The word Selah means to “pause and consider.” That’s what we’re doing for the next week or so.

Pausing.

Today we head out on our annual Spring Break trip to Destin, Florida. A week with family. A week with friends. A week to recharge and rejuvenate. To focus on rest and relationships.

No alarm clock, no blog, no calorie counting (you’re right, I rarely do that anyway).

Whether you’re able to take your “Griswold family truckster” cross country or not, I hope you’ll find (or make) some time this week to pause and consider. I don’t do it enough. We weren’t meant to run full tilt all the time.

Thanks so much for reading my ramblings here at BTR. I’m grateful.

See you in a week!

Two point one five billion dollars.

$2,150,000,000.00

That’s how much a conglomerate of business and civic leaders, including Magic Johnson, paid for the Los Angeles Dodgers baseball team last night while you were asleep. Billion. With a B. That’s a lot of cash. A lot of zeros.

How in the world did they come up with that value?

By the team’s performance?

Probably not. They haven’t made the playoffs in 6 years. Haven’t been to the World Series in over 20.

By the organization’s viability?

Hardly. The previous owner had managed them right into bankruptcy court.

So how did a mediocre baseball team sell for more than the GDP of 30 of the world’s countries? It’s actually pretty simple. No economics degree required. The LA Dodgers are worth $2.15 billion dollars….

…because that’s what someone was willing to pay.

If you were being auctioned off on the open market, how much would you be worth?

Well if we take into account your recent divorce, the bad review you just got at your job, the way your dad talked to you when you were a kid, the unbridled frustration you unleashed on your daughter this morning, your underfunded 401(k) and poor budgeting skills, that failed business venture, the messiness of your house, the craziness of your kids, and how you feel when compared to your successful sibling, neighbor, or best friend.

Carry the one.

Multiply by your insecurities.

Maybe a buck seventy five or so? Sounds high?

But that’s the problem with our valuation system. It’s based on our output. Our skills. Prowess. Performance. How other people view us. How we view ourselves. If that’s how the Dodgers were valued, the previous owner would have had to give them away along with a few 5 day passes to Disney Land.

Just like the Dodgers, you’re value is determined by how much someone is willing to pay.

That’s how much you mean to me! That’s how much I love you! I’d sell off the whole world to get you back, trade the creation just for you.” -Isaiah 43:4

God was willing to give it all for you. To send His Son as payment. To buy you out of bankruptcy.

That’s your value.

It’s not determined by how you feel, or by how I feel about you, but by how much God was willing to fork over.

Jesus.

$2.15 billion’s got nothing on you.

I admit it. I was rooting for Tiger Woods. I wanted him to win. I’ve secretly longed to see him hoist another championship trophy for the last 924 days. It’s true.

Not the icon.

Not the tabloid image.

Not the red shirt.

Not the machine.

Not the argumentative, pretentious, rehearsed image.

The man. The broken, fallen man. The human being.

The guy who stood sadly alone for his post-win interview. No smiling wife or excited toddlers to run clumsily across the manicured green into his open arms. The guy who blew it. Who gave it all away. Who thought he was bigger than life. Who tested gravity and found that even he was subject to it’s pull.

That guy.

It’s weird, and I’m undoubtedly a hypocrite (I kind of enjoy watching a guy pay for his transgressions if he wears a Patriots logo or plays Major League Baseball) . Tiger hurt a lot of people, and their pain deserves some restitution. A piece of me loves see a guy get what’s coming to him. I’m human, too.

But maybe that’s the point. I’m human, too.

The older I get, the less I want to throw stones (don’t misunderstand, I’ve still got a great arm). The more I want to celebrate unabashed grace (even if the guy getting it may not even know he needs it). The Bible soberly reminds us “we are utterly incapable of living the glorious lives God wills for us” (Romans 3:23 MSG), and that even my most righteous acts are nothing more than “filthy rags” (Isaiah 64:6 NLT).

Tiger Woods deserves to be exiled. Abandoned. Shamed. Anonymous. Finished. Hoisting another PGA championship trophy is far more than he deserves.

