Within the theory of evolution, it is said that we're limited by that from which we evolved. We have a base and from that base, we acquire variations that have helped us survive or that benefit us at some point in time in the past. But still, the base is there. We don't have different mechanisms of development or maintenance than any other organism- genes within our DNA are switched on or off, proteins are created, mechanisms occur, and the body creates or destroys or repairs or whatever else it has to do.
I was born here. I was raised here and I've lived here most of my life. There are things I've just always known to be true and even though my learnings in Christianity say the opposite of some of those things and with very good reason, I still live here and I'm still from here and sometimes, my base just rationally negotiates its way out, creating or destroying depending on the context and the perspective.
That's not to absolve myself of responsibility, but I'm not perfect. I can't be perfect. But Jesus loved me yesterday knowing what I would do today and He loves me today in spite of what I will do tomorrow. He wouldn't have chosen me if He didn't think that even though I'm a mess and even though I'm broken in so many ways, I'd try my hardest and do the best I could.
And I am trying. Regardless of how much I'm failing, I'm trying. I'm swimming against the current as hard as I can. I just might not be all that strong of a swimmer some days.
I'm not perfect.
I'm me.
I just hope that's enough.
By the grace of God am I saved. By God's mercy alone.
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Friday, September 11, 2009
Job: a book report...
So I finally finished reading Job after months of slow intermittent reading that involved plenty of discouragement, conflict, push back and empathy.
It was discouraging because of the repetitive nature of the book, and because of its general pattern of condescension and lack of respect. Job didn't respect his friends and they didn't respect him either. And we witness them going through several back and forths in a completely circular manner. It really is discouraging.
Conflict arose at several places, mainly because of a clash with scientific reason, or just plain lack of any reason at all (so... Leviathan in Ch 41 is a dragon...? "His sneezings flash forth light..." Um. Really?). But Job is not a textbook kind of book in the Bible, not prose but poetry. Things are exaggerated and elaborate analogies are made in spite of the more complex scientific understanding not yet having been revealed (e.g. Job 21:24 says, "the marrow of his bones moist," when at the time Job was written, the function of marrow had not yet been discovered. This particular conflict of mine was overcome by my being reminded that things were named (or described) long before they were understood, and people back then would have seen the difference in the marrow of healthy animals verses sickly animals. Marrow, rather than referring specifically to the spongey tissue that produces blood cells, referred to fat, which was often equated to health...). As usual, everything I confronted that stirred up doubt in me was quashed with educated theological guidance and interpretation based on context, language, the understanding of historical phrasing, as well as by getting a grasp on the intended audience.
The push back came when Job claimed to be righteous. "I put on righteousness, and it clothed me," Job says in Ch 29. I have a hard time believing I'm saved, let alone that I'm righteous in the eyes of God. This part was hard for me to reconcile because of my perspective as a New Testament Christian saved by God's grace. Nothing I do will earn my way into the kingdom of God. Nothing I say or give or promise will buy me that right. Only by the grace and mercy of God will He allow me to be with Him. But back then, it wasn't that way. You did all these things, sacrificial, ritualistic things, to get right with God. Job did all those things and therefore, within that context, rightly concluded that he was right with God. But still, his speeches rubbed me like blatant arrogance and it made it hard to feel for him.
After finishing Job, I heard a sermon wherein the pastor mentioned a verse from Job Ch 1, after Job had lost almost everything he had, including his children:
"And he said, 'Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.'"
And that hit me. Finally. That verse speaks of a profound love of God. In the midst of some of the worst crushings a man can endure, he still praised God. After thirty-six subsequent chapters full of arguing and criticism, I lost sight of that.
The last chapters were also humbling. No matter what we know of God, what we might attribute to God, what we might convey of God, we are powerless, ignorant, weak, and insignificant, unknowing and unable to comprehend the true greatness of God and His infinite power, grace, sovereignty, mercy and love for us.
I had set out to empathize with a man whose world collapses, ended up resenting him pridefully and finally, bowed down beside him, humbling myself before God, begging for mercy.
4"Behold, I am of small account; what shall I answer you?
I lay my hand on my mouth.
5 I have spoken once, and I will not answer;
twice, but I will proceed no further." (Ch 40)
So, to me, Job is not so much a book about suffering, but about how I am his friends, lecturing him on who God is when I have no idea myself. I am every character throughout the Bible who doubts, wrongly rebukes, judges, and ultimately who hangs Jesus on the cross. I am the one who is most in need of mercy because while I may be humble to the God I know, the fact that I believe I know God at all shows my pride. The fact that I judged Job, even after all he'd been through, showed my pride and lack of empathy. Language barriers, interpretation barriers, historical context- whatever issues I might be able to blame my response on simply point out my unwillingness to doubt my pride. Had I been humble, I would have believed Job. I would have believed God in chapter 1 when He said to Satan:
"Have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, who fears God and turns away from evil?"
Yes, I still have a lot to learn.
It was discouraging because of the repetitive nature of the book, and because of its general pattern of condescension and lack of respect. Job didn't respect his friends and they didn't respect him either. And we witness them going through several back and forths in a completely circular manner. It really is discouraging.
Conflict arose at several places, mainly because of a clash with scientific reason, or just plain lack of any reason at all (so... Leviathan in Ch 41 is a dragon...? "His sneezings flash forth light..." Um. Really?). But Job is not a textbook kind of book in the Bible, not prose but poetry. Things are exaggerated and elaborate analogies are made in spite of the more complex scientific understanding not yet having been revealed (e.g. Job 21:24 says, "the marrow of his bones moist," when at the time Job was written, the function of marrow had not yet been discovered. This particular conflict of mine was overcome by my being reminded that things were named (or described) long before they were understood, and people back then would have seen the difference in the marrow of healthy animals verses sickly animals. Marrow, rather than referring specifically to the spongey tissue that produces blood cells, referred to fat, which was often equated to health...). As usual, everything I confronted that stirred up doubt in me was quashed with educated theological guidance and interpretation based on context, language, the understanding of historical phrasing, as well as by getting a grasp on the intended audience.
The push back came when Job claimed to be righteous. "I put on righteousness, and it clothed me," Job says in Ch 29. I have a hard time believing I'm saved, let alone that I'm righteous in the eyes of God. This part was hard for me to reconcile because of my perspective as a New Testament Christian saved by God's grace. Nothing I do will earn my way into the kingdom of God. Nothing I say or give or promise will buy me that right. Only by the grace and mercy of God will He allow me to be with Him. But back then, it wasn't that way. You did all these things, sacrificial, ritualistic things, to get right with God. Job did all those things and therefore, within that context, rightly concluded that he was right with God. But still, his speeches rubbed me like blatant arrogance and it made it hard to feel for him.
After finishing Job, I heard a sermon wherein the pastor mentioned a verse from Job Ch 1, after Job had lost almost everything he had, including his children:
"And he said, 'Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.'"
And that hit me. Finally. That verse speaks of a profound love of God. In the midst of some of the worst crushings a man can endure, he still praised God. After thirty-six subsequent chapters full of arguing and criticism, I lost sight of that.
The last chapters were also humbling. No matter what we know of God, what we might attribute to God, what we might convey of God, we are powerless, ignorant, weak, and insignificant, unknowing and unable to comprehend the true greatness of God and His infinite power, grace, sovereignty, mercy and love for us.
I had set out to empathize with a man whose world collapses, ended up resenting him pridefully and finally, bowed down beside him, humbling myself before God, begging for mercy.
4"Behold, I am of small account; what shall I answer you?
I lay my hand on my mouth.
5 I have spoken once, and I will not answer;
twice, but I will proceed no further." (Ch 40)
So, to me, Job is not so much a book about suffering, but about how I am his friends, lecturing him on who God is when I have no idea myself. I am every character throughout the Bible who doubts, wrongly rebukes, judges, and ultimately who hangs Jesus on the cross. I am the one who is most in need of mercy because while I may be humble to the God I know, the fact that I believe I know God at all shows my pride. The fact that I judged Job, even after all he'd been through, showed my pride and lack of empathy. Language barriers, interpretation barriers, historical context- whatever issues I might be able to blame my response on simply point out my unwillingness to doubt my pride. Had I been humble, I would have believed Job. I would have believed God in chapter 1 when He said to Satan:
"Have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, who fears God and turns away from evil?"
Yes, I still have a lot to learn.
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
The Gift...
