Stubbornness or Adventure

Last week I was in the mountains for some time away. I didn’t go to the mountains with a plan to hike to waterfalls, but most days, those were the trails I chose.

One day I found a great place to eat lunch by a waterfall. As I ate, I noticed leaves that, instead of being washed downstream, were stubbornly clinging to rock, even though water was rushing forcefully over them. I cannot explain how they managed to hold on tightly where they were.

Certainly, there is a time to hold fast, but also there is a time to let go. I thought about the adventure of riding the current of the stream, and how, if we are too intractable, we miss out on the grand adventure that is life. To let go makes one vulnerable, because we cannot know what lies downstream for us.

However, staying stuck to the rock means those leaves will slowly disintegrate right where they are. We can wither when we are stubborn. We can stick so hard to a belief, a way of living, a job, that we wither away in that position. I have certainly known people whose stubbornness kept them from experiencing growth and adventure in their lives. To take hold of life means a willingness to live in the flow, even when that flow takes us through difficult or painful changes. A life immune from risk isn’t much life at all.

Faith as Not Knowing

 

Some thoughts about faith, surprise, wonder, and worship.

In Trouble

I will be with them in trouble. . .

                                                                                                Psalm 91:15b

Psalm 91:1-2, 9-16 is part of the lectionary for the first Sunday of Lent. It would be easy to read these verses and focus on God as a protective bubble, insulating us from anything difficult or painful. We would like such a God!

This text actually connects with the gospel lesson for the week, Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness (Luke 4:1-13). In fact, Satan quotes from this psalm as he seeks to tempt Jesus to jump from the pinnacle of the Temple.

But this verse about God being with us in trouble fits my experience more accurately than angels not allowing me to trip on stones. Refuge is not so much about God being a protective bubble as it is that God is with us when the storms of life come and we must ride them out for a period of time—often of unknown duration.

It can be tempting in the hard season of life to look for a reason for its occurrence, to connect cause and effect so that we can make sense out of our suffering. What I have learned though, through my own hard seasons, is that there isn’t always a clear reason for my suffering. I can become lost in my anguish or I can grab hold of God in my anguish. Like an anchor that keeps me rooted, I may find that I still am battered by storm and waves, but in the depts. of my being, I know I am not alone.

One of Lent’s great gifts, in my opinion, is that if we enter it thoughtfully and intentionally, it matures our faith. To spend forty days contemplating Jesus’ sacrificial love for us as a model of how we sacrifice for others, should burst the bubble of God as protective container. But a God who is with us in trouble, who suffers both for us and with us—such a faith tells me that belief is no promise of exemption from suffering. The promise, rather, is that God is with us in our trouble, in our pain and turbulence. That’s a promise I can celebrate.

The Freedom of Mystery

Silence has many benefits. Because silence involves surrendering our need for words to control ourselves and others, it opens us to welcome mystery, to embrace the ability to say “I don’t know” without embarrassment.

Kitchen Table Wisdom, a wonderfully insightful book by Rachel Naomi Remen, MD, says “An answer is an invitation to stop thinking about something, to stop wondering.” Yet most of us are more desirous of answers than we are of mystery. We are heirs of the age of reason, where knowledge was elevated over mystery, and skepticism was a prized trait.

We see it within the Church when people attempt to turn the creation story into a science lesson, instead of reading it as the story of God’s generous love for us. We seek to prove it literally instead of embracing the truth of what it says for us—that God created us to be in relationship with God. Our desire for proof causes us to miss the wonder of the story.

I recently had the delight of attending a Jars of Clay concert. As they shared about their most recent album, they commented that it reflected their own growing willingness to live with mystery. The ability to be content with mystery is a sign of spiritual growth. To be comfortable with uncertainty requires faith. When believers have all the answers, they are no longer believers, but knowers. And if you know something, you don’t need faith.

If we lose the ability to wonder, we cannot experience awe. If we are certain, growth stops. And if growth stops, then death is not far behind. When there is nothing left to learn, there is nothing left. Life is gone. The boundaries are set, and one is imprisoned by certainty.

Maybe the church, and we who are part of the church, should focus less on providing answers and instead should invite wondering. Embracing mystery frees us to grow, to wonder and to be in love with the one who loves us and who craves our relationship.

Knowing We are Loved

I’ve been reflecting over the past weeks about holy longing. And while I believe that relationship with God is superficial without yearning and desire, the panting love described in Psalm 42:1, I haven’t really talked about how to get to the place where you are so caught up with desire for God that you long for God. Not for God’s actions, but for God alone. (There is a big difference in seeking God because you simply desire the presence of God and seeking God because you want God to do something).

What I have grown to realize for myself is that for me to desire God, I have to know in my heart of hearts how much God desires me, just the way I am. God’s unshakable love for us, when we can finally accept that, opens us up to return that love. We can talk all day long about how “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so” but there is a big difference between saying it and really, truly believing it, believing it to the point that we finally realize that we don’t have to DO anything for God to love us.

No matter how much we may say we believe we are saved by faith, not works, many of us live in a fear-based relationship with God. We fear that we don’t measure up, that we are not lovable by God unless we act a certain way. Maybe we don’t believe God loves us because we know what we have done or failed to do. I expect it is nigh on impossible to be passionately in love with a God whom you believe is ready to zap you for not “measuring up.”

