Letting Go of the Trapeze

All that swinging from one extreme to the other, from social activism to enjoying my “blessings” and back again, only made me dizzy. I needed to find a way off the trapeze.

When we as Christians begin to examine our feelings about material possessions and our responsibilities in the world, we find believers promoting more extremes and calling them all biblical—prosperity gospel, graduated tithes, survival of the fittest (or most spiritual), monk-like simple lifestyles. How can we reconcile them? Or should we even try?

What makes it so hard to find my place is that the extremes are present in the Scriptures, and championed so boldly. Too often, they are the subject of what I read and hear. But the balance is there in God’s word, too, if we look, if we quietly wait for God to show it to us. Both views are presented in Scripture; both must somehow reconcile into a God-designed whole.

I do believe God calls a small number of people to extreme activism, to live a life of voluntary poverty in identification with the poor. I’m not one of them. And I no longer believe that admission makes me “unspiritual.” The Scriptures tell us there are “different kinds of gifts” (1 Corinthians 12:4).

But not having a gift or calling from God to live among the poor does not mean I can ignore their needs. That would be as ridiculous as saying that someone without the spiritual gift of giving never needs to put a dime in the offering plate. Or that the one not gifted as an encourager never needs to speak an uplifting word to another.

Finding Our Balance

When we take the whole of Scripture, we find that God offers balance to us and expects balance from us. His word is full of statements that pull together both of the extremes on many issues. We are not meant to be all-or-nothing people. We are meant to apply all of the Scriptures to our lives even when contrasts are presented. And we have the promise that the Holy Spirit will guide us into all truth (John 16:13). When we are presented with opposing opinions, only he can make the truth plain in our inner being.

Jesus tells us we are called to love God and our neighbor not just love God by loving our neighbor. In Mark 12:30, 31, he says, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.” Jesus refused to answer the “which is the greatest commandment” question by just telling us to love God. He includes two commands, two commands that are linked together in the life of the believer. He says we are to do both.

So my first priority is to focus on God and get to know him. I’m in a love relationship with him. For that to grow, it requires a commitment of time, of energy, of listening, of sharing. But I cannot be selfish in his love, hoarding it. I need to share it with others, introducing them to Christ, meeting their needs as Christ’s local representative. Loving him and loving others are both facets of our relationship with God.

First John 3:17 tells us that people have reason to question our love of God if we don’t help the needy—“If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him?” But it is not the only “proof” of our love. Obedience (John 14:15), love among the brethren (John 13:35), and sharing the message of forgiveness in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:11–15) are all signs that God’s love is active within us. When we bash the brethren with Scriptures on service to the poor (or anything else), people should question our love of God. And while they’re at it, they should remind us of our supposed belief in the indwelling Spirit as our individual teacher.

Scripture tells us that serving others and sacrifice bring with them prosperity and reward in this life, not just in the future. Luke 18:29, 30 promises both a heavenly payoff for earthly sacrifice and an earthly one. “‘I tell you the truth,’ Jesus said to them, ‘no one who has left home or wife or brothers or parents or children for the sake of the kingdom of God will fail to receive many times as much in this age and, in the age to come, eternal life’” (emphasis mine).

All rewards for the believer are not future tense and only spiritual. Here-and-now material rewards are also promised. The Old Testament speaks of earthly prosperity for those who were generous to the needy. “One man gives freely, yet gains even more; another withholds unduly, but comes to poverty. A generous man will prosper; he who refreshes others will himself be refreshed” (Proverbs 11:24, 25).

“When two truths seem to directly oppose each other, we must not question either but remember there is a third—God—who reserves to himself the right to harmonize them.”

Quote from Madame Anne S. S. Swetchine

The Bible presents many seemingly opposing ideas that we as humans find hard to weave together. So we tend to emphasize the Scriptures that support our view and ignore the ones that don’t. We often find ourselves looking for ways to discredit the scholarship, commitment or, if all else fails, the character of those on the other side. It’s time to acknowledge that we don’t have the mind of God and that we may not understand how he can balance the extremes.

For instance, contrary to the social action vs. evangelism dichotomy of my childhood, God’s Word, in both testaments, tells God’s people to be concerned with both people’s material needs and evangelism, not merely one or the other. Jesus not only gave his disciples the Great Commission (Matthew 28:18–20) but also told them that “whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me” (Matthew 25:31–46).

