Achuckallen

Instigating Better

America. Equality

How Should We Respond to Crisis?

by

AChuckAllen | Monday, August 1, 2022

Every week we are bombarded with another crisis. A school shooting, mass shooting, flood, fire, riot, shortage, war, and the hits keep coming.

How can we respond to these crises without remaining angry, bitter, or hardened? How do we hear about more crises without growing jaded or curled up in anxiety? Fair questions for a country that regularly finds its way into trouble.

As a pastor, coach, and counselor, I’ve learned four things that we can all do to respond appropriately to the next crisis.

  1. DON’T CATASTROPHIZE THE CRISIS
    Fight hard not to let your mind convince you that things are far worse than they are. If we aren’t careful, our brain will convince us that we are like our preferred news outlet. We can be so active in telling ourselves that the sky is falling everywhere. We can make every crisis our crisis. Yes, we should be concerned, moved, and burdened, but you cannot own and exasperate every situation. My friend Julie Homrich would say, “don’t believe everything you think.”
  2. ACTIVELY LISTEN
    In most crises, loud voices point fingers, find fault and politicize the situation. Friends, this is not how to help or how to respond. There is a reason our Creator gave us two ears and one mouth. The single best way to respond to a crisis is to exercise your capacity to listen actively. Yes, affirm your connection to those affected. Affirm their heartache or pain, but at all costs, hush and let them speak. Let them find solace in your presence without your words. Keep this in mind. If you don’t know what to say, please don’t throw a catchphrase or random Bible. Verse their way. Just be there and listen. It’s okay to have a ministry of presence. While meeting the wonderful people of Uvalde, Texas, I heard, over and over again, “you are the only people asking us what we need.” In most points of crisis, words are cheap. Listening is golden.
  3. PRAY AND THEN PRAY SOME MORE
    We Americans are such activity-based people. When a hurricane happens, we get out the chain saws and wet vacs. When a shooting happens, we tend to do the same thing. What in the world? Prayer should never be seen as the last resort. Prayer is the single most extraordinary power on earth and requires zero travel! The minute you see or hear of a crisis, start praying. I’ll never forget seeing a horrific auto crash and hopping out of my truck to see if I could help. I got to the driver and realized they were already in the process of bleeding out. An incredible EMT jumped in, and I started praying for this mom out loud in the middle of highway 78. At that moment, the single greatest thing I knew to do was to PRAY! Before I finished, there were more than 20 people that had gathered around and, in their way, joined me in praying. Five days later, I got word that this dear lady had lost her leg, but she had her life and her toddler in the backseat. Prayer works! Pray, and then pray some more!
  4. ACT WITH GRACE AND SERVE WITH HUMILITY Determine not to join the fray and jump on the whiner train. Here is an equation from my friend Brad Rhoads, “Grace + Intentionality = Transformation” grace extends forgiveness and continuously extends a benefit of the doubt. Grace doesn’t blame. It smooths. And here is an authentic truth – WHEN WE EXTEND GRACE, WE SERVE OTHERS WITH HUMILITY!” According to the poster child of humility, Mother Teresa, this is what humility looks like: These are the few ways we can practice humility:
  • To speak as little as possible of one’s self.
  • To mind one’s own business.
  • Not to want to manage other people’s affairs.
  • To avoid busy-body curiosity.
  • To accept contradictions and correction cheerfully.
  • To pass over the mistakes of others.
  • To accept insults and injuries.
  • To accept being slighted, forgotten, and disliked.
  • To be kind and gentle even under provocation.
  • Never stand on one’s dignity.
  • To choose is always the hardest. And best.

The evil in this world will continue to be a struggle from now until we reach Heaven’s gates. We will have minimal power over what they might be or where they will happen, but how we act and react to crises is entirely within our power.

Let us be a people that act and react in and through crises with grace, decency, and kindness. The world has a widening depletion of women and men that will respond in love. If we want to improve this world, let us act in these four areas.

Go in Peace, Chuck

Politics and Theology

by

October 21, 2021

We live in a strangely spiritual world here in America. On the one hand, we are more spiritual than ever and yet less religious than ever before. We are a country founded on Christian principles, yet we have and still fight over race, gender, and faith systems.

