. Like my “why me” friend, forget about you. Your life is not yours to order and control. You are part of his plan – a precious part but not the plan. You are just the vessel for carrying God’s love to others. It’s a smooth, constant flow. Like the perfect tennis serve, no hitches and halts or jerks and jolts – just a sweet, continuous motion, gathering strength as it flows effortlessly, that delivers power beyond belief.

Dan Merchant describes an extraordinary example of “pouring it out” in Lord, Save Us from Your Followers. He writes about Bridgetown Ministries in Portland gathers volunteer to help the homeless a group of Christians in all kinds of practically ways and then also wash the feet of the homeless. Remind you of anybody? What could be more Christ-like?

But most of our opportunities to pour it out are more mundane, taking place right under our noses many times a day, day in and day out. Just the tone of your voice when you talk to children or subordinates or people who serve you. The look on your face when you go through a trying day. The opportunities you take to extend an unexpected mercy. Just the choice you make to spend a little more time with someone. Be quick to apologize even when the other guy is wrong, too. Drive a little more politely. Befriend somebody. Keep your word. Volunterr for

Especially, I have learned, don’t underestimate the power of surprise. When people do not feel deserving of God’s love, they don’t expect his follower to be pouring it out on them. When it happens anyway, it’s doubly powerful.

In his Oscar-winning performance in Horton Foote’s Tender Mercies, Robert Duvall’s character Mac Sledge, says – almost grieves – to his wife, desperate to understand why he has been so blessed, “I don’t know why you took me in when I was drunk and destitute. I don’t know why you took pity and me and let me stay here with you and little Sonny. I don’t know why you did that. But somehow you saw fit to do that, and now…Andy, I need to find those words exactly – they are very moving in how they express the power of tender mercies… ”

But here’s what’s magic. When you do it – when you pour out your cup to the right – you are not depleted of love, you are filled again. An endless, pure stream of love.

Andy, this is as far as I got on this draft. What follows is pretty much still the way you sent it to me.

WHAT AN AWESOME GOD; IT’S NOT EASY

When we started the journey of the flow of love we have talked a lot about the purity and beauty of that love and I hope that you get that this way of living here on earth when brough to its simplest forms is one of motion. Of getting and giving love where you turn into a vessel or a deliverer. This motion is truly beautiful. What an Awesome God to take a very complex human being with ego, emotions, worry’s, anxiety’s and other stuff and to simplify what it is he intended when Jesus walked the earth 2000+ years ago. The two greatest things we can do on earth is to Love Him and Love Others….thats it. So why is it so hard….its hard because anything, I repeat anything that is worth anything is never, ever easy. Like I’ve said early in this story…it wasn’t meant to be easy. If it was easy and pain free then we wouldn’t have heaven…this would be heaven. We have been dealt, as humans, a life of choice. Choices everyday with a force against us that is scary powerful. This ‘force’ wants us to feel all of the emotional issues that we are faced has humans so we can ‘get out of the flow’ of Gods Love. Anything that disrupts the flow of his love puts us in a place to be out of his will and calling for each of us and into believeing that the day to day challenges of life are what its all about. Our society is powerful in that it is set up for us to have to ‘fight’ the flow. This fight becomes personal and when it becomes ‘personal’ then we, as humans start bowing our chests out and being fighting…and clawing….and trying as hard as we can to win. And then when we get up to look at the scoreboard of life we hopefully see a score in our favor. By getting into the flow of love by accepting that you are worthy of his love and pouring that love on others you eliminate the fight. You literally rip the scoreboard down that shows wins and losses and enter into a continous feeling of peace and joy. Its not about earthly wins friends…or fighting. In fact the simplicity of this love model enables you to exit those feelings and watch the world from a place that is like your most peaceful of moments…continuously. He is Awesome. He is Incredible…He wants everything for us…as long as we don’t make this life about US. It will not be easy and you will be challenged every day, every moment of your life to exit this flow. There will never be a moment that you ‘got it’. Its like when great athletes experience  being in the ‘moment’ and that there success was indescribable.. a feeling that they couldn’t explain. Theres also nights that they just flat stink. What will happen living the Red Cup way is that you will experience more and more meaning in your life and your will realize that tommorow is not guranteed and yesterday is over and move quickly back into the ‘flow’. Lets know look at how a practical day in the life would look and feel like…

