Romans and I don't get along. (Still.)

Romans 9:1-3:
1 I am speaking the truth in Christ—I am not lying; my conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit— 2 that I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. 3 For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to the flesh.

The ESV study Bible says this about it:

Paul suffers from great anguish because his Jewish kinsmen are unsaved (see also 10:1). Indeed, if it were possible, Paul might almost choose to be accursed (to suffer God's punishment in hell) so that his fellow Jews would be saved (cf. Moses in Ex. 32:30–32). But he knows this would achieve nothing, for none but Christ could be any person's substitute to bear God's wrath.

So let me see if I have this right. Paul would sacrifice himself such that his fellow Jews would be saved but that would be futile because only Jesus can do that. Right? But being that he wrote that in Romans, which was written after Jesus' crucifixion, doesn't that mean... that... Jesus already did that? Or was what Jesus did not as good as what Paul would have done had he been the one sent to be the sacrifice?

You know what I mean?

Why, by human standards, does it seem through this passage and its ESV explanation that what Jesus did was incomplete? Why didn't Jesus sacrifice Himself so that all of us could be saved?

And if He did, why doesn't Paul believe it?

On not deciding how or when God will show you things...

I suppose I should blog here once in a while. I think about it all the time. I just don't know what to write. I'm in a period of reflection lately, far less studying, falling behind in all the sermons I used to keep up with. But this time is different than usual. Most of the time, when I go through periods of withdrawal from God and from passionate learning, it's some sort of rebellion. This time, it's not. This time, it's more of a wall I'm hitting but through circumstance as of late, I might actually get through it.

See, there is a boy who is quite fond of me. But the whole situation is unsettling because of a post I wrote here a while back about God loving me. I won't go back and read it because I don't want to affect my memory of it for the sake of this post, but the way I remember it, I wondered why I expect God to take it all away from me all the time. Why would a loving God, who wants to see me smile once in a while, always be threatening to take everything I love away?

And so there's this boy and no matter how hard it is to admit it, I adore him. And I do know that it's all in God's hands and God could very well take it all away from me at any moment, but I know we'll be ok, regardless of what happens. I know that I am a child of God first and everything else comes second, if at all.

But I also know that it is so hard for me to trust.

And I can't help but wonder how God feels about all this because I haven't ever smiled this way. I haven't ever had somebody love me this way. And all the other times in the recent past, I remember having to shut my God off before interacting and this time, I don't. He isn't a Christian, though, but does appreciate my perspective. He lets me talk about God and he actually listens and feeds off my passion. In the land where angry atheism reigns, it's really amazing to be able to talk openly with somebody I love about the God things. So for once, my interactions feed my faith rather than put it on the back burner.

But there is this trust thing. Does God really want me to be happy? Isn't that a frivolous thought? Don't we grow more in suffering? Don't we look to God more in pain?

Sometimes, rainclouds are necessary for life, but when they break in the dark of night and reveal the stars, we find God there also. And I do have to trust that God does want me to see Him in the stars and the things of beauty and the feelings of awe. And I have to trust that God might also want to teach me to love Him more through bonding me to another person to my utmost human ability. I have to trust that I am not certain that my life will be spent as some sort of modern day, first world martyr. It is not a certainty as much as anything else is.

Why would God take away everything I love to test my love for Him, when it's my sadness and brokenness that I cling to most?

When he hugs me, I look different. My eyes change and I see myself as he describes me. I don't see the sadness I thought was me. I never realized how much I'd come to rely on something that is actually supposed to be temporary as my baseline for existence.

I wasn't depressed. I mean, I may have had instances, sure, but on the whole, I was doing alright. But I had so little trust in God's love for me that the only good things I ever expected were the ones that never left my imagination. And while it seems terribly sad to never expect anything good in one's own reality, I am eternally grateful that my imagination never dulled. I thank God for that.

And so now, this man, this absolute figment of my imagination, who seems to love me so perfectly, becomes reality and in doing so, is teaching me to let go of my fear of God a little and embrace the kind mercy and love of God a little more.

Even though so many seem to take that for granted, it always feels like one of the hardest things for me to grasp.

On mixed metaphors, parallels and the anthropomorphism of God...

Everything happens for a reason. People always say that, but usually, they mean it in the future, as if at some point eventually, things will make sense and without this particular event, other important events might not transpire in its wake. But when I say it, I mean it now. It's like how we're taught in high school English classes how authors of books write deliberately, choosing names that are symbolic in some way, times of day that are pertinent to the mood of the story and so on.

I have no idea what will happen later and to chalk something current up as a lesson for later irks me. It's like that other saying people have, "It'll be ok." Man, I hate that expression. That's all it is, really- an expression. Because you have no idea what will happen and have absolutely no assurances that it actually will be ok.

I remember failing a test one time, and I knew I'd failed it just because I didn't even answer enough questions to pass had I gotten them all perfectly right. And I came out and told a friend of mine that I'd failed it and she answered, "Don't worry. It'll be ok. I'm sure you'll pass." And I looked at her and said, "No, I'm telling you I failed." And she just kept reassuring me. I didn't get it. Facts are facts. I failed. There was no reassurance in the form of a potential for passing to be had. The only reassurance was that maybe the prof would alter the grading scheme overall and give this test less weight or something like that.

But I digress.

Everything happens for a reason.

And I used to sit in traffic every day for anywhere between forty-five minutes and three hours and the whole time, I'd listen to sermons. Well, sometimes, I'd listen to music, but I tend to listen to the same songs repeatedly and after a while, it just gets irritating (don't ask me why I don't just change songs...), so I'd end up back on the sermons. They're always different. And I quickly became overloaded with thoughts and newly learned things which stirs up the passion in me.

But lately, I've been working from home and trying not to drive anywhere and when I do drive, it's been so long since I listened to music that hearing the same song over and over doesn't irk me. And so I've fallen ridiculously behind in the sermons, which kind of sucks because I do miss the passion that was stirred up every time an awesome pastor would tell it like it is and I'd have the heart to listen.

Today, I found myself shattered. But not the usual shatterings that I ramble on and on about on my other blog. This one was different. Over the course of a regular conversation with a boy I'd been talking to a bit more lately, he said one word, in context obviously, and that one word shot my guard up so fast that I felt it. It spooked me so quickly and abruptly and completely shut me down. One word.

And the word?

Picnic.

I won't get into the context or anything, but it had absolutely nothing to do with me anyway. It wasn't like I was going to a picnic or I was invited to one in any way or anything of that nature. It was independent of me, but the important thing was my reaction to it. That one word took away every ounce of trust I had had in an instant. Every ounce of idealistic hopefulness too.

But everything happens for a reason. I got into my car because that's what I do when I need a breather, and I threw on a sermon. It was a relatively old one, but I'm so behind that it's new to me. And so my favorite theology pastor started talking in the sixteen or however many speakers my car ridiculously has and the first thing he talked about was how he was asked to preach but he's terrified of public speaking. He wouldn't give in to the shackles of fear, he said. And so there he was, standing up there in front of a crowd and speaking out of my pajillion speakers a month and a half later too. About fear.

Timing is everything.

I have to paraphrase because the more I start and stop my ipod, the shorter the sermon gets and I'm far too lazy to turn on my desktop and wait a half hour for it to finish doing what it does to warm up. I hope I don't get it too wrong...

At one point, he said something like, "Life is a river but it doesn't flow toward God. It flows away from God. [...] And if you lift your paddles, you drift downstream." Apathy creates drifting. Complacency. And he said he doubted that there were many people who actively decided to harden their hearts to God, but that's this sort of process that happens when you just stop paddling and bit by bit, let go.

But I think I am one of those "not many". If I am drifting away, because I know I've stopped paddling, it's not passive for the most part. It's angry and deliberate.

He went on to ask why we'd go back to these inferior things when Jesus is better? What Jesus gives us trumps all. Why would we choose to pursue other things, even minor distractions, instead of Him?

And I think of my anger and that's what it's about. I know what God wants or I know the basic idea anyway, but I just don't believe it. And that's what I figured out today, after being shattered by fear. My fear and my shattering were the result of me drowning in mistrust.

God's word that shuts me down is heaven. I don't believe it. No, that's not entirely true. I don't believe in it for me. And I don't know what it is exactly, whether it's an actual place or just being with God or getting to see the full picture to finally understand why we had to endure all this, but somehow, whatever heaven is, I don't mind not finding out. I don't expect to get to heaven, and more accurately, I expect not to.

So why would I paddle so hard?

I love that God loves me now. I love that He loves me right now, in my not-so-perfect state, without me having to tidy up my person and my life to impress Him first. And I do hope that God will love me forever, but I guess I don't trust that He will. Maybe I'm one of those vessels He'll use to draw other people to Him without me actually knowing Him in the end. Or maybe it's something else that I'm unaware of, but what it comes down to is even if I believe that God picked me and beat me with a sledge hammer so that I'd finally see Him, I still don't believe that we're in this for the long haul.

And so I stop paddling. And I still love God, and I still see Him everywhere and in everything. But I'm not worth the effort.

What the boy's word meant to me was that I was an insignificant one of many. So I stopped paddling towards him too, but the parallels between the two situations made me more aware of how much I still project my feelings of being unlovable on God too.