I rub people the wrong way often. Not usually immediately, but over time, as I get to know them better, I start to get under their skin in a way that usually leads to some form of retaliation against me. And while I do have a pretty intense fear of abandonment, I throw that aside and endure the repeated rejections because I can't "stand by".
So many people hear cries for help and don't react, assuming somebody else will help them or that if it's urgent enough, the person will make the urgency clear. I tend to hear the most subtle cries for help and react to them all. I often can tell exactly where a person is broken and how that brokenness is reflected in their every day lives.
I did a spiritual gifts test and had a pastor friend of mine go over it with me. He prayed on it for a couple of days and sent me his thoughts on my results. In his email, based on my results only (he doesn't know me deeply enough to assess me on his own, I would imagine, unless he's got a gift maybe...), he said, among other things, "You can see how people are struggling and it is your desire to help them. The problem you will face is that you will know what their problems are before they know what their problems are. You will want to tell them their struggles but this just makes them angry and defensive...."
And that's what happens.
Another friend of mine, who I hadn't talked to for ten years until yesterday said he remembered me as being "very uninterested in mundane things and being intellectually confrontational about people's behavior". So in ten years, no matter how hard I worked and how much I went through, this thing just stuck.
Whatever it is, whether it's a gift or a curse or just plain arrogance, it breaks me sometimes. It's like I can see things clearly, soul things, that the other person is adamant about not showing anybody.
What happens is this: I might either meet a new person or just get closer to an old acquaintance if some sort of opportunity arises. We get to talking and after a while, the conversation ends up inevitably moving towards deeper things. It's just how I am. I start to ask tougher questions to try to understand people's reasoning behind their choices and actions because, to me, their motivations and reasonings are a quick way to get to know their soul. Some people are exploratory and inviting. Others are quick to slam their doors shut at any inkling of questioning. As time progresses and we inevitably talk more, more of their soul becomes apparent and more of the subtle screams become audible to me (metaphorically, of course). And with time, I learn how to talk to each person, learn what upsets them and which approaches are more sensitive. But sometimes, the screams get so loud that I just can't stand by. And when the screams are so loud, the people themselves generally are repressing something they either are terrorized by or just really don't want to face. Often they've passed something hurtful off, brushed it away, and pretend they were successful in doing so when really, it's eating at their core and affecting their decision-making processes in the present.
And so in their words, their phrasing of things, their defensiveness and the walls they put up, I can see which door has to be opened to sort of free them from this oppressive repression.
Sometimes, they're not ready. So I sort of aim them towards the door and wait. Other times, they are ready, and I open the door and walk them through it. And the last group of people or circumstances, either aren't ready but are in desperate need, are ready but aren't willing, or catch me completely off guard. The result is they get thrust through the door in what is a very dramatic experience for both of us.
When they aren't ready and are in desperate need, I know what's coming. I know they're going to get extremely angry with me and that I might lose them. But the need outweighs my selfish stake in them and I proceed anyway.
When they're ready but aren't willing, the confrontation is a little less explosive, but still, there is a confrontation. The growth happens pretty quickly and our relationship usually ends up deeper because of it.
In the last case, I get crushed.
I've been pretty well tuned in to myself, overly critical and always striving to be better- a better person, a more lovable person, a more generous person, a more motivated person, and so on. I know where I'm broken just as much as I see the brokenness in others. I face everything head on, no matter how painful it is. Of course, I wasn't always like this. I used to repress just as badly as the next person. But I've seen the freedom that comes with letting go. I've seen the freedom that occurs when a person releases themselves from the things that are crushing their person. Once you walk through that door, it's hard to come back. It's hard to put all the walls back up again, unless another trauma occurs.
But at a certain point, the amount of vulnerability it takes on my part to "help" people in this way is devastating. Not only do I have to maintain communication that is open, never retaliatory but always loving, I can't let my own defense mechanisms affect what is going on. No matter how much brutal retaliation I get, I can't fight back because it'll change the message. They won't be able to walk through that door if there's one of my doors slamming in front of them before they get there.
Normally, I'm ready. If I approach a very clear situation, I'm prepared for the reaction. I'm prepared to handle it. I'm also prepared for their particular reaction because at that point, I'm fairly certain which way their defense mechanisms will shut me down.
But it's when I poke at their weakest spots unintentionally that everything turns.
On the weekend, I was talking about a family member with another, and this person was judging the first pretty harshly, so I tried to explain why he did the things he did, why he's wired that way, how his circumstances affected him and on and on. I know him well because we share a lot of the same history, only he handled it differently than I did and that was the difference I was explaining. Somehow, over the course of that conversation, I poked the weakest spots of a third person overhearing.
After a brief period of festering and growing in anger, the next opportunity this person got, they laid into me brutally. It was terrible. My person was attacked for at least fifteen minutes straight. I didn't react. I could have, I suppose, but the way it happened was so horrible and broken, I just couldn't.
I got into my car and drove home listening to a sermon from Vintage 21 on Mark Ch 4:1-20, in which Pastor Tyler talks about (paraphrased) how we need to be sure to be open to people around us, how we need to relent and listen to what they have to say about us and that he's got a few people he relents to and then he says:
[As usual, the opinions expressed in this blog in no way are reflective of the opinions, theology or whatever else of Vintage 21. They're just my views. Only my views. Endorsed by nobody. :D]
And it reminded me of what my goal is. It's not about me. It's about caring for people such that they might see Jesus through me.
But I do relent. On a scale of hardened hearts, my heart is moosh. And this person ripped into me and one of the main points they drilled into me amongst all the thrashing was how I have to stop doing this.
I came home crushed, not because I'm really adamant about staying this way but because I don't know any other way to be. I can't stand by. I can't watch somebody hurt themselves (or others) and say nothing. That's not love. That's not caring for them. Even if the consequences are losing them, I can't stand by.
I came online because I was just lost and upset and my cousin was on. I told her what happened.
me: I offend a lot of people. Constantly.
cousin: I think you need to look at it differently though. You're not doing it just for fun, like some people do.
me: I don't do it because it's fun. I do it because somehow I feel people have a need. But maybe I'm wrong.
cousin: Exactly. I don't think you're wrong. I think it's courageous.
me: Thanks. It makes me want to quit life sometimes.
cousin: And I don't mean to sound weird, but it reminds me a lot of Jesus.
me: lol
cousin: I'm serious!
me: I think that's, like, the ultimate compliment in the entire universe.
And it is for many reasons, but coming from her, it was incredibly special to me because I know I've thrust her through her own doors before. I know she got angry with me and fought against me before. She knows how I am. And she saw Jesus in me anyway.
I know I have to tone it down. I know I'll get burnt out quickly if I keep going the way I'm going. The problem is... everybody needs help. Everybody needs love. Everybody needs more Jesus. And I pray. I pray often.
But I'm right here. Why are they in need in a way I can see it and why am I right here?
Why did God make me this way? Am I supposed to fight against it? Am I supposed to take the rebuke I know I'm getting out of fierce retaliation? It just seems that too many of us mistake love for this bizarre passive hate. Like a few pastors have said, if the person was on fire, would you just stand by? Well, they are on fire. And I can see it. Is that a bad thing? Is it a character flaw?
Sometimes, I'm wrong. But I'm not in it for me. I admit when I'm wrong. I admit when things were expressed poorly. I admit that I'm a flawed and broken individual too. I am. But I'd rather put out the occasional non-fire by accident and be wrong sometimes than to miss one that's crushing and killing a person.
And sometimes, I need more tact and sensitivity. Yes, I agree wholeheartedly. I'm learning. Constantly. But sometimes, hard words are hard no matter what package they're presented in. Sometimes, I just have to say it in the clearest way possible so there are no misunderstandings. Sometimes, it's deliberate, not because I'm trying to hurt anybody, but because that is the best way it has to be said.
I guess I have to keep praying that God might guide me and use my life however He needs it, that He might give me the skills and sensitivities He wants me to use, and that He would keep my heart open to accept the rebuke I deserve and need and to know the difference between rebuke from the heart that aims to build me and criticisms based in anger that are meant to crush me.
Like my friend Eric said this week, Jesus says in John 14:6, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life," but people tend to leave out the "way" part. The way is hard. The way involves a more active response in our daily lives. But if the way is the most efficient and provocative tool we have to show people the Gospel, then let's.
Is the Great God of the universe not worthy of the life He has given me? Is it not all a gift? And if so, the very essence of my being should honor Jesus and reflect my abundant appreciation and gratitude back to God.
