Once more into the breach…

Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more,
Or close the wall up with our English dead!
In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility;
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger:
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood.
- Henry V (5.3.44-51) [ht: About.com]

There are just some times when it’s better to keep my mouth shut. It started with a twitter post on "once saved, always saved" – innocuous enough, but I thought the twitterer was actually looking for responses. I replied, others chimed in, but not the original tweeter. That should’ve been my first omen, seeing that someone was posting a question just for the sake of posting, sending a link with no room for comment just for the sake of getting free web hits. But the back and forth twits, short 140-character statements, that ensued with others caused the rift that I’m feeling now. From my perspective, the impasse was mostly syntax and supposition – but increasingly, I think I was seen as the antagonist asking someone to move off their rock of faith.

That was Thursday, and on Friday I was left unconnected, unable to respond twitteringly to my friend after our conversation. In each making our respective stands, you could say, something cracked. The strand of whatever was holding the relationship together was severed – and I’ve got to say that there’s a deep sadness in me that something like this has happened again, that it’s had to happen once more. And that’s the thing. This isn’t meant to put down the other person here, because I don’t think this is a "wrong" thing – we need to be able to draw boundaries like that sometimes, and I’m okay with it. But isn’t there a better way sometimes, a path that leads to better relationship and understanding rather than cutting the cord? I really hope there’s a reconnect in the future. But from past experience, I know that’s a long shot unless something radical happens on the inside. The folks I’ve "cut cords with" have not come back, nor I to them, and I can’t help but feel that we ourselves and the world at large is the worse for it in some way.

"They will know you by our love one for another" means more than our cordial buddy-ness on Sunday mornings passing in the church foyer, or on discussion boards, or in the blogs and coffeeshops and Christian bookstores of our lives. It means giving the time and space – and, to be honest, it means earning the time and the space – in each other’s lives to make our stands, to seek understanding, to give the benefit of my doubt and look for a way for both of us to grow, not just prove myself "right".

In the end this time, once again I’m left with the feeling that I wasn’t worth the time or the heart to work out the differences. It wasn’t worth it to let me disagree agreeably, and it was better to cut ties altogether. Instead of opening ourselves to what might have been a better thing, I’m left alone to wonder what went wrong. And I still want to give that same benefit of the doubt that wasn’t afforded to me. It wasn’t a close friendship, wasn’t culturally or socially like making an enemy – but it feels like a rip nonetheless, because the possibility of a friendship growing over time now seems like such an improbability.

Sometimes I keep my mouth shut for the damage it can do. Sometimes my twittering brings destruction upon the world.

On My Way to the ER

So I posted this video the other day (the ER scene, not "Godweiser") – that scene has been YouTubed to show how "postmodernism doesn’t get it" when it comes to God. I saw it differently, that the alternative being claimed is a legalism and shame-based religion, not the love, mercy and grace of God. I think it’s intelligent people seeing the same thing through different filters – I wanted the girl to be right, to be trying, while other friends wanted to see her faults and uncertainty as being unhelpful. But the ER Episode’s title, "Atonement", speaks to more than just one scene. So here’s a couple of clips from the show, in better context I think, after that opening one I posted last time.

Faith and Certainty are not enemies. Instead, I’ve come to find that they’re hanging out with Doubt and Questions, as well. One of the churchy problems I see is that we want to come across as having all the answers, that it’s a bad thing to have doubt or want to find something more meaningful than what we already have figured out. For all this man’s searching, his "atonement" is to live the life he’s been given the best he can, however that plays out, whomever that might touch. Some will forgive, some will be saved, and in the end it’s him and God trying to figure out what all this means. That’s dangerous and beautiful at the self-same time, isn’t it?

Editor’s Note: If you’re feed-reading, you might need to click through to the actual post to see both clips. Google Reader’s only showing one, and I’m not sure why.

Truth Art

Too very true… don’t get me started.

[ht:asbojesus]

Brick Walls

I’m doing a fair job this evening of shutting everything else out and just doing some work, watching some NFL, losing some fantasy games. If I let my mind wander back onto the things that are really weighty on my heart right now, it is very much like knocking my head against a wall. I find that I am not nearly as confrontational as I have been in the past – mainly, the battle is usually not worth the wounded. But sometimes, the stretching and the angst are just… If I push any further, I become what I’m trying to work against. And it is that frustration that gets to me most, not the confrontation – it’s the lack of a real conversation.