It's so hard to pray for me still, both prayers from others and me praying for myself. It makes me so uncomfortable. I am ok with being a sort of tool for some sort of purpose without actually knowing God in the end, not because I don't want to know God, but because I expect Him not to want to know me, but if He could at least use me so I could serve some sort of benefit somehow, then that's ok.

And suddenly, God is every person and in particular, every man, who has ever crossed my path. Especially the men.

My God is the great God of the universe, and I don't give Him more credit than that.

But everything happens for a reason in this story. I've often wondered how books, especially ones on controversial subjects can have multiple authors. I co-authored a blog for a while and when they'd change some minor formatting things in my posts, it pissed me right off. And here I am, struggling to equally co-author this life with God, trying to piss Him off enough so He'll leave so I can run this show alone. I mean I'm the Princess of this story, right? Nevermind that I wasn't there when they handed out the names.

But at the same time, as the pastor said, "If you want cement to harden, just stop stirring," I know that even before I let God happen in my life, I did stop stirring many times and God stirred for me. When I gave up, somehow I kept going. When I was completely trapped, somehow I got set free. And now I know it was God. It was God stirring my cement when I was determined to let it harden.

But I still don't trust Him. I don't trust anybody. I love people with all my person, but they can't love me back, not even God.

And so I hold up my paddles, look up to God, shrug and say, "I just can't do it," and let go, drifting downstream until I become invisible...

... secretly hoping He'd keep stirring my cement anyway.

On failing the "stuff"...

I'm angry at God lately and I couldn't figure out why. I don't understand why He couldn't have laid out this faith thing in such a way that it fit every day life a little more easily. Instead, though random conversations with random people, I get to hear constant reminders about how absurd Christianity is and how ridiculously thoughtless its followers are.

Can you have God without the religion?

In theory, yes. But then if you believe in Jesus too, you get into the part where you ask yourself how it is that you know who Jesus is? You know Him through the Bible and the Bible preaches the structures and doctrines of religion.

I can't help but wonder if we're in a third era of the Bible. First, you had the sort of angry God full of rules part, then you had the redeemed by Christ part which negated most of the rules so people had to live differently than they were before under the rule of the angry God, and now we have this part. It's the post-Jesus, post-Bible era. It's the part where we've learned not only how not to live a life focused on appeasing the angry God, but also to take the new relationship with God through the sacrificing of Jesus for granted.

And I'm not sure that the way to fix that, the steps to improve this situation, are to revert to the practices of faith written in the Bible. We're not those people. We're not the ones who prioritize rules and decorum over God. Instead, we're the ones who seek constant freedom without realizing that it's from God. We're the ones who run away from God by excessively loving the gifts He's given us. We're the ones who actually love God already, but refuse to call it that.

As time progresses, I feel like I am losing my faith simply because I can't follow the rules. (And yes, "won't" substitutes nicely there, but I'm implying a stronger and more beligerant "won't" based on the fact that if I try, I doom myself to failure every time. Same goes for the rest of this paragraph.) I can't go to church. I can't read my Bible extensively every day. I don't look forward to the textbook slash ritual aspects of what to me is simply religion and not God.

Yes, we have to learn and yes, we need community. But what if our community is in a different form than the ones depicted in the Bible?

If nobody in my circles would set foot into a church by their own will, how is Jesus using the church to draw people to Him?

On the other hand, if we live in such a way that we can find way to integrate God into every thought and every action throughout the day, such that He becomes like breathing or any other unconscious function of the body, then we will end up presenting a picture to the world of a life with God that is actually doable and reasonable.

But maybe that's lazy. Right? Not going to church, not being bound by the rituals of religion, not forcing yourself to read chunks of the Bible every day, sitting at home listening to sermons in your pyjamas... It's laziness, right? It shows a lack of appreciation for God. But on the other hand, forcing yourself to do all those things shows a lack of appreciation for God's grace also. And really, if you believe in an almighty God of the universe who knows your thoughts before you think them and who chooses who has faith and when, then wouldn't said God be able to guide you to a rich knowledge without the religion? Couldn't He pepper our lives with situations that reveal to us our heart and the nature of God? Couldn't He move us in some way to get us to see His character?

If God chooses somebody in some sort of religious desert to have faith, then wouldn't said person have all the tools necessary to have faith and to know God? If the great God of the universe didn't account for the absence of resources when He chose this person, then He's not really a great God of the universe afterall.

So yeah, I am lazy. And I asked God to help me with that. But in the meantime, why shouldn't I be able to love God wholly and feel God with me? Why does it depend so heavily on the "stuff" and not the heart?

But then, if I read the Bible, Jesus basically says that- it is about the heart.

Then why do I feel like I'm constantly doing it wrong?

So I am angry at God. He created a situation wherein He'll love me unconditionally provided I do the "stuff". He explained what real love was in Luke ch 6 in the sermon on the mount, a pure and selfless love, and then made it all meaningless if I don't wedge myself into a pew every week for an hour of false love and false community torture.

Don't get me wrong- maybe your church is your community and you love the people there. That's great for you. But I don't feel at home in church, even in my favorite ones. It feels forced and contrived and entirely unnatural for me. And the fact that I've been made aware that the love often stops when you stop attending the church, that it doesn't transfer into real life, doesn't help. Sometimes, it does though. Sometimes, Christians do actually love people, regardless of circumstance. And in those situations, it reinforces in me that the church is apart from the building, that the community is my own and the knowledge of God can be shared rather than learned from a textbook all the time.

All I know is that if God knows who I am, then He'll know how I express my faith and when I need help with it. And He knows where my heart is. And He feels me struggling. And all I need is exactly that- to know that He's with me and to know that He knows me. If I can keep that, then I think I just may be alright.

On idealism and the value of a person...

Alternate title: On prayer... again...

When I pray, which lately has become a little more frequent, yet not as frequent as it used to be, I remember Moses praying in Exodus 32:11-14:

11 But Moses implored the LORD his God and said, “O LORD, why does your wrath burn hot against your people, whom you have brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? 12 Why should the Egyptians say, ‘With evil intent did he bring them out, to kill them in the mountains and to consume them from the face of the earth’? Turn from your burning anger and relent from this disaster against your people. 13 Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, to whom you swore by your own self, and said to them, ‘I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have promised I will give to your offspring, and they shall inherit it forever.’” 14 And the LORD relented from the disaster that he had spoken of bringing on his people.

He basically says, "if you kill the Israelites, everybody else will wonder what kind of God you are. They'll see you make promises you don't intend to keep and that your intentions are evil and you don't want that, right? Show them instead that you're merciful and gracious and love us. And that's how they'll see you."

And my reference for prayer, even if the usual suggestion is Jesus' teaching of the Lord's prayer later on.

If God answers prayers to glorify Himself, then the way we should pray should reflect that also. Instead of asking God to heal a sick child because she's suffering and in pain (which without a doubt God hates), I'll ask God to glorify Himself through His mercy and healing. I'll say to God, "Here's your chance to make yourself known. If you do this, they'll have no choice but to respond."

Of course, the majority of the time, I'm wrong. I'll ask God to do the impossible for somebody who doesn't believe, and God will do the impossible and I'll be filled with this sort of unmatchable awe and my friend, upon whom the results of my prayer are bestowed, rejects it all. Sure, they might be grateful for the healing or whatever else it was, but they still won't thank God for it. And so feeling a little humbled, I return to God and apologize for my arrogant certainty and my unrelenting idealism.

And other times, they do know it and God is glorified and it makes prayer all the more amazing and full.

But then there are the selfish things, which I don't understand how people can ask of God. "Please, God, give me this promotion." Or "Please God, let my kid win his softball game." I don't get those. At best, God will ignore you and teach you some more profound lesson you totally deserve to learn. At worst, He'll give you everything you want and you'll eventually stop looking to Him for things.

And I know part of it is my skewed perception, as one friend put it, that everything good is undeserved and the bad things are just my fate and so I never dared to ask for anything, except maybe a little bit of guidance and healing.

But lately, I've found myself asking for more. After getting a glimpse of what life would be like if I had a soulmate, I started to ask God for more. But I know He won't do it if it's just for me, just a selfish ask, and if by chance, He does, I don't want such a selfish prayer answered either. It's too risky. And then as I thought of reasons why God should listen to me on this one, I realized it might not be nearly as selfish a prayer as it felt originally. So instead, I found myself asking God differently: "Glorify Yourself in me too," I said. "Take this girl with a beat up, broken past who can't be loved and let her show the world what love can be like in spite of that brokenness. Because to let me live the end of this life too broken to love anymore... It just makes me a horrible example of Your mercy and grace and healing. Heal me while everybody's watching. Restore me so they can know how good You are."

Maybe it's still selfish. And maybe it's not meant to be. But I have to believe that God will heal me. I have to because it hurts too much otherwise.

So maybe it's selfish, but at the same time, I find myself more afraid of Him healing me and me losing this need to press into Him to get through the suffery bits, which is actually even more selfish because not only am I not glorifying God to those around me because everything relating to Him is in suffering, but also because I'm isolating myself and I'm not loving people the way I used to. It's not good for anybody.