Getting in Step with Jesus

It’s time to stop trying to convince one another that Jesus was committed to only evangelism or only social justice. He was obviously committed to both. His years of public ministry displayed an emphasis on both. He hung out with the disenfranchised not only to meet their physical needs but also to offer them forgiveness for their sins. All people, no matter what their station in life, need the salvation provided through Jesus Christ.

Paul described to the Galatians his commission from God and from the apostles in Jerusalem. He was “entrusted with the task of preaching the gospel” (2:7) but also reminded that he “should continue to remember the poor, the very thing [he] was eager to do” (2:10). He traveled the known world to preach the Gospel, but he also urged believers to contribute to the needs of the poor and those beset by adversity. Chapters eight and nine of 2 Corinthians are devoted to the need for generosity, to meeting the physical needs of the world and to a mutual sharing of resources (8:13–15). The great evangelist believed in social action.

And so if I am to find my place in God’s purposes, I will need to care both about bringing those around me into a relationship with Jesus Christ and meeting their physical needs. I must embrace God’s sense of balance, not man’s sense of polarization. It is too easy to focus on one area and ignore the other, but that is not God’s way. If I want to follow Christ, I must seek both the salvation of people’s souls and the nourishment of their bodies.

Now, We Swing to the Other Side

But then a new Scripture reading or sermon comes. Now we’re exposed to verses that provide powerful ammunition for those on the other end of the spectrum, those who believe it is God’s desire for Christians to be wealthy (and often, that poverty is a result of sinfulness). We encounter verses such as Proverbs 13:21, “Misfortune pursues the sinner, but prosperity is the reward of the righteous.” There’s Deuteronomy 8:18, “But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms his covenant, which he swore to your forefathers, as it is today.” Those verses purport a cause-and-effect principle—sin and become poor or love God and become wealthy.

Many believers eagerly embrace these verses. We let the trapeze arc in the other direction. After all, who wouldn’t like to believe wealth is God’s blessing? Gone is the guilt over owning two new cars. In fact, maybe it’s time to consider a Lexus. Doesn’t that show God’s power in my life? It indicates to all around me (or at least those who espouse the same philosophy) how holy I am.

I would never have said I believed in a prosperity gospel, the idea that God promises his followers wealth and a life of ease. Nor would I have denied the need to make our world a better place. But at times I lived out my life as though I did. For months, sometimes years, I loved life and all it had to offer me, with little concern for what it offered others. The attitude of my heart, lived out through my life, seemed to be: Was I to blame if God chose to bless me?

Yet I believe that, for most of us, this opinion doesn’t quite ring true either. Maybe we’ve known believers who appeared to commune with God at a deep level but never seemed to make it financially. Or maybe we let ourselves acknowledge that there are whole countries filled with followers of Jesus who don’t know how they will feed their children tonight. We just can’t believe in a God so trivial that a Mercedes for me means more to him than famine in Africa.

Still Swinging on the End of a Rope

For years, I swung from one end of the spectrum to the other, like an inept trapeze artist, clinging to the bar as it arced back and forth. There would be a short swing over the concept of balance, and then away to the extreme. Instead of falling back to the center, to the place of balance, I clung to the trapeze, stuck on a wild ride.

Back and forth it would go, in my mind and in my life. I would be inspired and begin to do something. But as I did, the nagging sense that it wasn’t all I could be doing would invade my mind. “Do more,” it would taunt. “You have life way too easy. Why are you living on the safe side of the city? We see right through your good-deeds attitude.” Guilt became my motivator and my constant companion.

Eventually I would decide I could never be the committed kind of disciple other people were. I could never be Mother Teresa. I didn’t want to be Mother Teresa. I didn’t want to live in the slums, to live in poverty.

So I would give up altogether. After all, if I did nothing, retreating to my secure upper-middle-class lifestyle, there were less frequent reminders of the inequities of the world. Everyone around me had the same stuff I had. Everyone was looking to get more. Soon I didn’t even feel the guilt—until a photo of a starving child stared back at me from the glossy magazine ad. And off I would go again.

I ended up dizzy and sick, sick of the extremes, and of not knowing what to do about it.