Jesus is the way. So let's live like He is the way, or at least die trying to actively figure out what that means.
So many people hear cries for help and don't react, assuming somebody else will help them or that if it's urgent enough, the person will make the urgency clear. I tend to hear the most subtle cries for help and react to them all. I often can tell exactly where a person is broken and how that brokenness is reflected in their every day lives.
I did a spiritual gifts test and had a pastor friend of mine go over it with me. He prayed on it for a couple of days and sent me his thoughts on my results. In his email, based on my results only (he doesn't know me deeply enough to assess me on his own, I would imagine, unless he's got a gift maybe...), he said, among other things, "You can see how people are struggling and it is your desire to help them. The problem you will face is that you will know what their problems are before they know what their problems are. You will want to tell them their struggles but this just makes them angry and defensive...."
And that's what happens.
Another friend of mine, who I hadn't talked to for ten years until yesterday said he remembered me as being "very uninterested in mundane things and being intellectually confrontational about people's behavior". So in ten years, no matter how hard I worked and how much I went through, this thing just stuck.
Whatever it is, whether it's a gift or a curse or just plain arrogance, it breaks me sometimes. It's like I can see things clearly, soul things, that the other person is adamant about not showing anybody.
What happens is this: I might either meet a new person or just get closer to an old acquaintance if some sort of opportunity arises. We get to talking and after a while, the conversation ends up inevitably moving towards deeper things. It's just how I am. I start to ask tougher questions to try to understand people's reasoning behind their choices and actions because, to me, their motivations and reasonings are a quick way to get to know their soul. Some people are exploratory and inviting. Others are quick to slam their doors shut at any inkling of questioning. As time progresses and we inevitably talk more, more of their soul becomes apparent and more of the subtle screams become audible to me (metaphorically, of course). And with time, I learn how to talk to each person, learn what upsets them and which approaches are more sensitive. But sometimes, the screams get so loud that I just can't stand by. And when the screams are so loud, the people themselves generally are repressing something they either are terrorized by or just really don't want to face. Often they've passed something hurtful off, brushed it away, and pretend they were successful in doing so when really, it's eating at their core and affecting their decision-making processes in the present.
And so in their words, their phrasing of things, their defensiveness and the walls they put up, I can see which door has to be opened to sort of free them from this oppressive repression.
Sometimes, they're not ready. So I sort of aim them towards the door and wait. Other times, they are ready, and I open the door and walk them through it. And the last group of people or circumstances, either aren't ready but are in desperate need, are ready but aren't willing, or catch me completely off guard. The result is they get thrust through the door in what is a very dramatic experience for both of us.
When they aren't ready and are in desperate need, I know what's coming. I know they're going to get extremely angry with me and that I might lose them. But the need outweighs my selfish stake in them and I proceed anyway.
When they're ready but aren't willing, the confrontation is a little less explosive, but still, there is a confrontation. The growth happens pretty quickly and our relationship usually ends up deeper because of it.
In the last case, I get crushed.
I've been pretty well tuned in to myself, overly critical and always striving to be better- a better person, a more lovable person, a more generous person, a more motivated person, and so on. I know where I'm broken just as much as I see the brokenness in others. I face everything head on, no matter how painful it is. Of course, I wasn't always like this. I used to repress just as badly as the next person. But I've seen the freedom that comes with letting go. I've seen the freedom that occurs when a person releases themselves from the things that are crushing their person. Once you walk through that door, it's hard to come back. It's hard to put all the walls back up again, unless another trauma occurs.
But at a certain point, the amount of vulnerability it takes on my part to "help" people in this way is devastating. Not only do I have to maintain communication that is open, never retaliatory but always loving, I can't let my own defense mechanisms affect what is going on. No matter how much brutal retaliation I get, I can't fight back because it'll change the message. They won't be able to walk through that door if there's one of my doors slamming in front of them before they get there.
Normally, I'm ready. If I approach a very clear situation, I'm prepared for the reaction. I'm prepared to handle it. I'm also prepared for their particular reaction because at that point, I'm fairly certain which way their defense mechanisms will shut me down.
But it's when I poke at their weakest spots unintentionally that everything turns.
On the weekend, I was talking about a family member with another, and this person was judging the first pretty harshly, so I tried to explain why he did the things he did, why he's wired that way, how his circumstances affected him and on and on. I know him well because we share a lot of the same history, only he handled it differently than I did and that was the difference I was explaining. Somehow, over the course of that conversation, I poked the weakest spots of a third person overhearing.
After a brief period of festering and growing in anger, the next opportunity this person got, they laid into me brutally. It was terrible. My person was attacked for at least fifteen minutes straight. I didn't react. I could have, I suppose, but the way it happened was so horrible and broken, I just couldn't.
I got into my car and drove home listening to a sermon from Vintage 21 on Mark Ch 4:1-20, in which Pastor Tyler talks about (paraphrased) how we need to be sure to be open to people around us, how we need to relent and listen to what they have to say about us and that he's got a few people he relents to and then he says:
"Because I don't want this hardened response, where we just reject all things that are good and we walk away. One of the hardest parts of my job is to sit with people in my office and to tell them things that won't give me any money, won't give me any fame, are of no benefit to me at all, that are just life giving to them, that are just about Jesus and you can see in their eyes, they're not going to do it. They're not going to go that way. 'How dare you speak into my life.' And so I've even started saying 'Don't do this thing. don't go that way. You're hardened and it's only leading to destruction.'"
[As usual, the opinions expressed in this blog in no way are reflective of the opinions, theology or whatever else of Vintage 21. They're just my views. Only my views. Endorsed by nobody. :D]
And it reminded me of what my goal is. It's not about me. It's about caring for people such that they might see Jesus through me.
But I do relent. On a scale of hardened hearts, my heart is moosh. And this person ripped into me and one of the main points they drilled into me amongst all the thrashing was how I have to stop doing this.
I came home crushed, not because I'm really adamant about staying this way but because I don't know any other way to be. I can't stand by. I can't watch somebody hurt themselves (or others) and say nothing. That's not love. That's not caring for them. Even if the consequences are losing them, I can't stand by.
I came online because I was just lost and upset and my cousin was on. I told her what happened.
me: I offend a lot of people. Constantly.
cousin: I think you need to look at it differently though. You're not doing it just for fun, like some people do.
me: I don't do it because it's fun. I do it because somehow I feel people have a need. But maybe I'm wrong.
cousin: Exactly. I don't think you're wrong. I think it's courageous.
me: Thanks. It makes me want to quit life sometimes.
cousin: And I don't mean to sound weird, but it reminds me a lot of Jesus.
me: lol
cousin: I'm serious!
me: I think that's, like, the ultimate compliment in the entire universe.
And it is for many reasons, but coming from her, it was incredibly special to me because I know I've thrust her through her own doors before. I know she got angry with me and fought against me before. She knows how I am. And she saw Jesus in me anyway.
I know I have to tone it down. I know I'll get burnt out quickly if I keep going the way I'm going. The problem is... everybody needs help. Everybody needs love. Everybody needs more Jesus. And I pray. I pray often.
But I'm right here. Why are they in need in a way I can see it and why am I right here?
Why did God make me this way? Am I supposed to fight against it? Am I supposed to take the rebuke I know I'm getting out of fierce retaliation? It just seems that too many of us mistake love for this bizarre passive hate. Like a few pastors have said, if the person was on fire, would you just stand by? Well, they are on fire. And I can see it. Is that a bad thing? Is it a character flaw?
Sometimes, I'm wrong. But I'm not in it for me. I admit when I'm wrong. I admit when things were expressed poorly. I admit that I'm a flawed and broken individual too. I am. But I'd rather put out the occasional non-fire by accident and be wrong sometimes than to miss one that's crushing and killing a person.
And sometimes, I need more tact and sensitivity. Yes, I agree wholeheartedly. I'm learning. Constantly. But sometimes, hard words are hard no matter what package they're presented in. Sometimes, I just have to say it in the clearest way possible so there are no misunderstandings. Sometimes, it's deliberate, not because I'm trying to hurt anybody, but because that is the best way it has to be said.
I guess I have to keep praying that God might guide me and use my life however He needs it, that He might give me the skills and sensitivities He wants me to use, and that He would keep my heart open to accept the rebuke I deserve and need and to know the difference between rebuke from the heart that aims to build me and criticisms based in anger that are meant to crush me.
