Don Astronaut. In Blue Like Jazz, Donald Miller shares a story his friend Stacy concocted about an astronaut named Don. In the story, the astronaut wears a suit that keeps him alive without the need for food or water. One day, the space station on which he is working experiences a disastrous accident and Don is thrust into space, eventually orbiting the earth in his life-sustaining space suit. Round and round he goes, year after year, seeing his world in front of his eyes until the day he dies, utterly alone.
Epidemic Aloneness. I think we live in a particularly strange period of history. We are more connected to each other and the rest of the world more than ever, yet many feel terribly alone. Ironically, people in densely populated urban setting are more prone to feeling alone more than those who live in other settings. Surrounded by others yet feeling isolated. The trend for the future points to more and more people leaving rural areas and flocking to cities where they can enjoy all of the benefits of modern civilization. What might we predict, then, regarding mass loneliness? How have you experienced this trend?
Longing for Togetherness in a Hypercritical World. To make matters worse, along with our connectedness provided by technology, I think we face a difficult challenge. We know that our dirty laundry can be aired all too easily, which can be viewed by literally the whole world with a few mouse clicks. “What bleeds leads” has been the mantra of news media for decades, and we all know that bad news travels fast. In a time when we are quick to pounce on Tiger Woods, Charlie Sheen, Miley Cyrus, and any politician for being a politician, the challenge to community mounts – who can trust anybody who has a smart phone and knows how to use it? Do we dare open up to anyone except our highly secured digital journal? Have you found yourself more guarded in our world where privacy is becoming more and more difficult to secure?
Tension: Authenticity v. Safety. So we meet new people, we find a new community, and we slowly and very carefully take steps which make us increasingly vulnerable. But can we trust these people? Are they safe? What if they share our junk with someone else, or misinterpret what we say in ways that paint us in a really bad light? The temptation is to pull back and play it safe. Unfortunately, playing it safe means we never get too close, which also means our experience of caring and being cared for, loving and being loved is sabotaged. This happens in churches all the time. One of the primary complaints I’ve heard from people who have sworn off church is that they don’t trust the people inside the sanctuary. Confidences have been broken. People are discovered to be two-faced. Who can you trust? Have you ever found yourself struggling with such a situation?
Hated Hypocrisy. You may find comfort in the fact that Jesus hated hypocrisy as much as anyone. He constantly called the religious leaders of his day on the carpet for being duplicitous. They were in his cross-hairs when he uttered his famous words about seeing the speck in others’ eyes while not seeing the log in their own. In another setting, he accused these teachers and leaders of creating disciples who were twice the sons of hell as themselves. Jesus hated people we love to hate. Well, he actually loved them, but you know what I mean… Where have you encountered hypocrisy? What form ticks you off the most?
The Look of Real Disciples. Perhaps we need a refreshing refresher course on what a real disciple looks like. While we often focus on the twelve “inner core” guys who were up close and personal with Jesus, there were many others. Sometimes hundreds upon hundreds. But when Jesus raised the bar of commitment, they simply walked away. Nice to know you can count on folks when the going gets rough, huh? Among the twelve there was competitive bickering about who was the biggest deal among them. Go ahead and take a moment now to quote Ron Burgundy… One of his disciples was either the most courageous and faithful disciple of the worst among them, as he told the religious authorities were they could find and arrest Jesus – according to some scholars, all for the “low” price of a Napa Valley cheeseburger. Peter famously and vehemently stated that he would always stay by Jesus side, championing his cause, only to infamously deny even knowing him three times in the same night, when it counted most. Maybe instead of looking for perfection in “real” disciples, we need to recognize shared humanity? Maybe hypocrisy is only possible when we say we’re something that we’re not? So, perhaps instead of saying we’re Christians, with the implication that we’ve arrived, we should instead say we’re doing our best trying to follow in Jesus’ footsteps – we’re in process, and will not “arrive” on this side of the plane of life. My hunch is that people will be a lot more “real” if they know they don’t have to be perfect. I know I would be more relaxed. And I bet we’d give each other a lot more grace when inevitable missteps occur, even whoppers that cause a lot of pain. I think our society has proven to be rather graceful on occasion, and the church the opposite. Is the church or the society at large more graceful toward Bill Clinton and/or David Letterman after their respective struggles with infidelity? Who wants to be a part of a community dedicated to routinely criticizing those who dare to mess up? I think what’s learned is to not share what’s really going on in our lives in that context – we are terribly alone while professing to be in Christian community. Hmmm. But if we admit up front that we’re all misfits trying get fit, or all ailing seeking holistic health, maybe that would work…
Don Miller’s True Community. After living alone for a long time, Donald Miller shared a house with a bunch of other guys. In time, he admitted to hurting each and every one of his housemates. He was a jerk. He had to learn a different way of living – life in community. The payoff is support, feeling loved while being given the privilege to love in return, learning to be whole while helping others do the same, and much, much more. The writer of Hebrews knew the power of community when she wrote the following directive: And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near (Hebrews 10:25 NLT). This advice is given to those who were following Jesus at the risk of their own necks. Another servant of Christ told Donald Miller, “If we are not willing to wake up in the morning and die to ourselves, perhaps we should ask ourselves whether or not we are really following Jesus” (135). May you be “real” and help others do the same as you pursue the life found in following Christ.
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