And what do I try to work against? In me, it’s the need to be right over all else. We find no shared ground because we have to be right. I find nothing else to say because so often I feel I’m so right. And when the pushback keeps pushing back – it’s then in frustration that I lay down my sword and stop fighting.

My head hurts again. Back to football.

Raining

Last night and tonight, we’re getting heavy rain. By "heavy", I mean the kind that falls sideways, making the loud pelting noise on our metal-roofed sunroom, washing small pets down the gutters out in the streets. Heavy rain – where the post-precipitation sky is a pale red and the thunder continues to roll long after the storm passes east.

I’ve received a few new books for review this week. One of them, what the heck am I going to do with my life?, is just a title that seems all too apropos, doesn’t it? It’s by Margaret Feinberg, a neat author and a really neat person. Another set of books is the Coffee Cup Bible Series – I’m going to work my way through Mocha On The Mount, just to see how this study might work for someone individually, how it might play out in a small group setting for our fall semester.

So what does the search for meaning in life and the study of the "discourse on the hill" over a cup of coffee have to do with me? with spirituality? with growing up or getting through the stuff of life? I don’t know, and I’m okay with that. It seems that things resonate with me all the time, matter of the moment kind of thing. Might be a song or a commercial or the way light is coming through the window during a storm – sometimes, it’s like everything comes through everything else to say something, anything, that might be meaningful for what needed at just that particular point in time.

But I don’t hear it all the time. Does that make sense? I don’t want it to sound like I’ve got a tuner in my head that is constantly tuned to the right channel to hear from God. Sometimes I intentionally ignore whatever’s coming; other times, I’m sure I’m too busy to be bothered. But when a moment clicks – wow. I can live off one of those "wows" for weeks, and I’m sure I’ve missed a few "wows" because I’m still basking in the lightness of the last pertinent "wow" that "wowed" me before.

The rain has stopped, and I’m not going to add any spiritual significance to it beyond that fact that rain has stopped. For me right now, in the flow of this moment, that’s spiritually significant enough. If I stretch it out, if I lay hold of it too tightly, I’ll lose my "wow" – and I don’t like doing that if I can help it.

INJUSTICE!

• CNN.com – Christian film’s PG rating troubles Congress

There are members of Congress up in arms that a Christian-oriented movie has received a PG rating. The outrage! The humanity! The injustice!! Oh, wait – this is an election year. It’s not really a problem with the film’s producers and distribution company, and it seems to be on the up-and-up for dealing with tense and non-lighthearted themes. So no one’s really bothered by what is probably the right thing anyway.

No one, except for the moral watchmen of the Legislative Branch. I’m sure this is all a coincidence that it’s an election year with no hope of retaining Republican control of the House and Senate. It’s got to be because they feel the moviemoguls of Hollywood would rather allow sex and violence than God-talk.

"This incident raises the disquieting possibility that the MPAA considers exposure to Christian themes more dangerous for children than exposure to gratuitous sex and violence," [House Majority Whip Roy] Blunt said in a letter to MPAA Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Dan Glickman.

I’m glad they’re on the job, watching over us and making the right choices for truth, justice and the American way. And wow, that’s going to be a great soundbite on someone’s re-election commercials come fall.

Fun with Authority

Submission and authority are not real catchy words or thoughts for the Western world today. I was IMing with a friend last night, and I asked a generally easy softball question: "so, how’s church?" The ensuing conversation was on missed expectations, realized frustrations, and ministers generally not doing their jobs.

It boils down to our sense of authority, doesn’t it? I think we’re brought up with things going on around us, especially in church, and we see how things work and how people relate and how folks want certain things done in certain ways. I think I’ve seen too much of what happens from too many angles – I was ordained to the church’s Deacon Body, then left a couple of years later to help out with a youth ministry at another church, then to start a new church and be ordained for ministry proper. I’ve gone from "Rick" to "Pastor Rick" and back again over the past fifteen years or so, and I’ve participated on various levels with this "authority" issue.

I go back to Hebrews 13:7, 17 – "Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith…. Obey your leaders and submit to their authority. They keep watch over you as men who must give an account. Obey them so that their work will be a joy, not a burden, for that would be of no advantage to you." There’s so much rich scripture that talks directly to submission to God through our leaders and authorities. When I hear the horror stories, I cringe for the leaders – I know they’re not perfect, and there are probably huge problems to be dealt with. But at the same time, it’s so difficult to cut those leaders a little slack when our expectations aren’t met.

