Yesterday as a long-awaited treat, I went to see ‘Toy Story 3′. A kids’ film that speaks to the child in all of us.

I have huge respect and admiration for the creativity that goes on at Pixar Animation. The first ‘Toy Story’ came out in 1995, when my son was just five years old. It’s amazing to think that fifteen years later, we all still wanted to see the new ‘Toy Story’ just as much as when he was a child…!

Pixar pioneered the idea of a ‘short’ before the main film and I’ve always loved those as much as the longer films they make. Capturing ideas and character in a few minutes takes a lot of skill and creativity. Making a lamp (the ‘i’ in ‘Pixar’) that you care about has to be something special! So I was just as eager to see the short as I was to see the film.

This time, the short was entitled ‘Day and Night’ and the official plot synopsis is given below:

“When Day, a sunny fellow, encounters Night, a stranger of distinctly darker moods, sparks fly! Day and Night are frightened and suspicious of each other at first, and quickly get off on the wrong foot. But as they discover each other’s unique qualities — and come to realise that each of them offers a different window onto the same world — the friendship helps both to gain a new perspective.”

[Read more: http://www.firstshowing.net/2010/06/05/watch-this-making-of-video-for-pixars-short-day-night/#ixzz0uaVcORrq]

The synopsis can’t possibly capture the magic of those few minutes, watching the tensions and excitements of these two vastly different characters and having life revealed to you in the shape of two cute 2-D characters. Pixar’s skill is using the creative medium to unveil truth. Which of us has not looked at someone very different to us and not felt jealous of them, envying them those traits which are so different to us whilst also feeling suspicious and resentful of them, simply because they are different? Which of us has not envied someone else’s lifestyle, honestly believing that the grass is greener on the other side? Which of us has not, at some point, longed for change in our lives and yet been afraid to take the risk of doing something in a different way?

The simplicity of the genre cannot actually hide the significance of the message, and that’s the secret of Pixar. They have real truth to communicate. They do so in a style that makes us laugh, that awakens our curiosity, that sets fire to our imaginations… but their success lies in the fact that they are handling truth.

And I haven’t even begun to talk about ‘Toy Story 3’ yet!!

Have you ever had the joy (!) of getting some new computer part, only to find that it doesn’t work because it ‘doesn’t have the right driver’? It has taken me a long time to understand the jargon, but apparently a ‘driver’ in this sense is a program that controls a device. Every device, whether it be a printer, disk drive, or keyboard, must have a driver program. Many drivers, such as the keyboard driver, come with the operating system. For other devices, you may need to load a new driver when you connect the device to your computer and if you don’t… you don’t get very far! It’s maddening to have a shiny new printer that just sits there looking at you (without printing anything) because it can’t communicate with your computer because of driver problems.

On Sunday, Garry preached (amongst other things) about what ‘drives’ us or motivates us as people. With coloured ovals that resembled the Venn diagrams I loathed at school (more maths, you see…!), he talked about 3 things that drive us to do the things we do:
1) what we want to do
2) what we have to do
3) what we ought to do

Now, if all those three drivers line up, we are happy and enjoy what we’re doing. But if what we have to do isn’t the same as what we want to do, there is conflict. And if what we want to do or what we have to do are not the same as what we ought to do, we’ve got as many problems as the printer that sits there inert.

So, if we’re feeling stalled, maybe it’s because the things that are driving us aren’t talking to each other. We have to bring those three motivating forces into alignment so that we can live whole, integrated lives.

Paul talked about this conflict in Romans 7. “What I don’t understand about myself is that I decide one way, but then I act another, doing things I absolutely despise,” he writes. “I decide to do good, but I don’t really do it; I decide not to do bad, but then I do it anyway. My decisions, such as they are, don’t result in actions. Something has gone wrong deep within me and gets the better of me every time.” (The Message)

You can feel his frustration and despair at the end of Romans 7: “Is there no one who can do anything for me? Isn’t that the real question?” But thankfully, he doesn’t end there. He goes on to say, “The answer, thank God, is that Jesus Christ can and does. He acted to set things right in this life of contradictions where I want to serve God with all my heart and mind, but am pulled by the influence of sin to do something totally different.”

God’s influence and help in our lives make all the difference, and, as Garry pointed out, there is no conflict within the Godhead. What God wants to do is exactly the same as what He has to do and what He ought to do. The unity of God gives us hope when we are wrestling with driver issues.

I have continued to think about the things that inspire me and have been pondering ‘authenticity’ recently. What does it mean to be authentic? What does it mean to be genuine, rather than counterfeit?

The first dictionary definition of ‘authentic’ surprised me: “conforming to fact and therefore worthy of trust, reliance, or belief.” As someone who struggles with the unreliability of feelings on a daily basis and who is, therefore, striving to live by faith rather than by feelings, I liked how this definition was anchored in ‘fact’. Authentic living is rooted in reality, not fantasy.

The second definition is ‘not counterfeit or copied’. It’s very easy to ‘fake’ things at times, especially in Christian circles. We can ‘look the part’, but as in the old sketch, going to church doesn’t make you a Christian any more than flapping your arms makes you an aeroplane. We need to learn to walk with God for ourselves, not copying other people or putting on a show. God sees the heart. Authentic living must, therefore, be genuine and must reach the parts that only God sees. What we are in private must match up with what we are in public. Authenticity and dissonance don’t go together. Dissonance (lack of agreement or consistency) is most often associated with musical sounds that just don’t ‘sound right’; usually intervals of the second and seventh, or diminished and augmented intervals, and all chords based on these intervals. In the same way that such sounds ‘hurt’ our ears, a life that is dissonant can’t please God, because there is a lack of agreement between who we say we are and how we really are.