But were they the only options? Somehow I couldn’t help feeling that there must be a better way. How had I ended up here? How had so much of the church ended up here? Why were we so polarized?

How can these contradictory verses appear in the same Bible and all be God-breathed? No wonder people get confused. No wonder I tend to latch on to the ideology that makes me most comfortable—usually the ones that tell me that my cushy, well-off lifestyle is a gift from God, based on my relationship with him. Unfortunately, encountering the radical discipleship verses still induces guilt. Why would Jesus have said it if it were not true? Am I really not following Jesus if I don’t chuck it all and move to the inner city, or at least a convent?

And so I continued to swing back and forth, hanging on to my trapeze, but getting nowhere.

There must a better way, a way without the extremes, the way of balance.

First, We Swing to the One Side

Most of us know God is supposed to be our guide. Yet so often we end up living at the extremes. We’re adamant on an issue, but feel guilty if we cannot seem to live in harmony with our chosen opinion. Usually it happens like this: We hear a sermon, or read the Bible, and are confronted with a verse that seems to present no middle of the road, only all or nothing. Depending on our own behavior at the moment, the passage may dismay or delight us. In either case, there seems to be no arguing about its meaning.

For example, take Luke 14:33, “In the same way, any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be my disciple.” Add Matthew 19:21, “Jesus answered, ‘If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give it to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.’” These seem to deliver a straightforward message right from the mouth of Jesus: Don’t claim you’re a follower of Christ unless you have denounced possessions.

Those who feel it is a God-given mandate for all believers to live at the poverty level and serve the poor are delighted to expound on these verses. And even in context, they seem to present little wiggle room. Indeed, Matthew tells us that the rich man whom Jesus advised to sell all his possessions went away sad. There is no indication that Jesus ran after him, assuring him he had been using hyperbole and didn’t really mean he had to sell all his possessions; he just had to recognized they belonged to God.

So we begin to grapple with the concept, and it’s a difficult one. Most of us enjoy our possessions, take comfort in our homes, receive pleasure from our gizmos, and don’t want to give them up. Can I really not follow God if I have clothes enough to fill a walk-in closet or an flat-screen TV that commands a wall in my spacious home?

For a brief time, like a trapeze artist, we may swing for the extreme that is demanded. We may begin to divest ourselves of some possessions, give more money to social causes, consider relocating our families or switching careers. But the arc is difficult to sustain.

When my husband Les graduated from seminary, the country boy who always pictured himself serving in a rural church ended up in a small inner city. The city was small, but the drug problem huge. While we lived in a parsonage on the “nice” side of the city, the church location was in the thick of things. The church staff couldn’t even get pizza delivered at lunchtime. They had to walk two blocks out of the “bad neighborhood” to await the Domino’s deliveryman.

Steve, the church’s minister of community outreach, had a variety of organizations functioning in our church building. He began to introduce us to them. We learned the church made a difference by offering things people needed to escape the cycle of poverty—adult education to earn a GED (the equivalent of a high school diploma); inexpensive, quality child care so single moms could work; mentoring in job skills and discipleship for ex-prisoners; and tutoring and kid’s clubs so children did well in school and stayed out of gangs.

And because Steve lived in the neighborhood and knew everyone in a four-block radius, he began to introduce us to the poor themselves. God was teaching us to see them as real people, individuals with goals and dreams just like ours, people he loves.

Thanks to the programs operated in the church, I learned how I could become involved rather than just feel sorry for people. I tutored adults for whom English was a second language. I helped others in developing résumés and interview skills. I saw my efforts make a difference. And I liked the feeling of satisfaction it gave me.

But I was still working full-time, helping with the youth group, teaching Sunday school, and attempting to keep my house clean enough to keep the Board of Health away. Tutoring was one more responsibility in my busy life. I often felt I wasn’t juggling those obligations well.

Even though life felt jam packed, I never thought I was doing enough to make a difference in my world. I still wasn’t living in the midst of the need like Steve. What made me feel even guiltier was that I had no desire to be. The books I read about our need to identify with the poor, to chuck it all and live among them, indicated I was not really a disciple.

So I would allow the guilt to propel me into heavy-duty activism. I jumped at every opportunity, threw money at every cause. But more opportunities kept presenting themselves; more photos of starving children showed up in my mailbox. I couldn’t stem the flood. I couldn’t do it all. The guilt and exhaustion grew in spite of my actions on behalf of others.