On the other hand, if I pray for everybody and never pray for me, I'm not loving one of God's children properly. And I'm also not trusting that God loves me as much as anybody else either.

I just really hope that people don't look at my life for all its brokenness and use it as a reason to dissociate from God. I hope they don't say things like, "See? She believed in God and where did it get her?" Because you know, even if my life ends tomorrow, what it got me was God. I did get to feel loved for the first time in my life. And that's not nothing. That's everything. I just wish I could make it more obvious, even if I should know by now that even if Jesus Himself stood in front of some people, they'd still say He didn't exist.

On loving till it hates...

Listening to Tim Keller's sermon on marriage (I think it's called "Marriage: Part 3" or something), he talked about how when you put too much value into something, it will end up crushing you and ultimately falling apart. And even though this is Tim Keller's usual idolatry line of thinking, this time it was slightly different. He talked about parents who physically (or verbally, I guess too) abuse their kids. He said (paraphrased), "It's not that they hate their kids. It's that they love them too much." And he went on to describe how that works, and it made me wonder things.

My dad was a single dad with three kids- two boys, ages seven and three, and me, two. And over the years, I've come to empathize with his situation more and more, the more I realize how difficult it must have been to feed us, clothe us, look out for us, teach us, nurture us, and discipline us all completely and entirely alone. We lived in the country, away from everybody, away from all family. Apparently, they'd tried to get him to move to the city earlier, but he wouldn't. And he'd raise us likewise, without the ability (or with far too much pride) to ask for help.

I can't imagine being a single parent with three kids, let alone having two of them still in the toddler stage of life. And add to that a full time job in the city with an hour commute each way on a good day. I can't imagine.

So I empathize. I would lose it too. In an effort to get some sort of sense of control over my life, I would exert extreme control over my kids- the one aspect of life I can control. Kinda.

In the end, our childhood was like bootcamp, only the rules were unpredictable. And with the remnants of unlovableness (unlovability?) from my mom leaving us, this new set of reasons we were unlovable took shape and scarred all three of us for life. It doesn't matter how much I try to rationalize it away through empathy, the remnants are still there.

But then Tim Keller starts talking in a roundabout way about the effects that idolatry has on a parent who worships his kids and suddenly, my remnants got lighter on my shoulders.

It's not that he didn't love me. It's not that he didn't care. What if he loved me too much? What if all his value and self-worth were wrapped in us?

There came a time a few years ago when I cut him out of my life completely. Meanwhile, my brothers had done the same, but in very different ways. Suddenly, he didn't have us anymore, and I think that made him reevaluate things a little. It made him let go a little. And when I emerged from my isolation, it angered me how it felt like I was the only one at the dinner table who had remnants. It bothered me that nobody else seemed to care that the family dynamic had suddenly changed and everybody acted as though it'd always been this way, i.e. peaceful.

But if it was idolatry and the idolatry shifted to something else, then it is highly likely that over the span of time it took for a flash of insight, the entire dynamic could change. Suddenly, his value wouldn't be in us anymore. Suddenly, we weren't such massive failures regardless of what we did or did not accomplish. Suddenly, we could just be ourselves and that was enough.

Granted, he still goes through episodes where he is fiercely controlling, but all three of us seem to just back off when those situations arise, rather than cater to his need for control, whatever the root cause.

For a girl who has spent her entire life unlovable, Tim Keller's suggestion is highly controversial. It breaks the patterns I've fallen into almost at their source. I say "almost" because I know that even if my dad had been able to cope more solidly, I still would have remnants of being unlovable because my mom left before an age where I was able to reason or understand what was going on at a level beyond just, "She left because I wasn't lovable enough."

And just to neatly tie up within Christianity, this idea of the complete difference between the actual reasons somebody does something and the reasons we perceive from the point of view of the recipient of the actions is interesting because while the vast majority of the Bible (from my perspective anyway) is very vague and easily misinterpreted, Jesus' death isn't. He made it so clear what he was dying for. He made the reasons for most of his actions as depicted in the Bible so explicit. And I don't think there is any other time in the history of me where intentions, motivations and reasons for actions are so clearly understood. And I think that's why even if I'm unlovable, God is safe. God loves me and I know that because there is never a dichotomy in His love for me. There is never anything for me to interpret in His love for me. Sure, there are other things to interpret, like why things happen, why there's suffering, why the Bible is so ambiguous about so much... But there is just no question about His love for me.

And the thing about that concept is no matter how we receive it, no matter how difficult it is for us to grasp that inconceivable unconditional love, deep down I think we know we have all the time in the world to work towards it, to work towards figuring out how to accept it, how to deal with it.

What this Tim Keller sermon showed me is no matter how much somebody loves you, there will always be a barrier, a filter through which you receive that love. And whether the mis-reception or misunderstanding of that love is understandable as in the case of a tyrannical parent's over-love being misinterpreted for hate, or it's incomprehensible as in the case of a loving, forgiving, merciful creator God of the universe, the common denominator is me.

My shrink back in the day once said, "You have to stop expecting people to love you the way you want to be loved and accept the love they are able to give." That's not to say that in situations of abuse, one should feel adored or anything, just that maybe, even in the best of circumstances, we seek so fervently to be unlovable that no method of loving will ever break through those filters and barriers.

And then there's God, who loves us perfectly and how many of us spend our lives trying to prove Him wrong?

So here we are, surrounded by love, doing whatever we can, gathering endless bits of evidence, both consciously and not, to convince ourselves otherwise.

So what if it's not that they don't love us? What if it's that they love us too much? And if you look at the people in your life and scoff at that idea, maybe it's time to figure out the root of that cynicism.

Because if they do love us too much, wouldn't we react differently? And wouldn't we love them more? Wouldn't we try to bring them to the middle ground where loving us is safe and good and not a means of indication nor reflection of of their value?

And in the process, if God's love is perfect and without this brokenness that requires so much interpretation, wouldn't we start to view God differently?

What if?

What if we have it backwards? What if we need the misery and God's just accommodating that need? What if we are born divided from God, but not because God divides Himself from us but because when we acknowledge there is a God, suddenly, we become so inferior that we need some way to make up the difference? What if God is like, "Alright, fine, be bad, and when you'll feel like that badness divides you from Me and you start to feel guilty about the horrible things you do, I'll give you some rules to make you feel connected again. And when you rebel against those rules, I'll give you some sacrifice procedures to follow. And when you still can't keep up, then I'll do something of which you won't be able to deny the power and significance. And then maybe you might see that I love you no matter what, even if it seems like your goal in life is to be a failure."

And God will judge us on the last day, and we assume that'll be horrible because we're so terrible, even if He loves us no matter what.

What if rather than creating a God because there is an innate need to explain things, we've actually created suffering to make sense of this world? Or rather promoted it? What if we need the suffering? What if we need the pain and the separation from God to make sense of this world?

As an agnostic, it did make more sense. It made sense to believe there was possibly no God and we're just alone, abandoned by nothing to live on this planet for no reason. It makes more sense at a core level when your life has no meaning and no purpose and very little meaningful love and is riddled with abandonment.

We do crave the suffering. We crave mistakes and regret. We call it rebellion, and even if it has a name, we refuse to admit that that's what we're about.

We want to be in control, even if that control is the equivalent to a passenger grabbing the wheel of a car somebody else is driving. It's pointless and requires far more effort than letting the driver get on with it. But we have trust issues, so even if we're swerving dangerously, we've got the wheel and that's all that matters.

So what if God's all, "Ok... Seatbelts. Let's do seatbelts." And then we swerve more. "Alright, airbags." And still, we come dangerously close to death because of our rebellion and need for control. The next step? Automatic driving sensors- an autopilot. We'll be in the driver's seat and we'll have the illusion of driving, but we won't be in control at all. And being that we'll feel like we're in control, we won't give any credit to the actual driver. Maybe we have to crash every now and then to realize what we're doing, what it's costing us.

And what if all those rules and the procedures are meant to amplify that rather than actually "get good with God"? What if they're just the brick wall we're meant to hit before finally realizing the grace and mercy of God?

The other day when my car's wheel almost fell off, I praised God a thousand ways till Tuesday for what He did. I pulled over just in time. And my entire life built up to that moment. All the knowledge I had acquired about cars culminated into me pulling over at that moment. Other women I know wouldn't have stopped. And so yeah, it might just be my knowledge and a bit of luck, but naw. God is good. And I was so grateful. He saved my life. Or at least my finances. And a heap of time and trouble. And probably the same for whomever else became a casualty of my stray wheel.

Fast forward a few days, and the topic of prayer comes up in conversation. And a few people have told me it's a gift I have. Stuff happens when I pray. Incredible stuff. But it terrifies me because I know it's not me. I know that it can disappear any second because it's not mine. And I dread people becoming dependent on my prayer for that reason. It glorifies me and it's not me. It's God. And so in this conversation, I told the person it may be a gift, but I'm in denial because I don't like the responsibility it brings. It's like a dichotomy. God answers my prayers and then people come to me instead of to God. And I point them to God, always, because I know it's not me, but what happens if I lose it? Will they all lose God? Will they all start to wonder about their faith?

God answers prayers. I just think that He answers mine more explicitly because I believe He will. And that's not to say the people who ask me to pray don't believe, but they just believe more through me. It's more explicit when you tell somebody to do something and you let it go and it happens outside of your control.