Synonyms of ‘authentic’ are given as ‘bona fide, genuine, real, true, undoubted, unquestionable.’ All of those adjectives could be applied to God, and as always, He is our standard for authentic living. If we look at the life of Jesus, we see someone who lived to do His Father’s will. There was consistency in His lifestyle. He lived with people who knew Him: “…which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched”, as John says in 1 John 1, yet there was no sense of dissonance in His life. He is our great high priest, our example, our hope and the genuine article!

Does this mean, though, that to live authentically we always have to be on a high? That we always have to have the right answers or be living on the mountain top? I don’t think so. We are frail and fallible people, who wrestle with sin, who struggle with doubt. We are like the man who cried out to Jesus, “I do believe! Help me overcome my unbelief!” (Mark 9:24) I think the mark of authentic living is not a denial of doubt or fear or uncertainty, but a willingness to trust God through all of those things.

We’ve finally got some notices in the notice board:

The poster says ‘The best vitamin for a Christian is B1’.

Yesterday we had a number of birthdays to celebrate for the coming week:
Ellen…

Lincoln…

Amber (you can run, but you can’t hide…!)

Letty…

And Garry decided to play for himself as well!

After the meeting, we had the usual conversations:

Another busy day!

Mark preached last night from Psalm 51 about the cleansing God provides. It was a vivid reminder of all that God has done for us in washing us from our sins. Not only does Jesus remove sin, He also removes the stain sin leaves behind and cleanses us from the guilt and hurt of sin.

“Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin” (Ps 51:2) and “Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.” (Ps 51:7)

We looked at different stains that are difficult to remove from clothing and how our sins, though red like scarlet, can be washed white as snow by the blood of Jesus. Related scriptures were Isaiah 1:18, Titus 3:4-5 and 1 John 1:8-9

Unconfessed sin can be a great barrier between us and God (Ps 66:18), but God is faithful and just and when we confess our sins, He is able to cleanse us from ALL unrighteousness. Mark talked about the secret sins we often hide from other people but cannot hide from God and how Jesus is able to forgive us and cleanse us.

Usually, getting washed is something we do to ourselves: the linguist in me teaches about this in the lessons on ‘reflexive verbs’, verbs where the subject and the object of the sentence are the same. ‘I wash myself’, literally. But we cannot wash ourselves from sin. We need to have God wash us. We need to be washed. We need help from outside!

Psalm 24 says, “Who may ascend the hill of the LORD? Who may stand in his holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift up his soul to an idol or swear by what is false.” God is the only one who can give us clean hands.

Who, or what, inspires you?

I’m not talking about the physical act of breathing in (which is also known as inspiration, or inhaling.) I’m talking about things that motivate you, that give you enthusiasm and increased energy and keep you going in the right direction when maybe you don’t much feel like it. One dictionary definition of inspiration is “stimulation of the mind or emotions to a high level of feeling or activity.” What are those things or people which inspire you?

Here is a list of things which inspire me, in no particular order.

Faithfulness
Quiet, steadfast faithfulness inspires me to be faithful to God. Faithfulness is a fruit of the Spirit, but is often overlooked in favour of more ‘showy’ attributes. Faithfulness is reliable and committed, often doing mundane things, things which are repetitive or unglamorous but which need doing. It’s much easier to start things than it is to finish them, but faithfulness is the thing which keeps people going.

Perseverance
I guess this is allied to faithfulness. Ongoing perseverance inspires me. I think there is such a lot to be said for stickability in our society which wants instant solutions and quick fixes. I listen to musicians’ skills and understand that a great deal of persistence and practice have gone into the final sound I benefit from. No amount of talent can make up for perseverance.

Eugene Peterson, in his excellent book ‘Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places’, says that “in the Christian way, patience and urgency are yoked… There are no shortcuts to becoming the people we are created to be.” Perseverance understands that and doesn’t give up. Paul tells us, in 1 Corinthians 13, that love doesn’t give up. Most qualities we admire are mixed with perseverance to make them even better!

Congruent living
I’m not talking about the mathematical sense of the word here, but about the quality of agreeing and living a life that is appropriate to one’s beliefs. I guess I see this as the opposite of hypocrisy, where someone says one thing but does another. Congruent living is ‘practising what you preach‘; it’s about living out one’s faith in every situation, about having consistency in one’s lifestyle. That kind of living is really attractive. I’m sure we all know people who inspire us because they have integrity in how they live; they are not just ‘putting on a show’. They are real – flawed people, maybe, but people who are striving for honesty and to integrate God into every part of their lives. Tim Hughes’s song ‘Everything’ captures this idea so vividly – God in every part of our living.

Integrity
So much of life is spent wearing a mask. We learn early on in life how to fit in, but so often that is at the expense of honesty. People who combine loving behaviour with honesty and integrity inspire me. They show graciousness but don’t pretend to be something they’re not.

Vulnerability
Vulnerability is not a very popular idea, since it means ‘capable of being wounded or hurt’ and we don’t much like being hurt. But people who are real, who live honest lives, will get hurt and we actually need to see that being wounded is not the end of the story. We serve a God who uses broken people. Hebrews 11 talks about those ‘whose weakness was turned to strength’ – if we only ever see raw strength, how will we ever learn from weakness?

Those who allow us to see their imperfections but who understand that God is transforming us inspire me far more than those who pretend they have already made it. 1 John 1 says “If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word has no place in our lives.” That’s the kind of vulnerability I’m talking about – allowing others to see our weaknesses and sharing the struggles we face so that we can all learn to rely on God’s love and grace more and more.