:: In.a.Mirror.Dimly ::

I once heard an interview with comedian Dennis Leary who shared that his grade school teacher told him that anyone could be president. He returned home that day and asked his dad, “Can anyone be president?”

“Sure, anyone can,” his dad replied.

“Could I be president?” young Dennis asked.

His dad snorted and replied, “Are you kidding me?”

I like conversations like that because Leary’s father didn’t necessarily discourage him from pursuing a successful career. He simply understood who his son is and where he would be successful—i. e. not politics.

Why I Want to Fail

I have a little hobby on Twitter where I unfollow everyone who posts pithy motivational sayings about never giving up, never quitting, and failure being a choice we don’t have to make. I wrote about this a little while back in a post called Jesus Hates the Smell of Failure, and I wanted to follow up with some additional thoughts about the pitfalls of “never” giving up.

For instance, I want to fail. I don’t want to exclusively fail, but I’ve been thinking lately that I want God to expose everything that is not part of his plan for my life. I want anything outside of his plans for me to wither and die.

Arriving at this point wasn’t easy.

The Success I Crave: God’s Path and Provision

After seeing a friend of mine receive some fresh opportunities from out of the blue, I began to think, “Gosh, I wish God would affirm my direction in life like that!” Some days I feel like I’m just slogging along with the same old list of things to do. I begin to wonder if anything is going to change, if something big will ever happen again.

Sitting down in church yesterday, I recalled that God had actually affirmed a new project in several ways. In fact, he had even provided the way to develop it that I’ve always craved. In many ways, God has affirmed and provided for me. I had just missed it.

That startled me. How dense could I be? God has already been providing for the path he wants me to follow?

The next obvious question was this: Am I missing anything else?

Why yes, there was. Of course there was. A note from a friend later in the day affirmed something else I’ve been working on.

As soon as I began to ask God to cut off anything that wasn’t from him and to affirm anything that was from him, I began to see his fingerprints in several key areas of my life. I have no doubt that I’ll always find new paths to follow. I need to keep praying this prayer: “Frustrate what is not from you, affirm and provide for anything that is part of your plan.”

I pray that I will be frustrated, that plans will fail, and that I’ll sing God’s praises while walking through the ruins.

May God frustrate us until the day he reveals the path laid out for us. May God give us grace, patience, and courage to wait on his timing, to submit to his process, and to leap at the opportunity when the time comes.

I was careful to avoid saying that I would never go to church again, but it was certainly hard to imagine how it would ever happen again. Nine years ago I left a season of rooted stability in my faith and entered into a six-year season of transition into another expression of Christianity.

The basics remained the same, but over that time my perceptions of the church, salvation, the mission of God, the ministry of the church, and my own life calling passed through a major, major overhaul. I don’t know if you’ve ever done major renovations on a house before, but much like house renovations, my faith renovations were not pretty.

I was angry, frustrated, and disappointed at various times. I had a hard time tolerating those who remained rooted with their faith in tact. Sometimes I struck out at them, and sometimes they struck out at me for asking unsettling questions.

I’m now in a season of relative stability, rooted in a take on God that fits my limited perspective. As I look back over the past nine years of transition, I can see how others around me are in similar seasons of being either rooted or transitioning.

• Some have been disappointed by Christianity for various reasons and left the faith.
• Some have switched from one denomination to another.
• Some are still wandering.
• Some have found loving Christian community in new places that had previously been off their radar.

If we hope to keep the unity of Christ in the midst of our divisions, we need to understand these seasons. Besides our divisions over beliefs and practices, we can also divide over our seasons of belief.

At the risk of oversimplifying things, here are three seasons I have observed:

The Rooted Season of Faith

Many of us are in a rooted season in our faith where we have a certain level of comfort with our understanding of the Bible, our spiritual practices, and the ways we serve others. Those who are rooted need to be aware of welcoming those who are sprouting in their faith and have yet to find their place, while also remaining patient with those who are being transplanted.

The Transplant Season of Faith

For some of us who have been rooted in one spot for a while, sometimes the old answers and ways of doing things stop making sense. We all have our different reasons for pulling up our roots and moving elsewhere, though sometimes wider trends emerge.

Transplants are often in vulnerable positions, as they don’t feel like they fit anywhere, their beliefs have been shaken in some way, and they may be hurting enough to become combative. The hardest thing for a rooted person is patiently loving an argumentative transplant. I reached a point during my own transplant process that I actually couldn’t go to church for a season because I wasn’t in a healthy place to deal with it.

