Two years ago, I lost my best friend. After years of heart-wrenching conflict, agonizing silence, and the judgmental fear typical of a couple 20-somethings, the man who stood up at my wedding—promising to be my friend until we were old codgers sharing beers on front porch rocking chairs—quietly made his exit. And I made mine.
It was the most painful experience of my life. Not just because I lost a friend, but because I knew somewhere deep inside that I could never replace him. For all our immaturity and brokenness, he was a good person and a good friend. And I knew that I may never again have a “best friend” like him. I’m grieving that loss today. Not because I think bestfriendom could never happen to me again, but because:
1. It SHOULD never happen in the sense that I idolized my friend, hoping too deeply for his attention and approval to fill some gaping holes in my heart. It’s a weight no friend should bear.
2. I’m tired of scanning the relational “horizon” for some friend who can fill my best friend’s vacant shoes and provide connection, value, and acceptance.
3. My wife has made it abundantly clear that she doesn’t want the job of needs-meeter (nor would it be healthy if she did).
I guess I’m stuck with God! Trouble is, I’ve experienced God as a meet-er of emotional needs... but only sporadically. There have been times when God’s love and acceptance has overwhelmed me in a way that made my wife go, “what did you do with my husband?!” Then there have been long parched seasons of my tired, crotchety, insecure self whose needs tank always seems to hover right around EMPTY.
I’ve been accused of being rabidly extroverted. But I’m still not buying it. Because I sometimes wonder if I neurotically fill my life with the presence of other people... desperately hoping for a friendly nudge, a word of care, an expression of gratitude, a meaningful connection to take my mind of the black hole of need inside.
Yesterday morning, I looked flinchingly into that black hole and God seemed to whisper, “what would it feel like to give up on your passionate pursuit of relationships to meet your needs?”
I thought for a minute and replied, “It would feel like drinking a smoothie through a straw with dry sockets: constant pain and a loud ‘sucking’ sound. I would always be desperately aware of my need!”
The whisper replied, “and that’s a bad thing?” I reeled, curled into a ball and wept. I mean... like... “healing-your-inner-child-therapy-weekend” wept. After a couple minute of staring down the maw of this deep belief that people will always reject me and that God isn’t strong enough, or kind enough, or consistent enough to meet my needs, I cried, “God you’ve GOT to give me something!” And this is where it gets fun. Because in that moment He did.
The Whisper came back into my head, “go read Matthew 6:8.” I was skeptical, but hopeful. After all, “Bible Roulette” is a dangerous game and has often backfired on me. “Okay,” I said. “This had better be good.” So I set my thumb on my weathered NIV and as if by magic, it fell open to Matthew 6:8. And in the middle of the verse, the words of Jesus leapt from the page and seemed to look me straight in the eyes: “Your Father knows what you need.”
“Your Father know what you need...”
“Your Father knows what you.... need!”
Those 6 words began to catch a rhythm and have been marching around in my brain like a game-day chant now for 24 hours. I’m not totally sure what to DO with them, but they’re becoming a healthier mental loop tape than, “everyone will always reject you.” They don’t yet ring as loud and potent as the lie but I hope that someday soon, they will.
As I process it now, I wonder if my emotional and relational need-chasm was something I thought was obscured from God, or perhaps the shameful little secret that quietly exasperated Him. If He knew how deep my need was, would He freak out and quietly take his leave, saying, “that’s way too much pressure”? Of course, it’s a silly thought. And yet, that’s the response I’ve come to expect from people. So why not God?
The words of Jesus tell me a different story. They say, “The Father knows the black hole of need inside you AND He’s not threatened by it. You look at it with a grimace of shame. The Father looks at it directly and stays with you. Even if he doesn’t make the chasm disappear, he stands with you in the chasm and encourages you to look at it without fear or shame.”
To me, the promise of His presence in my deepest place of need rings truer and more refreshing than a simple promise to “fix it”. If He knows my need and is willing to stand there with me, then maybe I can face it. Maybe someday, I’ll even learn to joke about it! Because the fact of his knowing and His Presence in the midst of my need knocks the teeth out of that lion.
In that reality, the loss of a friend (and the fear of always being alone) is still extremely painful. It makes me sad. But suddenly, I’m not as scared of the pain as I used to be. It doesn’t threaten me as deeply. Because somewhere beyond emotion, I sense the presence of the One who knows what I need and isn’t scared by it.