It's why I praised God for my wheel. It was completely out of my control. It could have been gnarled up suspension parts. It could have been thousands of dollars' worth of repairs. It could have been deadly. It was outside of my control, and God gave me the tools to fix it. He gave me knowledge, a jack and a tire iron. Not to mention the physical capacity to jack up a car and remove a wheel. He gave me the inquisitiveness to have asked questions in the past that led me to assess that my suspension was indeed perfectly safe and fine. Nothing was in my control. In that moment, it was clear that my life was not in my own hands at all.

And that's what I believe my prayer does for other people. It separates them from the consequences. It separates them in such a way that they can't accidentally take credit for the things that happen. They can't brush it off as coincidence or as their own accomplishment.

And I have to admit, every time a prayer is explicitly answered, I love it. I love that this girl who hated even the idea of God is now not only heard but heard in such a way that deeply affects those around her. I look at my neglected prayer list and everything ends up done. It's the most bizarre thing ever. It's the only "to do" list I have that actually gets wiped clean. It really is a beautiful thing.

And it scares me. It really does. And so I don't pray. And I deny that I have a gift. Because I really don't. I'm not more special than anybody else. And one day, without a doubt, I'll feel like God's not listening. Well, actually, I'll feel it again. And again. And I could either start the processes to "get right with God", or I can stop praying for the wrong things and ask God to help me pray for the right things.

I can stop trying to drive the car and instead, use this opportunity to become more aware of my surroundings, all while pointing out the things I love as He drives us by all the people and places He built for me and show my gratitude and appreciation by letting Him take care of it all for me.

Because He loves it all too.

And somehow, I think He wishes we didn't need the suffering to understand that.

But it's merely speculation. God is God and even if I won't presume to know what any of it is all about, He gave me the drive to wonder. :D

On faith and unknown unknowns...

One thing my meanderings into Christianity has brought me is a new perspective of truth. Pastors seem to like the elephant analogy where a bunch of blindfolded people represent all the religions, and each religion representative touches a part of the elephant and has their own version of the truth of what the elephant looks like based on their tiny fragment of it and combined, they form the whole picture, the one which the self-proclaimed outsider claims he sees when they don't. And they like it because it shows that the outsider thinks they know more about truth than everybody else, and it illustrates the sort of arrogant self-righteousness of that particular truth claim.

But from the other side, none of the blindfolded people will ever think they're the blindfolded ones either. Yes, the atheist or agnostic or Oprah can make a truth claim and we can laugh about how they don't think it's a faith-based truth claim because they think they have no faith in anything but science, but where does that leave us?

The problem is the categories. When you categorize a Christian, you say things like, "All Christians think they know where they go when they die," or, "Christians think they know what is God's will." But I don't know those things. I don't know where I go when I die. As a Christian I think I'm supposed to believe it's somewhere with God? But only when He decides it's over? I don't know.

[Whoever does the supposing in the "Christians are supposed to" statements and whether they are of any worth is beyond my realm of knowledge also.]

I used to be firm in my belief that death was a grocery store of possibilities. Aisle six had the possibility that we reincarnate. Aisle seven, that we reincarnate irrespective of time. I could be Jim Morrison in my next lifetime. Or my last one. Another was that we're one collective soul, split up into fractions, each fraction left to fend for itself and only when we work as a collective will we ever end this suffering. Another still was that we are all God on holiday. God was all, "I want to know what it's like," so he split himself into the billions of people and animals and things and is experiencing every breath of everything simultaneously. And when we die, we will be one again.

There are endless possibilities really. And even if I like my Jesus, I don't presume to know how it ends. Jesus says there's a paradise of some sort, but God also says, "Never presume to understand what I mean or intend because your little pea brain really has no idea." Paraphrased, of course.

My point being that Christianity has taught me a lot about truth in that none of us really has any idea what's going on. Not even the atheists. Not even the agnostics (like me) who think they know they have no idea what's really going on.

I do like that Bush quote, even if it makes me a social outcast- the one about how there are known knowns, known unknowns and unknown unknowns. Because he's right. Known knowns are science. Known unknowns are the breaches of faith and unknown unknowns are... well... who knows? And in my humble opinion, none of us can make a full truth claim until we can actually see all the unknown unknowns.

In the meantime, we have partial truths that end where faith begins.

All of us.

And that's my truth claim. :D

On white-knuckles and trust issues...

God will be glorified in me regardless of how I live my life. Whether it be through His mercy or through His justice, my life will be a means through which He will show Himself.

And in the meantime, my failings as a Christian don't change that. Nor do they change the world. I am not that important and my failures and faults aren't surprises either. If I am a piece of a puzzle, I can't suddenly change shape. Even if I rip off the sticky outy bits or patch up the dents to either better myself or ruin myself, God will still find all the pieces, clean me up and make me fit.

And there's nothing I can do to change that.

And in the meantime, the things I do, the habits I fall into, the things I refuse to ask for help with, all affect my joy. They're all to my own detriment. They don't affect my relationship with God on His end. Because you know what? Even if I conquer all those things, all the things I perceive to be detrimental to my relationship with God, they are but the tip of the iceberg. And to believe that I will be able to somehow be good enough for God one day is to underestimate God's righteousness and undeservingly amplify my own.

Repent. I think that's what I'm having trouble with. Repenting without action is a meaningless admission of flaws. Repenting with action is behavior modification, which often leads to the replacing of one behavior with another, rather than absolving the need for the behavior to begin with. It also seems like a way to control your salvation. So where's the line between futile, self-important repentance and real repentance? Asking God for help? Asking God to remove whatever it is? Asking God to be more satisfying than the benefits of the behavior? Asking God to change your heart?

But what if that behavior pattern or lifestyle is the only facet of your life in which you have any sort of certainty at all? What if that is where you're comfortable and you don't want it to be removed? What if without it, life just doesn't seem worth it?

Obviously, there are a whole bunch of underlying issues there. But they're there regardless. This is the hand we've been dealt and in some ways, it's a bad one. In some ways, we need something to hold onto for fear that if we let go to merely hold onto God, we'll get dropped.

I'm the girl who, when my dad would carry me on his shoulders as a tiny child, would grip his hair so hard in an effort to keep myself from falling that he'd get a headache and lose handfuls of hair. Every time. God knows I can't let go. Not yet anyway. And I like to assume that He knows I would if I could and I wish I could.

And in the meantime, I guess all that's left is to pray that God might protect me and watch over me while I make my mistakes so that eventually, I might realize He's got a tighter grip on me than any grip my tiny white-knuckled fists could ever muster on their own.

It's true...

"[God] is not glorified in begrudging submission."
- Matt Chandler

[... in the Culture & Theology talk thingy he gave last week on homosexuality. You can watch it here. It's long. Lonnnng. But it has funny bits... And some moments where you're like, "Yes! Thank you for saying that in a room full of churchies..." And only a couple of moments that really make you cringe. And by "you", I mean "left-wing, ultra liberal me". But I digress.]

It's true though. If you make God seem like a chore, how does that glorify God at all? How does that stir people up to challenge themselves and their faith/spiritual beliefs?

Nobody looks at a dog owner as they squat down to load up a baggy with dog doo and says, "Man, I want a dog."

Well, unless they're being sarcastic.

So if our life starts to revolve around those particulars which cause us to mumble and grumble incessantly, not only do the people around us not see God through us, but over time, we start to detach from God as well. Why follow a God who is nothing but a pain in the ass? Why worship a God who does nothing but impose impossible rules on us? Why adore a God who makes us feel like a constant failure in everything we do and feel?

And I think when we [I] start asking questions of that genre, that's when we've [I've] forgotten what it's all about.

On setting yourself up for failure...

Lately, I'm having a lot of trouble with the rules and exclusions of Christianity.

We spend our entire lives setting rules for ourselves, rules that not only do we intend to keep, but that are actually easy to keep. Often, they're even rules that would better us in some way, or at the very least, make our current lives a little more tolerable.

Take, for instance, milk. If I eat dairy products, not only do I have symptoms of lactose intolerance, but they also give me migraines. And once a migraine is triggered, I risk months and months of a low level migraine in its wake. So, obviously, I have to set a rule in my life: no dairy. Based on the consequences and the alternatives available to me, one would think that "no dairy" wouldn't be all that difficult a rule to follow.

And then you realize how milk products are in everything- bread, cookies, um... that's all I can think of right now, mainly because I've had a fierce craving for cookies for like a week now. But I digress.

So it's not that easy to avoid milk products, but still, it's doable. I've spent every day since I was ten years old watching out for oats in everything, and that too is difficult, but I got used to it. Along with the wheat intolerance that came later. Then the citrus intolerance. And so on and so on.

It is absolutely possible to do cut stuff out entirely.

Vegans do it...

Today, I was hungry, so I ate cheese. And then I decided that cheese wasn't enough, so I went to the store to buy supper materials, came home and on the way, ruined my appetite with milk chocolate.

Oh, yes.

It was tasty.

And it got me wondering. God is supposedly all about knowing how we operate and working around that. He's also all about the rules that are really to our own benefit. They benefit our soul. Right?