I doubt that a backwoods pastor|author|speaker like me can help that dysfunction, but I’d like to take a shot at what is a gross misrepresentation (maybe) of how our theology can get our faith in trouble when we replace it with politics.

I’m a political junkie. There, I said it. Whew! But I’m so disgusted by the way we have replaced our convictions with policy and politics. Please don’t hear me say that they do not intersect, but listen to me when I say that we have gone way past the point of reason.

I grew up in the home of a politician and pastor. I watched my dad serve as a voice of reason and delineate the difference between the two. Dad never seemed to replace his convictions grounded in his faith with the party politics, even though he was a state chairman of one of the two major parties. He somehow found a way to be a Republican without blindly going along to get along.

Here are the “things” that I fear we “evangelicals” are dangerously close to or have already crossed the line in.

  1. All policy matters. All policy affects all other policies. To choose a party, person, or policy, we must see the person’s whole and the entirety of the platform.
  2. The idea that any single person is qualified to run the country is truly a silly concept. The people the person surrounds themselves with are of equal or greater significance than just the person.
  3. To assume that as a Follower of Jesus, you must support one party and park your brain regarding the immediate contextual concerns is ridiculous. There are extraordinary people of faith on both sides of the aisle.
  4. We must be confident that we do not worship any person, plan, party, or policy. Let our worship be connected to God alone.
  5. The voice of American Christians is far more vocal when it comes to our political preferences – or favorite news channel – than we are about the wonderful Christ we claim as Savior. No explanation needed, I fear.
  6. We must be willing to question our motives when it comes to our politics. The Christian life doesn’t change leaders every four years. He is the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. He is not subject to voters and their whims.
  7. Character and decency matter as much as toughness and savvy. It’s an age-old challenge. But I am confident that the ends rarely justify the means. How we lead is as important as what we accomplish.

Let us not confuse our politics with our faith-filled convictions. We are a great country. Let’s not slip into another political has been and depart from the framework of integrity, decency, and honesty.

Peace, Chuck

9/11 Never Stop Telling the Story

by

Where Were You When the World Stopped Turning?

This weekend, we Americans remember the tragic loss of life and liberty experienced on 09.11.01.

I recalled walking into the Alpharetta office building, where I worked at that time, and seeing the reports that American Airlines Flight 11 had struck the North Tower at 8:46 am.

By the time that I reached my office, just seventeen minutes later, at 9:03 am, the World Trade Center’s South Tower was hit by United Airlines Flight 175.

Given the degree of hate and division in our country, only 20 years later, I am amazed at our incredibly short memories. On September 12, 2001, we were a country unified in serving one another, caring for our neighbors, and honoring our heroes. I pray that it doesn’t take the great uprising of evil to stir our American hearts toward faith and unity…once again.

I also pray that we will REMEMBER how horrible the pain was, deep in our American souls when we saw people murdered on live television and thousands of family’s futures ripped from them as a result of pure hate.

We must tell the story of why we were attacked, how we were attacked, and the way we responded in the moments following the attack. We must remind our next generations that cannot remember, or did not experience the ache which we all felt.

Country artist, Alan Jackson asked the question, “Where Were You When the World Stopped Turning?” Here are the lyrics:

Where were you when the world stopped turning on that September day?
Were you in the yard with your wife and children
Or working on some stage in L.A.?
Did you stand there in shock at the sight of that black smoke
Rising against that blue sky?
Did you shout out in anger in fear for your neighbor
Or did you just sit down and cry?
Did you weep for the children who lost their dear loved ones
And pray for the ones who don’t know?
Did you rejoice for the people who walked from the rubble
And sob for the ones left below?
Did you burst out with pride for the red, white, and blue
And the heroes who died just doing what they do?
Did you look up to heaven for some kind of answer
And look at yourself and ask what really matters?

Let us be a people that look at ourselves and ask, what really matters.

Peace, Chuck

Reacting to Global Crises

by

August 31, 2021

Let’s face it, this world is in a mess. Afghanistan, Southern Border, COVID-19, Hurricane Ida, Western Fires. Oh, my stars!

The world has gone mad. And in the middle of all the chaos, we humans have grown more angry, anxious, and intemperate. Don’t hear me say that I’m not joining you. I am most definitely angrier, more anxious, and certainly more intemperate these days.

