Measured out and overflowing.
I debated whether or not I would write a thankfulness post, just because that’s not who I am. I don’t need a written account of all of God’s blessings to remind me how fortunate I am. And I don’t need a singular time of year to make me remember that I ought to be grateful. Gratefulness, for me, is far more a way of life. I’ve learned to count my blessings, to measure good fortune, to always remember that if I’d had my own way with my life I’d be dead and my husband might still be alone and my kids would never have existed- so I know well enough to be thankful.
But then I got to musing on how ironic this time of year has been for me. I have a lot to NOT be thankful for. Our family had a four year run of really bad luck that left us nearly five digits in debt, I’ve been looking for a job for six months and have yet to find one, we still don’t know how we’re going to be able to afford to buy Christmas presents this year, and our budget for buying groceries for Thanksgiving is $10. (And top that all off with a pregnancy scare last month, and I’d have every excuse to just want to scream at God. It’s been a long, hard four years, and we’re just now beginning to come out the other side.)
But that run of bad luck has been sprinting hand in hand with similar good fortune. While our city has the highest jobless rate in our state, and our state’s unemployment rate is TWICE the national average, my husband still has a job. We managed to move into a place that is nearly twice as large as our previous home but with cheaper rent, plus I can have a garden. Usually the winter is the “lean” time when it comes to paychecks, but my husband’s hourly bonus is actually higher than it was throughout the summer. And my book has been selling well enough for us to keep making payments on our debt and not get a judgment against us- so we may make it through the winter, yet. While I have no money to buy groceries for Thanksgiving, we’ve decided to have it with some close friends, and between the two of us couples we’ll still have a proper feast. My grocery list looks like the following: apples, garlic, butter, onions. That’s it. Everything else I need to make all my dishes I have in the pantry- due to some fortunate grocery purchases earlier in the month and a big box of food from my mother-in-law.
There have been so many times in the last month when I wondered where we’d get the money to buy food, or pay bills that were overdue- and every time a check would come in the mail, like clockwork. Granted, I knew this month would be hard and I worked like a devil (or angel as it were) to get my book out in time that we’d have some money coming in- but I never expected things to go as well as they have.
We may make it into the next year without sinking to the level of desperation. And, for that I am grateful. There are a lot more young couples having to be taken in by family than I like to think about. Not everyone is fortunate enough to be able to make ends meet, especially with our current economic climate.
But for me? I choose not to see the darker side of our current situation. I see a measure poured out and overflowing, I see grace, I see $10 for groceries and still being able to feed my family a feast.
Praise be to the author of our salvation.
Known, unknown, and unknowable.
I’ll start you off with a quote (and points to anyone who knows where I got it)
There are known knowns. There are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we now know we don’t know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we do not know we don’t know.
The purveyor of that quote was trying to present a simple concept- that is, that there are things that are known, unknown, and unknowable. And there are times where we know what is known, where we know we don’t know what is unknown, and where the unknowable is totally ineffable. (Which reminds me of a Douglas Adams quote: Let’s think the unthinkable, let’s do the undoable, let’s prepare to grapple with the ineffable itself, and see if we may not eff it after all.) In any case, I’m not sure why the above quoted man mangled the concept so incredibly badly that when somewhat intelligent people such as myself speak of that which is known and not known and unknowable, we get heckled, but, the concept does stand the test of time.
I think about that a lot as a Christian. There are things I simply know- I know that God exists, that God is love, and that God is passionately involved in Salvation. This I simply know. There are things I know that I don’t know. I don’t understand a lot about sin, a lot about my own calling, a lot about what God would have for my future. And I know I don’t know, and am comfortable with my own lack of knowledge.
Here’s the problem: A lot of Christians have things that they don’t know, and they aren’t aware of the fact that they are ignorant. A lot of this has to do with sin. One can trust that if someone is seeking God and God is drawing them to him, they’ve been convicted of a fair amount of sin. So they know a little about what God wants from them. What they do not know (and don’t realize they don’t know) is that God may not be saying the same thing to everyone. So when Suzy Q hears God about how she needs to tithe in order to get her finances in order, she simply assumes that since it’s been so great for her, it’ll be great for everyone. Suzy Q then starts evangelizing about how tithing will help you out so very very much, and convinces Bob, who has been laid off and missing rent, that he has to tithe even when it’s painful.
Bob then can’t feed his family. (One could argue that the problem, in this case, isn’t that God didn’t want Bob to tithe but that the church should be meeting his need with grace for his faithfulness. Well, that’s another post entirely.)