11.18.2013
10.29.2013
Righteousness Disqualifies
I’ve been trying to encourage a friend of mine to start investing intentionally in the lives of others. Over the last few years, I’ve walked with him through an intense season of humbling and new growth. He’s one of the most aggressive learners I know. He’s an intense, messy, ruthlessly honest person and I think he has a lot to offer other people on the journey with Jesus.
But when I try to encourage him to disciple others, he says something like, “yeah right. Look at me! I’m worse than most people...” To which I commonly reply, “I think that’s your best qualification!”
Okay, hang on. I’m about to get a little preachy... a bit “thou”-ish. Please excuse. ☺
I know precious few who so authentically pursue God’s love while being so honest about the mess that is their lives. In other words, here’s someone who gets grace. He just doesn’t know yet what a rare gem that makes him.
I know FAR more people who excel in righteousness and stink at love. When those people run off to “serve the Lord”, I get seriously worried. In my own journey, it’s become far less about conforming my behavior or cultivating more zeal... I did that for way too long. Instead, my journey has become far more about knowing my neediness and cultivating compassion for the neediness of others.
If you’re a Christian who has “gotten clean” and grown in righteousness, but hasn’t been recently humbled and deeply shaken by God’s love in the midst of your mess... PLEASE don’t run off to the mission field or church work, even if you’re really smart and talented and all the Christians beg you to. Let’s leave that work to those beautiful rotten sinners who need God. In the mean time, we should pray that God makes us one of them. (If you need practical suggestions in how to become more aware of your sorry state, try getting married and having kids.)
But if you’re one of those honest messy people that knows God’s love and thinks you have nothing to offer, then hold on to your hat, “cause it’s about to get real.” You'll probably find you have more to offer than you ever dreamed. That’s the upside kingdom for ya. As Jesus says, “I have not come to call those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners and need to repent.”
PS- If your thinking of slapping me in stocks and informing me of the biblical mandate to pursue righteousness, I'll save you the time. I'm perfectly familiar with the various views on sanctification, the sermon on the mount, Paul's lists of spiritual ills, etc, etc. My point isn't that we should be more fleshy, but that we should more readily acknowledge self-righteouness as the most insidiously fleshy thing we can do according to Jesus. It's not a nasty little habit. It's the deadliest of those deadly sins. And we should be a little quicker to encourage and empower those who struggle daily to live up to the "standard" and know it. They're make the best teachers of grace and we'd all do well to sit at their feet.
But when I try to encourage him to disciple others, he says something like, “yeah right. Look at me! I’m worse than most people...” To which I commonly reply, “I think that’s your best qualification!”
Okay, hang on. I’m about to get a little preachy... a bit “thou”-ish. Please excuse. ☺
I know precious few who so authentically pursue God’s love while being so honest about the mess that is their lives. In other words, here’s someone who gets grace. He just doesn’t know yet what a rare gem that makes him.
I know FAR more people who excel in righteousness and stink at love. When those people run off to “serve the Lord”, I get seriously worried. In my own journey, it’s become far less about conforming my behavior or cultivating more zeal... I did that for way too long. Instead, my journey has become far more about knowing my neediness and cultivating compassion for the neediness of others.
If you’re a Christian who has “gotten clean” and grown in righteousness, but hasn’t been recently humbled and deeply shaken by God’s love in the midst of your mess... PLEASE don’t run off to the mission field or church work, even if you’re really smart and talented and all the Christians beg you to. Let’s leave that work to those beautiful rotten sinners who need God. In the mean time, we should pray that God makes us one of them. (If you need practical suggestions in how to become more aware of your sorry state, try getting married and having kids.)
But if you’re one of those honest messy people that knows God’s love and thinks you have nothing to offer, then hold on to your hat, “cause it’s about to get real.” You'll probably find you have more to offer than you ever dreamed. That’s the upside kingdom for ya. As Jesus says, “I have not come to call those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners and need to repent.”
PS- If your thinking of slapping me in stocks and informing me of the biblical mandate to pursue righteousness, I'll save you the time. I'm perfectly familiar with the various views on sanctification, the sermon on the mount, Paul's lists of spiritual ills, etc, etc. My point isn't that we should be more fleshy, but that we should more readily acknowledge self-righteouness as the most insidiously fleshy thing we can do according to Jesus. It's not a nasty little habit. It's the deadliest of those deadly sins. And we should be a little quicker to encourage and empower those who struggle daily to live up to the "standard" and know it. They're make the best teachers of grace and we'd all do well to sit at their feet.
10.14.2013
He Loves You and it has Nothing to Do with You
It seems like there's this tension in the bible between the holiness and love of God and Christians have always tended to camp out on one end of the continuum or the other. Either God is glorious and distant, or he’s a big teddy bear who hopes we’ll do our best and follow our hearts.
