This is not a political post.
It is occasioned by reading an article in Rolling Stone about an interview that Fox News Anchor, Brett Baier, did this week with Donald Trump, but it is not a political post.
I smiled at a few things when I read the article, but if I were to tell you all of them, then this post would veer into the political, which is not terrible, but I assured you that I would not do that this time. So, I will tell you only the one thing in the article that made me smile the most.
It was in reference to a portion of the interview when Baier was asking Trump why he did not hand over classified documents when they were requested by the government. Baier pointed out that the indictment stated that not only did Trump not hand them over, but he moved the boxes that contained them in response to the request and then instructed lawyers to tell the government that all documents had been handed over.
Trump’s defense at this point was interesting. He did not deny failing to hand over the documents. He did not even deny moving the boxes. Rather, his defense was that he was very busy and had not had a chance to go through the boxes yet. He said that there were golf shirts in some of the boxes, and clothes and shoes, and that he did not want the government getting hold of such personal things. Here is where I smiled the most, prompted by the words at the end of the quote below;
“Like every other president I take things out,” Trump said. “In my case, I took it out pretty much in a hurry. People packed it up and left. I had clothing in there, I had all sorts of personal items in there. Much, much stuff.”
MUCH MUCH STUFF - Amen. Glory Hallelujah. That’s gold!
That’s something that so many of us can identify with, not “a lot of stuff,” or “very many things,” but rather, “much, much stuff.”
Here is where the evangelical preacher background kicks in; I could preach it;
“Friends, that’s like life. We all have much, much stuff. Sometimes, much, much stuff gets in the way of what we should be doing in life. Maybe you want to go golfing again, but now you can’t because you have to clear out the boxes. Maybe the government has told you that you need to reply to their request, but you know that much, much stuff is making that difficult. Maybe you have so much much, much stuff that you don’t even have time for God anymore… (and then the preacherly friendly condemnation/correction guilt)”
You get the idea.
Or, there is another way of thinking about much, much stuff. Walking around the neighbourhood this morning, passing by people who were waiting for the bus or commuting to work I thought about how people have so much on their plates these days, simply trying to make ends meet. This is the sympathetic way of pointing out that we have much, much stuff. When I told a friend about this over morning coffee, she said that it sounded like it could be Trump’s way of saying that beautiful quote (attributed to Meister Eckhart or Plato or Ian MacLaren or Philo of Alexandria or Robin Williams), “Be compassionate. Everyone you meet is engaged in a great struggle.”
In other words, “People have much, much stuff.” To be fair, when Donald said the words he was referring only to himself. To be fair, he mostly refers only to himself, but we’ll take what we can get, even if it unintentionally leads to compassion for others.
Being very careful now, I smile thinking that Jesus once told us not to worry about tomorrow because each day has “enough trouble of its own.” Some Bible paraphraser might simply translate that as “much, much stuff.”
So, may you know peace amidst the much, much stuff of your life, especially if it is the totality of all of the tasks and and challenges pressures that you feel.
“Be compassionate. Much, much stuff.”
Love this. Muchly. Thanks Todd for the smile.
Eric Bibb - Too Much Stuff
https://youtu.be/6dtKtGGXH4o