But how can this God know us at all if He supposedly decides who is in or out based on a set of intangible rules?

I can't even go a day without eating some sort of dairy product, and in the grand scheme of things, that's a drop in the bucket.

So then Jesus comes and He says He fulfilled the Law, and yet, establishes a whole bunch of new laws. Or, rather, they're the same ones, but since He fulfilled the old ones, they're new again...ish? And then He dies on the cross so that our sins are washed away and we can be with God... but only if we try hard enough? Only if we go to church? And let's not forget, we have to recruit new members for the army (otherwise they'll be excluded).

Ah, the exclusion part. That's where my agnosticism kicks in. I still can't imagine a God who creates us this way, ultimately sending us straight to hell. I can't imagine that some of the things we do to help each other out in this unbelievably messed up world are things on the list that also lead to damnation.

"There are no levels of sin," they say. "Sin is sin."

So if a rapist rapes, if a victim aborts, if a friend lies to protect the victim, sin is sin. And God abhors sin.

If a priest molests a kid, if a man moves in with his girlfriend, if a woman can't forgive her mother for the horrible pain she has caused, if two people of the same gender intertwine souls, sin is sin and it's all the same.

There's just no way. There's no way that a) God would give us this "sense of justice" that supposedly reflects His own and then have us believe that "sin is sin" and b) God cannot be God if He doesn't know that we're terrible at rules.

In theory, b) is easy to rationalize away. He knows we suck at rules, so that's why He sent Jesus. Right? Except that Jesus left us with rules, so that's kind of a circular argument.

Unless...

If it really is "just Jesus", then it makes sense. Then we aren't expected to follow any rules, rather they're guidelines and Jesus, being full of empathy after having lived in this busted up world, knows that it's almost impossible to stick to them all the time.

I mean, really, the guy only lived till thirty. It's kind of like Marilyn Monroe. You wonder if she had survived a little longer, would she have aged well? Would she have stayed sexy like Sophia Loren? Or would she have ended up a washed up mess with no dignity? And sure, Jesus was God so He had that, but depending on your view of Him, don't you wonder if He could have made it till ninety without sinning? Of course, as a good Christian, you have to answer, "yes," right?

But my point is if Jesus came here and endured this and has empathy for our situation as a result, why is everybody going to hell? It's so bizarre and twisted. Why, if our God is so loving, is the default hell? I don't get it.

God created us this way. God knows who we are. God knows what we'll do before we do it. God loves us. So then clearly it only makes sense that ultimately He's going to ship us to hell by the bus load? And don't forget- if you don't believe that, you're bumped up to the first bus.

Fantastic.

So yeah, lately, I'm having a lot of trouble with the rules and exclusions of Christianity. :D

Old habits die hard...

Of course, after dissecting Genesis 29:15-35 as guided by Tim Keller's podcast, I had to read chapter 30.

I can't help but chuckle at how in verse 35 of chapter 29, Leah realizes that if she puts her focus on God instead of on her husband, this need to have children and be the perfect wife to please him dies, but a few verses later, she's having basically a battle of fertility with her sister again. And the first thing that came to mind when I read that was the whole "you can't lose your salvation" thing that the Protestants seem to bask in.

You might not lose your salvation once you had it, but how do you really know you ever have it?

If Tim Keller's interpretation of Gen 29 is accurate, I don't think Leah was lying or wrong when she thought she was devoted enough to God to stop seeking fulfillment in bearing children. I think she really meant it. But then times change, circumstances change and so on and she ended up back where she started. And even though the superficial reasoning was different, the root was the same. She was looking to be good enough by a standard outside God.

I like to think that over time, the reasons we turn from God, the things we look to to give us value become more and more profound and harder and harder to fully conquer. And the reason I like to think that is because if I'm right, then no behavior modification in the world will ever work, and not only that, but it will actually prevent us from getting to a point of metaphorical bushwhacking through what is really at the core of our being.

Just as when you stay on the main road all the time without deviating, focusing constantly on what's ahead and whatever bumps you're headed for in an effort to see them coming ahead of time to drive around them, you'll end up missing the scenery entirely, so is focusing on behavior rather than discovering the true nature of your heart.

And so if Leah means it when she puts her fourth baby in the hands of God and quickly finds herself back in the trap of idolatry (in this case a sort of idolatry of comparison), then we should probably expect similar cycles in our own lives. Like they say about getting over habits, you have to replace the habit with something. You can't just quit cold turkey. And if you replace your idolatry with God, then you probably stand a chance, but most of us can only hold onto God as a replacement for so long before we slip back into a habit in which we have more control- or more perceived control anyway.

I guess there's nothing we can do but do our best and learn from our falls, growing continuously, instead of spending our lives so actively trying to avoid everything. *shrugs*

I know, it's a crap ending to this post, but I've been sitting on it for two days now and couldn't think of any way to wrap it up. It just... ends. :D

"The Struggle for Love"... the [very] long version...

Alright. Continuing on with the sermon mentioned here, first I'll write what catches my ear upon my third listen and then I'll say stuff. So in this first part, even if they're not direct quotes, assume the thoughts and ideas are Tim Keller's, not mine. Unless I've altered something in a bad way, then that's not Tim Keller but my own misinterpretation of his words. ;)

Genesis 29:15-31...

One of the first things pointed out is how even though Jacob has begun a relationship with God, it is not an immediate remedy for his inner emptiness, rather it starts a process of transformation through mistakes and disasters. God is at work in his life and those around him anyway, even if he's not finished making mistakes and so on.

People with an inner emptiness give themselves to a hope- the idea of that "one true love".

So Tim Keller divides it into three sections:
1. What is behind that hope in the one true love?
2. There is a disillusionment that always follows.
3. What gives ultimate fulfillment is God.

First, Jacob arrives on the scene, fresh off of life failures, and Tim Keller asks, "How is he coping?" Well, he copes by making a deal that allows Laban to take advantage of him because he's so in love with Rachel. He copes by suddenly putting all his hopes in her. He works to get her and lives for her for seven years. He believes that if he could just have her her, finally something would be worth it, his life would be worth it and his mistakes would be resolved.

He quotes Ernest Becker's Denial of Death, wherein he describes how in ancient times, romantic love wasn't the goal, whereas now, we make up for a lack of inner spiritual fullness by trying to find that "one". We need to feel that our life matters and without God, we do it through the "romantic solution". We look for it in the love partner. "We want to be rid of our faults. We want to be rid of our feeling of nothingness. [...] We want redemption and nothing less."

When Jacob presents his deal to Laban, Laban sees that Jacob is vulnerable and he doesn't say yes. In verse 19, he answers, "It is better that I give her to you than that I should give her to any other man; stay with me." But he doesn't actually say yes. Jacob hears yes because he wants to hear yes.

And after Jacob confronts Laban about tricking him into marrying Leah, in verse 26, Laban says, "It is not so done in our country, to give the younger before the firstborn," which was exactly what Jacob did to Isaac when he tricked him into thinking he was his older brother, Esau, when Isaac was dying.

"He's doing to me exactly what I did to my father."

"Leah is the unwanted one, the one who everybody sees through, she's the ugly duckling, she's one who has been rejected, she's the one people have looked right through, she's the one who has been ignored for years and years and years." But maybe all that makes her Jacob's real soulmate- Leah fills her heart from the brokenness from all those years of rejection by being the perfect wife and mother. If she is successful in family things, she'll be somebody, have worth and be important. But in the end, this situation is actually worse than if she had never been married because she's looking to Jacob for this fulfillment and he's in the arms of the woman whose shadow she has been in for her entire life. "She's in hell."

She has four sons, the names of each carrying a particular meaning:
Reuben: see- God saw her affliction and now that she's had a son, maybe her husband will see her instead of looking past her.
Simeon: hear- God heard she was hated and after a second son, now maybe he'll listen to her.
Levi: attach- now, finally, will her husband love her and be attached to her.
Judah: Praise- she puts her hope on God and stops having children. The need is no longer there.

Tim Keller goes off on an aside for a bit, and in it, he explains how Christianity is the only religion where broken people reject God's grace constantly and God just sort of keeps after them anyway. God chooses them, whether they like it or not, and works through them. They don't earn His place in their life. And the result is all these broken "heroes" of the Bible (that so many people use to argue against Christianity because they're looking at their character rather than the work God does through their life).

"Morals won't get you into God's story but God has to come into your story."

[He also makes a second point about how even though the characters may be involved in some shady deals and practices, that doesn't imply that God nor the Bible condone that behavior or practice. If God works through broken people, those broken people are bound to do some broken stuff still.]

Back to the story-
Jacob goes to bed with "the one" and wakes up with Leah- "In all of life, through every event, though every aspect of your life there will always will be a ground note running, a ground note of cosmic disappointment."

"Leah represents something.[...] In the morning, it's always Leah. You go to bed with Rachel and in the morning, it'll always, always be Leah."