Besides spreading conflict, another problem with transplants is they sometimes rush into something new without dealing with their previous hurts and disappointments. I saw this a lot with folks who were disappointed by the church and then jumped right into house churches or emerging churches without seeking healing first.

The Sprouting Season of Faith

On the opposite end of the spectrum from the more jaded transplants are the sprouts, Christians who are still enthusiastic about their faith. The danger with sprouts is transplants can snuff out their zeal with their grievances, while those who are rooted may fail to reach out to them and nurture them in the faith.

A sprout can wither easily and get trampled down if it isn’t guarded with care. Sprouts will have lots of questions and they may feel overwhelmed by the maturity of those with deep roots. Those who are rooted must make sure they protect the sprouts from storms and hard times, ensuring they receive the nourishment from God they need so badly.

Besides different beliefs and practices, Christians differ with their seasons of faith. I’m sure there are folks who would claim to be hybrids or something different altogether, but these three seasons keep coming up for me. When we understand the seasons of faith of those in our communities, we’ll be able to love them right where they’re at today.

Do these seasons of faith make sense to you?

Have you passed through a season of transition or of being rooted?

When I saw the enormous flowers toppling over our Christmas cactus on the dining room table for the first time this morning, I knew I had a problem. How long had those blooms been sitting right under my nose while I sat at the table reading, browsing the internet, or staring dumbly at my cup of coffee?

It was like God gave me a pleasant little metaphor of how I approach the Christmas season. It usually looks something like this.

The first Sunday of Advent hits like an unexpected tidal wave. It throws me into a panic because I need to start shopping and getting ready for a spiritually significant Christmas. I now have a deadline. If I can’t get my gifts purchased and wrapped, as well as arrive at a spiritual epiphany by December 25th, I fear that the universe will start to unravel and I’ll be sent into exile—or something like that.

Dread often gives way to guilt until December 25th passes and I’m filled with nostalgia for the glories of Christmas. Ah, I can’t wait until next year…

It struck me yesterday that dreading the arrival of Christmas is sound evidence that my priorities are in the wrong place.

I still love buying gifts for family members, but I don’t want to dread Christmas. I want to enjoy this season of prayer and meditation on God’s love for us. Reading through a daily Advent Devotional has helped immensely. However, I’m still pretty confident that I can screw things up with overblown expectations and busy schedules.

Just as I schedule time to get my work done, to do the dishes, and to even shop, I’ve been working on scheduling time to wait on the Lord. I’m not even hoping that anything in particular will happen.

My goal is to wait in peace and hope, letting God do as he pleases. If I only end up waiting better for the season of Advent, then perhaps I’ll have learned something valuable in the process.

This post is part of Bonnie Gray’s Thursday Faith Jam. Check out her post today: Be Fully Present

I wasn’t going to share this on my blog. My only hope is that God can be glorified by me telling it. I assure you that I’m no saint. I’ve got my issues, but if God can speak through a donkey, he can use me. Here we go…

The comments on a recent blog post impressed on me the crisis we have today when it comes to hearing from the Holy Spirit—namely, there are so many frauds out there, many of us don’t know what it’s like to genuinely hear from God.

Here is my story:

One night I ran out for some lumber and groceries. After picking up some lumber and pocket cash at Lowe’s, I stopped by Aldi for a few things. While checking out, the woman in front of me mentioned “stamps.”

These were food stamps, not postage stamps. She had a full cart, clearly buying food for a large family. When it came time to pay, she started rooting through her purse for change. She wasn’t paying exact change just to be anal like me. She was just trying to pay her bill.

I heard God tell me, “Take out your wallet.” I did. Thumbing through the ones and fives, I heard God speak again.

“Not those. A Twenty.”

Read the rest of this entry »

As a veteran of Catholic elementary school and a survivor of fundamentalism, I like to think of myself as rather experienced in the realm of poorly exercised authority. My elementary school seemed to teem with sadistic teachers who only knew how to punish us in groups because of the one undiagnosed ADD kid.

At their worst, the fundamentalists figured out a way to make the Bible feel like my sadistic Catholic school teachers—a guide to the punishments we’re bound to receive unless we’re perfect. As a child, most of the religious authority figures I knew were rather heavy on the guilt and punishment end of things, save for a few women who were amazing teachers and Christians.

Attaching the word “loving” with authority strikes me as impossible in some unguarded moments, and yet, for Christians, this is really the only way authority truly works.