And the same concept can be applied to any number of situations. Like sex. I know, it’s a little hinky to even bring it up, but as a married woman I can tell you that a whole lot of couples hear a whole lot of things, and it’s always different. What is sin for me may not be sin for you, and what is great for you may be bad for me, and it all goes in these huge headache inducing spirals. The point is that we know what we know but we’re not aware of all we don’t know, and it constantly gets us all into trouble.
I guess that’s all. Hope it wasn’t too confusing.
Militant Homosexuals
Lately I’ve been hearing a lot about “militant homosexuals” who have a “propensity for voilence” and are a “threat to society.”
I’ve been having a hard time really verbalizing my feelings about this. But I will try, for your sake.
Remember the peace movement? I’m talking Vietnam War here. There you saw a movement for peace, and it started out with people sitting around on laws. Having “lay-ins” in the streets, peaceable obstruction, quiet protest. They tried to fight fire with love, and they were largely ignored. Then you saw an escalation. People started chanting, yelling, holding more boldly worded signs. There started to be an energy, an anger. A bitterness. And still, the war raged on. That’s when you started seeing riots and broken windows and things that escalated beyond “civil disobedience” to violence and terror.
Why?
Because no one really listened. They were written off as selfish and naive at first, and misinformed to the last. The government ignored them and would have continued to do so indefinitely if public opinion had not changed as a whole.
Now we are seeing the same thing.
First the gays quietly protested, they kept to themselves, they stood peaceably on street corners, put gimmicky bumperstickers on their cars and wore rainbow tshirts. They tried to mobilize- but let’s be honest: they are a minority. Even in California there are rainbow colored pockets on the coast, but the state as a whole is farmland. Conservative. “Family Values”. So the minority lost it’s voice, as always happens in these cases.
They lost their voice.
I can’t even imagine how it must feel, to be doing everything you can to fight for what you believe is right, and then to simply have it all silenced. The media says, “well, now that’s over”, and you are expected to go home to your wife who is no longer your wife, to your children whom you are no longer legally entitled to, and to simply shut up.
Of course the demonstrations escalated. In ANY case where a minority tries to vocalize and are cast aside, the demonstrations escalate. And gay people are no more prone to voilence than peace protestors, blacks or latinos. In every case where once peacable demonstrations take a turn for the bitter and evocative it is not done because they WANT to be voilent, but because they see NO OTHER WAY for their voice to be heard.
Not that I approve of voilence- of course not- but I understand.
I understand that this is the way the world works, and unless the government takes actions to protect the rights of a minority from the subjugation of the majority, in EVERY SINGLE CASE the minority will turn to civil disobedience and eventually voilence.
And in every case, while there are pockets of anger, the greater sum of people simply suffer voicelessly, dependent on someone else to take up their cause.
You shouldn’t be afraid of “militant homosexuals”. You should seek to hear the subtext- to truly understand what is happening. Just as I seek to be the voice for the voiceless, believing that Christ would do the same were he still in possession of a physical body.
Oh, wait, he is: me and you.
Me, and you.
From your head to your heart to the world
Anyone heard that cliche about “head knowledge” versus “heart knowledge”? You know, the youth leader says it’s not enough to have the knowledge in your head from reading the Bible, it has to get into your heart.
I’ve always been a strange girl, and I would picture a surgeon clamping someone’s chest open and inserting a Bible. Getting knowledge into your heart seemed to be a grisly occupation.
The past few weeks have found our little group (remember the group that May Or May Not be a Church?) searching for a way to find the precepts of faith that we are passionate about, and make them go from Principles (Head Knowledge) to Practices.
It’s been an interesting experiment.
And since I have nothing else of substance to blog about today, I’ll share them all with you.
Our Principles:
- Living Creatively
- Generosity (Hospitality)
- Knowing Jesus
and those have turned into Our Practices:
- Do one creative act every week. (This can be anything from writing, to painting, to making an interesting meal, to anything creative, really.)
- Show generosity to someone every week. (Or hospitality, or both.)
- Learn about Jesus. (needs no explanation.)
And every week we check in with each other to see how the experiment is going.
I’ve found that I don’t need to make any effort to really follow through with my practices- although learning something new about Jesus every week is a little hard after over fourteen years of being a devoted and studious little Christian. As a group we’ve had some really amazing reports from the real world application of our principles.
So- I’m wondering:
Does anyone reading this have a similar method of turning principles into practices? Or- what would happen if you borrowed mine for a week? Would it be hard, or would it come naturally? How close are you to really living the precepts of your faith?
Like/Don’t like: Church Edition
I used to do the “Like/Don’t like” lists as a kid. It’s an interesting exercise, to try to change everything you do like into something you don’t, or something you don’t like into something you do. So: what I like/don’t like about church:
- I Like the feeling of corporate agreement and the close bond from knowing that we are “in this together”
- I don’t like how readily that lends itself to the mob mentality
- I like knowing that there are all those other people there, interested in my well being
- I don’t like when they involve themselves in areas of my life I don’t invite them into- especially when we aren’t in agreement.
