Page 7 - EMCAPP-Journal No. 16
P. 7

Brett Vaden






                                        Brett Vaden (USA) is the Associate Pastor of The Journey West
                                        County in St. Louis, MO. Brett trained at Moody Bible Institute
                                        (B.A., Biblical Languages) and The Southern Baptist Theological
                                        Seminary (M.Div., Ph.D.). Brett has a passion for helping people
                                        seek to know God as he is revealed in his Son Jesus Christ and to
                                        follow him. Brett is married to Rachael, and they have three child-
                                        ren: Story (12), Arrow (10), and Harmony (9).


                                                                                   bvaden@thejourney.org



             A Christian Perspective on the                    story in our marriage.

             True Self and False Self                          “I’m not okay with this! I asked you to grab
                                                               the camera charger, and you told me you
                                                               would, but you didn’t.”
             My wife and I were on vacation in Colorado.       “Look, I’m sorry! I just forgot. There was a
             One morning, we drove out for a day-excur-        lot happening and it just slipped my mind.”
             sion with our three young kids. Earlier as I      “This isn’t about the camera. It’s you. When
             was packing up the van, she had asked me          I ask you for something that I care about,
             to grab the camera charger (this was before       you don’t treat it like it’s important to you.
             the days of high-quality smartphone came-         You just shrug it off.”
             ras). But as we drove down the highway, an        “Look, I’m not meaning to hurt your fee-
             hour into our trip, she asked me where the        lings. I just forget...”
             charger was so she could plug the camera          And, so on, for a couple of hours. At one
             into the van’s charging port. I realized then     point in the conversation, however, I finally
             that I had forgotten to grab it; probably, in     realized what Rachael was getting at, and it
             the bustle of packing, something else had         hit me like a ton of bricks:
             pushed her request out of my thoughts. As         “It’s like you’re asking me to change who I
             this realization dawned on me, she asked,         am. I’m a laid-back person. If I forget to do
             “You remembered to pack it, right?”               things, or others forget to do things, it’s not
             “Oh no, I guess I forgot it. Whoops!” I re-       a big deal to me. Forgive and  forget. But
             plied  nonchalantly.  I  was  trying  to  make    you’re  wanting  me  to  become  a  radically
             light of it. After all, it was just a mistake, and   different person. It’s like you’re asking me
             a very natural one considering all the other      to change my personality. It’s like you’re as-
             things I had my mind on. We’d be fine, ma-        king me to die.”
             king memories without having to stop and          “Yes, that’s what I’m asking you to do.”
             take pictures of them. No big deal. Or so I       “Oh.”
             assumed.                                          I don’t remember exactly how our conver-
             My  wife,  Rachael,  did  not  share  my  fra-    sation ended, but I know that by the end, I
             ming of the situation. While I automatically      had come to a profound recognition: some
             shrugged  off  my  mistake  as  a  mere  acci-    of the most basic ways I had seen myself
             dent—something I didn’t mean to do—she            up to that point—aspects of myself that I
             considered  it  part  and  parcel  of  a  bigger   would have taken for granted as just “me”






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