And then he quotes CS Lewis:

Most people, if they had really learned to look into their own hearts, would know that they do want, and want acutely, something that cannot be had in this world. There are all sorts of things in this world that offer to give it to you, but they never quite keep their promise. The longings which arise in us when we first fall in love, or first think of some foreign country, or first take up some subject that excites us, are longings which no marriage, no travel, no learning, can really satisfy. I am not now speaking of what would be ordinarily called unsuccessful marriages, or holidays, or learned careers. I am speaking of the best possible ones. There was something we grasped at, in that first moment of longing, which just fades away in the reality. I think everyone knows what I mean. The wife may be a good wife, and the hotels and scenery may have been excellent, and chemistry may be a very interesting job: but something has evaded us.

"In the morning, it's always Leah."

Without realizing that, we look to fill that longing on our heart with new things, different things, better things, instead of understanding that no matter which things we choose, that fulfillment just won't come with them.

There is something in your heart that you want that nothing of this world will satisfy. The "one true love" cannot be any human being. If you put [whatever you put your hope into] in the place of God you will have absolutely nothing.

Leah calls out to God at the same time as she's looking to her husband and family as her savior. The moment she realizes that and takes the deepest passionate desires of her heart away from her husband and puts them on the Lord, she becomes free.

Judah is born and "he is the one through whom the King, the scepter, will come." God chooses the ugly woman, the one nobody wanted, the one who is unloved and unlovely and says, "You're going to be the mother of Jesus."

"When the Lord saw that Leah was not loved, He loved her."


Now my words. I'll break it into sections.

A) Emptiness.
B) He heard yes.
C) Laban did what Jacob did to Isaac.
D) Leah is unwanted, unloved and invisible.
E) The aside.
F) In the morning, it's always Leah.
G) Leah cries out for the wrong things, and God leads her to Himself anyway.
I) And He loves her.

A) Emptiness.
I think that we all have that. There's a longing we feel deep in our soul that can't be fulfilled by earthly things. I blogged about that a little already, in the context of that sort of longing for home, after reading Tim Keller's Prodigal God. But along with that feeling of home is also this deep-rooted desire to feel like we have worth. And that's part of what made me struggle so much with this sermon- I don't feel I have worth. And I know that money, success and family won't give it to me, but I haven't yet learned that relationships won't. Or, not even relationships but the simple validation of men. That is my most obvious emptiness. I still do feel as though if I found a guy who gets me, life would be better. Life would be more worth living. And I would have value. I would be important enough to somebody that my life would mean something.

And how am I coping with that?

Well, now's probably not the best time to ask because I don't feel I'm at my worst at the moment so I might end up saying something ridiculously cocky that I'll regret later. But for now, let's just say I'm actually working on it. I'm working on first, dissociating my value from men, and second, actually finding value in God. I know it's there, but I have yet to fully believe it.

But on a bad day? I cope with it through so-called harmless flirtation and the more harmful occasional escalation to proposition. Thank God my baggage and fears have kept me from doing anything too stupid lately though. ;)

B) He heard yes.
Jacob heard Laban say yes because he wanted to hear yes. Tim Keller jokingly asks the people listening if they've ever dealt with that. My last "relationship" was plagued by question answers. I would ask him something that required an opinion, and he would answer in a question.
me: Are you excited about coming to visit?
him: Why wouldn't I be?
And I did exactly what Jacob did- I heard the yes I wanted to hear. Every time. And I put so much hope into him that even though it was obvious that he wasn't into it, I just clung onto my own obliviousness just so I wouldn't have to face the disappointment that was inevitable.

No more question answers.

C) Laban did what Jacob did to Isaac.
This one bothered me. Jacob was so quick to quit fighting Laban on what he'd done simply because he seems to have felt he deserved the treatment he got. I'm not a revengey kind of girl. I'd rather people grow as a result of becoming aware of the pain they've caused and the betrayals and things than to learn it via a massive slap in the face like this one. But maybe that's just my empathy talking. No matter how much ill somebody may have caused me, I don't really wish the same on them. Justice, yes, but not sheer brutality. But maybe some people only learn the hard way. Maybe some people only realize what stuff feels like if it happens to them.

Or maybe, what bothers me about this section is that Jacob just seems to have no sense of justice at all. What he did to his dad, and then what he lets Laban get away with... Even if I might have made mistakes in my past, that doesn't forgive other people wronging me in the future. You can't create karma. You can't use a karma-type system to take advantage of people who have wronged others in the past. You know what I mean? I understand why Jacob relented. But I don't understand Laban's moral standing.

D) Leah is unwanted, unloved and invisible.
When Tim Keller talked about Leah, she became the first woman in the Bible to whom I really related. I never went through a long-endured phase of gawky awkwardness or anything, but a lifetime of worthlessness has left me with a certain amount of "ugly duckling syndrome" that I can't seem to shake. It's like I know I'm alright-looking and I should appreciate that, but I really can't feel it. And it's not just on the outside either. My closest friends tell me what makes me special, and on a superficial level, I understand, but deep down, I don't feel it at all. Deep down, the core of me is self-loathing, broken and really doesn't see all that much good in my person- inside or outside.

And here's Leah feeling pretty well the same way I do. And even though the people around her made her into nothing, God made her something.

E) The aside.
I liked that aside because I know how often people around here bring up Sodom and Gomorrah as examples of the Bible supposedly condoning terrible things. Just because the Bible's characters find themselves in immoral situations, it doesn't mean the Bible is condoning the behaviors or lifestyles.

F) In the morning, it's always Leah.
No matter what earthly things we put our hope in, we will always be left unfulfilled. And even though on paper, that's really easy to grasp, in reality, we're constantly looking for that fulfillment from so many things in our every day existence. I thought it was interesting that C.S. Lewis used travel in his example. I know quite a few people who put their hope in travel. It's that sense of awe they get that fulfills them temporarily. It must stir up their soul in a way that nothing else can- except worship, I guess. But the travelers I know aren't likely to drop their bags and throw their hands up anytime soon.

On the other hand, somehow, being in awe of God's creation and letting it stir your soul, even if you don't attribute it to God, seems a healthier outlet of idolatry than seeking out validation from men. They're probably equal in some way. I mean, technically, they're both worship of created things. But the awe seems to stir the soul in a more positive and powerful way than the validation does. Or maybe that's just my own lack of fulfillment and failing idols talking.

G) Leah cries out for the wrong things, and God leads her to Himself anyway.
I like this part. It's like God's just waiting for her. And then finally, she comes to Him and they live happily ever after and she doesn't have to try so hard to feel worthwhile. A fairy tale ending, I say.

I'm still working on mine. And frankly, still working on all this stuff too.

Processing. Progressing. Bit by bit.

Thank God for His patience.

I) And He loves her.
And when the Lord saw that she was not loved, He loved her. He loves her. And maybe one day, I'll be able to replace "her" with "me" and actually believe it.

Something to hope for?

He doesn't say, "Yes". He doesn't say, "Agreed."

I'm listening to Tim Keller's podcast called "The Struggle for Love" (free on itunes) for the second time because I don't get it. It's based on Genesis ch 29: 15-36.

I mean, I understand it, but there's so much to it that I'm still working on it.

I guess I'll blog more when I've figured it out after a few more listens.

Too many layers and all of them are me.

Just because I like it...

Unless the Lord builds the house,
those who build it labor in vain.
Unless the Lord watches over the city,
the watchman stays awake in vain.
It is in vain that you rise up early
and go late to rest,
eating the bread of anxious toil;
for he gives to his beloved sleep.

(Psalm 127:1-2)

On God and suffering...

My usual answer when people ask, "Why does God allow suffering?" is that God doesn't allow it, but we allow it. We watch each other suffer, inflict suffering on each other and just fall into selfishness that's strong enough to overpower any shred of empathy we might possess.

But what if I'm wrong? Maybe that's only half the answer.

What if God allows suffering as a great act of mercy?

When my brother asked me today why my God allows suffering, I answered, "Because if God didn't allow suffering, we'd all be dead."

We always think of it from the receiving perspective, how we wish we would no longer suffer and how we wish those we feel for would no longer suffer, but what about us on the giving end? Have you really never made anybody suffer?

I doubt that. This post alone might cause suffering in some unsuspecting passer-by. Aside from the deliberate and accidental hurts I have caused in those around me over my lifetime, no doubt I've caused suffering in other ways too. Maybe I'm boring. Maybe I took an opportunity away from somebody who really needed it. Maybe my carbon footprint or my use of water and sanitation resources adversely affected people.

Or maybe, just by being me, I've caused suffering in a great multitude I'm not aware of.

In that sense, God allowing suffering is a great mercy. If suffering is abolished, I will be too. And somehow, I really doubt anybody else would be exempt either.

Your God is too easy...

At the risk of sounding somewhat like Jared Wilson's book title, which is not my intention, especially since I haven't read the book, five words have been running through my head the past little while:

Your God is too easy.

It started out with somebody pointing out to me that my relationship with God shouldn't be so hard, that maybe I don't have enough faith in a God who loves me just as I am, and it ate at me all week.

My God is too easy, but in different ways than that. I don't tone God down to ease my discomforts. I don't say, "Why would God not want me to do this if He and I both know it would help me in this or that way?" I don't say, "I know that having a carefully controlled fling would help me get over some of the traumas of my past, and I've prayed on it and God is ok with it." No. Just no.

