Belief. The deep-down kind.

First, can I say that my general disposition has dramatically improved with the weather here in Minnesota over the last week or two. For my seasonally affected comrades out there, you’ll understand… it’s like a weight off my chest. I’m writing this out on the back porch and I can smell dirt for the first time in 5 months. But this state is always moody and I’m not about to be lulled into another winter here. Georgia here I come!!

I’m in John 7. For the last couple weeks, God has been saying to me, “bathe in John”. So I’ve been focusing on small chunks. It certainly is an “immersable” book. Lots of rich stuff getting right at the core of what I feel and believe about Jesus. Today, I’m thinking about belief.

3 Jesus’ brothers said to him, “Leave Galilee and go to Judea, so that your disciples there may see the works you do. 4 No one who wants to become a public figure acts in secret. Since you are doing these things, show yourself to the world.” 5 For even his own brothers did not believe in him.

Sound familiar? It does to me. Advice from a skeptic. “Anyone who wants to become a _________, does __________, so you should _________.” Jesus’ own flesh and blood held him at arm’s length. They couldn’t deny that he was special, and perhaps they thought he was sent from God. But opinion and belief are two different things. It’s my opinion that God is powerful, but ask me to pray for something concrete and I hesitate. I’m confronted with a fear of disappointment rooted in the deep-seated belief that God won’t show up, that he’ll leave me hanging.

Jesus’ response to them isn’t to convince them that he knows what he’s doing. He knows the problem isn’t with their cognition or his communication with them, but in their fundamental beliefs about him.

 6 Therefore Jesus told them, “My time is not yet here; for you any time will do. 7 The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify that its works are evil. 8 You go to the festival. I am not going up to this festival, because my time has not yet fully come.”

He gives them the information: the reason for his behavior. But he doesn’t try to convince them. He is patient and realistic. His actions will speak louder than his words. He must show his brothers who he is because they won’t believe it otherwise.

So what made the difference for me on those occasions that I ignored my core belief about God and acted on what I thought about God? Experience and desperate hope I suppose. I would see God work in undeniable ways through some life experience and extrapolate with desperate hope that God could and would do more. My hope and yearning outweighed my fear of disappointment. Guess what? I discovered that God DID work in cool ways when I did that. And even when He didn’t work (or I didn’t understand the way he worked), it wasn’t as big a deal as I had feared. It wasn’t so disappointing after all. In fact, I kind of enjoyed living on faith, even the result wasn’t what I expected.

I mean, if I were expecting Jesus to be something He’s not, then I’ll be rightly disappointed. But by reading the bible and spending time with Him every day, I get more familiar with what he promises and claims to be. And among those promises is PLENTY of crazy stuff to keep me on my toes, living a radically different lifestyle, expecting WAY more out of Him than I do now. I’m living in the tension of the Kingdom-among-us and the Kingdom-not-yet-here. But even walking that tension I find my core beliefs about Jesus are emaciated and paltry compared with the robust “feast on me” attitude he invites me to adopt.

Why I'm still a Christian. Honestly (Part 2).

Okay, a few more reasons I still do the Jesus-follower thing…

5. Other folks like Jesus too. Okay, it's not just Americans who accept this whole born-again, bible-believing, Jesus gig. I get that now. In fact I keep hearing from and about folks in radically different cultures loving Jesus for a lot of the same reasons I do. I know sometimes there's cultural colonization that happens with Western missionaries. But other times the gospel strikes at the heart of a person's culture quite on its own merit. One of the most humbling stories I’ve ever heard is from a Chinese guy who had virtually NO contact with missionaries or other Christians discovering Jesus and then becoming an outlaw for his faith. I also keep hearing (second AND first-hand) about Muslims who have crazy random dreams about Jesus saying stuff like “follow me, I am the way, etc” and start trusting him (often while remaining “Muslim” in their communities) without ANY contact to Christians or the West. All that to say… to negate the personal and corporate experiences of a hundred divergent cultures based on my culture’s enlightened pluralistic outlook seems... colonial. It seems wiser to be skeptical of American pluralism.

6. It’s deep, not wide. One of my bible favs is, “God chose the foolish thing of this world to shame the wise.” God doesn’t seem interested in imparting secret knowledge to really smart folks. Rather he made himself knowable to kids and quantum theorists alike. The gospel doesn’t deal primarily with the mind, body or emotions (though they’re all really important), but with the human spirit which is ALWAYS able to respond to God’s Spirit regardless of mental aptitude or anything else. In my hangout time with Jesus, I don’t learn important new truths. I just learn and relearn the importance of old truths I knew when I was 8. One of my friends just went to a Christian Smartypants Conference (my name for it) talking about our approach to culture and its framework-inverting ministry implications. He said it was really deep and profound, but by the end the most important thing he learned was, “God is good.” It made him laugh. Me too. My most profound epiphanies are always moments of spiritual “no DUH!” To me, that speaks well for the gospel. Like a spiritual E=MC2, it’s head-scratchingly simple… shallow enough to wade in, deep enough to drown in.

