The catchphrase of the day is “It’ll change your life.” Pretty much every product sold on the market is guaranteed to do so, as well as every program or thought. We’ve all bought into this idea on one level or another.

I start this post pondering this idea because I just finished a summer program. While it didn’t promise to “change my life,” it did present many counter-cultural issues and challenge my thinking and conduct.

I haven’t really said much about where I was or what I was doing this summer, mostly because I didn’t know how to describe it. I spent eight weeks in Boulder, Colorado, where I lived with four other guys, learning about life, family, and home. For the men, that mostly meant learning practical around-the-home maintenance stuff: plumbing, electrical, structural remodeling, etc. Five women were part of this “Project” as well – they learned about skills of homemaking, like sewing, cooking, bargain shopping, raising children, etc. Now, looking at this from the outside, it appears to be completely sexist and backwards from the “modern” man and woman. I did say that this program raised some counter-cultural issues.

One of these issues was this idea of roles. The program strongly advocates gender equality. Women and men are equally valued and respected. However, gender equality does not correspond with sameness. This program was not designed to tell women that they can’t do home repair and that men can’t cook. What I took from the program was that within families and marriage relationships, men and women need to be respected as equals with different roles. For a “successful” marriage and family, there has to be a willingness on part of both husband and wife to role-play. The Bible is clear on the roles of man and woman. The man was created for hard work. The woman was created to help man. Manhood is rejecting passivity, accepting responsibility, leading courageously, and expecting God’s greater reward. Womanhood is rejecting worldly temptations for significance, believing in God’s priorities, nurturing the next generation, and expecting God’s greater reward. In marriage, the man is the head, as Christ is the head of the church. That means that the man is placed in authority over his wife, not to lord it over her but to protect her and love her. The woman submits to her husband, as the church submits to Christ. That means that the woman chooses to follow her husband, not to blindly accept his decisions or to be trampled, but to support and encourage him.

Okay, that’s a poor explanation of the summer, but I need to move on. Because program structure aside, there were some things that were brought to my attention this summer.

Firstly, my heart has and hopefully will always be to minister to others. Being others-centered is a freeing experience – not much compares to acting like Jesus. But the biggest obstacle to me caring for others is myself. Whether it’s my feelings or my desire to be liked by others or my fears or anything else, nothing should keep me from thinking of others. Sure, a lot of that is caring about what others think and how they’re feeling, but I shouldn’t let the way they feel about me affect my caring for them at all. I think that I’ve let criticism about my actions prevent me from trusting in God and doing good. This definitely doesn’t mean that I won’t make mistakes – I lost count of how many times I learned that this summer. But it does mean that I don’t need to focus on myself every time I get criticized for what I do or how I do it. I also don’t need to focus on myself when others tell me I need to. The more others-focused I am, the less my idiosyncracies will be an issue. I guess to sum it all in one sentence, God molds my character, not me. The more I try to change myself to make others happy, the less I am able to give out to others – I’ll be too busy working on my own flaws (God knows there’s a lot). It’s a tough pill to swallow, but I hope that that lesson will stay with me.

Secondly, I learned that I need to be more open about myself with others. My familial upbringing taught me to listen to others’ problems but never talk about my own. In one sense, I don’t really have many struggles, but at the same time, I was made aware that I can come across as this “perfect” guy who doesn’t need help from others and has it all together. But I’m not perfect. What I’ve learned is that this perception comes because I don’t ever share what’s troubling me. Part of this is my sense of propriety – I don’t like to trouble my friends with my problems and struggles because I don’t think they’re that important, but at the same time I feel alone a lot because most people don’t know what’s going on and don’t seem to care. So I learned this summer that I should be honest about my struggles and feelings. Sure, probably most people don’t care about what’s going on in my life, but more people care about my life than I think.

Lastly, I learned that there are times when criticism and rebuke need to be handled with an apology and moving on. Not every piece of criticism is true. In a sense, this lesson is similar to the first lesson, because it’s about being others-centered. I think that it’s important to receive criticism and rebuke with humility, rather than to respond out of pride. But that doesn’t mean that every rebuke or piece of criticism is true, either. I think that it’s a sad deal that most people are not interested in understanding others – we make assumptions about others and are more interested in making ourselves understood more. This summer I learned that I play the “I’m wrong, everyone else is right” game – if people criticize my actions or motives, I’ll believe that there’s an element of truth to what they say. If my conscience is clear and I haven’t violated Scripture, I’ll assume that there’s something vile hidden deep within me and get down on myself. It goes back to being self-centered. What I ought to do is to apologize for offending whoever is criticizing me, ask for forgiveness before them and God, and move on. There doesn’t need to be a huge sense of contrition after every single mess-up. I don’t have to repent for things that aren’t sin. So while all of this sounds really arrogant and prideful, it’s really keeping things in God’s perspective. Am I wanting to please God, or people? Being God-centered and others-oriented means that if my motives are pure, I can and should learn to not offend people, but those things should not prevent me from trying to do good as best as I can. And part of that is trying to understand people, and being okay with not being understood.

I could probably go on with this, but I’ll leave it here for now. So do I think my life was changed this summer? Not really. But God’s still teaching me things, and He’s still in control of my life. I think that as I continue to obey His Word, I will begin to look more and more like Jesus. That’s my hope and prayer.