Just Enjoying Things

If you follow me long enough, you'll pick up that I have a great love for comic books, particularly the art, and boxing. Some people will tell me they share a similar love, and as we talk, it becomes clear that while they are appreciators, they don't have quite the obsessive devotion I've had. For example, by sight alone, I can tell you who the artist is on almost any Marvel or DC comic from the late 60s through the late 90s. There is a very small percentage I couldn't identify because I even know guys who only illustrated a couple issues in their entire career.

It's very similar with boxing. I don't just know the big names or the contenders, but also the club fighters with records under .500. And not just in the key marquee weights, but across the weight classes. I'm interested in the history and development of comics and boxing. I read books and watch documentaries on both. They have been constants in my life, and I love them.

However, I rarely write about them as the focus of anything. You'll find me pulling lots of metaphors from boxing, but that's about it. I would say I'm probably at an expert level in both because when I listen to other people commentate on them on YouTube, it's clear to me that while they're not just casual fans, they lack my autistic devotion. I've come close on several occasions to doing shows and writing stuff on these topics, but decided to pull back.

My reason is that not everything needs to be content. Not everything needs to be monetized. Some things should just be enjoyed for what they are. Matter of fact, I would say most things should be.

I've listened to videos by YouTube creators who talk about how they made videos just to share their love for a hobby and how slowly their channels grew. They got supporters and followers who really loved their content. Then they started catering to their followers. They liked the money they were getting and started producing the content that converts people into subscribers willing to pay. Before long, what they were sharing out of love became a slog that actually caused them to lose interest in the thing they had loved so much.

I don't want that. And I already got a little taste of it with my rise to Z-list celebrity in Reformed Christian circles.

I never meant to become an influencer. I wrote about sexuality, fatherhood, physicality, localism, and family because those are things I care about. They're not niches to me. They're areas of interest. For many years, I wrote about them and no one cared very much. But over time, I became a better communicator and writer, and then It's Good to Be a Man took off and opened a whole lot of doors.

I went through some of those doors, and what I saw on the other side wasn't for me. Some of it was just a different path in life, being a talking head or commentator as a vocation. Some of it was disgusting, realizing that so many of these people don't practice what they preach. Matter of fact, what they preach is what will get the largest audience capture, which is why so many of them are always shifting from thing to thing.

But I also didn't like the relationship it created between me and people who followed me. The entitlement people think they have just because someone became a public person is crazy. They act like we're in some sort of formal relationship and they're owed this or that thing.

To be very clear, I don't write for you. It will be a cold day in hell before I cater to anyone to hang on to them as a subscriber, follower, or even church member. I write for two reasons. One, something has captured my attention and I think it's worth writing on. Two, I see a particular need in the particular people God has called me to serve, and I write to help them.

Now, I do care what those people want at some level, but I think pastors have to be a little like Henry Ford, who supposedly said that if he had asked his customers what they wanted, they would have said a faster horse, not a car. Pastors produce content, but not really to engage an audience in a way that entertains, captures their attention, and scratches their itch.

If you want to maintain a prophetic voice, meaning a voice that speaks with clarity on the issues of the day, there is a degree of independence you have to maintain as a writer and pastor. And that means having a general disregard for what people want you to say, do, or write.

Now, there are all sorts of caveats and nuances I could add to make that perfectly acceptable to a large mass of readers. But if you know how to read with charity, looking to understand what's being said as opposed to what's not being said, you know what I'm saying. So I'll leave it as it stands.

The other day, I was looking to download some YouTube videos while I had Wi-Fi at our new church building so I could watch them at home, where we still didn't have electricity. I was looking for some content on comic books and kept finding all these guys talking about the best comics to invest in.

I was thinking about how they don't understand comics. They're not investments for money. They're modern mythology. They're stories to captivate, inspire, comfort, and challenge.

The reason I have a deep love for comics is that they came to me at a time in my life when my parents kept moving us every year and I often didn't have friends. So I would just sit around and read comics. Matter of fact, some of the comics I was into are not good investments at all.

I really liked X-Factor because it had so many great artists on it. Walt Simonson, Joe Quesada, Larry Stroman, and many others. I also loved Marvel Comics Presents because I'm a huge Sam Kieth fan. And I loved that there were four little stories that gave me something different every time I got one.

Neither X-Factor nor Marvel Comics Presents have keys worth that much. I know because I have the full run of X-Factor, whose most valuable book is probably the first appearance of Apocalypse. And I almost have the full run of Marvel Comics Presents. Some of the most valuable books in that run are from the later issues when print runs dropped, and they're kind of crappy issues. The best issues are the ones by Barry Windsor-Smith and Sam Kieth.

Anyway, I love these not because of their potential resale value. I don't want to sell them. I just want to enjoy them. They represent a pathway back to my childhood. There's nostalgia, and then there's just the fact that I love good art and fun little stories.

I don't want to stop loving comics. I'm glad I can pick up John Byrne's recent return to X-Men and read it before I go to bed as a way to recover from a long, hard day.

Being a pastor who writes because he loves writing and has interests in different topics is so much better than being a heavily monetized influencer who has to shift to keep up with novelty. I am free. I am so free. And I won't put a price on that freedom because I know part of the cost is spoiling the things you love.

I’ve been working hard to teach my children the importance of having some things just for themselves and their friends, and of enjoying things just to enjoy them. And I’m trying to bring my own practice more in line with what I preach.

I don't want to make my life into a commodity to be sold to bored strangers who want their brains tickled for just a few seconds. What a prison that would be.