7. I’m a nicer guy with Jesus. I’m always disturbed by what I’d do if I didn’t love Jesus. And believe me, it’s worse than the zany (and sometimes misguided) things I do because I DO love him. If I believed I was a cosmic orphan making my own way through life, I don’t think any legalism or ideology would be strong enough to restrain me from being a self-centered flesh-pot. But the shame-free wooing of God’s relentless love-pursuit (reference the shameless way the “father” in Jesus’ stories runs toward the wayward son) captures my heart and imagination. So yeah, I try to take in and pour out that Superlove on other folks. I usually suck at it, but I’m still trying. I try to swallow my pride, love my family, cry a lot, hope a lot, hang out with messy folks, and let go of anxiety that would make me a real scrooge if I didn’t think God had my back. Sure, maybe you can do a lot of the same stuff just by “trusting the universe” or “thinking positive” or hoping against hope that all your dreams will come true… but the Happy-thoughts gospel just isn’t potent enough stuff for me. No sir. Jesus is my drug of choice. Perhaps the sacrifice imagery of Jesus on the cross is hopelessly Draconian, but to me it’s the ultimate wellspring of hope, inspiration, and trans-Nate behavior.

Hmmmm…. will there be a part 3? Maybe so! You can tell, this is no theological manifesto… just my most potent personal reasons for being Christian. I hope you can understand (even if you don’t share my enthusiasm) why I would sell my life down the river for this stuff. Like Jim Elliot said, “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.” Anyway, at this point in my life, I really can’t imagine going a different direction. I think that made my agnostic friend sad… given what a “bright young man” I am. I suppose I can’t please everyone.

Why I'm still a Christian. Honestly (Part 1).

A friend recently told me agnosticism is the most honest theological position out there. Well... I might have agreed with him once, but not now. Here is my most un-Christiany explanation of why I still love Jesus, read the bible, and go to church. I'll keep it personal.

I was born into this subculture of American evangelicalism. But I've never been given to blind acceptance. Maybe it's because I was "securely attached" or maybe I just prefer my beliefs to feel uber-real and personal. So when I was 15, I branched out. I sampled a bit of teenage narcissism, grayed a few of my parents' hairs, and got into more trouble than is appropriate to blog about. But every moment, I somehow knew I would return to my Christian faith. I'll admit I never really wanted to leave Christianity.

A more serious season of doubt came a few years ago. I was nearly swallowed alive by the crazy epistemological assertions of Christianity. I mean, if I could know so little about ANYTHING, how could I claim to have specific knowledge about the creator, much less claim to know him personally and possess his blueprint for all human history. I also wrestled with the cultural baggage of the faith. Was I culturally conditioned to accept this crazy upside-down Christian gospel? Was Karma or an Islamic view of God more sensible than grace? Those 6 months were dark, but even then I admit I never wanted to leave my faith for permanent agnosticism.

But why? What primal thing beyond reason and logic compels me toward the Christian faith? Beyond the comfort of the familiar, what deep-seated need did the Christian gospel continue to meet in me even when the whole thing seems like medieval nonsense? Here's my running list in no particular order...

1. The gospel makes me feel "seen". I'll spare you the sappy middle-child saga. But suffice it to say it's powerful for me to feel known. And known is exactly what I feel in a personal relationship with God. Some of my most ass-kickingest times with Jesus are when I feel like he gets me and chooses to relate with me accordingly. Rather than bestowing his Jesus-mojo on all humanity, I think he relates to each person individually and I like that. God is not a one-size-fits-all Father just keeping his head above water with a billion kids on his hands. In my experience, agnosticism is a great orphan-maker. But Jesus makes me part of a family.

2. It's not fair and that's a good thing. I mean really. It's not fair that God doesn't just measure good and bad deeds on a scale. It's not fair that "good people" can go to hell while a murderer begging forgiveness on death row would actually receive it (see Luke 18). Thankfully, I know I'm a mess I'm not about to say my messedupness is everybody else's fault. I know how damning my actions (and attitudes) are and I see how badly a "fair" system would work out for me. So I suppose I'm happy to accept grace, offensive as it can be.