Eventually I gave up. I collapsed. I couldn’t sustain the edge of the arc. If I was going to feel guilty anyway, why do anything?

Most of us feel defeated before even trying to live the ideal. We give up, we fall back. But it doesn’t change our belief that only those who have sold it all and moved to the slums to minister to the poor are true disciples. Suddenly, discipleship itself is marginalized. It’s not something for the average person. It’s a call only for the truly spiritual—and that isn’t us. We’ve become second-tier Christians.

Living at the Extremes

I, like most humans, tend to see everything as black or white, all or nothing. It’s obvious in politics: red state vs. blue state, Republican or Democrat. Advertising forces it on our lifestyle choices: Coke or Pepsi, Mac vs. PC. No middle position. No common ground.

As Christians, we even use verses to back up our positions, no matter which side of an issue we support. It’s liberal vs. evangelical, simplicity gospel vs. prosperity gospel, spending life enjoying all of God’s good gifts (materialism) vs. giving our lives away in service.

It’s easy to see how we end up this way. The extremes are easier to define and, thus, easier to defend. When I support a position that is on the far side of an issue, I know exactly what I am for and what I am against. Think Glenn Beck and Arianna Huffington.

With a single battle cry, I can quickly rally people to my cause. And for a little added fun, I can use caricature and hyperbole to demonize those on the other side. I know who the enemy is and even quote the words of Jesus to identify them: “He who is not with me is against me” (Matthew 12:30).

Let’s Swing Together

As followers, we are also drawn to the extremes. Like moths to the light, we flitter around dogmatic leaders who advocate a certain position. We gravitate to messengers who are sure of themselves, who have every conceivability in its proper cubbyhole. It feels less dangerous somehow. Any uncertainty in those calling the shots makes us nervous. If they are not 100 percent certain, how do we know we are listening to the right leader?

And that’s what we desire—the right leader. We make the initial decision to join this army, but then we want someone else to make the battle decisions, to devise the plan. Ultimately, we look for the easy way, the way of not thinking. The old adage, “Ours is not to wonder why; ours is just to do or die,” fits our Christianity too. Give us a take-charge guy who knows exactly what should be done, how we are to live each day. We’re content when he issues orders firmly and clearly.

Why? Because clear-cut rules are easier to obey. Even if the instructions themselves are difficult—sell everything, give the money to the poor, and follow Jesus, for instance—there is no indecisiveness about what it means. When the lines are drawn, there’s no need to seek guidance from the Spirit of God, certainly no need to wrestle with him. We can mindlessly obey, like a faithful border collie, and not have to figure out any of the big issues for ourselves.

It’s safer to follow another’s lead. If it doesn’t work out, it’s his fault not ours. We were just following; we can’t be blamed for heading in the wrong direction. There’s anonymity in being part of the crowd. We like not being held responsible.

But that’s not God’s way for us. Although we are called children of God, we are admonished not to stay children in our thinking but to grow up. Paul told the Ephesian believers to “become mature.” When that occurred, they would “no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching.” The goal, Paul said, was for believers to “grow up into him who is the head, that is, Christ” (Ephesians 4:13–15).

Being a grown-up means taking responsibility, living independently. In the Christian life, it’s living independent of man’s dictates and totally at the direction of the Spirit, our indwelling source of wisdom. We are still part of Christ’s body, and therefore interdependent, but he is to be the only head.

Just because the eyes have a better view than the kneecaps, doesn’t mean they get to tell the knees what to do. Because eyes are only eyes, they would likely tell the kneecaps to do something eye-like, something knees are not designed for. That’s why being a grown-up part of Christ’s body means listening to the head, being who God created us to be, and serving the function he designed us for.

“With me it’s all or nothing. It’s all or nothing with me . . . ”

as said by Ado Annie in Oklahoma

Uncle Dave was a minister. He and Aunt Flo provided me with my first exposure to social justice issues. Unfortunately, my independent, fundamentalist church considered his denomination “liberal.” And so even though my grandparents had been Salvation Army officers who worked among the poor during the Great Depression, I absorbed the dichotomy I observed: Fundamentalist churches did evangelism; liberal churches did social action. For some reason, it seemed that trying to do both would mean that liberalism had won the day; so, of course, we didn’t.

