Enough

I tend to write when I see connections. Call it the work of the spirit. As we begin the season of Advent we should focus on being prepared for the birth of Jesus. But how are we preparing? When will we feel that we have done enough preparation?

In the last twenty-four hours, we have been told that Americans have spent 11.8 billion on Black Friday sales and 14.2 billion on on-online sales. Lane Kiffen, Coach of the Mississippi Football Team, whose team is going to the playoffs, took an $84 million offer to coach at LSU and therefore won’t be able to coach his players in the playoff game. He sold them out. At church yesterday I ran into a former student who I advised at EA. When she saw me, her smile lit up the room, and it certainly lit up my heart. She is working at Vanguard, an investment firm that manages $11 trillion of global assets and she loves her job. I knew the founder of Vanguard, John Bogle, who popularized index funds. Index funds follow the market. He is in the same league as Warren Buffett.

I had read John Bogle’s book, Enough. During a vestry meeting one of my student members of that spiritual leadership group asked those assembled, “What about having John Bogle in to speak in chapel?” Her family knew him. Everyone said, “That would be great!” I was thinking to myself that the likelihood of that occurring was zero as he is in great demand with colleges, universities, and financial groups waiting years to have him speak at their venues. At the next meeting, my student said, “He can come in two weeks. Can we give him a date?” John and I talked about his address which focused on his key ethical points covered in Enough.

His book begins with a story that I have repeated often: “At a party in the Hamptons Joseph Heller, the author of Catch-22, was present when a friend remarked, “You know, this hedge fund manager makes more money in a single day than Catch-22 made in its entire history. Heller without missing a beat, replied, “That may be true, but I have something he will never have.” His friend asked, “What’s that?” Heller grinned and said, “Enough.”

Bogle’s book focuses on unparalleled insights on what we should consider as the true treasures. He puts our obsession with financial success in perspective. He talked with our community about the world increasingly focusing on money, stats, and scorekeeping. There are moments when relationships take a back seat to actions without character. Think Lane Kiffin. Think Donald Trump.

One of my mantras that you have read in my books and on this blog is that we are all paying a price. Is that price preparing us to love and to seek justice? Think Advent leading to the very embodiment of love and justice!

John Bogle put it another way. Our moral direction asks, “What do we mean by enough? Enough of what?” His fellow author, Kurt Vonnegut, recounted the story in an essay published in the New Yorker in 2005.

As we move through this season of Advent, perhaps a way to prepare for the birth of love and justice in the incarnation is to also keep that question shaped by that word, enough, in heart, mind, and spirit as well. Jesus in a manger should fulfill those spiritual longings that we find in a stable whose life and death is enough to shape our behavior to be noble and true right now.

The abundant life occurs when we respond to that essential question regarding enough. When we keep reaching out toward that child in a manger, we discover the spiritual journey and not the material one.