If you wear a mask, you’re humiliated. If you don’t wear a mask, you are insensitive. If you vaccinate, you love your neighbor, if you don’t, you are selfish. If you voted red, you hate gay people and black people. If you vote blue, you don’t love America.

In a world that is in desperate need of solutions, we have become a nation of whiners and finger pointers! Never before, have we been so divided, on so many different issues.

I find that people who claim to be Christians are often at the center of the fight. I often see people that have been forgiven and redeemed by the sacrificial death of Jesus, the Christ pointing the same fingers, screaming the same diatribe, and succumbing to the ridiculous rhetoric of the right, left, up, or down leaning of the crowd of choice.

Friends, it doesn’t have to be so. Much of the angst and anger we experience and share is rooted in fear. Fear that people don’t agree with us. Fear that the world has lost its way. Fear that things will never be better. Fear that we will never be enough or amount to anything. Some of us are experiencing fear in such a way that we are fire hydrants of anxiety and hate, spewing out our anger, anxiety, and fear on all who walk in front of us.

There is a better way! But it requires us all to answer a question. What do you think of, when you think about God?

AW Tozer once stated,
“What comes into our minds when we think about God
is the most important thing about us.”

I believe that is absolutely true. It also makes the case for the fact that there is a better way! But you have to settle on what you believe about God. It’s that simple.

Once again, it is of the utmost importance!

If you do not believe that God created you with a spirit of power, love, and sound mind, then you will continue to believe that you were created with a spirit of fear and timidity.

Paul, author of a large part of the Bible’s New Testament wrote to his understudy, Timothy, in 2 Timothy 1:7 that “God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity but of power, love, and self-discipline.

I get it. You might be saying, Chuck, I do not need some preacher lobbing a bible verse hand grenade at me. Here is the good news. The same God that created you and wired you into the unique human that you are today, is the same God the created you with the ability to change the way you think and renew your mind!

You can literally change the way you think because you have been given the spirit of power, not fear. You’ve been given the spirit of love, not hate. And you’ve been given the spirit of a sound mind and self-discipline, not chaos. All of that is evidence that you can quite literally change the way you think about the way you think!

My friend, Julie Homrich is a psychotherapist, and one of the brightest people that I’ve ever met. She calls thinking about we think, metacognition. I call it the 2-step of change. Stop and face reality, then change the way you think about it. Get it? Stop and think! Take all the problems in the world and just stop and think about how you see them and how you are reacting to them.

  1. Can you change the outcomes of any of them today? If not, then pray for them. If yes, what 2 things will you do today to help resolve the problem?
  2. Does your opinion on the matter help discover a solution to the problem? If yes, then by all means, share! If no, then take that anxiety and pressure of your plate.
  3. Are you holding on to the news, the worst case scenarios, or the what-ifs? then write those down and leave them on your nightstand. Before you call it a day, just offer up this simple prayer to the Creator. God, I do not understand all that is happening, but I want to be a part of solving, not complaining. Give me wisdom and protect the people in the line of this problem with your care and your love. Amen. Then leave it all with Him.

You do not have to live in doubt, fear, or timidity. But you also do not have to live in anxiety, stress, and anger. Especially if you cannot directly own that solution or problem yourself!

Because you were not given fear and timidity by your Creator. Then where did it come from?

Satan would love to convince you of your fears and insecurities. He would love to keep you locked up in emotional knots over crises found across the world.

But God has given you POWER, LOVE, and SELF-DISCIPLINE! Don’t fall for the bait! You can live in peace, even through all of the storms we face in this life. It’s a matter of what you think about, when you think about God.

Peace, Chuck

Bigotry Matters

by

JULY 2, 2021

Let me start this post with a simple yet poignant statement from our 40th President, Ronald Reagan, “Let me speak plainly: The United States of America is and must remain a nation of openness to people of all beliefs. Our very unity has been strengthened by this pluralism. That’s how we began; this is how we must always be. The ideals of our country leave no room whatsoever for intolerance, anti-Semitism, or bigotry of any kind — none. The unique thing about America is a wall in our Constitution separating church and state. It guarantees there will never be a state religion in this land, but at the same time, it makes sure that every single American is free to choose and practice his or her religious beliefs or to choose no religion at all. Their rights shall not be questioned or violated by the state.