Read the rest of this entry »

One of my fondest memories of seminary is lunch time. The first generation Korean students gathered at a table and opened their Tupper wares to share with one another. I was even invited to pick up some chop sticks in join them at times.

Meanwhile, the occasional middle-aged pastor who had forgotten to bring a lunch would survey the vending machines with dread, knowing that the cheeseburger in a plastic bag would be his best option. He delayed that decision as long as possible.

Once a month we had a guest speaker come for a pizza lunch. Just about the entire seminary turned out for these events, filling the cafeteria and giving us all a chance to see each other and to catch up. These lunches gave us something that is essential when a bunch of people from a variety of backgrounds and relationships gather together to talk about God: relationships.

Do We Speak Truth in Relationships?

I love the way that ideas and conversations can spread on the internet, but the most significant drawback is the relational void that can occur in some online “conversations.” That isn’t to say that relationships can’t happen—they do. I’m just saying that we can now enter into conversations where we know nothing of the people participating in them.

Consequently, we don’t understand where someone is coming from and we’re not all that invested in seeking the best for that person. We just see a pile of text that challenges something important to us. There’s no prospect of seeing that pile of text at the next community lunch.

The Difference That Relationships Make

I’m certainly all for sharing my ideas online and hearing out those who disagree with me. However, I’ve observed some interesting dynamics. For example, though I’m a committed Arminian, many of my closest friends since childhood remain Calvinists. Although my childhood church is complementarian in their views toward women, and I have changed to egalitarian, I would pay close attention to the opinions of my pastors should they even contact me with a concern about my writing.

It actually can be quite easy to be friends with people we know who believe differently from us. Of course we all have experienced exceptions to this.

Who Should We Listen To?

As a general rule, I put the most stock in the opinions of the people who know me the best. Starting with my wife and some family members, I also pay close attention to friends, pastors, and colleagues. It is both unhealthy and impossible to acknowledge every opinion online as a kind of authority for our lives, and yet, it’s often tempting to do just that—even if we think we need to challenge these voices.

Who Should We Ignore

The tricky part about blogging is that I need to remain open to conversations with folks from a variety of perspectives, but I also can’t let a challenge from someone who doesn’t know me rattle my cage. I can’t lose sleep over the stuff coming from denominational leaders, celebrity pastors, and groups that would condemn someone like me.

They’re free to believe as they wish and I recognize their place in the church, but their critiques are also irrelevant to me. They have nothing invested in my own spiritual growth or the growth of my community, and therefore the best thing I can do is to seek accountability among those who desire to see myself and my community grow. While I seek guidance from perspectives outside of those who agree with me, a relational investment is critical.

Recognizing the Benefits of Authority

Having set some boundaries around the opinions I care most about, I want to make it clear that within the confines of relationships and becoming personally invested in one another, I also highly value the place of authority. We all need pastors and friends who care enough about us to challenge us to change. Tomorrow I’ll write about the freedom that comes from loving, relational authority.

This Sunday marks the beginning of Advent, and I’ve asked Christine Sine, an author and blogger at God Space, one of the best Advent and Lent resources around, to share a guest post about the Advent Season.  She most recently edited a collection of brief devotions for Advent and beyond called Waiting for the Light:

The Christian calendar begins at the end of November, with the season of Advent and our preparation for the coming of the Christ child at Christmas. This season means different things to different people.

For some the season of Advent is just a time to enter into the hype of consumer binging and overindulgence. For those of us who follow Christ, this season is meant to have a different focus. This is the season when we all should await the coming of Christ in quiet expectation.  We don’t just await his coming to us as a baby, we enter into the anticipation of the coming of a Savior who not only brings personal salvation for those who choose to follow him but who will also redeem all creation with love and righteousness. 

This is also the season when we anticipate the coming of a God who brings justice for the poor and freedom for the oppressed and judgment for the oppressors.  For still others it is the remembrance of a child whose birth two thousand years ago radically refocused our world.

Christians of all traditions are discovering the value of taking time in the days that lead up to Christmas to break away from the consumer frenzy of our culture and prepare their hearts and minds for the coming of Christ.  Waiting for the Light is a book that responds to this desire. It is more than a devotional; it is a complete guide to the Advent and Christmas seasons providing liturgies, weekly activities and daily reflections to equip and nourish us throughout the season. Reflections are contributed by bloggers across the globe who love God and love to share their faith with others.

And if you want to spend more time in quiet reflection during this season you may also like to follow along at http://godspace.wordpress.com where we will continue to add new thoughts on the theme Jesus is Coming – What Do We Expect?