Like my friend Eric said this week, Jesus says in John 14:6, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life," but people tend to leave out the "way" part. The way is hard. The way involves a more active response in our daily lives. But if the way is the most efficient and provocative tool we have to show people the Gospel, then let's.
Is the Great God of the universe not worthy of the life He has given me? Is it not all a gift? And if so, the very essence of my being should honor Jesus and reflect my abundant appreciation and gratitude back to God.
Jesus is the way. So let's live like He is the way, or at least die trying to actively figure out what that means.
Monday, September 7, 2009
Church vs. Religion: Why church and I still don't get along...
Today was my fourth time going to the church here, and my sixth time going to church so far without being coerced, manipulated or forced.
My early exposures to church were particularly bad. The first time I remember, my dad got criticized by his family for not being more proactive in our spiritual lives and I vaguely recall him bringing us to a white church with grey steps. I was probably no more than five and I'm not sure I had been in school yet. Needless to say, it didn't take and the three of us got yelled at in the car for falling asleep so quickly. At least we were quiet...
The next times I'd go would be a little later on, when my grandparents forced me while I was staying with them at their cottage in the summer. The services were Catholic and French. Two things I didn't have a good enough grasp of to understand nor to care to understand. Somehow though, I did like the outdoor services, even with the three giant crosses looming in the background. I don't remember ever wondering what the other two were for, and I know for sure I never asked.
I remember my grandparents having an anniversary party wherein a pastor or priest gave communion and I was told specifically not to move out of my seat because it wasn't for me. I think I was nine at the time and I watched dozens of my cousins line up while my brothers and I sat silently along the edge of the room.
I had quite a few church experiences under my belt before I became a follower and the overwhelming theme repeated throughout seems to have been "you're not one of us." Somebody I know (not sure if she'd want me to post her name on this blog, hehe) posted a thingy of rejected children's book ideas on her blog and #1 was "You're different and that's bad." I think that book would have been about my experiences in church. :D
And so today, as I sat there during the opening worship, I still felt equally out of place, only I've been trying a lot harder to try to... well, not fit in, so much as respect the goings on in the church. The heartfelt worship I understand. The lifting the hands up in praise of God I also understand (now). But the language I still don't understand. I mean, I know what they're saying, but after spending a lifetime outside of it, I still see it from the perspective where all of a sudden people are so enraptured by God that they stop speaking English and start speaking something else. And it would still be all fine and good except that when they revert to that language, they seem to lose sight of reality too.
"You're the defender of the weak, You comfort those in need, You lift us up on wings like eagles."
Like.. um.. what..?
I'm standing there, reading the words off the screen and I know I've got the worst poker face ever so I must have had my "wtf?" face on the whole time. I just can't do it. I can't sing that God is the defender of the weak. Or that He comforts those in need. That's not the gospel to me. The gospel to me is "you're weak now, but trust God and you'll be redeemed. Trust God and one day, everything will be made clear." The gospel to me is not that God comforts those in need, because let's face it, when we're really, desperately in need, whether we have faith or not, we tend to feel ridiculously alone. No doubt somebody in the audience was going through a hard time and stood there mumbling the words thinking the same "wtf?" I was, but would never admit it in case that made them a bad Christian in some way.
If David asks, "My God my God, why have you forsaken me?" and Jesus Himself asks the same question, why are we not allowed? And frankly, to not ask the question kind of lacks a little honesty. You know? I'm a relatively new Christian and I've still already prayed, "God, I can't feel You at all right now. I know You're there. I just can't feel You. I wish I could. But I don't. Help me to feel connected to You again." I've already felt the burn of doubt in my heart so many times regardless of the fact that I'm a newbie, full of passion and naive certainty. I can't imagine that the others in the room who live in this city and are surrounded by anti-religious hate have never felt that burn.
It's a nice idea though- God comforting us when we need Him. Wrapping His big, strong God arm around you, making it warm or cool depending on what He knows comforts you most... But that's not God. Nowhere in the Bible does it say God sent His only begotten Son such that whoever believes in Him should not perish but feel hugged and cherished... While that might accidentally be a cute rhyme, I don't think that was the point of the Gospel. God knows we struggle to feel Him. He knows because He felt it Himself in Jesus' darkest hour. He knows.
And really, "You lift us up on wings like eagles"? What? Like eagles'? Bah, I just don't get it. It's just not English.
That was my problem as I stood there watching these people sing lyrics that I just can't understand them actually meaning without them being subject to a sort of lifelong plague of superficiality. Like, if nothing in your life has gone wrong ever, obviously God will feel comforting. Right? Because at that point, your faith has never really been challenged. But how many people does that represent? And so are the rest pretending? Worshiping via wishful thinking?
I'm not judging the worship leaders or anything. They just pick stuff that they feel suits the context of the sermon and things. They do their best and they do lead well....
Anyway, the sermon went on, about the Beatitudes (which I still haven't figured out how they acquired that name. Why Beatitudes? I should look it up. Later.), and the pastor talked about how he came to plant in Montreal. A non-Christian where he used to live attended church and helped with the church simply because he enjoyed the environment (that part blew my mind a little), and then he moved to Montreal. The pastor thought right away, "Oh, no. He'll be lost forever now." But somehow in seeing the complete faithlessness and brokenness here, he was driven into faith. He asked the pastor to plant here. There's definitely a need... The pastor said he'd pray on it and see. After a couple of visits here, the guy went to a prayer meeting for the city and came home particularly upset and asked again why the pastor wouldn't plant here. "If you saw somebody drowning, would you pray on it?"
And so he planted.
As a person praying for the Acts 29 network to plant here, that story touched me. I counted the people in church today and it was somewhere around forty and I'm generally near the top as far as age goes. It's such a young church with such an overwhelming uphill battle, especially when it seems like the strongest leaders of the Christian community have already written us off. And I know bickering about words in songs is counterproductive, but at the same time, if it makes me want to run and I love Jesus...
People here have a fierce problem with religion. Myself included. That's why the sermons from Vintage 21 in North Carolina hit me so hard last year. They weren't religion. They were the Gospel. They were just Jesus. And honestly, I don't see how anybody can get to know Jesus without loving Him. The problem is, things get in the way between us and Jesus. Things like how we should be like eagles sitting on the wings of some other mystery bird.
After the sermon, the worship team or praise team, I don't know the semantics, got up again and then it was time for the breaking of the bread.. Um.. I don't know what that's called either. Communion? Or is that Catholic only? Supper? I don't know. Anyway, as the pastor broke the bread and said his little thing about it, I watched intently. He did make it meaningful though, and asked those who have accepted Jesus to go and partake in the breaking of the bread. Everybody stood up and lined up except me.
It was at that moment that I realized that no matter how much I might ever allow myself to conform, God made me different. And if nothing God does is accidental, He made me different deliberately.
I can't eat the bread. And whether the wine is wine or it's grape juice, I can't drink it either. My body just will not allow any of it. Well, it would probably allow wine, but I haven't had any alcohol since 1996 and I'm not about to start now.
But I can't help but wonder. God chose me. If God chose me, knowing I'd live the life I have so far and knowing who I am inside and out, why would He choose somebody so different? Why would He choose somebody who can't conform no matter what?
I came home afterward, made my pancakes (as long as the flour is stripped of nutrition and especially of fiber, I can eat it) and poured a glass of single-ingredient grape juice (it's actually the apple juice they usually mix in with grape juice that I'm intolerant to). I thanked Jesus for sacrificing Himself for me even though I'm so broken and undeserving and dug in, knowing the food I had accepted gladly would be accepted gladly both by my body and by my heart.
I love Jesus. I just still suck at church. But the way in which I suck at it makes me wonder if maybe there's another more natural way to go about church. Maybe there's another way to go about preaching the gospel, worshiping God and living in community without having to learn an alternate language. Maybe.
Wouldn't a theologically sound yet naturally passionate endeavor stemming from the heart be more productive to the kingdom of God? Maybe not for everywhere, but at least for here, a place that has been so burned by the church and religion?
Or maybe I just have to suck it up, be quiet and be a good legalist... uh... I mean, Christian, and mumble along about wings shaped like eagles.
Maybe.
My early exposures to church were particularly bad. The first time I remember, my dad got criticized by his family for not being more proactive in our spiritual lives and I vaguely recall him bringing us to a white church with grey steps. I was probably no more than five and I'm not sure I had been in school yet. Needless to say, it didn't take and the three of us got yelled at in the car for falling asleep so quickly. At least we were quiet...