I would also like to follow that up with a word from one of our Founding Fathers, Thomas Jefferson, “Bigotry is the disease of ignorance, of morbid minds; enthusiasm of the free and buoyant. Education and free discussion are the antidotes of both. We are destined to be a barrier against the returns of ignorance and barbarism.”

My fear for this great land is that we have rapidly become a nation that destroys our opportunity to be the shining city on a hill. In His Sermon on the Mount, Jesus described that Christians are to be “the light of the world.” That we are to be like “a shining city on a hill.” I fear that we have become a nation of light snuffers and city wreckers. Too often, bigotry is described in America through the singular lens of black vs. white tensions, prejudices, and hate. But I’ve discovered in this country, founded on the principles of freedom, we are now determined to destroy any person, organization, or thought that doesn’t agree with our own.

Before you hurl your first disagreeable thought or hearty amen, hear me. This is not a one-sided issue. Every side is presently guilty of the hate-filled anger and bigoted speech that I hear about others and have even received regarding me, my church, and my faith.

The late Donald Rumsfeld had a quote that describes how we got here. He said, “There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we know we don’t know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we don’t know we don’t know.“

Our assumptions are not known knowns. Our bitterness and bigotry are based on unknowns. Therefore, they are built on faulty foundations that break down with reasoned interpretation and understanding. Case in point: Pick the audience that any bigotry is assigned to, be it racial, religious, sexual, educational, etc. Once you’ve identified that bigoted assumption, imagine having to share a cab ride with any person in your bigoted category, let’s say for 60 minutes. And you engage in a conversation with that person and genuinely disagree with them on any level. Is it then your assigned role to convey to them, or worse about them, your great displeasure with who they are, color they are, educational or religious preference? What if you are heterosexual and they are gay? Can we not see the person without the tagline?

I’m not suggesting that we all agree on issues of conviction or preference. If anything, I’m stating that we should disagree! But isn’t that the American experiment that is 250 plus years in the making? But brave men and women didn’t lose their lives to allow any of us to use the modern accessibilities of technology and information to destroy and despise one another. Instead, they died for a belief that our constitution was not flawed in its preamble: “We the People of the United States, to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.“

I’m afraid I have to disagree with so many things. I do not like the fact that an Olympic athlete snubs the flag and national anthem of the USA. As a matter of fact, it sickens me. BUT! That right is indeed hers as an American citizen. I disagree with so many freedoms granted by the constitution of the United States of America. BUT! I am willing to defend that very freedom to avoid the tyranny that inevitably follows in the path of squelching it.

Another case in point: Chick-Fil-A is defined as a “Christian Company.” But that is not possible. Organizations are not “Christian,” people are. Yes, they employ many Followers of Jesus, and yes, the Cathy family has been consistent in their faith walk for decades. I should stop and state that I may be the only person on the planet that doesn’t have a preferred palate for the Chick-Fil-A menu. I know, let the hate mail begin! But here is the point, Dan Cathy has ascribed to the biblical position on marriage as one man and one woman. Can we not attack his business as homophobic and hateful? That is nonsensical, at the very least!

I’ll never forget the day that I received this email from a senior adult at my church (embarrassment fully added here). It is quite literally a bigotry-filled rant that cuts against every single teaching of Jesus. “I cant help but tell you there was lots of grumbling at church today.  Most people completely support the Espanol ministry. What the grumbling is over is having to constantly undergo Spanish lessons and today iced the cake with a full blown Mexican party complete with Mariachi band and food plus the ongoing Spanish word lessons.  Please this is the United States of America, We do not want this kind of stuff at our church.“

There it is! Bigotry is at its finest and a significant reason people say no thank you to the local church! And I do not blame them. If there has ever been a place that should be committed to breaking down the walls of prejudice and bigotry, on any level, it is the Church Jesus claims as His own Bride!

I am more committed than ever before to model and lift high the ideals built within the foundation of our nation in search of a more perfect union. A nation where “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Disagreeing with me or anyone else is fine. It is even encouraged by our Creator and the declaration of our own independence and constitution! When then can we not determine that God made no mistake in who He has created? Why can we not choose to live more like Jesus and less like the Pharisaical leaders of the very people He came to this earth for? Why can we not choose to discover our own convictions, speak up for them, and know we will be disagreed with, and yet know that is equally true once the shoe is placed on the proverbial other foot?