We can give friends and family a little leeway, a little benefit-of-the-doubt – but not to those in leadership who should know better. We cherish God’s mercy, but we’re quick to judge, too. I don’t doubt the validity of my friend’s issues, but I hope that I’m a little more open to being able to encourage, to affirm leadership when I can. These men and women have the call of God on them, answering ultimately to a much higher courth than the one of public opinion. What would change if we would help make "their work be a joy", instead of reinforcing hell at every dropped ball?

Stand: Relationships

Is anyone actually reading this stuff? Just checking – I’ve found that writing thoughts like this is more cathartic than the feedback – just want to make sure y’all aren’t too bored. – thanks! – rick

I’m working my way through a bout of writer’s block as I continue this thread in "Relationships". Bear with me…

Everything we are about in this life is wrapped up in relationship. We imitate our parents first, and later we rebel against them. We long for everyone’s approval, and then we turn on each other at the slightest whim. We think no one else will look out for us, so we make sure we’re taken care of for ourselves. It’s only in living a life that puts others ahead do we find real contentment and community on this planet.

I’ve found that our major interaction with each other is through conflict. A major portion of your own maturing process has been in the realization that you have more love for those who wrong you now than you did before – am I right? Your patience, manifested as fruit from your life, is keeping you from offense, is keeping you grounded enough to forgive and to love in spite of betrayal. Or perhaps, in the same way we can guage lack of spiritual growth in the lack of love for those who’ve offended us?

Another aspect of relationship that changes for the one growing in Christ is selflessness. Before, you would "act selflessly" in order to get something, or to manipulate people or situations to your benefit. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, and often our discipline system at home is based on that same set of "rules", I guess. But as you grow in Christ, you find yourself sacrificing for someone else’s good just because it’s the right thing to do. You find yourself acting in a way that might even be detrimental to your plans, but it’s a joy to be able to lift up someone else. you serve as Jesus served and love as He loved – because it’s a natural outflow of Him in your life. I wish I could live at this level more consistently, you know?

One more thing from my own self-inspection: I hope I’m not judging people as much as I seem to be. At least, I pray that my discernment doesn’t negatively effect my view of anyone. As I talk with friends about deep life issues, let me pray first and console or exhort second, but let me also give them the benefit of the doubt and trust that God is already doing in them what I see and what I can’t. It’s a dreadful thing to stand in judgment, knowing that I’ve been guilty of so much more myself, and that I’m in need of mercy and forgiveness more than anyone else I might know.

If I could point to four things that can strengthen us as individuals and as partners together, those things would be:
1) In conflict, forgive
2) In action, do for others first
3) In judgment, pray
4) In everything, just enjoy each other

Just being together makes us more than the sum of ourselves individually. We are meant for personal relationships with Christ, but we’re also meant for public relationships with Christ – and for personal and public commitments to each other. I need to value the people around me more, see them as the gifts God has intended, encourage them and be encouraged by them.

Stand: The Bible

Reading the Bible has probably been the one thing that’s changed the most over the past decade or so. For me, it’s about the story, finding truth instead of facts, and letting God reveal Himself in every page. More than the morning checklist of devotional thoughts, reading the Bible tends to wreck me.

I have come to understand that my stance on Christ as the foundation is the only thing that lends real credence to the Scriptures. Jesus is Truth, and the Bible is a book of truths revealing Truth. Where He is the Logos of God (John 1:1), the Bible follows suit, through stories and parables and prose, detailing for us what’s really meaningful and life-giving in this world (Psalm 119:66). When Jesus speaks, it’s important. When God inspires men to put pen to paper, it’s because He has a message (Revelation 1:19). That message is contained in the Bible, and any other message worth anything will be backed up by the full testimony of Scripture. The message of Paul, the message of Peter, the message of Jeremiah, the message of Solomon, the message of Obadiah, the message of Moses and the many other voices and messages all point to the same thing, the gospel: "The kingdom of God is at hand – live like it."

When I say that the Bible is "inerrant", I mean that there are no mistakes in there: that the people writing wrote what God wanted them to write, and that men over the centuries have translated it as accurately as possible with the divine gracious guidance of the Holy Spirit. "Inerrant" means that we’ve got pretty much written now what was written then.