Don’t get me wrong; my church was no Ebenezer Scrooge shouting, “Are there no poorhouses?” We collected “White Gifts” for the city mission to distribute each year at Christmastime. For several years, we even brought in a busload of poor urban children for a Christmas party in our fellowship hall. I just don’t remember any exhortation about making the world a more just place or our part in that. There was little encouragement to think about the poor on a regular basis rather than only on special occasions.

Maybe it was the great emphasis on individual responsibility, even while we said we believed in grace. “People should pull themselves up by their bootstraps.” “Anyone who is willing to work can achieve the American dream.” These were the maxims of my youth, philosophies I absorbed from the adults around me. They were ideas that implied the playing field was even and the poor were responsible for their own poverty. Only the children were to be pitied—until they grew up.

My first real exposure to “evangelical” social activism came in the late 1970s. I picked up Stanley Mooneyham’s What Do You Say to a Hungry World? and, shortly thereafter, Ron Sider’s Rich Christians In an Age of Hunger. I found them thought provoking and disconcerting. Maybe being an evangelical didn’t mean I was supposed to ignore the physical needs around me. Something about that resonated with me. Maybe it was my Salvation Army genes kicking in.

But immediately there was a problem. I enjoyed my middle-class lifestyle. I had no interest in selling my possessions, living in an inner city, and making do on a poverty-level income so I could give my money to others. And the examples held up for public adoration seemed to offer no other choice. It was all or nothing.

I admire Mother Teresa, really I do. But I don’t want to be her. And that’s not just because she’s dead. I don’t want to be what she was when she was alive either, living in Calcutta, caring for the poorest and sickest of humanity day after day.

Intellectually, I believe in preserving our environment, pursuing justice for the poor, and being a global Christian. But I don’t want to sell our suburban, middle-class home, forgo eating out, buy only “green,” or make all food from scratch. Do I have to feel guilty for taking a vacation or eating a steak? Is it possible to live with a concern for social justice and still enjoy some of the finer things of life, or is it an all-or-nothing commitment?

See, I like my life. It may be crazy at times, much like a circus. I often feel like an acrobatic clown juggling plates of responsibility, trying to find the rhythm that will keep them from crashing down on my head. I’m trying to keep everyone entertained while I get more frantic as the pace picks up.

And yet I like my plates. And I’m willing to stay in the circus in order to keep them, most of them anyway.

That’s why I’m no Mother Teresa. I like having a closet of clothes to choose from, not just a simple sari. I like to have a pantry full of variety to eat and not a simple staple meal. I enjoy the many blessings of my life, but to do so, I must keep the plates spinning.

Then along came Jeanette. She was the editor of one of the magazines I’d been published in, but then she moved on to the book publishing world. One day I got an e-mail from her. “Do you think you have a book in you?” it asked.

“What?”

I thought about it. I prayed about it. I wrote her a short summary of a book idea I entitled I’m No Mother Teresa: Social Activism for Nonactivists. I wanted to share why I thought it was okay that most of were never called to be on the front lines of the justice wars, but how we were each called to do something in some way in our sphere. It would include chapters on various problems, outlining ideas of simple ways to make a difference in the world. It would include ideas of things families could do together. I wanted to combine rationale for acting with practical ways to act.

Jeanette liked it. She walked me through writing a proposal and sample chapters and all the things I didn’t know about writing a book. Her boss liked it. They took it to committee (the gatekeepers of the publishing world).

It got rejected.

I got the nicest letters from Jeanette and her boss Bonnie telling me how sorry they were and how much they believed in my book. Bonnie even met with me at an industry conference to coach me in how to pitch the book to others.

For 12 years I took the book to writers conferences and industry expos in Atlanta, California, Philadelphia, New Mexico. I pitched it to dozens of editors and agents, many of whom asked for full proposals. Six of them loved my writing and my concept, and they took it to committee.

There it died, rejected yet again.

The marketing people were sure it wouldn’t sell.

I hate to use this phrase because it sounds arrogant, but I don’t know how else to say it: I was ahead of my time. When I started marketing the book proposal a dozen years ago, no one was writing about social justice except hard-core social activists. Somewhere, about five years ago, the tide began to turn. Books on making a difference began to appear, some by the big guns in the publishing industry: Max Lucado and Bruce Wilkinson, for instance. Soccer moms began to have books published on the topic.