If we were to spend our energies on becoming the human being that God desires us to become and less energy on how we can find fault or destroy someone else, this world would be a far greater place to exist. I am not suggesting that we try to live in some Pollyanna world with rainbows and no-calorie doughnuts. I am simply suggesting that we each have so much to work with and to work on that we are literally ruining life for so many as we verbally, spiritually, and physically beat them down.

I’ve been guilty of this, and so have you. But surely we are better than that? Can we not grab hold of Matthew Chapter 5 and allow the words of Jesus to clarify how we are to live and enjoy this life? Can we not, as Americans, not listen to the words of Reagan when he stated…

“I’ve spoken of the shining city all my political life, but I don’t know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when I said it. But in my mind, it was a tall, proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, wind-swept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace; a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity. And if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors, and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here. That’s how I saw it and see it still.”

We were never created to be a nation of hate, bigotry, intolerance, or spiritually empty people. We were and are the greatest nation on this planet and still the greatest hope for a world to live in peace. Our constitution, the document that those brave patriots fought to create and then uphold, demands better from us. May we once again become a nation worthy of God’s richest blessings.

Go in Peace, Chuck

WE ARE THE ANTS & Who Shook the Jar?

by

June 9, 2021

A young friend of mine (Charlton Clayton) posted an Instagram pic on his wall that reminded me of an old story with a super powerful truth attached to it. It goes like this; If you fill a glass Mason Jar with 100 black ants (think picnic) and 100 red ants (think OUCH!), you now have 200 ants. Here is the non-math part of the story. Those 200 ants get along just fine, living and anting together.

But then some knucklehead comes along and shakes the jar. They don’t shake it vigorously, but they shake it pretty well. The Mason Jar is now shaken, not stirred, but the 200 ants, having been disoriented and “all shaken up,” have picked sides. They are no longer just 200 ants living in harmony. They are now 100 red ants versus 100 black ants. And the peaceful Mason Jar is now a full-on battleground.

If you haven’t figured out the natural correlation to our shaken-up world, let me spell it out for you. You pick the division, and I’ll show you the jar shaker. You determine the problem, and I’ll show you the constant instigators. You point out the divisiveness, and I’ll show you the dividers.

How about this? Let’s get in the mason jar and refuse to be shaken or stirred. Let’s determine that we do not need others to do our thinking or our speaking for us. Let us think and reason on our own. Let us speak on and of our personal convictions and conclusions. Let’s tell the truth, keep no secrets, and respect each other.

Let’s stop the insanity of hate-filled rhetoric that has trickled down with all the gentleness of Niagra Falls onto our children.

I am not suggesting that we hide from the differences and divisions. Let’s face it; we have green ants, brown ants, black ants, mean ants, red ants, fire ants, and flying ants. Did you know that there are more than 12,000 species of ants on this planet? In some ways, they are all living together in a globe-shaped Mason Jar.

They do not need us to teach them how to live and survive. They just need to appreciate all the ants.

Allowing jar-shaking leaders in our churches, courtrooms, classrooms, and chambers should be criminal. Let’s live, lead, teach, serve and parent with a passion for loving one another. I know. What a preacher thing to say? But really, why is this so hard? Little kids playing together couldn’t care less what kind of ant you are. They don’t care if you are a right-wing ant or a moderate ant. They aren’t concerned about if you are a brown ant or a green ant. They do care if you play nicely. It’s a universal action…being nice.

Jesus said, “Let me give you a new command: Love one another. In the same way I loved you, you love one another. This is how everyone will recognize that you are my disciples—when they see the love you have for each other.”

He instigated and directed that we first love, then forgive, then love even more. And if we, who claim to be Followers of Jesus are spending more time shaking jars or griping about who shakes the jar, we missed the whole point, didn’t we? Maybe we are spending our time listening to and watching the jar shakers to the point that we don’t recognize the commonalities of all us like ants in the jar anymore?

We are all ants, living in a globe-shaped jar. Stop giving the jar shakers a voice. Give your head and heart to serving the fellow ants in the jar with grace, dignity, kindness, and good old-fashioned love. I think we’ll live in a far better jar.

Peace, Chuck