Some of you have known me long enough to know that one of my favorite theologians is Charles Schultz, the artist who gave us the wonderful Peanuts cartoons. In one of my favorite cartoons, Lucy comes storming into the room and demands that Linus change TV channels and then threatens him with her fist if he doesn’t.

“What makes you think you can walk right in here and take over?” asks Linus.

“These five fingers,” says Lucy. “Individually they are nothing, but when I curl them together like this into a single unit, they form a weapon that is terrible to behold.”

“Which channel do you want?” asks Linus.

After a moment, he turns away, looks at his own fingers and says, “Why can’t you guys get organized like that?”

There are all sorts of lessons in this exchange. There are the personal one…