I’ve traversed the spectrum for 10 years from John Piper’s reformed passion to Jack Frost’s bathe-in-the-love-of-God sentimentality. These days, I know I err on the love side (seems harder to go wrong there). But then I’ve found myself recently in Isaiah and Ezekiel:
“It is not for your sake, people of Israel, that I am going to do these things, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations.”
“Do not be afraid, you worm Jacob, little Israel, do not fear, for I myself will help you,” declares the Lord, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel.”
I think the miracle of the Christian faith is that God’s presence with us is both Holy and Intimate and that makes us ridiculously uncomfortable. We either want an unknowable God we can passively acknowledge and go on with our lives, or we want a super nice God that grades on a curve and just wants us to be happy. The problem in the bible is that He’s neither of those things.
Let me bring it out of the stratosphere: when I’m sitting here in the morning, God’s presence often shows up. Or at least I become aware of it. It’s hard to explain but it feels both warm and chilling. The first feeling is electric. Then comes a flood of guilt. I’m a failure, a worm, a love miser. I think of my impatience with my family, my resource-clinging, my failure to care. Suddenly, there’s warmth. Wave after wave of undeserved acceptance come with words like “son, beloved, accepted, My Own.” As my heart sheds the crust of self-interest and self-righteousness and settles into the warmth of the God we insanely call “Father”, He begins to say things that nobody else could get away with: strong, honest words of correction, rebuke, and direction. Exquisite, tough love.
I know that His passion is for me, but ultimately, His passion is for himself, the Source, the triune Lover, the Unmoved Mover. It’s not because I’m just so good or have so much potential. I know He loves me for His own sake, because that’s just who He is.
Ultimately in my faith tradition (I say tradition, but to me it’s a breathing daily reality), Jesus plays the role of ultimate mediator, making the exquisite tension of God’s Holy Intimacy possible on a personal level.
Every religion I’ve met seeks to navigate our relationship with the transcendent through some kind of mediator (whether it’s sacrafices, good deeds, lesser gods, ancestors, a book, or a priest). Agnosticism is an exception, but as a former agnostic, I can say it’s more of a spiritual in-between (a purgatory of sorts) than an actual position and there’s very little hope there unless your “ultimate” is temporal. In the Christian tradition, Jesus plays the role of mediator and priest. And because He himself is Transcendent, you don’t have to go to a church, make a sacrifice, or commune with the ancestors to relate to God. You can go directly to Him. Heck He invites you to call him “Papa”! So in the end, this is how it works out in the Jesus Kingdom:
“Now that we know what we have—Jesus, this great High Priest with ready access to God—let’s not let it slip through our fingers. We don’t have a priest who is out of touch with our reality. He’s been through weakness and testing, experienced it all—all but the sin. So let’s walk right up to him and get what he is so ready to give. Take the mercy, accept the help.” (Hebrews 4:14-16)
Because of that, we find Presence and Transcendence, Love and Holiness occupying the same space. It’s not a continuum. It’s a tension: living, breathing, electric.
I’ve traversed the spectrum for 10 years from John Piper’s reformed passion to Jack Frost’s bathe-in-the-love-of-God sentimentality. These days, I know I err on the love side (seems harder to go wrong there). But then I’ve found myself recently in Isaiah and Ezekiel:
“It is not for your sake, people of Israel, that I am going to do these things, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations.”
“Do not be afraid, you worm Jacob, little Israel, do not fear, for I myself will help you,” declares the Lord, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel.”
I think the miracle of the Christian faith is that God’s presence with us is both Holy and Intimate and that makes us ridiculously uncomfortable. We either want an unknowable God we can passively acknowledge and go on with our lives, or we want a super nice God that grades on a curve and just wants us to be happy. The problem in the bible is that He’s neither of those things.
Let me bring it out of the stratosphere: when I’m sitting here in the morning, God’s presence often shows up. Or at least I become aware of it. It’s hard to explain but it feels both warm and chilling. The first feeling is electric. Then comes a flood of guilt. I’m a failure, a worm, a love miser. I think of my impatience with my family, my resource-clinging, my failure to care. Suddenly, there’s warmth. Wave after wave of undeserved acceptance come with words like “son, beloved, accepted, My Own.” As my heart sheds the crust of self-interest and self-righteousness and settles into the warmth of the God we insanely call “Father”, He begins to say things that nobody else could get away with: strong, honest words of correction, rebuke, and direction. Exquisite, tough love.
