Life is Like a Rubik's Cube

My column for the local paper this week. Here's a copy for those of you that live far away.

Life Is Like A Rubik’s Cube

Rubik’s Cubes are making a comeback.

I don’t know if that’s true nationwide, but I see a lot of kids with Rubik’s Cubes when I substitute at our High School. There are the classic ones that I remember from the early 80s as well as new variations, from small, 4x4 Cubes to all kinds of different sizes and shapes (Rubik’s Octagons? Tetrahedrons? I’m not sure what they’re called.)

I remember playing with a Rubik’s Cube when I was a kid and trying to figure out how to solve it. There were books written to help guide you into trying to understand the algorithms needed to get all of the colors together. I never could figure out how to do it, short of peeling off the stickers and putting them back on - which wrecks the cube, but by that point you’re too frustrated with the stupid thing to care!

My good friend Evan Olson, who is in seventh grade, is a pro at solving them. He even demonstrated for me solving a Rubik’s Cube with his eyes closed! How he did that still baffles me. All I know is that if I get my hands on a Cube and need help – which I no doubt will – he is the first person I’ll go to for guidance.

It strikes me that our lives are, at least in some ways, like a Rubik’s Cubes. It’s easy to get twisted around and messed up. So you try to back up and retrace your steps to put everything back into order, but you just end up more twisted up and confused. You keep trying and trying to solve the mess you’ve gotten yourself into, but you end up just getting more and more frustrated and more and more messed up. You might even try to cheat, which only ends up wrecking your life more.

We’ve all been there.

It’s not until we’re willing to admit that we need help and that we are unable to solve our problems ourselves that we can get the guidance we need. It’s only when we allow others to come alongside that we finally begin to get our lives back into some type of order.

We resist that for some reason. There’s a spirit of fierce independence in us that, unfortunately, often leads to isolation. But that’s not the way we were created to operate. God says that “It is not good for a person to be alone.” We were created for community – to journey together and to help each other.

That’s one of the brilliant things about the Church. Going to church is not about having to go in order to fulfill some religious duty. A big part of what the church is about is finding other people who can walk with us and help us out when we need it. Because we all have times when our lives feel like a messed-up Rubik’s Cube.

Rob's Review: Coffee-Mate Pop-tart Brown Sugar Cinnamon

While I'm still waiting for Coffee-Mate to resume production on my favorite Creme Brule flavor, I've been trying different flavors, and even tried creating my own version of Creme Brule. Currently my default flavor is Coffee-Mate's Kahlua, which I reviewed a few months ago. Coffee-Mate just released a new "Pop-Tarts" inspired Brown Sugar Cinnamon flavor, and I got my hands on a bottle at our local Walmart yesterday.

I was very excited by this as Brown Sugar Cinnamon is my favorite Pop-Tarts flavor, and it's pretty awesome everywhere else, so I had high hopes for this combo, in spite of the fact that it's being touted as a limited time only offering. And I do have to say that it's pretty good, if maybe not the best ever flavor. The flavor of the creamer alone is quite good, but it doesn't compliment the coffee flavor as well as it might. I'm thinking it might need a stronger brown sugar flavoring or something. Maybe I just need to get used to it. It's not bad, though, and I'll definitely be adding it to my rotation until I can restock on Creme Brule, and maybe keep it for a change-of-pace flavor as long as it's being offered. 

Overall grade: A-

Rob's Review: Treason

There's a new 5-episode limited series on Netflix right now called Treason that Rosalie and I watched over the last week. I'm always up for a good spy story and it stars Charlie Cox who plays Daredevil, so I was predisposed to be interested and to like the series.

I liked a lot of the series. It all takes place in Britain so it's a nice change-of-pace to a lot of the political spy stories I'm used to seeing that are set in the US. Cox does a great job and is always enjoyable to watch. The supporting cast seems strong, as well, and the plot is decent, if a little convenient, but not that deep or compelling. It did have a nice twist at the end, courtesy of being a limited series.

Overall it's fairly enjoyable (although it wasn't Rosalie's cup of tea, as the British might say). I don't know that it was something I would necessarily watch again, and I don't know that if it had been longer that I would have stuck with it, but at five episodes I figured I'd give it a shot. Overall it was okay, but there's probably more compelling shows you can spend your time on, unless you are a big fan of Charlie Cox, in which case you'll like it.

My grade: B

Practicing the Art of Showing Up

“Every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become. No single instance will transform your beliefs, but as the votes build up, so does the evidence of your new identity.”