I have something surprising, if not shocking to share with you. It’s something so astounding, that you may not even believe me.

Nothing can quite prepare you for this. So I’ll just go ahead and say it:

There are Christians who love Jesus, serve Jesus, and are even saved by Jesus who… disagree with me.

I know, I know, that is shocking news for you. I sometimes find it hard to believe some days.

There are divisions in the church that separate the sheep from the goats, but these divisions don’t necessarily lead to breaks in our fellowship with one another—even if these divisions take issue with my awesome perspective…

If you’ve read my book Coffeehouse Theology, you know that I’m a firm advocate for dialogue with other Christian perspectives. In fact, the diversity of Christian views available makes the Christian faith stronger in today’s context.

Over the past year I’ve given a lot of time to thinking over redemptive approaches to others, and I think division itself can play a somewhat redemptive function, provided we know when to unite.

My grandparents used to have this huge German Shepherd. They loved that dog, but it growled at the grandkids. Every time we came over, the dog was relocated upstairs. We were divided on our views and experiences of the dog, but for the sake of visiting with each other, the dog was hustled upstairs and locked away.

There are some issues in Christianity today where we have sharp disagreements, and so far as I can tell, we’ll always be divided to a certain degree. We can play around with our word choice here, but I think the word “divided” is in the only way I can honestly describe the nature of some debates.

I’ve seen some Christians do admirable work at fostering dialogue and understanding. There is real value to such dialogue, but I’m curious whether each side enters dialogue thinking, “If I just expressed my views perfectly, those other dummies will change their minds.”

There simply are issues where Christians both love Jesus and remain divided. In most cases that come to mind, civil dialogue won’t bring us to a place where many on either side will change their minds.

Our divisions are real, but we don’t have to let them consume us.

Our divisions are real, but they don’t have to cut us off from one another.

Our divisions are real, but we can actually remain united in spite of them.

For the foreseeable future, I don’t see myself attending a church where women aren’t allowed to teach. I will continue to acknowledge spiritual gifts and healings. I can’t imagine ever again tying the Republican party to my Christian faith. I don’t see the point in trying to ban same sex marriage, but I know I’m not as progressive on this issue as many of my left-leaning friends.

Those are just a few of the issues where I differ from some other Christians that I know. These are issues that “divide” us on one level, but I don’t have to let them get in the way of what actually unites us.

Let’s face it, we’re going to hang on to different theologies, support different cases, and attend different churches. The solution isn’t getting everyone on the same page, and sometimes the solution isn’t always dialogue.

Christian unity does not come from our heads. Unity isn’t a list of bullet points. Unity comes from the life of God’s Spirit within us. Our fights and divisions can’t undo the presence of God among his people.

However, we can decide that our issues and divisions are more important than God’s Spirit. We can fail to recognize the means by which God has made us one—sabotaging his uniting work among us in spite of our divisions.

If someone is good enough for God’s dwelling Spirit, then who am I say I’m too good, too right, or too “just” to have fellowship? How could I ever think I have higher standards than God? 

I remember the look on my coach’s face as I threw one ball after another—as in, the opposite of a strike. He mixed a “Why me?” sort of despair with a tinge of amusement—perhaps it had to do with the absurdity that his starting pitcher couldn’t throw a strike in a play off game.

The stakes weren’t exactly high in the grand scheme of things. I was pitching in an eighth grade baseball game, but for me, it was one of the most humiliating moments of my life. I remember hitting rock bottom as my coach made an audible snide remark about me as yet another batter trotted to first base.

We often see coaches walk out to the mound to advise struggling pitchers in the majors. As much as I hated my coach at that moment, I just wanted help. What was I doing wrong? I’d practiced over and over again to the point that I knew how to throw strikes. A pre-game panic attack had thrown me into a tailspin, and I didn’t know how to salvage my form.

Looking back, I can see that my problems started long before that game. Our coach didn’t really teach our team all that much. He could hit ground balls and fly balls in practice, but I had to teach myself how to throw a fastball, slider, and changeup. I even taught myself how to throw  a knuckle ball.

Previous to that playoff game, I just showed up and pitched. My coach literally taught me nothing. He didn’t invest anything in me, and when I fell to pieces, he just stepped back and watched.

My step-dad was the one person who actually invested anything in my young, short-lived baseball career in Jr. High. He taught me a few things about how to hit, and his lessons paid off. In one game he stood behind the batting cage and said, “Think of that pitch as a big grapefruit.”