I know that His passion is for me, but ultimately, His passion is for himself, the Source, the triune Lover, the Unmoved Mover. It’s not because I’m just so good or have so much potential. I know He loves me for His own sake, because that’s just who He is.
Ultimately in my faith tradition (I say tradition, but to me it’s a breathing daily reality), Jesus plays the role of ultimate mediator, making the exquisite tension of God’s Holy Intimacy possible on a personal level.
Every religion I’ve met seeks to navigate our relationship with the transcendent through some kind of mediator (whether it’s sacrafices, good deeds, lesser gods, ancestors, a book, or a priest). Agnosticism is an exception, but as a former agnostic, I can say it’s more of a spiritual in-between (a purgatory of sorts) than an actual position and there’s very little hope there unless your “ultimate” is temporal. In the Christian tradition, Jesus plays the role of mediator and priest. And because He himself is Transcendent, you don’t have to go to a church, make a sacrifice, or commune with the ancestors to relate to God. You can go directly to Him. Heck He invites you to call him “Papa”! So in the end, this is how it works out in the Jesus Kingdom:
“Now that we know what we have—Jesus, this great High Priest with ready access to God—let’s not let it slip through our fingers. We don’t have a priest who is out of touch with our reality. He’s been through weakness and testing, experienced it all—all but the sin. So let’s walk right up to him and get what he is so ready to give. Take the mercy, accept the help.” (Hebrews 4:14-16)
Because of that, we find Presence and Transcendence, Love and Holiness occupying the same space. It’s not a continuum. It’s a tension: living, breathing, electric.
10.04.2013
Conversion and Progress in Ghanaian Villages
I think I’ve earned my stripes as a cynical Christian. I’m the first to criticize hypocrisy, apathy, and pretense in the church. I cringe at churchy language and religious manipulation. Yet I remain a firm believer that God loves all people equally and that Jesus is the best redeemer of cultures and religions—Christianity included. When Jesus is present in the church, something beautiful happens.
I spent my first week in southern Ghana where every business, every preacher, every crooked cop seems to tout some exaggerated form of Christianity. The culture is so anemically religious you could call it, “Ghana’s bible belt.” I hated it.
But in northern Ghana, where we’ve been spending the last week, the church is leaner and stronger. In a Muslim and Traditionalist context, Christians believe that the gospel is always pushing outward. They believe that the most natural environment for Christian faith isn’t in the Christian capitals of the world, but in the animistic villages and nomadic tribes. They spend less time building church empires and more time sharing the “good news”. And in a real sense that “good news” isn’t JUST a hope in heaven. It’s clean water. It’s education. It’s love-based development.
I know that sometimes, development can be used as a switcheroo for proselytizing, and these Ghanaians DO preach Christianity. But I sense that most of them actually believe that God loves all people—Christians, Muslims, and traditionalists—the same. So they work tirelessly in the villages, though it’s often a thankless job. And just being around them preaches to me.
After meeting with our Fulani friends the other day, we went to a village where a small hole in the ground serves as their water supply.
Some years it sees them through the springtime droughts. Usually, they spend a couple months struggling to find water. A small brick reservoir built to catch the rain falling off the tin roof would see them through the dry season with clean, accessible water. It wouldn’t be expensive... a couple grand maybe. In 3 other villages, we noticed that the arrival of water projects ALSO brought small village schools—sometimes just a chalkboard under a mango tree... Suddenly I’m thinking... I could buy a new macbook. Or I could kick start a future for 40 kids.
I’m looking into the faces of these beautiful children and I’m seeing my own children—Annabel and Levi—and it ruins me. I’m thinking, “We had no right to be born in America. It was just dumb luck. These people aren’t CNN headlines, poverty statistics, or global problems. These are people. They are part of me and I’m part of them. How can I not care for them?”
The exciting thing is, the church is loving them. For all of its issues, the church... Christians are responding in love. All over Northern Ghana, we saw the church (not government) at the forefront of development. Sometimes, projects are funded by NGO’s, but it’s Ghanaian Christians providing the manpower. It’s not benefitting them or their churches. They’re doing it just because.
In church-saturated cultures, I often feel embarrassed and alarmed by the church. But in the northern Ghana, I feel proud to be a Christian, because the church is presently the most effective change agent in that region. And where the gospel is pushing out to the margins, good things are happening. We were told that the general perception among traditional villages is that Christianity brings development and that’s true for a number of reasons. One is a greater connectedness to the outside world, the Christian community, and to NGO’s. Another is that Christians spend less on alcohol and witch doctors. A sense of generosity, community, and universal human brotherhood is developed. (For instance the new Christians in one village report that their faith challenges them to live at peace with their Muslim neighbors and share resources with them.) Christianity shows up as a liberating force for women. And Christians are choosing healthier lifestyles overall.