- I like the spontaneous honesty, and knowing people as whole people far more deeply than one would in another context
- I don’t like knowing the deepest secrets of someone who may have stayed a relative stranger if we hadn’t gone on a retreat together.
- I like the “church food” served at luncheons- no one knows a casserole like a church lady, am I right?
- I don’t like that church luncheons always seem to be a table of casseroles and a table of deserts and one lonely salad with fatty dressing
- I like hearing sermons I didn’t expect to hear, and agreeing where I didn’t expect to agree
- I don’t like the other eighty percent of the time when all I can think is “been there, read that, heard this.”
- I like the fact that I seem naturally propelled into positions of responsibility. It feels good to take care of people.
- I don’t like the fact that I don’t always feel like I get to choose my own calling.
- I like being in a community.
- I don’t like the fact that the church community seems to be a gated one.
- I like having hope for the future
- I don’t like knowing that we’ve got such a long way to go.
That’s enough for today. I’m feeling very sleepy.
Blind faith is folly
Wisdom is supreme; therefore get wisdom.
Though it cost all you have, get understanding – (Proverbs 4:7)
*
My son, preserve sound judgment and discernment,
do not let them out of your sight;
they will be life for you,
an ornament to grace your neck. – (Proverbs 3:21-22)
The entire book of Proverbs is like a love letter to Wisdom, whom the author personifies as a woman of endless worth. It’s a good book of the Bible. I still prefer Ecclesiastes, but Proverbs has it’s high points as well.
I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately. I’ve been spending a lot of my time in meditation about the things that really, really bothered me about church as a teen. This and the book of Proverbs walk hand in hand.
I hate the whole principal of “faith by formula”. I hate the idea that we think we can boil the mysteries of God down to simple equations. I hate the fact that so many pastors and youth leaders buy in to the concept that the journey to God is a set path with predictable markers- because it often means that people who are truly seeking God have their faith killed in the crossfire when they stray off of what people expect their path to be. A kid who realizes he is gay is told that he has a secret sin and his sexuality is a judgment for said sin. A girl who likes dark music is told that she does so because of demonic opression. A boy who feels the spirit of God filling him and comforting him in love is told that he won’t have TRULY felt God until he speaks in tongues. A single mother is told that God doesn’t want her children to be raised without a father- she then feels betrayed by God when relationship after relationship fall apart, and judged horribly when she’s told that she won’t be “allowed” into a relationship until she fixes some sin in herself.
Time and time again hearts are broken and faith is tested not by God, but by God’s people. As the bumper-sticker sarcastically says “I love Jesus- it’s his WIFE that’s the PROBLEM!”.
We are taught that we are to have a “childlike” faith. I don’t believe that childlike faith and blind faith are the same thing. A child believes because it is natural to believe. They expect the best, they are unashamed in their love, they glimmer and glow over the simplest things. To love Jesus as a child would love him means to love fearlessly, with abandon. But a child is not blind or stupid- they will stop to question if they see someone getting hurt. When I punish my son, my daughter will come and try to intercede on his behalf. She asks me why he is crying, if I wanted him to cry, she says she doesn’t care that he hit her, she forgives him, why can’t I forgive him? That is the love of a child- not unquestioning, but DESPERATELY wanting the best for all, happiness for all.
Our faith in God should be the same. We SHOULD question, we SHOULD cry and beg and plead for the souls and happiness of our fellow man. We should not snap to judgment or accept formulas that leave others out in the cold- we should wrestle and struggle with the formulas, we should test and test and test, we should attempt to perfect.
But most of all we should seek wisdom, good judgment and discernment. We should learn to recognize what God’s spirit looks like when it manifests in a way we don’t expect. When the gay man starts crying and professes that he feels God’s love and embrace, we shouldn’t say, “ah, but you won’t TRULY feel God until you stop being gay.” When the single mother says that she is trying to provide a holy and stable life for her kids, we shouldn’t pressure her into marriage and claim we know what life God wants for her, we should walk at her side, protect her from danger, and help to seek and discern God’s individual voice for her life. When the young girl shows her propensity for Gothic music and make-up, we shouldn’t scream “DEMON!”, we should seek to help her find the voice to describe what she’s really experiencing- and if all she’s showing is an artistic taste, let her have it.
The world would be a boring place if life were homogenized into predictable norms.
Like a child, we should crave the excitement that comes from difference and discovery.
And like the writer of Proverbs, we should hunger and thirst for Wisdom the way a young man hungers for a beautiful and perfect woman.