When I say that the Scriptures are "infallible", I mean pretty much the same thing, only twisted: that God didn’t write anything untrue. I don’t have to dismiss something I don’t understand just because it’s outside the realm of human knowledge or experience. "Infallible" means to give God the benefit of my doubt, and that doesn’t allow me to write off what we’ve seemingly "proven to be false". If it’s not written the way we would’ve written it, it just goes to show once again that He’s God and we’re not. He hasn’t tried to mess us up, but instead to bring His perspective to bear on reality. That’s huge, and not to be taken lightly. Too much of the time, we explain away the scriptures, either with our bad theology and interpretation, by ignorance and not digging to find what the Bible is really saying, or by outright deception in discounting passages we would deem to be wrong. "Infallible" means that since we have an inerrant Bible that’s been copied and translated down through the years, we can also trust that what’s written is exactly as God intended, and that His intentions toward us are outlined therein. "Infallible" and "inerrant" don’t necessarily mean that everything is or has to be "factual" – just that what’s there is what God wanted there, and that if it’s in there, it’s true. Read it as literally as you can, and when that stops making sense in accordance with how God has revealed Himself, only then can we start reading it figuratively. Leave the contradictions alone, because they beef up the story. Leave the problems in there, because they seem to tell us that we don’t know the whole story yet, that we’re still missing something and still need to grow in understanding and love.

The subtle semantic difference between "truth" and "fact" is probably the biggest thing I needed to discover. "Fact" is based on perception, whether it’s from culture, time, circumstance or experience. Truth, however, is truth, always and forever, regardless of culture, time, circumstance or experience. The Bible is truth, and it has some facts – but it’s all good and all true.

Context, context, context. Never rely on anyone to tell you what a passage means. Check and double check, and cross-reference all you can. When history is being shared, consider the perspectives of all the characters. When prophecy is shared, consider God’s intent and man’s response as it unfolds in history. Don’t "just read the Bible" – read it, and make every effort to "get it".

Dwell on the hurts as much as the pain. Read the Old Testament and fall in love with Jesus back there, as you see God interact just like He does in the New Testament. Spend time reading the prophets, even if their names are hard to spell or pronounce. Get to know God the way they did, failures and triumphs together. Mourn with the Lord over Jerusalem in the OT, and with Jesus over Jerusalem in the NT. Don’t read in anything that’s not there – question every interpretation you can, and come at the scripture from a new direction to get a new glimpse of what’s being written to you today. It’s good for showing you what’s right, what’s not right, how to get right, and how to stay right (2 Timothy 3:16-17) – and notice that three-fourths of those attributes are about the "right" thing, and only one is about pointing out the "wrong" thing. I know that God is harsh in many places of the OT – don’t dismiss that, but instead let it fill out your own thoughts of God and who He is. Grieve when babies are killed, and rejoice when people praise the Father. Feel the anger of the psalms, and feel the redemptive pursuit of the psalms. It’s all good, together, intertwined, meaningful and transformational.

The Bible is not a textbook with the answers in the back; instead, it’s a book of questions that are in themselves answers to what we’re really looking for. The Bible is not a roadmap for my life; instead, it’s a glimpse at the journeys of so many people, showing me what to look for along the narrow path. The Bible is not an owner’s manual for the human life; instead, it’s a romance, a dance for the Creator and His Creation, for the Lover and His Bride. It holds a position somewhere above its interpretation, meaning what God wants it to mean more than we claim that it means, and that He’s the only One who can open it up for us (1 Cor 2:14).

I appreciate that we have a Bible, something written down that anyone can own, anyone can read, and that we can gather together to read it together and live it out together. It’s amazing that it even exists. It’s been modified a little to make it user-friendly: chapters and verses have only been around for only about five or six hundred years. Before that, even having a Bible would’ve been a travesty because the religious establishment didn’t think the common family would understand it and needed to be protected from it by people who could tell them what it meant. You’ve probably got more than one Bible now – and that’s not something that people over the centuries have been able to enjoy.

Hold onto Jesus and you’ll find yourself loving the Bible, because it talks about Him in ways only folks in love with Him would want to ponder and understand. The Bible is not Christ, not the Messiah – this book did not die for God’s forgiveness of sin, and it’s not a person of the Trinity. But it’s good – real good – at showing us the heart of God, even as His heart was poured through the authors’ hearts and onto the pages to flow into our hearts and beyond. You’ll find yourself not so much reading the Bible, but having it read you.