So even the flagrant proselytizing doesn’t bother me (I say this not as an evangelist, but as a Christian cynic). In fact, it excites me, because I know that 1.) It comes from a loving heart and is not manipulative, underhanded, or neo-colonial. And 2.) Conversion has brought more hope and authentic transformation than I’ve ever seen in a community. It hasn’t culturally disenfranchised them. It’s culturally invigorated, redeemed, and united them. In one village, a group of children broke out in spontaneous song and dance with big grins on their faces. Our Ghanaian friend leaned over and said, "This song is popular in the villages. It means, 'when I die, don't ask the soothsayer what killed me because Jesus took me away.'"
In another village, an elder told us, “everybody in the world longs for progress. We see this as progress.” THAT'S something I can get behind.
I spent my first week in southern Ghana where every business, every preacher, every crooked cop seems to tout some exaggerated form of Christianity. The culture is so anemically religious you could call it, “Ghana’s bible belt.” I hated it.
But in northern Ghana, where we’ve been spending the last week, the church is leaner and stronger. In a Muslim and Traditionalist context, Christians believe that the gospel is always pushing outward. They believe that the most natural environment for Christian faith isn’t in the Christian capitals of the world, but in the animistic villages and nomadic tribes. They spend less time building church empires and more time sharing the “good news”. And in a real sense that “good news” isn’t JUST a hope in heaven. It’s clean water. It’s education. It’s love-based development.
I know that sometimes, development can be used as a switcheroo for proselytizing, and these Ghanaians DO preach Christianity. But I sense that most of them actually believe that God loves all people—Christians, Muslims, and traditionalists—the same. So they work tirelessly in the villages, though it’s often a thankless job. And just being around them preaches to me.
After meeting with our Fulani friends the other day, we went to a village where a small hole in the ground serves as their water supply.
Some years it sees them through the springtime droughts. Usually, they spend a couple months struggling to find water. A small brick reservoir built to catch the rain falling off the tin roof would see them through the dry season with clean, accessible water. It wouldn’t be expensive... a couple grand maybe. In 3 other villages, we noticed that the arrival of water projects ALSO brought small village schools—sometimes just a chalkboard under a mango tree... Suddenly I’m thinking... I could buy a new macbook. Or I could kick start a future for 40 kids.
I’m looking into the faces of these beautiful children and I’m seeing my own children—Annabel and Levi—and it ruins me. I’m thinking, “We had no right to be born in America. It was just dumb luck. These people aren’t CNN headlines, poverty statistics, or global problems. These are people. They are part of me and I’m part of them. How can I not care for them?”
The exciting thing is, the church is loving them. For all of its issues, the church... Christians are responding in love. All over Northern Ghana, we saw the church (not government) at the forefront of development. Sometimes, projects are funded by NGO’s, but it’s Ghanaian Christians providing the manpower. It’s not benefitting them or their churches. They’re doing it just because.
In church-saturated cultures, I often feel embarrassed and alarmed by the church. But in the northern Ghana, I feel proud to be a Christian, because the church is presently the most effective change agent in that region. And where the gospel is pushing out to the margins, good things are happening. We were told that the general perception among traditional villages is that Christianity brings development and that’s true for a number of reasons. One is a greater connectedness to the outside world, the Christian community, and to NGO’s. Another is that Christians spend less on alcohol and witch doctors. A sense of generosity, community, and universal human brotherhood is developed. (For instance the new Christians in one village report that their faith challenges them to live at peace with their Muslim neighbors and share resources with them.) Christianity shows up as a liberating force for women. And Christians are choosing healthier lifestyles overall.
So even the flagrant proselytizing doesn’t bother me (I say this not as an evangelist, but as a Christian cynic). In fact, it excites me, because I know that 1.) It comes from a loving heart and is not manipulative, underhanded, or neo-colonial. And 2.) Conversion has brought more hope and authentic transformation than I’ve ever seen in a community. It hasn’t culturally disenfranchised them. It’s culturally invigorated, redeemed, and united them. In one village, a group of children broke out in spontaneous song and dance with big grins on their faces. Our Ghanaian friend leaned over and said, "This song is popular in the villages. It means, 'when I die, don't ask the soothsayer what killed me because Jesus took me away.'"
In another village, an elder told us, “everybody in the world longs for progress. We see this as progress.” THAT'S something I can get behind.