The next times I'd go would be a little later on, when my grandparents forced me while I was staying with them at their cottage in the summer. The services were Catholic and French. Two things I didn't have a good enough grasp of to understand nor to care to understand. Somehow though, I did like the outdoor services, even with the three giant crosses looming in the background. I don't remember ever wondering what the other two were for, and I know for sure I never asked.
I remember my grandparents having an anniversary party wherein a pastor or priest gave communion and I was told specifically not to move out of my seat because it wasn't for me. I think I was nine at the time and I watched dozens of my cousins line up while my brothers and I sat silently along the edge of the room.
I had quite a few church experiences under my belt before I became a follower and the overwhelming theme repeated throughout seems to have been "you're not one of us." Somebody I know (not sure if she'd want me to post her name on this blog, hehe) posted a thingy of rejected children's book ideas on her blog and #1 was "You're different and that's bad." I think that book would have been about my experiences in church. :D
And so today, as I sat there during the opening worship, I still felt equally out of place, only I've been trying a lot harder to try to... well, not fit in, so much as respect the goings on in the church. The heartfelt worship I understand. The lifting the hands up in praise of God I also understand (now). But the language I still don't understand. I mean, I know what they're saying, but after spending a lifetime outside of it, I still see it from the perspective where all of a sudden people are so enraptured by God that they stop speaking English and start speaking something else. And it would still be all fine and good except that when they revert to that language, they seem to lose sight of reality too.
"You're the defender of the weak, You comfort those in need, You lift us up on wings like eagles."
Like.. um.. what..?
I'm standing there, reading the words off the screen and I know I've got the worst poker face ever so I must have had my "wtf?" face on the whole time. I just can't do it. I can't sing that God is the defender of the weak. Or that He comforts those in need. That's not the gospel to me. The gospel to me is "you're weak now, but trust God and you'll be redeemed. Trust God and one day, everything will be made clear." The gospel to me is not that God comforts those in need, because let's face it, when we're really, desperately in need, whether we have faith or not, we tend to feel ridiculously alone. No doubt somebody in the audience was going through a hard time and stood there mumbling the words thinking the same "wtf?" I was, but would never admit it in case that made them a bad Christian in some way.
If David asks, "My God my God, why have you forsaken me?" and Jesus Himself asks the same question, why are we not allowed? And frankly, to not ask the question kind of lacks a little honesty. You know? I'm a relatively new Christian and I've still already prayed, "God, I can't feel You at all right now. I know You're there. I just can't feel You. I wish I could. But I don't. Help me to feel connected to You again." I've already felt the burn of doubt in my heart so many times regardless of the fact that I'm a newbie, full of passion and naive certainty. I can't imagine that the others in the room who live in this city and are surrounded by anti-religious hate have never felt that burn.
It's a nice idea though- God comforting us when we need Him. Wrapping His big, strong God arm around you, making it warm or cool depending on what He knows comforts you most... But that's not God. Nowhere in the Bible does it say God sent His only begotten Son such that whoever believes in Him should not perish but feel hugged and cherished... While that might accidentally be a cute rhyme, I don't think that was the point of the Gospel. God knows we struggle to feel Him. He knows because He felt it Himself in Jesus' darkest hour. He knows.
And really, "You lift us up on wings like eagles"? What? Like eagles'? Bah, I just don't get it. It's just not English.
That was my problem as I stood there watching these people sing lyrics that I just can't understand them actually meaning without them being subject to a sort of lifelong plague of superficiality. Like, if nothing in your life has gone wrong ever, obviously God will feel comforting. Right? Because at that point, your faith has never really been challenged. But how many people does that represent? And so are the rest pretending? Worshiping via wishful thinking?
I'm not judging the worship leaders or anything. They just pick stuff that they feel suits the context of the sermon and things. They do their best and they do lead well....
Anyway, the sermon went on, about the Beatitudes (which I still haven't figured out how they acquired that name. Why Beatitudes? I should look it up. Later.), and the pastor talked about how he came to plant in Montreal. A non-Christian where he used to live attended church and helped with the church simply because he enjoyed the environment (that part blew my mind a little), and then he moved to Montreal. The pastor thought right away, "Oh, no. He'll be lost forever now." But somehow in seeing the complete faithlessness and brokenness here, he was driven into faith. He asked the pastor to plant here. There's definitely a need... The pastor said he'd pray on it and see. After a couple of visits here, the guy went to a prayer meeting for the city and came home particularly upset and asked again why the pastor wouldn't plant here. "If you saw somebody drowning, would you pray on it?"
And so he planted.
As a person praying for the Acts 29 network to plant here, that story touched me. I counted the people in church today and it was somewhere around forty and I'm generally near the top as far as age goes. It's such a young church with such an overwhelming uphill battle, especially when it seems like the strongest leaders of the Christian community have already written us off. And I know bickering about words in songs is counterproductive, but at the same time, if it makes me want to run and I love Jesus...
People here have a fierce problem with religion. Myself included. That's why the sermons from Vintage 21 in North Carolina hit me so hard last year. They weren't religion. They were the Gospel. They were just Jesus. And honestly, I don't see how anybody can get to know Jesus without loving Him. The problem is, things get in the way between us and Jesus. Things like how we should be like eagles sitting on the wings of some other mystery bird.
After the sermon, the worship team or praise team, I don't know the semantics, got up again and then it was time for the breaking of the bread.. Um.. I don't know what that's called either. Communion? Or is that Catholic only? Supper? I don't know. Anyway, as the pastor broke the bread and said his little thing about it, I watched intently. He did make it meaningful though, and asked those who have accepted Jesus to go and partake in the breaking of the bread. Everybody stood up and lined up except me.
It was at that moment that I realized that no matter how much I might ever allow myself to conform, God made me different. And if nothing God does is accidental, He made me different deliberately.
I can't eat the bread. And whether the wine is wine or it's grape juice, I can't drink it either. My body just will not allow any of it. Well, it would probably allow wine, but I haven't had any alcohol since 1996 and I'm not about to start now.
But I can't help but wonder. God chose me. If God chose me, knowing I'd live the life I have so far and knowing who I am inside and out, why would He choose somebody so different? Why would He choose somebody who can't conform no matter what?
I came home afterward, made my pancakes (as long as the flour is stripped of nutrition and especially of fiber, I can eat it) and poured a glass of single-ingredient grape juice (it's actually the apple juice they usually mix in with grape juice that I'm intolerant to). I thanked Jesus for sacrificing Himself for me even though I'm so broken and undeserving and dug in, knowing the food I had accepted gladly would be accepted gladly both by my body and by my heart.
I love Jesus. I just still suck at church. But the way in which I suck at it makes me wonder if maybe there's another more natural way to go about church. Maybe there's another way to go about preaching the gospel, worshiping God and living in community without having to learn an alternate language. Maybe.
Wouldn't a theologically sound yet naturally passionate endeavor stemming from the heart be more productive to the kingdom of God? Maybe not for everywhere, but at least for here, a place that has been so burned by the church and religion?
Or maybe I just have to suck it up, be quiet and be a good legalist... uh... I mean, Christian, and mumble along about wings shaped like eagles.
Maybe.
Friday, September 4, 2009
My Lord's prayer...
My God,
who is in heaven,
who watches over me,
those I love
and those I haven't yet met.
There's endless glory
in Your name.
The awesomeness
of Your creation
and of Your goodness
reflects Your greatness.
Guide me
to do Your will,
to use my life
to reflect You.
Give me today
my daily bread,
provide for me
what I need
and stir my soul
into renewed
and continued
passion for You.
Forgive me.
Forgive my sins,
my disobedience,
my lack of trust,
my lack of compassion
and my narcissism.
Forgive me
as only You
are able to,
so that in knowing
Your forgiveness
I might learn
to forgive
those in my life
who have hurt me,
betrayed me,
used me,
abused me
and probably will again,
just as I will them,
and will return to You
to seek Your forgiveness.
Teach me mercy
and compassion
through Your grace.
Guide me to Your glory
when I might stumble.
Test me,
break me,
crush me,
love me-
whatever I need
to know You
and to glorify You.
Protect me,
and keep me
Your child,
Forever and ever.
Amen.
who is in heaven,
who watches over me,
those I love
and those I haven't yet met.
There's endless glory
in Your name.
The awesomeness
of Your creation
and of Your goodness
reflects Your greatness.