My God is work. And He's not work as in that I have to serve and stop swearing and so on and so on. Nor is He work because I have to be somebody I'm not. He's work because His righteousness points out my crap. And I know God loves me now and He loved me yesterday too, rather than waiting for me to become a better person first and then reciprocating with affection. No, God loves me even when I'm all busted up and continue in my mistakes, but that's just it- now I have mistakes to contend with.

No matter what God you create for yourself, there are things in the Bible that just click with us on a spiritual level even if we don't agree with them. What I mean is, when God says sex is the intertwining of souls, we can scoff and point out our one night stands, but deep down, we know it's true. We know that those people we slept with are somehow apart from other people in our lives. We know it because no matter how much we deny it, we feel it.

So I can say that bit of the Bible was misinterpreted, mistranslated or was meant for people of a different time, but I'll feel the truth. And the difference between an easy God and a God who works on you is the reaction you have to that truth.

What is it?
Is it just Christian guilt?
Or is the negative reaction you have there because you know it all means something more and you're taking that meaning for granted?

If I have my fling, I won't feel Christian guilt. I won't come home and shower till the hot water heater is empty in an effort to feel clean again. There really is no difference in me right now versus me right after sleeping with somebody I don't care about. We're the same person. If I sleep with somebody next Thursday, that person, the one who would sleep with somebody next Thursday, is also me now. Do you know what I mean?

Behaviors don't just happen. They grow out of our own deep-seeded ideologies. We can't feel guilty for those. Instead, that is where we're supposed to lean on God to change our heart and make it so He is enough.

It almost makes me believe that we shouldn't do any behavior modification at all until we believe in it and really understand the root of the behavior. Why? Because there's this idea in society today that if you go to the gym for twenty-one days straight, it will become a habit. It will become something that is just natural to your day. And if you apply that to bad behaviors, then you really could program yourself to not do certain things, and when a new undesirable behavior takes the old behavior's place, you can conquer that too. And the end result is that you live an entire lifetime skipping from one behavior to the next without ever coming to the conclusion that these behaviors are masking a giant idol in your life.

If I say that having a fling is bad and it's a behavior I want to avoid, then I'll do whatever is in my power to avoid it. And I might mess up sometimes and be all, "Oh, well I did the behavior. Bad me." And I'll dive back into programmed abstinence and resort to gardening, watching movies, staying busy or buying things to not think about it or worse yet, remove myself from the presence of men entirely. Just being in a room with one puts me at risk, right? Temptation... Can't risk temptation...

I hate that. I'm the kind of girl who wants to be in the room with temptation and fail nine hundred and ninety-nine times until one day, that thousandth time, I realize what I'm doing and walk away. Walk towards God instead. I'd rather that than walk away the first time and be all proud of myself for being so strong. I'd rather get crushed if that crushing brings me closer to God.

So no, I'm not a behavior modification girl and that is why my God is difficult. I want God to get at the roots of my behaviors. I want God to win. But at the same time, I know my inner dialog is incredibly combative. I know I am going to mess up. I know I'm saying, "God guide me," on one side and, "God, don't watch this part," on the other. I know I'm asking, "God help me overcome this," all while demanding He not touch it because I'm not ready yet.

I'm not abstaining from sex because it's in the rule book. I'm actually not abstaining at all. I'm not having sex, but not because I don't want to and not because I think God's plan is perfect. I'm not having sex because I'm far too busted up for it right now. I can't let anybody close to me because of what happened. But I want to. I want to be able to again. And God is supposed to heal me, not some guy who I overcome mistrust around for a few hours. And God knows I'm fighting, both for Him to win and for Him to lose, but He knows I'm fighting. He knows what He's asking of me is not just about this behavior today or tomorrow or next week or whenever. He knows it's a lifetime of crap that I have to sort through just to overcome this one thing.

My God isn't easy. My God works me hard. And I wouldn't have it any other way because life as I've lived it has never been easy, and if God guides me into some hard patches that help me grow in a positive way instead of the way the hard patches I've brought upon myself have broken me down, then why would I give that up?

I'd rather God kick my ass so I would never consider giving this body, my body, the body entrusted to me, to a stranger who doesn't care one way or the other as even a plausible option, let alone one that I expect to bring some sort of healing.

But I'm not there yet, so the ass-kicking continues.

Bring it on... I guess. :D

Ifs and buts...

(Scribbles in traffic while listening to more Tim Keller sermons...)

How would you finish this sentence:

God, I will obey if...

I never thought of myself as one of those "God indebtors", but I realized as I sat there in traffic for two hours that totally am.

God, I will refrain from casual sex/premarital sex if you promise me that there is an amazing husband somewhere in the world for me.

And while you're promising me that, do you mind maybe giving me a sign to tide me over for a while?

It's a results thing. If I go out and do things, I get instant results. They might not be good results, definitely aren't the best results, but they're predictable in that there will be results.

I could go out right now and find a guy to sleep with and let him flatter me as he believes he's doing all the work to seduce me, all while letting him believe that he's in control just so the flattery gets painted on a little thicker such that it might last longer... I'll get results. Without a doubt. I'll feel (temporarily) satisfied, (temporarily) confident and (temporarily) slightly more loved than I was before.

But by saying, "If I sleep with a guy to feel good now, while rejecting God's idea of sex, then I don't trust God and don't trust that His idea of sex is what's best for me," I'm essentially saying the same thing as, "God, I will refrain from casual sex/premarital sex if you promise me that there is an amazing husband somewhere in the world for me," except wording it like the former separates me from God and the latter tells it like it really is. What I mean is, in the first statement, while I do admit to a lack of trust in God, I don't admit what it would take for me to achieve it. And that's the real problem here.

It's one thing to acknowledge a shortcoming and it's another entirely to question the real motivation behind it.

I don't think there's a husband in the cards for me. At this point, I don't even see a relationship happening. But between growing up with sex being a nothing thing and it being all around me all the time and me swearing off relationships for the long term, the only thing left is casual sex. Flings. Abstinence is a four letter word. And it really is. I mean, I see God's point, but I also see where I am and my state of affairs is not good. I'm not the marrying type. Nor am I the abstaining type. I'm... the results type.

Matthew ch 7:
21 "Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. 22 On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ 23 And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’"

Tim Keller says being a Christian involves a gradual and inevitable change. And as in the passage above, we can go around helping others with their gradual and inevitable change, helping them to grow towards Christ, helping them to understand God and understand what this Christian thing is all about, but at the end of the day, we're merely vessels for others' change if we don't see that change occurring in our own lives.

Is it? Is Christianity changing your life? Or are you the same person you were a month ago? Or five years ago?

My growth comes and goes. I grow constantly. I strive for it and try really hard never to stay stagnant. But my growth in faith particularly isn't constant. I suppose any growth is a battle, but my faith is more of a battle than most other bits of learning and growing I experience, probably partly because it's the newest and therefore, I'm not as accustomed to incorporating faith-growing into my every day life. But at the same time, whenever I read pastors' tweets about how people in the Bible belt forget Jesus entirely for weeks and months at a time, even if they do go to church every Sunday, and I know that Jesus is a part of my every day, but it's a lazier part. It's kind of a heart part. You know? Instead of putting in the hours of Bible study I used to when I first started, along with hours and hours of sermon listening, I'm more likely to just listen to sermons and work on them for a while. They're like therapy, only with God and with more important purposes. I suppose if you're in a state of coasting, then yeah, you have to dive further into the texts, probably to find more layers of meaning to elevate your spiritual senses, but I'm not coasting. I'm rebuilding. And while I should be working on my textbook Jesus a little more than I am, I find myself working on the grace part of Jesus and the prayer part and most of all, the guidance part. I'm working on my listening.

I think my entire life, I've been guided, either by the Holy Spirit I misunderstand (still) or by my gut, but either way, I never listened and I got myself into terrible situations where the casualty was always me. And so I'm learning to listen. But it's hard to listen for something when you don't know what it's supposed to sound like. And at the same time, with the pull of the familiar, the comfortable, the physical and the easy, it's hard to stick with the unfamiliar, the uncomfortable and the obscure.

Sex is easy. Abstinence is uncomfortable. And it's easy to say that through abstinence would come the most growth, but I don't think that's true either. For me, through suffering comes the most growth, and if I abuse sex, it's bound to create suffering. That's not to validate my actions or anything, but just to point out that it's a difficult situation and not only that, but if I haven't figured it out yet and I mess up, I'm still growing. Growth is inevitable for me. I just have to make sure it's in the right direction in the end. Or, really, I have to make sure that I pray that God makes sure my growth is in the right direction in the end. I have to make sure to pray for God to know me. I think that'd be the worst thing- for me to be face to face with Jesus and Him tell me, "I never knew you." It's like I'd rather be judged and go to hell but have a little Jesus in my heart to get me through it than for me to get up there and be told I don't know Him at all. You know?

So I'm working on listening. And hopefully, out of that listening will come the trust with no strings attached. But I'm skeptical- just about the husband thing. I think that's my downfall, really. I just don't see how it'll work out for me, but that's the thing- I'm ok with not knowing how anything else in my life will work out, and I trust God for most of everything else (gotta leave room for future realizations), but for some reason, the husband thing is where I have a hard time letting go of the control.

I guess with healing, that might come. As the fear of ending up with another sociopath diminishes, maybe I won't feel such a strong pull to control that part of my path.