    - James Clear, Atomic Habits

You don't have to do everything... just do something.

What are you doing?

Media Tracking for the Year

I've often wished that I had recorded every time I finished a book or a movie in my life. It would be fascinating to see the list. And based on the graphic I found above, I'm not the first to have this idea.

A few years ago I started doing something like that with movies that I watched and the date I saw them if I knew what it was. I would then make a little notation on the movie - maybe what it was about - and give it a grade. Here's a very few I ran across in my file: 

1 Mile to You B (Netflix) 7/4/19

A Quiet Place A

A Quiet Place 2 A 6/11/21

A Week Away C (Netflix) 4/17/21

Aquaman C

ARQ B- (Netflix) 11/19/16 time loop

Parallel (Amazon) 6/5/21. B - Like an episode of Black Mirror with a nice Twilight Zone twist at the end. Plot a bit predictable but decent ride.

            ...and so on

I started this because with the plethora of movies available on streaming services I would sometimes have trouble remembering what I had watched. Then I'd start a movie and go, "Hey, this seems familiar..." This would be super helpful to have also for them it's been a number of years since you've seen the movie and you can't remember if it might be worth watching again. The movie ARQ listed above I have no recollection of, but with my B- grade I am pretty sure I won't be watching it again. (I also look at Aquaman and think I might have been generous with my C grade, but that's a discussion for another time.)

I think this would be just as interesting for books that I've read. I thought about going through and making a list, but I've literally read thousands of books in my life and there's no way I could ever complete the list. And forget about TV shows! That list would be overwhelming and, potentially, depressing. (But maybe a list of series?)

I think this would be a good project throughout each year from now on - just list when you've seen a movie and read a book or finished a TV series. Then you could go back at the end of the year and review. Of course, with my blog, I pretty much report on every major movie or book I've seen, so there's that. But a summary list would be helpful as well. 

Stay tuned and at the end of the year I'll post mine here. If you have one of your own you to share, you can post in the comments.

Labels and Identity

How do you identify? 

There are so many labels that we use to categorize and distinguish ourselves - our job, nationality, region of origin, favorite sports team, hobbies or interests, religion, denomination, birth order, type of food you eat, political affiliation, sexual preference, school you attended, graduating year, physical abilities,... pretty much anything you can think of.

What is your primary identity? What's most important?

Do the labels we use help us understand ourselves and others better? Do they serve us in that they help us identify others who share the same traits? Or do they just serve to divide us ("You're different. You're not X like me!")? 

For a Jesus-follower this has huge implications. Paul addressed this in his letter to the Christians in the region of Galatia when he wrote, "For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise." (Galatians 3:28)

For a believer, our primary identity is "forgiven and beloved child of God." That is the most important distinguishing factor in our lives, not any of the other labels we so often use.

Looking back on 2023

[This is from part of my challenge at church this morning.]

I think it's interesting how we characterize and categorize years - like they have their own personality and are good or bad years. 

I was trying to think of years that stand out to me personally. 

1966. That was the year Star Trek came out and the year I was born. Both very memorable and important to me. Good year!

1984. I graduated high school and headed off to college. We had economic prosperity in our country and great 80s music and styles. For me, I would say that was a good year.

2001. We had 9/11 happen, so we tend to characterize the whole year by that and say it was bad year. 

2013. That was the year I started out as a full-time pastor at First Presbyterian Pine City. It was a good year for me. Hopefully my congregation would agree.

2020. I don’t even need to talk about it. Bad year.

What about last year, 2022? There were lots of global and national challenges, but a lot of individuals still had a good year. A mix of good and bad. Pretty typical for a year. 

One thing all of those years have in common – they’re all in the past. You can’t change them now.

But 2023 is just starting. It’s full of potential and possibility.

So my question is: How will you categorize 2023 in 12 months when you look back on it?

We can’t control most of the circumstances of our lives. Good and bad things are going to happen to us throughout the year. But one of the things we do have some control over is the person we are becoming. 

At the end of 2023, you will not be the same person you are today. You will have had experiences and relationships that will shape you, for better or for worse. Maybe you will have developed some new practices that will develop into habits.

There are a lot of areas where we can grow and improve this year: physically, intellectually, relationally and so on. But I hope you don't neglect of think about your spiritual growth. 

Spend some time reflecting on how you want to grow spiritually this year. If you are a Jesus-follower, your goal is to draw closer to Jesus and to become more like him. How can you do that this year? What is a step you might take this week? Today?

Hopefully in 12 months you can look back and say 2023 was a great year.