3. The gospel is art. I just think the whole thing is awfully pretty. It's such a compelling and curious story: God relentlessly pursuing people, taking the initiative, turning the created order on its head. Death through life, glory through humiliation, strength through weakness. I'm a sucker for gospel paradoxes.

4. Miracles are real. I think I've seen enough to substantiate that: legs growing, spines aligning, prophecies fulfilling.... in front of me. If I can accept those "little" miracles, maybe I can reasonably accept some wild claims from trusted sources of legit resurrections, exorcisms, healings, and plenty of other stuff for which "psychosomatic" explanations would be a hell of a leap of faith. The funny thing to me though is that the miracles people claim happen "in Jesus name" are a totally different breed than the ones that happen in other religious systems. Other worldviews contain accounts of crazy human feats, bizarre ghost stories, messages in the clouds, and the like. But the Christian stories seem to swallow all others whole. I just haven't heard ANY hint of an invoke-able spiritual authority greater than Jesus.

Well, enough for now. My list keeps growing…. Stay tuned for part 2.

A little life update...

Thought you'd like a couple updates:

Levi slept 7.5 hours a couple nights ago. Hurrah! Mom and Dad are noticeably more agreeable, even when he "only" sleeps in 4 hour stretches. He is full of smiles for anyone who will look him in the eye, loves to play little games and be sung to, HATES being alone, and is constant wiggling his arms and legs. Relational, happy, easy.

Debra and I caved in to that hallmark of grownup life and joined a gym (the YMCA). It's been a big blessing as the childcare is free, it gives us time together while exercising (alone time is currently at a premium for us) and there are times I'll drop the kids off and just work on WDA stuff in the adjoining lounge.

My new responsibilities with WDA (namely, spearheading the international part of the blog on their website) is going well. It's familiarizing me with the awesome work we do overseas and I'm able to give a "face" to the ministry I'll be investing my life in. However (and I ask your prayers in this) I’ve been “encouraged” to make sure my time doesn’t get diverted from support-raising. It would be so easy to get sucked into ministry and try to live on our paltry income… but then we’d never get to Georgia (much less Africa). So I’m trying trying trying to keep my eyes on reaching our income goal by the end of summer. Pray for miracles!!

My new mini-job at Faith Covenant is going well. I led my first Sunday a couple weeks ago and I realized that I really love leading worship. The chance to help craft a service with lots of inviting spaces for the Holy Spirit to move is a fun and exciting task.

It’s also giving me the chance to meet people. This week alone I’ve had 4 one-on-ones with folks from the church. It’s been great to hear their stories and get a read on the church’s heartbeat.

I’m planning to start a “Restoring Your Heart” group for men at the church. I’ve got one guy signed up through word of mouth and I’m looking for a few more. I need the hookups on discernment of people going forward as this is a really intense and powerful experience in people’s emotional healing journey. Will you p-p-p-pray with me?

Finally, it’s off to the Congo for me! They really want us over there in Lubumbashi in the south for the second half of August. I’m making it my goal to spend 5 days a week in my French textbook with lots of listening in the car. Je voudrais visitee le boulangerie en ville. And that’s as far as I’ve gotten! Well we gotta start somewhere right? (Any french-speakers out there wanna hang out with me??) I hope I can carry on decent conversation with the conference participants as those one-on-one times are always the highlight of these trips for me!

Debra and I keep dreaming and dreaming about the future. I was brought to tears yesterday with excitement about an idea that’s been brewing: Take the whole family to Africa somewhere during the 4 months of Atlanta’s hot summer. We can lead Restoring Your Heart groups for missionaries (believe me, they need it), Debra can counsel individuals, I can partner up and trek out with local pastors and missionaries to conduct discipleship trainings all summer. Meanwhile we can lend out our house (we want to buy a big one for hospitality) in Georgia’s to WDA’s summer interns so they can hang out under one roof. We also keep dreaming about planting a church out of our big house where everybody is working on their stuff (er… emotional baggage), building good friendships, reaching out to the neighborhood and the world, and creating a safe, hospitable environment for people to feel inspired (Holy Spirit) rather than judged (Satan, the Accuser) to live the Jesus life. Well, we can dream.

One last exciting piece of news: Levi turns out to be a cash cow. He doubled the amount of our tax return this year! With this development, we will be able to finally get rid all non-school debt (which is in forbearance anyway). Yay! The last two months, I’ve been worrying a lot less about money as I see ALL the ways God has provided everything we need… not enough for a cushion, but enough for right now. I like that.

Thanks for all y'all's support, prayers, and happy thoughts toward us. We need and appreciate our friends!