One more thing: there is also an authority that resides within scripture. To say that it is "authoritative" is to say that it speaks with relevance to me as a person in pursuit of God. Reading it opens opportunities and grace to do as it says, to obey as Jesus commands. But all of that is wrapped up in the foundational qualities of Christ – tradition and reason are not enough to give this weight to the Bible.

Stand: God the Father & The Holy Spirit

One of the things that strikes me now is taking the word "The" off of the subject lines. When I posted these essays in 06/2004, they were "The Stand", marking my territory, the place where I would stand for doctrine and theology. Now, I think I see the word "Stand" in the title as more of a verb, a directive to stand well on these things. Just a thought…

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It’s been a philosophically tough week. But it’s important for each of us to discover God, and to follow Him as He reveals Himself. These essays are not intended to be doctrinal dissertations on the meaning of life, just my ramblings on what these various "churchy words" really mean to me at this point in the process. Of course, if you disagree with me or have any questions, please post – I promise not to say funny things about the way you’re combing your hair and stuff.

I don’t want to move too far down this path without also sharing some thoughts on God the Father and on the Holy Spirit, building on what I wrote earlier on the Person of Jesus Christ. I know that we’ve had some discussion recently on the necessity and understanding of the doctrine of the Trinity. In a nutshell, God is God (Exodus 20:2), Jesus is God, and the Holy Spirit is God (Acts 5:3-4; Matthew 28:19). There is one God, and as much as we can tell, these three personalities are the same entity and at the same time three aspects of the same Person. All three are individually a Person. The Holy Spirit is not an It, but a He. The Father is I AM, and He is loving and merciful and holy, each trait being first and foremost at the same time in all three Persons.

When talking about God culturally, most people don’t know Him. It’s a concept, not a personality yearning for relationship. He’s not the grandfather in the sky, arbitrarily posting rules and regulations, smiting all the sinners and patting the heads of all the blonde kids. He doesn’t act like us, doesn’t react, isn’t surprised or perplexed. He doesn’t lose His cool, thankfully, and He loves us beyond our own limitations. He created us, and knows our worth better than we do, knows our potential better than we do, and knows our weaknesses and strengths better than we do.

Sometimes, God is silent. We can’t hear Him because we’re not listening, or because we have shut Him off by opening ourselves to too much worldly noise, or because we are in sin and holy things are not on our minds. Or, He is silent of His own choosing. That is His right and prerogative. We are tested in the quiet times, moreso than in the He-spoke-to-me times. There is never a time when God doesn’t love you. There is never a time when He will desert you. But He might hide for awhile, and wait for to see how long it is before you come looking. "Hide-and-seek" is a fun game for the Divine.

God is in control, but only to the point where He sovereignly chooses to not intervene: namely, in the realm of our free will, our ability to choose wisely or not. While He is "in control", we are not automatons under His control. He does not use a remote control to flip our channels. Much like a child is under a parent’s "control", there are rules and warnings and chores, and the parent directs the child towards successful obedience and discipline. That’s how I view God’s control and sovereignty.

The Holy Spirit is the personal representative of the post-resurrection Messiah (2 Cor 13:12-14), gracing and empowering (Micah 3:8 – this post-resurrection Person was available in the pre-resurrection times of the OT, if I can get my mind around that) and urging us onward in fulfilling God’s will around us. He instructs us in the ways of God (John 14:26), and He gifts us in particular ways for particular times and tasks. The gifts of the Spirit are given through the ministry of the Spirit, even as He interceded with groanings that go beyond our language and understanding (Romans 8:26).

He is the Comforter, the Healer, and we can only "communicate" with Him in the spiritual realm: that is, our spirit, newly born and formed by the miracle of Christ in us, can interact with the Holy Spirit, and as we live by the spirit within, we are in proper alignment to hear from God. Most of the time, however, we try to make decisions and hear from God through our own feelings, our own intuition, our own perceptions – through our flesh – and we miss out on what He’s trying to say. When my spirit hears the Holy Spirit through the filter of my flesh, then everything sounds like Charlie Brown’s teachers, "whaaah whaah, waa waa wa whahh". I hate it when that happens.