Guide me
to do Your will,
to use my life
to reflect You.
Give me today
my daily bread,
provide for me
what I need
and stir my soul
into renewed
and continued
passion for You.
Forgive me.
Forgive my sins,
my disobedience,
my lack of trust,
my lack of compassion
and my narcissism.
Forgive me
as only You
are able to,
so that in knowing
Your forgiveness
I might learn
to forgive
those in my life
who have hurt me,
betrayed me,
used me,
abused me
and probably will again,
just as I will them,
and will return to You
to seek Your forgiveness.
Teach me mercy
and compassion
through Your grace.
Guide me to Your glory
when I might stumble.
Test me,
break me,
crush me,
love me-
whatever I need
to know You
and to glorify You.
Protect me,
and keep me
Your child,
Forever and ever.
Amen.
Thursday, September 3, 2009
On legalism, selfish generosity and the desire to be lovable...
When I was sixteen, I stopped drinking permanently. I'd soon fall into anorexia because my eating followed such a strict set of rules that there was next to nothing to eat and very little time in which to eat it. At nineteen I was assaulted by a person I'd considered one of my best friends and a potential soulmate, and in consequence, I created a new set of rules as pertained to boys.
At twenty, I was generally the best woman snowboarder on most hills I played on and I moved out west to follow my dream of becoming an Olympic halfpipe rider, following a strict training regimen. Shortly thereafter, I had a catastrophic tumble upon landing a big air off a huge kicker and broke my body. I could have died that day, according to my athletic therapist. The imprints my skull had made inside my helmet were deep enough to deduce that had I not been wearing it, I'd most likely not be here today.
Between the fear, the arthritis and the devastation that came with being unable to maintain my athleticism at a certain level, I stopped snowboarding completely and moved back home. As my plans differed from those which my father had intended for me, I was soon very unwelcome in his house and had to find another place to live, which was made all the more scary because of living with the remnants of a blunt force trauma to the brain. My eyes were completely bloodshot and dimmed and my body was a mess.
A boy took me in and would spend the next six years telling me how terrible a human being I was. The stress of the abuse caused my immune system to attack me and as my endocrinologist would put it later on, "It was touch and go for a while there."
Suddenly, my body was useless and completely broken. I wasn't allowed anything over a slow walk for fear that my heart would stop beating. I was put on relatively massive doses of thyroid suppressants and beta blockers, both of which gave me the constant urge to die but the lack of motivation to get on with it.
Up until that point, I had lived a fairly selfish life. I was nice to my friends, but I wrote people off extremely quickly, and I was quite angry and very repressed most of the time. I did go out of my way for friends though, even to the point of jeopardizing exam results to spend time with them if they needed me. I was always a loyal friend to a select few. And I was honest. I've always been honest, often overly honest to my own detriment.
But being practically incapacitated while in a relationship that offered no support or love, only belittlement and condescension, I decided somehow that maybe if I gave people what I needed, the world would be a better place (for me). And so I did. I gave them community, loyalty, love and compassion and with time, I began to realize how much of the world had been exactly in my shoes. I realized how many people felt unloved and uncared for. I realized how many people, regardless of their circumstances, were so burned by life that they too were shut down and angry.
And so, I thought it'd be nice to be the one person in maybe a couple of people's lives that might keep their hope alive, or at least give them somewhere to vent and somebody unexpected and reliable to lean on.
Over time, I started becoming more open, less angry, and far more empathetic. Life was just too short and leaving a legacy of bitterness just seemed so counterproductive to life itself.
The guy I lived with would grow to resent it, complaining that I spent too much time helping others and not enough time on him or on things that were profitable. But I started to realize that the more people communicated, the more they'd open up and the more burdens I could help them carry. People would tell me I empathized too much, but in my heart, I knew that without empathy, without living life from their perspective, all I was left with was my daily handful of pills that made me want to die. All I was left with was my abusive relationship that I was too broken to leave. It felt good to live in other people's shoes for a while, even as they struggled and in spite of the fact that some of their loved ones were dying.
I developed a heart for other people because my heart was so broken and mutilated. I developed a heart for other people for selfish reasons.
I gave my all. I gave my time, what little money I had and what little effort I could muster up. I gave everything such that they might feel loved and supported such that I might feel loved and supported, not through reciprocation but through the actual act of giving. It really was selfish.
And eventually, my confidence grew and I left the abusive situation. My health still wasn't 100%, and my doctor was on "wait and see" mode, making me go in for blood tests every two months. If I didn't start taking care of me, he said, I'd soon need radiation.
I worked on myself and tried to put the years of emotional abuse behind me to lower my stress and try to gain some optimism for the future, all the while, still giving all of myself to others.
I didn't drink or party, I didn't hoard my money, I gave whatever and whenever I could and I was always there if anybody needed me- I was a good girl. I really was. (Except maybe to myself...) By almost anybody's standards in this society, I was an unselfish giving person, but even still, after spending a few years feeling the brokenness around me, I started to feel like anything I did to help was never enough.
And then I met the Christian guy who asked me, "What's the point of being such a good girl if you don't believe in heaven? What do you get out of going above and beyond what any normal person would do to help anybody? You're like the perfect Christian only... you're not Christian."
Had I not had such a disdain for religion back then, I might have said, "Even the good I do as a non-Christian is still the work of Jesus, using my life to glorify God," but we all know that no atheist or agnostic on the planet would ever say that.
But that's what it was, and still is, only now that I'm a Christian, the Christians I meet have a tendency to call it legalism. It's the funniest and most disturbing thing in a way. I do set rules for myself. I always have, even when generosity is concerned. If I haven't helped somebody today yet, I go through my mental rolodex and figure out somebody who might need support and reach out. It's not legalism. It's not filling quotas for Jesus. It's purely selfish and always has been. Being a Christian doesn't change that; it just makes it a little more socially acceptable in Christian circles.
Suddenly, I'm in a circle of people who thinks they shouldn't drink or partake in other purely hedonistic activities and suddenly, I'm in a group of people who endeavors to be nice against their normal will and desires and therefore, I must be the same and have the same justifications for my behaviors.
But I don't.
And while it seems like legalistic behavior to the Christians I meet because I tend to set so many rules and obligations for myself, I was a rules and obligations girl long before I became a follower of Jesus. I didn't get into this pattern of behaviors because of my quest for Jesus, either. Jesus is relatively new to me. I didn't even get into this pattern because I wanted to be a good girl. I got into this pattern of rules and over-generosity because of my own brokenness and my desire to feel lovable. Granted, if any pattern of broken behavior is a good one to have, it's a pattern of unselfish selfishness and selfish generosity, but that doesn't make my broken motives anymore righteous.
However, the goal now, as a Christian, is not to tone myself down such that Christians stop thinking that I'm a legalist to the max (wouldn't that be legalism? :D), rather to redirect the response to God. The goal becomes redirecting the reaction I get away from me and my desire to be lovable and point it to God. I have to let go of my driving need to be loved, reflect the glory to God and be satisfied in His love alone.
But I'm a broken girl and no doubt I'll end up hoarding some for myself. I'll just have to make sure to, at the very least, thank Him for it later.
At twenty, I was generally the best woman snowboarder on most hills I played on and I moved out west to follow my dream of becoming an Olympic halfpipe rider, following a strict training regimen. Shortly thereafter, I had a catastrophic tumble upon landing a big air off a huge kicker and broke my body. I could have died that day, according to my athletic therapist. The imprints my skull had made inside my helmet were deep enough to deduce that had I not been wearing it, I'd most likely not be here today.
Between the fear, the arthritis and the devastation that came with being unable to maintain my athleticism at a certain level, I stopped snowboarding completely and moved back home. As my plans differed from those which my father had intended for me, I was soon very unwelcome in his house and had to find another place to live, which was made all the more scary because of living with the remnants of a blunt force trauma to the brain. My eyes were completely bloodshot and dimmed and my body was a mess.
A boy took me in and would spend the next six years telling me how terrible a human being I was. The stress of the abuse caused my immune system to attack me and as my endocrinologist would put it later on, "It was touch and go for a while there."
Suddenly, my body was useless and completely broken. I wasn't allowed anything over a slow walk for fear that my heart would stop beating. I was put on relatively massive doses of thyroid suppressants and beta blockers, both of which gave me the constant urge to die but the lack of motivation to get on with it.