It never occurred to me that baseballs could be compared to grapefruits. How does that help anyone? I’d think that a grapefruit would just explode on contact into a sticky but delicious snack. Humoring him, I told myself that the incoming pitch was, in fact, a large grapefruit.

In those seconds, I no longer saw a tiny, spinning baseball with red stitches. I saw an enormous yellow grapefruit that had been lobbed before me and was just begging to be clobbered. I swatted that ball with everything I had, sending it way beyond the centerfielder. I remember my step-dad yelling, “Yes!” as I took off for first base.

It felt good to have his support at that moment, something so different from that other time on the pitching mound when I couldn’t throw a strike. Someone wanted me to succeed. He invested in me, stood with me in my moment of challenge, and celebrated when I succeeded.

I write all of this not by way of publicly chronicling my stellar baseball career. I assure you, these are the highlights—save for the one game where I really got my knuckleball going. I wanted to talk about the feeling you get when someone is supporting you and working hard to help you succeed.

To say that God isn’t like a Jr. High baseball coach ventures toward the obvious, but I honestly think that I sometimes turn God into this smug, wait-and-see coach who is just watching us fall apart from the sidelines. God wants us to succeed because he expects that of us, but it’s tempting to think that he could take us or leave us depending on our performance.

God doesn’t want failures… or does he?

I had already made up my mind to write about this topic today, and then I read Ezekiel 18 this morning. Check it out. It’s a beautiful statement by God about wanting his people to succeed, forgiving them when they fail, and welcoming them back.

God is deeply invested in you and me because he is passionate for his people—even if we fail. His Spirit is here with us because he’s with us in the game. He’s empowering us, cheering us on, and dusting us off when we fall and sulk back to him.

We can go back to God after we fail because he’s right there with us, hoping that we’ll come to our senses and turn our “no’s” into “yes’s.” As long as you have today, your “no” does not have to be final. Your fail does not define you.

Stop looking at your failure. Look up to God because he’s leaving the sidelines where you expected to find him. He’s coming out to help you.

He was a no name assistant on a team full high profile talent. His superiors were household names throughout town. They were the people everyone talked about and looked up to.

One devastating day, this no name member of the team saw one of his superiors commit a horrible crime. Usually the witness of a crime calls the police. These isn’t much to debate here. However, he didn’t reach for a telephone. He thought too much, and we’re left to speculate on what went through his mind…

If he called the police, there would be a scandal. The lowly assistant would receive criticism as a whistle blower. There would be allegations made, the superior would most likely deny them, and who knows what would happen in the midst of a trial. It was his word against the word of a superior. Who would believe him?

To make matters worse, he would most likely be fired or marginalized. Who would hire a whistleblower who didn’t know his place?

What should a lowly, assistant do if he wants to protect himself?

There are easy ways out and half measures available, and he opted for that route. He followed the kind of procedures you’d observe when dealing with financial indiscretions, not a major crime. He reported the crime to his superiors, and they followed the same strategy of doing something without doing enough.

In the process, the no name assistant was able to take some kind of action without appearing disloyal. He told his other superiors without causing a national scandal. He protected himself. Who doesn’t want to protect himself?

Selfishness shines through in this story. It is a cancer that prevents us from seeing the world through the eyes of others, the victims and the weak. Selfishness seeks to ensure our own safety and security above the well-being of others. It asks, “What’s right for me?” regardless of the consequences to others.

I confess that I often want to protect myself, to preserve my own comfort at the expense of others. I don’t like the thought of taking a stand and alienating myself among the people I like.

It never feels good to be alienated or rejected by your own people, to lose colleagues because you don’t see eye to eye on ethical matters, let alone a crime. So, instead of being rejected by my own tribe, I look for half-measures, easy ways out that can preserve a shred of my integrity without offending “good people.”

Jesus tells us to love our enemies.

The prophets demand that we pay our workers fair wages.

God tells us that he hates injustice.

I read these words and look for easy ways out. I don’t want to choose a path that is too costly. I look for half-measures. I don’t want to be the whistleblower who challenges the rest of my team.

It’s all so clear when the story involves sex abuse and a college football team, but when it comes down to my views on war, the policies I protest, the shopping decisions I make, the ways I donate money, etc… the lines become murky again.

Should they?

It may help to remember that ten or twenty years from now, we’ll all look back at our lives and begin to ask ourselves, “Did I choose the right course or did I only try to protect myself?” With the benefit of hindsight, we’ll see the fruit that comes from our decisions. We’ll see whether we benefited from self-preservation or from serving and preserving others.

May God give us the courage to protect those who are vulnerable and abused.