I had skipped pitching the book for about three years because I was so burnt out and discouraged. Apparently that was the sweet spot. I missed it. And my book proposal was just one among many.

I am officially retiring the attempts to sell the book. I originally named this blog I’m No Superstar, a twist off of the I’m No Mother Teresa book title, because I wanted to showcase simple things non-superstars like me could do to make a difference in the world.

Therefore, I’m going to use the blog to serialize the first few chapters of my book. Maybe that’s crazy. Maybe no one will read it. But what the heck? No one is reading it now sitting in a file on my desktop.

You’ll see it appear here over the weeks ahead. If you enjoy it, let me know. If you don’t, don’t tell me. It’s already received more rejection than I can handle.

Welcome to the book of my heart.

“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.

“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

“The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’

“Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’

“They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’

“He will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

“Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.” (Matt. 25:32–46)

That passage came to mind a few weeks ago, because I was headed to prison. A Lancaster-area prison reform ministry—Justice & Mercy—had hired me to come along on their annual whoopie pie Christmas distribution at the prison and then write articles about it for them.

And so the morning of the visit, I read Matthew 25:31–46 because I knew it mentioned visiting prisons. It struck me as I read that the other things the King commends his people for doing—feeding the hungry, providing water to the thirsty, inviting in strangers, clothing the naked, and visiting the sick—I’d been doing regularly all of my adult life, and some even as a child.

But I was 54 years old and I’d never been inside the walls of a prison, not even the waiting room. Why wasn’t this a regular part of my life as the other activities have been? And why had I never thought about it before?

My experience was eye-opening. The Lancaster County Prison was built 8 years before the start of the Civil War, and while clean, it’s not one of those cushy prisons you sometimes see on TV. Martha Stewart did not live here.

The cells in the area I visited had solid walls and solid doors with just a narrow vertical window and a food slot. The prisoners remain in those cells with one or two other people for 22 hours a day. There is no exercise yard. Prisoners spend a lot of their time sleeping to pass the day away. That doesn’t prepare them for life on the outside.

I’m not sure how this experience will change me. I don’t know when I’ll be back in prison—quite possibly when Justice & Mercy hands out its chocolate crosses at Easter. But I feel the need to grapple with this complex issue, with the overwhelming number of people in prison, with the need for a better way to provide both justice and mercy.

Have you ever been to prison? I’d love to hear your thoughts on the experience and what steps you’re taking.

But I’ve known since the start that I wanted to count this blessing: shoes. I love shoes, although with the foot and ankle problems I’ve experienced over the last two years, I haven’t only begun to branch out and wear some fun shoes again. (My newest? These Green Eggs and Ham Converse high-tops. Favorite Dr. Seuss book meets favorite piece of apparel.)

I’ve known about TOMS Shoes for a year or so now, but have yet to buy a pair due to the aforementioned foot problems. But I want to, and you should too! (I’m very jealous of Emily in our church youth group who owns a pair.) For every pair of shoes TOMS sells, it donates a pair of shoes to a child somewhere in the world who cannot afford one. One for One. It’s a great concept, and TOMS is doing well by doing good.

When I was offered two copies of TOMS founder Blake Mycoskie’s new book, Start Something That Matters, I jumped at the chance to read it and blog about it and to give a copy away. While this easy-to-read book does tell the story of how and why Blake founded TOMS (and why it’s called TOMS—with no apostrophe—rather than Blake’s), it is really a manual on how anyone can pursue the things they are passionate about that make a difference in the world.

Blake tells his own secrets of what made TOMS successful as well as the stories of others to illustrate his seven principles that will get you moving toward living your dream and doing good at the same time. His advice is practical and sometimes unexpected (I’ve never read the word “interns” so many times in such a short space), and his enthusiasm is contagious.

What are you dreaming of? How do you wish you could change the world? What project or business have you considered starting that you just aren’t sure you have what it takes? Or what have you started that you’d love to see grow even bigger? Tell me in the comments section and it will put you in the drawing for the free copy of Blake’s book.

You can do it! A new year is about to begin. Start Something That Matters might just provide the perfect motivation to make 2012 the year you changed the world. And that’s even more satisfying than a new pair of shoes.