Up until that point, I had lived a fairly selfish life. I was nice to my friends, but I wrote people off extremely quickly, and I was quite angry and very repressed most of the time. I did go out of my way for friends though, even to the point of jeopardizing exam results to spend time with them if they needed me. I was always a loyal friend to a select few. And I was honest. I've always been honest, often overly honest to my own detriment.
But being practically incapacitated while in a relationship that offered no support or love, only belittlement and condescension, I decided somehow that maybe if I gave people what I needed, the world would be a better place (for me). And so I did. I gave them community, loyalty, love and compassion and with time, I began to realize how much of the world had been exactly in my shoes. I realized how many people felt unloved and uncared for. I realized how many people, regardless of their circumstances, were so burned by life that they too were shut down and angry.
And so, I thought it'd be nice to be the one person in maybe a couple of people's lives that might keep their hope alive, or at least give them somewhere to vent and somebody unexpected and reliable to lean on.
Over time, I started becoming more open, less angry, and far more empathetic. Life was just too short and leaving a legacy of bitterness just seemed so counterproductive to life itself.
The guy I lived with would grow to resent it, complaining that I spent too much time helping others and not enough time on him or on things that were profitable. But I started to realize that the more people communicated, the more they'd open up and the more burdens I could help them carry. People would tell me I empathized too much, but in my heart, I knew that without empathy, without living life from their perspective, all I was left with was my daily handful of pills that made me want to die. All I was left with was my abusive relationship that I was too broken to leave. It felt good to live in other people's shoes for a while, even as they struggled and in spite of the fact that some of their loved ones were dying.
I developed a heart for other people because my heart was so broken and mutilated. I developed a heart for other people for selfish reasons.
I gave my all. I gave my time, what little money I had and what little effort I could muster up. I gave everything such that they might feel loved and supported such that I might feel loved and supported, not through reciprocation but through the actual act of giving. It really was selfish.
And eventually, my confidence grew and I left the abusive situation. My health still wasn't 100%, and my doctor was on "wait and see" mode, making me go in for blood tests every two months. If I didn't start taking care of me, he said, I'd soon need radiation.
I worked on myself and tried to put the years of emotional abuse behind me to lower my stress and try to gain some optimism for the future, all the while, still giving all of myself to others.
I didn't drink or party, I didn't hoard my money, I gave whatever and whenever I could and I was always there if anybody needed me- I was a good girl. I really was. (Except maybe to myself...) By almost anybody's standards in this society, I was an unselfish giving person, but even still, after spending a few years feeling the brokenness around me, I started to feel like anything I did to help was never enough.
And then I met the Christian guy who asked me, "What's the point of being such a good girl if you don't believe in heaven? What do you get out of going above and beyond what any normal person would do to help anybody? You're like the perfect Christian only... you're not Christian."
Had I not had such a disdain for religion back then, I might have said, "Even the good I do as a non-Christian is still the work of Jesus, using my life to glorify God," but we all know that no atheist or agnostic on the planet would ever say that.
But that's what it was, and still is, only now that I'm a Christian, the Christians I meet have a tendency to call it legalism. It's the funniest and most disturbing thing in a way. I do set rules for myself. I always have, even when generosity is concerned. If I haven't helped somebody today yet, I go through my mental rolodex and figure out somebody who might need support and reach out. It's not legalism. It's not filling quotas for Jesus. It's purely selfish and always has been. Being a Christian doesn't change that; it just makes it a little more socially acceptable in Christian circles.
Suddenly, I'm in a circle of people who thinks they shouldn't drink or partake in other purely hedonistic activities and suddenly, I'm in a group of people who endeavors to be nice against their normal will and desires and therefore, I must be the same and have the same justifications for my behaviors.
But I don't.
And while it seems like legalistic behavior to the Christians I meet because I tend to set so many rules and obligations for myself, I was a rules and obligations girl long before I became a follower of Jesus. I didn't get into this pattern of behaviors because of my quest for Jesus, either. Jesus is relatively new to me. I didn't even get into this pattern because I wanted to be a good girl. I got into this pattern of rules and over-generosity because of my own brokenness and my desire to feel lovable. Granted, if any pattern of broken behavior is a good one to have, it's a pattern of unselfish selfishness and selfish generosity, but that doesn't make my broken motives anymore righteous.
However, the goal now, as a Christian, is not to tone myself down such that Christians stop thinking that I'm a legalist to the max (wouldn't that be legalism? :D), rather to redirect the response to God. The goal becomes redirecting the reaction I get away from me and my desire to be lovable and point it to God. I have to let go of my driving need to be loved, reflect the glory to God and be satisfied in His love alone.
But I'm a broken girl and no doubt I'll end up hoarding some for myself. I'll just have to make sure to, at the very least, thank Him for it later.
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
Normally I don't hang with religious people...
I'm an exception to a lot of rules. Either it's because I'm persistently defiant, relentlessly stubborn, or idealistically empathetic or maybe some other reason or maybe a whole bunch of reasons, but whatever the reason or combination of reasons, people tend to have a hard time categorizing me, or they quickly categorize me wrongly to suit their defense mechanisms because I'm some sort of threat in some way. Regardless, I don't seem to fit in in a lot of ways wherever fitting may be necessary or at least encouraged...
Religion is no exception.
A few people have told me recently that generally they don't enter into the company of my "kind", and also generally, their "kind" is "liberal".
"Equal rights for everybody! End ignorance! Down with the religious!"
You know what I mean?
I answered the guy who told me that normally, he doesn't "hang with religious people" that that was ok because I wasn't religious anyway. He didn't buy it.
Anyway, back to the gay issue. I've been meaning to blog about it again for a couple of weeks at least, but things got in the way (I'll blog about those later.. I really should be more disciplined in this blog, or less... I'd probably blog more if I was less disciplined.. But I digress.).
A few weeks ago, I had a soul-changing conversation with a theology pastor of one of my favorite churches about homosexuality. So the Bible says it's a sin. But a lot of things are a sin. This post is not about that. It's about my perception of my gay peeps being skewed by my "liberalism".
One of the arguments on the gay side as to why being gay is a natural, God-given, innate part of a character is, "Why would anybody choose a life that is more difficult? Why would they deliberately inflict this hardship on themselves?" And I used to wholeheartedly agree.
And then I became a Christian.
Do you know how hard it is to be a Christian in not only an atheist/agnostic society, but a staunchly anti-religious society? It's effing hard. I get belittled, made fun of, and my opinions, even if they were formed long before Jesus came to haunt me, are of no merit because I'm a Christian. But that's all ok. I mean, it's hard, but that's ok. But the hate I have a hard time with. The hate that I am exposed to makes this new lifelong endeavor nearly unbearable sometimes.
It's one thing to get hated on by strangers. But when your eyes are opened to the brutal hate in the people you love? That hurts. That hurts like hell.
I love them. I know them. I've shared life with them. They've been there for me and vice versa through great times and terrible times. And then one day, I cracked open a book somebody gave me, and I began to love them even more while they began to hate me and reduce me to a stereotype. It wasn't something I said. It wasn't an aspect of my personality. It was the new category I fit into that they didn't associate with. At all.
But I'm still me. I didn't get beaten with an ignorant stick and lose all my reason, accountability or justice. I didn't lose my common sense. All I did was doubt my doubts. All I did was question my doctrine or whether I had had any at all. All I did was break down the walls I had constructed around me out of hate and ignorance.
That's not to say that people without faith are hateful people, nor are they ignorant, just that maybe what separates them from exploring spirituality in the form of God is hate and anger, as was the case in my own life. And if you're atheist or agnostic and think I'm wrong, feel free to let me know, but if you do so by means of angry rantings, you're likely to prove my point rather than your own. Just sayin'.
Anyway, that's not my point. My point is I chose a path that was excessively difficult. The life I am choosing makes me cry. Often. But while Jesus might not make me happy all the time, He infuses my life with a joy that I would never have known otherwise.
I could have hidden it. I could have been a closet Christian, which in some ways I was, but if I truly believe it, then hiding it is, as the Bible says, like putting a basket over a flame. You just don't do that. You let the light glow openly.
The other thing the theology pastor pointed out was that I expect Jesus to move in my life and change the most fundamental things about my core. I expect Him to change parts of me that I was born with or that are so ingrained into me that they are just second nature at this point. I expect him to change things about me that make me who I am. And I don't apply the same standards to gay people. It's hard for me to write anything remotely close to "gay people choose to be gay" because that makes me cringe instinctively, but at the same time, I do believe there is a lot of brokenness in my gay friends' lives that goes unchecked because their sexuality is such a huge issue. Their concept of love and relationships is so skewed, but the majority of the people I know just pass it off as being part of the gay perception, rather than being as hard on it as we are towards our hetero friends' busted up views of love and relationships.
