second circle

A student at WSU recently had this as his status:

To live with no regrets is impossible. It's saying that every decision you've made in the past has been correct, you were wrong and you don't care, or you've had a lobotomy and are lethargic. Regret, repent, move forward.
(thanks Steven Christian, Lead Singer of Amberlin)

I was struck by the sophistication of this worldview. He noticed the inconsistency that many of us live in.

Some run forward, boldly proclaiming "no regrets!". They look like free spirits, the kind of guiltless existence that many are envious of. However, are actions do have consequences. I have a friend who fell asleep at the wheel, caused a car accident that killed his passenger and those in the other car. He's the only one who survived. He now knows he has narcolepsy. And he lives the rest of his life wondering how is life would be different if he had that knowledge before getting in the car that day.

How can he have "no regrets"? Even though he didn't do anything wrong, those lives were still lost.

So what's the other road? Guilt, of course.

Some say he should remember those faces daily. He should question himself. He should question God. He should somehow pay back the families.

What value is there in either of these views? Either our actions or valueless or they are the only thing that defines us? Is this all there is?

I would like propose another way to deal with the consequences of our actions and our world.

I am borrowing the theological framework James Choung, the author of True Story: A Christianity Worth Believing In. All stories and analogies are my own.

Is the world good or bad? This is a very difficult question. As a soon-to-be father, there is so much of our world that I am excited to show my child. I'm excited to take them to a Mariners game, show them Mt. Rainer, teach them how to read and I am especially excited to teach them the story of God. However, I also know that Mariners players make an obscene amount of money, while millions are dying of starvation in the horn of Africa; Mt Rainer may destroy Tacoma sometime, my child may read Richard Dawkins (or Bertrand Russell) and decide that God is just a story.

Our world is confusing. There is so much that is lovely. There is so much that is disastrous. Births and deaths. Feasts and famines. Exquisite beauty and pain.

It really does seem like we live in a corrupted world. Anyone who has ever watched a marriage fail knows what I am talking about. Something that once looked so promising can become so ugly, it is unrecognizable. It's my belief that the more beautiful the intention, the more ugly the corruption.

We occupy this world, and that occupation really does effect us. Consider my friend. Even though he didn't choose to kill those people, he is effected by those deaths. They change him.

Or the marriage example; a million little pieces of corruption culminate into a broken relationship. Pornography, selfishness, angry and evil bosses that sap hope at work, abuse of a child by a family friend, financial pressure...these things all press onto a couple until they split. Some of these elements are chosen and can be controlled. Many elements cannot. Eventually the corruption of the world corrupts the relationship.

None are spared by being in our world. We encounter the beauty and the corruption. It inspires and corrupts us.

We can only live without regret when we cease to notice or care about the corruption. When we stop caring about the corruption we no longer have hope for the beauty that proceeded the corruption. When we stop caring about the corruption, we cease to have hope.

Above, I posted a picture with four worlds. I have just described the second. Tomorrow, I'll talk about the first, a world that has been designed for good.