Maybe.

On trust and arrogance...

Something Tim Keller said in a sermon (from a while ago) bothered me lately. Those of us who are naively blown away by the horrible nature of those around us are arrogant in that not only do we underestimate the horrible nature of humans, but we somehow also manage to count ourselves so exempt from it that that kind of horribleness is actually surprising.

If it is so hard for us to understand the completeness of God's love for us, why is it so easy to love certain people so naively? And if it's so hard for us to trust God, the same God who created us and knows us better than we know ourselves, why are we so quick to trust the broken people in our lives who are the least deserving of trust?

But then aren't we supposed to? Doesn't everybody deserve to be loved? Or do we not deserve anything at all? If human nature is really that horrible, how are we supposed to love each other? If we don't have an ounce of naivety or a glimmer of faith in humanity, where do we find ourselves within a community? Or within any relationship?

To fully understand the depravity of the human condition, wouldn't we become the world's greatest cynics?

So again, in my mind, there's a dichotomy that comes with the extremes. People are a certain way and as a result of that, the preachers of that particular society preach the opposite way, partly assuming nobody will ever get to the other side. We're supposed to try and end up somewhere in the middle, where we're ideally supposed to land, I guess. But I'm all or nothing girl and if you point me in a direction, I'll tell you what is at the end of that path.

It's like when I hear people from the south pleading for more sexual freedom. They believe that acquiring certain freedoms they don't have yet will solve all the ills of their society. But here in Quebec, we are the exact result of those freedoms acquired and we've got a whole new set of issues to face. Nobody expects to "get there from here" when they start their fight. Nobody who sees the greener grass on the other side of the fence expects to somehow end up living there.

But isn't that human nature- that desire for things to be better even though we have no idea what that actually means?

That's how I fit in community, whenever I actually do. I see the potential. I see the bags and boundaries people have and I hope that one day, they'll break through them and release their better, unhindered self. But then, they kind of prove Tim Keller's theory and make me feel utterly naive followed by the inevitable arrogance that comes as a result of the surprise that a human could turn away from growth and turn towards horrible, hurtful, deceitful things instead.

But if I think I'm a good person, or at least I think my intentions are generally good, then how is it wrong to hold other people to a standard of goodness that is me? Obviously, I'm not perfect and I have terrible parts of my person too, but if I know how hard I try to do things right, to be honest and to live with empathy, then why is it arrogant to assume I'm not the only one who achieves this particular standard, however high or low that is? That doesn't mean I think I'm all good- I'm still broken and selfish, but I don't think I could ever do to others what some have done to me, especially the ones whose intentions were terrible. You know what I mean?

I think at our most cynical points in life, we do take reassurance in a couple or a few of the people around us, as if just knowing they exist makes the world, and humanity in particular, less horrible. If we really did fully grasp the reality that is human brokenness, I'm not sure we'd get out of bed in the morning. I don't think we'd survive without the glimmer of hope we get from acts of kindness and unconditional love.

Sure, God is supposed to be enough, but if He is enough and this world is really that horrible, why would we stay here? Why would we endure this?

We are created in God's image so why would it be so terrible to look for godly traits in each other? Or worse, to expect them?

As bad as it sounds, I guess I'm lucky that my brokenness doesn't usually affect other people as much as it could. Most of my brokenness is self-destructive rather than projected. And while for me, there's no real difference there- brokenness is brokenness- I'm still glad that the emotional casualties of my life have been at the very least decreasing in number the more I grow.

That's all we can do, right? Grow? Grow in trust for God. Grow in love for God. Grow in love for each other?

And maybe I misunderstood Tim Keller's point. Maybe he didn't mean the worst of the worst of human beings catching the naive among us off guard, but the more simple every day broken people. Maybe he doesn't expect us to not be surprised when a best friend assaults us or a loved one turns out to be a complete sociopathic fraud. Maybe he just means the arguments and the misunderstandings and the tiny, almost insignificant betrayals.

Because I can't imagine being the kind of person who gets suddenly physically mauled by somebody close or gets a middle of the night phone call that is an absolute rape of the soul and isn't surprised. That kind of person, to me, is just broken beyond repair.

To understand the brokenness is one thing, but to expect the absolute worst all the time is something entirely different. And I just don't think that's the world perspective with which God wants us to live. So I must have misunderstood TK.

On Interpretation...

A little light reading before going to sleep...

Romans 14:
1 As for the one who is weak in faith, welcome him, but not to quarrel over opinions. 2 One person believes he may eat anything, while the weak person eats only vegetables. 3 Let not the one who eats despise the one who abstains, and let not the one who abstains pass judgment on the one who eats, for God has welcomed him. 4 Who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another? It is before his own master that he stands or falls. And he will be upheld, for the Lord is able to make him stand.

I thought I understood this passage. It seems clear enough, right? He starts out by telling the recipients of the letter to welcome the weak. And then he explains how it goes both ways, how each side shouldn't judge the other, and assuming that the recipients are not the weak ones, verse four says, "Who are you...?" so I read that as telling the strong not to judge the weak because only God judges. Only God decides who is righteous and who isn't, if any of us are at all.

And then Romans 14 goes on to say:

5 One person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. 6 The one who observes the day, observes it in honor of the Lord. The one who eats, eats in honor of the Lord, since he gives thanks to God, while the one who abstains, abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God. 7 For none of us lives to himself, and none of us dies to himself. 8 For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord's. 9 For to this end Christ died and lived again, that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living.

So I took that as saying whatever we do, whether we do stuff or don't do stuff, whatever our reasons, as long as our heart is for God and as long as we live to honor God, then our lives are for God. Because Christ died for how our actions fail. Christ died because we never get the actions right. Christ died so having a heart for the Lord would be enough. He died so it is enough.

Like I said, I thought I understood the passage. It seemed pretty clear. But since I was too lazy to hold up my 4,000 page ESV study bible and my new toy is lighter, I decided to read it online, where the study part is more accessible in the right side bar... so I couldn't help but read it, even though I thought I understood the passage.

This explanation caught my eye:

"Rom. 14:4 This verse is likely directed to the weak. It is not their place as fellow servants to pass judgment on the strong. The strong stand or fall before God, and they will stand righteous before God on the last day because God will give them grace to keep them from falling away."

After reading it the way I did, the way I explained above, and then reading that... it just burned me up.

What happened to Matthew 5:5's “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth"? Or Colossians 3:12:

12 Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, 13 bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.

In that Romans passage above, I thought the strong and weak were just being contrasted. Some need more rules than others to feel like they know God. Some don't. But the idea is that both are trying to be good with God in their own way.

"Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind."

That's what bothers me about pastors relying on commentaries and analysis outside of their own grasp of the Bible: it seems possible that all this Bible study could be similar to a chain of laboratory research that has detrimental flaws in some of the steps. That's not to say commentaries aren't important. No, from what I know, they save a lot of time and provide important insight to better informed Christians like the sermons do for lesser informed Christians like me. They are important.

But the Bible is the Living Word. It's the Word of God. If you're a Christian, you supposedly believe that, because if you don't, then you don't believe what John said, and if you don't believe what John said, then how do you believe the rest of the Bible is true and if you don't believe the rest of the Bible is true, how do you believe ANY of the Bible is true?

And John said in chapter 1:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

Then again, maybe I've misread and misunderstood that too.

Probably.

But God loves us. God loves us individually and wholly. God wants a relationship with us. God wants us to worship Him and what that means is God wants us to live in the wholeness and spiritual completeness that is only in Him which, when we really begin to understand what that means, we have no choice but to talk about His awesomeness to those around us. Right? In a nutshell?

And so, the Word is God. And here is the Word communicating to us. Like, today, a random Tuesday (my favorite of the random days), God suggested I read before bed. Read what? Romans 14. So I did. I read it with an open heart and open mind, ready for God to say something to my soul. And He did. He provided me with a passage that says, "Live for Me. That's all I want. Don't worry about the p's and q's about it. Just Me. I'm the only thing that matters." And if you read this blog, or even my other blog sometimes, you'll know that I feel like a crap Christian. I don't fit in. And God pulled me aside before I went to sleep tonight, on a night when I read an email from a church telling its members (and other subscribers) to pray for a girl because since she can't stand church, she obviously hasn't found Jesus and we (the subscribers) should be worried about that. So God gave me Romans 14. And every day, the words on those pages are the same. They don't change. But every day, every time God shows them to us, they're different. They're alive.

If God is God, then He can get His word to say anything He wants it to.

And the stuff in the side bar?

It just kind of kills it. Yes, we should know the historical context. We should know what they were talking about and use that to help us interpret the text. Yes.

But we should also just read it sometimes. Just let it affect us. Just let God make the Living Word come alive for us and for us alone. Let God talk through the Word.

Reading the Bible isn't like a textbook for exactly that reason- it's a book you have to read with your heart, not just with your mind.

And yes, it's a risky endeavor because what if you read something a certain way and it's not a godly interpretation? Well, then like they say, it's only from God if it fits His message. You do have to know the message to determine the difference. So you have to do both.

But, when I read a "scholar's" interpretation that just rubs me as being blatantly self-righteous, I'm going to side with my heart.

*shrugs*