[Keep in mind that I'm not categorizing all the gay people in the world. I'm just talking about a few I know. And also keep in mind that I'm just one girl, with my own perceptions and opinions based on my own limited experience and my opinions rarely are of any consequence in the great realm of things, so it's not like what you might disagree with in this post is moving through the lives of thousands of people or anything... /end midpost disclaimer :D]
Can gay people have healthy relationships? I still believe they can, just as much as heteros can. But just like heteros, I think they get stuck in patterns of self-fulfilling prophesy and cycles of interference from damaging emotional baggage that they drag along behind them.
Can Jesus heal the baggage and the relational brokenness? Sure. But the problem lies with what I feel gay people need. The problem lies with the fact that I actually don't know what Jesus needs to heal in them.
And that, the theology pastor said to me, is a fierce double standard.
So what is my role as a Christian in a gay person's life?
After a couple of weeks of working on it and praying on it, I came to the conclusion that the role is the same as it is in anybody's life- I just have to show them Jesus. I have to live out the Gospel all day, every day, and IF God opens their heart to it, and gives me the means through which I might guide them, and IF He calls them to repentance and drastic life changes, then my role will become one of a more active support in that respect.
But until then, telling a gay person they're sinning is way counterproductive. For a person who doesn't know Jesus to not sin is religion. It's not a change of heart. It's not a new heart.
Somebody in a sermon (I can't even remember which church it was) said, "The goal is not to try so hard to stop sinning, but to be satisfied in God." The goal is not religion and good behaviors, it's Jesus and the Gospel.
So if my friends are gay, and if members of my family idolize money, and other friends of mine idolize relationships, and others still are prideful and lustful, working desperately and hopelessly to get them to alter these core behaviors and perceptions will be fruitless and laden with judgment and resentment. The only way to effect the drastic change required for real life-changing repentance is if it comes as a reaction and response to the grace and mercy of God.
So what's my role? To live in Jesus, love in Jesus, forgive in Jesus and all the while, making sure I point it all back to Him and make it known that it is all done for His glory and not for the people around me to glorify me as a good, kind, loving and generous person. The goal is to reflect God in my every day life such that the people around me are stirred into passion for their own souls and their own eternity.
That's how I see it for now anyway.
And frankly, is that not enough of a challenge to focus on?
Religion is no exception.
A few people have told me recently that generally they don't enter into the company of my "kind", and also generally, their "kind" is "liberal".
"Equal rights for everybody! End ignorance! Down with the religious!"
You know what I mean?
I answered the guy who told me that normally, he doesn't "hang with religious people" that that was ok because I wasn't religious anyway. He didn't buy it.
Anyway, back to the gay issue. I've been meaning to blog about it again for a couple of weeks at least, but things got in the way (I'll blog about those later.. I really should be more disciplined in this blog, or less... I'd probably blog more if I was less disciplined.. But I digress.).
A few weeks ago, I had a soul-changing conversation with a theology pastor of one of my favorite churches about homosexuality. So the Bible says it's a sin. But a lot of things are a sin. This post is not about that. It's about my perception of my gay peeps being skewed by my "liberalism".
One of the arguments on the gay side as to why being gay is a natural, God-given, innate part of a character is, "Why would anybody choose a life that is more difficult? Why would they deliberately inflict this hardship on themselves?" And I used to wholeheartedly agree.
And then I became a Christian.
Do you know how hard it is to be a Christian in not only an atheist/agnostic society, but a staunchly anti-religious society? It's effing hard. I get belittled, made fun of, and my opinions, even if they were formed long before Jesus came to haunt me, are of no merit because I'm a Christian. But that's all ok. I mean, it's hard, but that's ok. But the hate I have a hard time with. The hate that I am exposed to makes this new lifelong endeavor nearly unbearable sometimes.
It's one thing to get hated on by strangers. But when your eyes are opened to the brutal hate in the people you love? That hurts. That hurts like hell.
I love them. I know them. I've shared life with them. They've been there for me and vice versa through great times and terrible times. And then one day, I cracked open a book somebody gave me, and I began to love them even more while they began to hate me and reduce me to a stereotype. It wasn't something I said. It wasn't an aspect of my personality. It was the new category I fit into that they didn't associate with. At all.
But I'm still me. I didn't get beaten with an ignorant stick and lose all my reason, accountability or justice. I didn't lose my common sense. All I did was doubt my doubts. All I did was question my doctrine or whether I had had any at all. All I did was break down the walls I had constructed around me out of hate and ignorance.
That's not to say that people without faith are hateful people, nor are they ignorant, just that maybe what separates them from exploring spirituality in the form of God is hate and anger, as was the case in my own life. And if you're atheist or agnostic and think I'm wrong, feel free to let me know, but if you do so by means of angry rantings, you're likely to prove my point rather than your own. Just sayin'.
Anyway, that's not my point. My point is I chose a path that was excessively difficult. The life I am choosing makes me cry. Often. But while Jesus might not make me happy all the time, He infuses my life with a joy that I would never have known otherwise.
I could have hidden it. I could have been a closet Christian, which in some ways I was, but if I truly believe it, then hiding it is, as the Bible says, like putting a basket over a flame. You just don't do that. You let the light glow openly.
The other thing the theology pastor pointed out was that I expect Jesus to move in my life and change the most fundamental things about my core. I expect Him to change parts of me that I was born with or that are so ingrained into me that they are just second nature at this point. I expect him to change things about me that make me who I am. And I don't apply the same standards to gay people. It's hard for me to write anything remotely close to "gay people choose to be gay" because that makes me cringe instinctively, but at the same time, I do believe there is a lot of brokenness in my gay friends' lives that goes unchecked because their sexuality is such a huge issue. Their concept of love and relationships is so skewed, but the majority of the people I know just pass it off as being part of the gay perception, rather than being as hard on it as we are towards our hetero friends' busted up views of love and relationships.
[Keep in mind that I'm not categorizing all the gay people in the world. I'm just talking about a few I know. And also keep in mind that I'm just one girl, with my own perceptions and opinions based on my own limited experience and my opinions rarely are of any consequence in the great realm of things, so it's not like what you might disagree with in this post is moving through the lives of thousands of people or anything... /end midpost disclaimer :D]
Can gay people have healthy relationships? I still believe they can, just as much as heteros can. But just like heteros, I think they get stuck in patterns of self-fulfilling prophesy and cycles of interference from damaging emotional baggage that they drag along behind them.
Can Jesus heal the baggage and the relational brokenness? Sure. But the problem lies with what I feel gay people need. The problem lies with the fact that I actually don't know what Jesus needs to heal in them.
And that, the theology pastor said to me, is a fierce double standard.
So what is my role as a Christian in a gay person's life?
After a couple of weeks of working on it and praying on it, I came to the conclusion that the role is the same as it is in anybody's life- I just have to show them Jesus. I have to live out the Gospel all day, every day, and IF God opens their heart to it, and gives me the means through which I might guide them, and IF He calls them to repentance and drastic life changes, then my role will become one of a more active support in that respect.
But until then, telling a gay person they're sinning is way counterproductive. For a person who doesn't know Jesus to not sin is religion. It's not a change of heart. It's not a new heart.
Somebody in a sermon (I can't even remember which church it was) said, "The goal is not to try so hard to stop sinning, but to be satisfied in God." The goal is not religion and good behaviors, it's Jesus and the Gospel.
So if my friends are gay, and if members of my family idolize money, and other friends of mine idolize relationships, and others still are prideful and lustful, working desperately and hopelessly to get them to alter these core behaviors and perceptions will be fruitless and laden with judgment and resentment. The only way to effect the drastic change required for real life-changing repentance is if it comes as a reaction and response to the grace and mercy of God.
So what's my role? To live in Jesus, love in Jesus, forgive in Jesus and all the while, making sure I point it all back to Him and make it known that it is all done for His glory and not for the people around me to glorify me as a good, kind, loving and generous person. The goal is to reflect God in my every day life such that the people around me are stirred into passion for their own souls and their own eternity.
That's how I see it for now anyway.
And frankly, is that not enough of a challenge to focus on?
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