A woman steps up to the window at her local post office and tells the postal worker that she wants to buy some stamps.
“What denomination?” asks her attendant.
“Good grief! Has it really come to this? Well, ok, I guess I’ll have 20 Baptists, 20 Methodists, 20 Presbyterians, 20 Episcopalians, and 20 Catholics just for good measure…”
Aah, pastor humor. Funny anywhere at any time…
There was just a group of people on the Way in the beginning of this movement we call Christianity. No denominations. No Protestants and Catholics. No Mormons or Jehovah’s Witnesses. Just people following Jesus.
Of course, the temptation to define oneself based on particular belief was there at the beginning, too. The Apostle Paul had to call people on the carpet for organizing themselves into a pecking order. For some, it was based on who baptized them. For others, which spiritual gift they had. We seem to have a deep-seated leaning toward comparing ourselves with others and figuring out ways to elevate ourselves above others we feel don’t quite measure up the way we do.
The truth is, I have lived in this tension for a long time. In college, I experienced an awakening in my faith, but I didn’t fit in with the religious crowd. They would challenge me now and then on certain concepts and positions. I think they kind of wrote me off. While in seminary, I was on staff at a church in suburban Chicago. Once sunny summer Sunday, Lynne and I attended worship. I went casual (anyone surprised?). It was too nice to wear socks that day, which really set off a member who let my wife know – when I wasn’t present, of course – how inappropriate it was for me to be in the house of God showing complete disrespect for God. I pointed out to the member the stained glass window of Jesus that adorned the front wall of our sanctuary. He wasn’t wearing socks, either. Why should I?
In my first full time pastor gig in a small town in Northern Illinois, I taught about equality between men and women as evidenced in Jesus’ words and actions and even in Paul’s words and actions. A woman came to see me that week. She was not comfortable with this equality, and was sure I was leading the church astray with my liberal teaching.
The gender equality heresy was an issue for some here, too, and some found that they could not be under my teaching because of my apostasy. Others have had a difficult time with our taking the Great Commission seriously – helping more and more people come into relationship with God through the teaching of Jesus. One board meeting I have recounted often was heated over what this meant in terms of our approach. A board member said, “I don’t’ give a damn if those people (non-Christians) go to hell in a hand basket.” Ah, the good old days…
I found myself feeling like a salesman about five years in here, and really wondered if I could continue as a pastor anywhere. Then my doctoral work took me to a deep study of the salvation God really wants to extend to all people everywhere. My mind was blown and my heart expanded as I discovered how much larger and more beautiful a thing God is trying to do than the sales-pitch approach that is sometimes used and believed.
Over time – as I think it should be – my understanding of God has grown. As Paul said in his letter to the Corinthian church, he put away child things to embrace more adult things. This is what happens when we continue to be bothered by our language for understanding God. So, a word of warning: if you have your theology all worked and God all figured out, you probably have been living with a dead faith for at least as long as you have felt that way. We like our means of differentiation. But if the end result is division and rivalry and angst in the Church, we are producing the wrong fruit – not the fruit of the Spirit Paul talked about.
A huge part of my faith experience is being touched by the Holy Spirit. First in High School, then again in college, and since then innumerable times, there are no words that can describe the inbreaking of God into my life or why it happens, really.
Some friends saw it as an indicator that I was really in – not quite speaking in tongues but close enough! For them, it was another part of the Kataphatic drive.
But many others really resonate with the idea of God’s presence moving about us all the time. In fact, some are so focused on it that they just want to grasp for the spiritual, and distance themselves from anything remotely religious. For them, it’s all about being led by the spirit of God. There is no need for study or reflection, because they have the spirit. Of course, what they do not realize is that without reflection and study they will inevitably discover that their God conveniently validates much of their value system and rarely challenges their thinking. This is a sign of truth for them, but a red flag for those around them.
Is God interested in a fight about who is more right about one word or another?
Is God interested in being kept in a fog – keeping God fuzzy and basically irrelevant?
For we explain not what God is but candidly confess that we
have not exact knowledge concerning him.
For in what concerns God, to confess our ignorance is the
best knowledge.
– Saint Cyril of Jerusalem, in his Catechetical Homilies
What if the biblical norm for faith isn’t just a mental trip? What if it isn’t just spirit?
The reality is very clear from the beginning of the Bible all the way to the end: there is a constant tension present between knowing and unknowing, between the Kataphatic and the Apophatic, between being able to describe God with some certainty and yet not finding words that can really do the job. I dare you to find me an exception. I might give you a stick of gum or something if you can find an example of healthy faith where this tension does not exist.
You will find examples of extremes, where people settled for their box where they kept God. Never turned out good for them. You can also find examples of “just the Spirit, please” folks. Same bad ending. The heroes, however, find themselves thriving in the tension.
Paul was no exception. He had his mind – and vision – blown by the resurrected Christ. Whatever box he had got recycled. But not forgotten. He continued to be an incredibly thought-full leader even as he was open to the Spirit’s leadership. Because he lived and thrived in the tension, the life-changing good news of Jesus spread. We are here today because he chose to have a living, thriving faith.
Are you settling? Are you stuck? Consider McLaren’s points in his video. Reflect on the questions in the bulletin. Buy the journal and use it to work out your response. Show up at a group and see how others are faring.
But please, for your sake, as well as a world that needs Good News, don’t settle. Instead, embrace the fact that, as Blaise Pascal noted, “you are embarked.”
God is the wind in the sail and the sea we sail upon; the
source and goal of our quest.
No comments:
Post a Comment