And maybe that’s why I enjoyed it so much. Isn’t “more than we deserve” what we’re all desperately hoping for?

Last night, I spent a few hours with my brother, our dad, and family friend (Kellog MBA and global powerhouse) Jim Ordo. We engaged in a little brainstorming session.

Strategery.

My (10 years younger yet 10 inches taller) brother has a dream. A music school. An environment where kids can not only learn an instrument but release their creativity. Become artists, not just technicians. It’s a cool concept, and we had a blast hashing it out with him.

The ideas flowed faster than the coffee. By the time Darren would jot one down, three more were colliding in the airspace above our heads. It was energizing. Freeing. Easy. Because at this point, all I’m really responsible for is the dreaming.

Dreaming comes standard with energy, freedom, and ease. They’re built in. Creating is the expensive upgrade. I left our dialog with dreamer’s hangover. Darren walked out with four reams of action steps and a mountain of hard work.

All of us can dream. Few of us will create.

Imagination is intoxicating. Creating is flat out (terrifying) hard work.

I have 6 or 7 major initiatives on the table for City Community Church and our family in 2012. They’re good ideas. Big dreams. Massive potential. But there’s a giant cavern between what resides in my head (and my heart) and the tangible creation process. A gap full of:

FEAR: Of failure. Of being misunderstood. Of finding out the dream was idealistic. Unrealistic. Maybe not that good. Of shame and embarrassment. (I even fear the responsibility that comes from being successful).

And….

LAZINESS: Let’s face it, realizing a dream isn’t usually impossible. It’s just really, really hard. Dreaming is fun (and cheap). Maybe I could just hang there? (Makes for some great blog posts).

Courage and lots and lots of hard work – that’s our bridge. So let’s get to it. The creating, not just the dreaming.

The painting only manifests if you actually pick up the brush.

What 3 action steps do you need to take to actually create what you’ve only been dreaming about?

We all need a good butt kicking from time to time.

We’re self-absorbed.

Lazy.

Dysfunctional.

Willfully ignorant.

Self-righteous.

Some days we just need to get over ourselves, there’s no doubt about it. A good Kanye West enema.

But there’s a paradoxical epidemic that seems to run tandem to our self-indulgence. In fact, I think their roots are intertwined. Far too many of us consistently size ourselves against those around us, those we’re connected to, those we admire, those the culture has elevated, (in general anyone with a pulse), and find we’re lacking.

Less than.

Constantly engaging an internal war of comparison. Constantly arguing with voices in our heads. Constantly battling wounds from the past. Constantly losing. Constantly manufacturing and believing our lies.

There’s no switch you can flip. No magic glasses that instantly right-size your perspective. No 3am infomercial with a secret $19.95 solution.

It takes courage. Good old-fashioned courage.

Courage to believe the truth. Courage to boldly live into it. Embracing who God created you to be will be the scariest adventure you ever undertake. It’s way safer to be who everyone else has decided that you are. And way more unfortunate.

Here’s a little jump start for your journey. A little insight into how the One who made you feels about you. Give way to His comparison. It’s the only one that matters:

“Oh yes, you shaped me first inside, then out;
you formed me in my mother’s womb.
I thank you, High God—you’re breathtaking!
Body and soul, I am marvelously made!
I worship in adoration—what a creation!
You know me inside and out,
you know every bone in my body;
You know exactly how I was made, bit by bit,
how I was sculpted from nothing into something.
Like an open book, you watched me grow from conception to birth;
all the stages of my life were spread out before you,
The days of my life all prepared
before I’d even lived one day.
Your thoughts—how rare, how beautiful!
God, I’ll never comprehend them!
I couldn’t even begin to count them—
any more than I could count the sand of the sea.”

Psalm 139:13-18 MSG

You can’t help others when you’re obsessed with yourself. You also can’t help others when you don’t feel you have anything of value to give. Don’t believe the lies.

You’re way more than “less than.”