When I was part of the 2-Year Academy for Spiritual Formation, I remember Dr. Roberta Bondi telling us that God does not love us in spite of ourselves. God loves us because of ourselves. Take some time this week and see if you really believe you are loved by God. Look at your actions for God. Are they motivated by love or by fear? If you are having a hard time truly believing that God is crazy in love with you, spend some time this week pondering Romans 5:8: But God shows his love for us, because while we were still sinners Christ died for us.

Can you believe that God loves you so much that God would die so you would not have to live with the fear of condemnation?

Knowing Who We Are

Colossians 3:12-17 was one of the lectionary readings for this past Sunday, and it packs a lot in a few verses. In fact, verse 12 alone is powerful: Therefore, as God’s choice, holy and loved, put on compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience.

It’s easy to overlook the first part of this verse and focus only on the traits listed. However, considering just the first part of this verse is powerful and awesome and humbling: God’s choice, holy and loved. That is who we are! We are God’s choice. We are holy and we are loved. If I could really believe and accept that about myself, then living out the traits of compassion, kindness humility, gentleness and patience become easier because I know who I am and am left with nothing to prove. Who I am and whose I am is settled. Who you are and whose you are is not open for debate. You and I are loved, holy and chosen.

What if we began 2013 with a mission to accept that for ourselves and then, to accept it for others? How would it really change us if we know, really know, that we are chosen, that we are holy and that we are loved?

Say these three sentences to yourself:

• ·         I am God’s choice.
• ·         I am holy.
• ·         I am loved.

Just to know this is enough. What a way to begin a new year!

Scandalous Faith

A group at our church is studying the book Christmas is not Your Birthday by Rev. Mike Slaughter.  As we studied the chapter on Scandalous Love yesterday, Slaughter pointed out that Mary would have been criticized and ostracized by her community. But when she traveled to visit with her cousin Elizabeth, Elizabeth’s first words to her are “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear!” (Luke 1:42). Elizabeth speaks words of encouragement to her young cousin, words that Mary desperately needed to hear.

Slaughter asks, “How many miracles are aborted because of put-downs, sarcasm, and negativity?” As we considered that question in our study, we wondered aloud how we as the church often respond when a member or a group comes enthusiastically with a new idea, a radical “what if we . . .” or a dream for something different. Are our church’s administrative structures the places where dreams go to die, or do we believe that God still acts through ordinary lay people? Do we believe in each other, that God lives in each one of us and that God can unleash God’s power in any one of us at any time? Or do we only believe in what we can actually see, which is often a shortage of money or people to support what the Spirit is urging us toward?

Slaughter observes that the example of Mary can be the example for any of us, that God can and does work God’s miracles through ordinary people who are open to hear God’s word for them and who will act on it. I am challenged to discern when I am called to be the place of gestation for God’s miracle, as Mary was, and when I am called to be Elizabeth, the encourager of the miracle in another. Or maybe I am called to be the midwife, who helps another birth the miracle that is in them. To be any of these requires that I pay attention, accept my role-whichever one it is, and believe that God is alive and at work in every one of us, even the unlikeliest of folks. How would our churches look if each of us did this? They would be scandalous places indeed, for they would be aflame with God’s Spirit!

Is It Possible to Believe?

They replied, "We want to perform God's works, too. What should we do?"
Jesus told them, "This is the only work God wants from you: Believe in the one he has sent."
                                                                                                            John 6:28-29


On the surface, it sounds so simple. But we would much rather do God's works than to believe in Jesus. 


We are creatures of action. We get our worth from doing things. It's the way our society values people. That's why children and older adults are not respected in our society.  They aren't the doers. Think about it. Children play and older adults are retired. We don't value play or retirement unless there is accomplishment in either. 


As Christians, we are more comfortable with a task to do than with this call to believe. Belief implies faith and faith implies waiting and waiting is not easy for us. We are used to meeting our own needs, not asking God to meet them. Shane Claiborne says we don't see miracles because we do it ourselves. If we need food we buy it. If we need healing we go to the doctor. We save for retirement instead of trusting God to provide, and while we are saving for retirement, the great need of the world now goes unmet.


Why don't we simply believe?
Believe that Jesus is the bread of life?
Believe that God will give us all we need?
Believe that miracles can and do happen?


Can I ever truly believe while living in this society? Trusting God for everything seems outlandish, radical, downright crazy. 


But Jesus say it is the only work God wants from us.


Can we even comprehend what our churches would be like if people really believe God would give us everything we need? I've sat in far too many finance committee meetings to know that this kind of belief is not prevalent in our church, and I expect in other churches as well. Because we don't have that kind of belief we also don't have sacrificial, some would say reckless, giving. We hold onto our resources because we don't believe God will provide.


I can hear folks saying, "Well remember the story of the woman on the roof in a flood who drowned because she was waiting for God to save her?" Is that the "gospel" we choose to believe? 


Jesus said anyone who puts a hand to the plow and then looks back is not fit for the Kingdom of God. Every time I fail to believe that God will provide, I am looking back.


Is it possible to live in this society and believe, when everything around us discourages us from belief?