Chapter 9: 	 A day in the life; speed bump on our way to heaven

(What follows in italics is what you sent me much earlier, Andy – for this chapter. It’s great stuff, but needs to be tightly written, so I think I won’t tackle it until we improve on the previous 4-5 chapters.)

Let’s get practical and even drive the simplicity message to its core…Here’s a day in the life of living the Red Cup Way-not that I do it everyday, however I try…

Wake up and thank God for that day and just close your eyes and say “God, yesterday is over and tomorrow is not guaranteed so wear me out today for your Glory. I am all yours today God…wear me out. That will set the tone and open up the flow of Love and just sit or lie with ‘him’ for as long as you can and keep saying those couple of sentences. I then head to work and sometime I’ll fire out a ‘bullet’ prayer (that’s a quick one liner ☺) about what’s going on that day. Once I’m at work I get a daily scripture paragraph with a written paragraph explaining he scripture and say another ‘bullet’ prayer of ‘what are you trying to teach me today Lord’.

Throughout the day I will try real hard to pray before every big decision. So in essence I try to ‘hang’ with him most part of the day and on Sundays I really try and get filled up while also filling him up by praising and singing to him. I believe its all about ‘spending’ timse with him by receiving him and giving it all to him in every conversation. There are times when I really, really believe he is talking to me…when I am alone and spending time with him and we hit on a huge connection I get a huge shudder down my back that I AM SURE IT’S HIM.

So that’s the ‘tilt left’ portion of the day. I would recommend anything that can get you ‘with him’. Bible School, Small Groups, etc., etc…but I wouldn’t do those if it’s to check a box. We have too many ‘box checkers’ and there isn’t enough time spent with Him one-one and I’m not talking about a full 60 minutes day and night. I’m talking about making him they part of everything you do…just hang with him, chat with him, give it all to him, shoot him your sins and move the heck on!

We have multiple times in a given day when we interact with people and while we are interacting with people there are hundreds of people in a given day that see you interact with those people!!! So, we have hundreds upon hundreds of chances to ‘pour love’ on others. Here’s what I try to do…EVERY human conncection I make I stare into the eye’s of the individual and acknowledge them, listen to them and leave them with something that will make there day better. What do I mean;

Acknowledge them- no human being wakes up and says I want to have a crappy day today and not try at all. No one wants to be miserable. By acknowledging them as human beings you are saying ‘I’m open to you and am ready to listen to what you have to say. By acknowledging others with eye contact or a ‘hello’ you are opening there cup up and showing those around you what it looks and feels like to pour love on others. After You acknowledge them ask them a question or just ‘listen’ to them…and really listen. I heard something recently that we can learn something from everyone we come into contact with…pretty amazing huh. Lastly, leave them feeling better about themselves, the critical word is themselves then they did prior to your interaction with them. So you acknowledged them by name, you listened to there words and leave them with something special that you found about them…and that’s the strangers you interact with. Tell me what your kids, spouse, significant other, our anyone that is influenced by you will think and learn from one little interaction with a stranger.

Chapter 10: 		Remember simplicity (end with a one pager)

Chapter 11: love story continued – a million person/30day challenge

A Notes not dealt with above: Jon Robert, Red Cup musician?

Andy will give me the Guidelines for the Red Cup Model. Andy this is how he tries to livehis life. It’s very detailed. What happens if I’m mad at somebody. What are the things that throw you off the Red Cup Way – and then take it from their.

Going to church – Calling It Shooting the Wounded?

Stained glass window in Andy’s church – God the Shepherd. The staff to guide you and keep you close. If you have problems he will pick you up and carry you. Always good for those two things.