About fear.
I once attended a church where they taught that the sign of God’s spirit being in someone was that they spoke in tongues. One rule, applied to every single person on earth. At the time, I bought in. And so did someone else I knew who pretended to speak in tongues because he was ashamed that the fact that he didn’t, naturally, meant that God’s spirit wasn’t in him. At the time it bothered me, because I felt that the Bible showed God touching people in a lot of different ways than just speaking in tongues.
But some of the people in this church, they tenaciously held on to the belief that God could be defined in rules and patterns, that his ways could be traced out to a single set form, that life could be made to be predictable. The other side of this homogenizing of God’s ways was the homogenizing of God’s people. And the other side of this homogenizing of God’s people was fear.
Because as we all know, people often don’t fit within the strictures of our expectations, especially when the expectation is that God will manifest himself in someone according to a formula. So there was this constant fear and questioning. If Mary Sue was “blessed” and didn’t speak in tongues or start laughing with the “joy of the spirit”, people questioned why. Maybe she was feeling God’s grief over some kind of sin, or… maybe she was being oppressed by a demon.
It wasn’t every single person in that church who thought that way, but there was a group. A group my father described as having to cast demons out of their teacups before drinking. There was a period of time where this sort of heightened spirituality was rampant, and there was a few times where good, decent, not demon-possessed people found themselves as the victims of exorcisms when people failed to come up with a good enough excuse for not abiding by the formula.
A good friend of mine was “exorcised” by a similar church when she had the bad luck of wearing a black t-shirt with a band logo that looked demonic.
Romans 8:14-15 says (paraphrasing) that those who belong to God are not given a spirit of fear but of belonging, and 1st John 4:18 says that perfect love casts out all fear, because fear has to do with punishment.
God doesn’t MEAN for us to be afraid. And I think if we ARE afraid, it’s because something is amiss. That something is amiss not in the world, but in our hearts.
The fear that the people of my old church experienced came out of a lack of understanding and discernment. They truly believed that God operated by a formula- so anything outside of their guidelines meant one of two things: something was wrong, or they were wrong. Either way, they were terrified. And the church that tried to cast a demon out of my friend- they saw something they didn’t understand, something in her that they could not define, and it terrified them.
The same fear drives Biblically defended homophobia, isolates people in cultural minorities, and starts wars.
But that fear? it is NOT God’s intention, and it is NOT okay.
Honest Conversation: yet another excerpt
I don’t have time to write a post today, so I’ll just plug my book some more!
The following is a conversation between Zoe (the associate pastor) and Kyle, with Kyle’s boyfriend Evan chiming in from time to time.
“When I first started feeling like I was really gay, I told my mom.” He said, “and she flipped out. She sat me down and she told me all about how good boys don’t become gay, how it’s something that only happens to evil people. And she told me I needed to repent and find the sin that made me gay and change it.”
“Jesus Christ,” I said, not knowing what else to say. I wasn’t taking his name in vain, I was honestly trying to invoke his presence.
“And I tried to. I really tried to. For a year, I tried to. I prayed and prayed and begged and begged and I did everything I knew how to, to be good. And I tried dating a girl. I tried kissing her. I tried to make myself love her. And the whole time I felt like what I was doing was so wrong. I hated myself, for trying to be someone I wasn’t. I used to be able to feel God in things, so long ago. I used to be able to tell that I was making God happy. But no matter how hard I tried to make God happy that year all I felt was this resounding emptiness.”
“A Godshaped hole,” I said with all of the irony of a girl who spent years in Sunday school talking about the hole that only Jesus Christ could fill.
“Then I met this boy, Milo.” Kyle smiled, “and the first time he smiled at me, I felt desperately sick. I wanted him so badly it scared the crap out of me.”
Evan chuckled.
“Laugh all you want,” Kyle said, “but I think I literally crapped my pants.”
I suddenly felt a million pinpricks in my heart. Never had I felt what he was talking about. Rarely had I even wanted to. “And then what?” I asked.
“And then I couldn’t take it anymore. I couldn’t stand hating myself. I couldn’t stand trying to win my way back into God’s graces. I couldn’t stand being in a church every Sunday where I knew that all the other parishioners thought that I was going to burn in Hell for a sin I wasn’t aware of having committed. They treated me like the plague, because if I was attracted to other boys that meant God had cursed me. And you know what?”
“What?” Evan and I said in unison.
“Every time I read the Bible the only people I see God cursing are the hypocrites.” Kyle choked back tears again, “and I wasn’t a hypocrite. I was a scared little kid that only wanted to please everyone else and never even thought of what he wanted, until I wanted Milo. And if I had to choose between a God that cursed me and a boy that looked like a god, well, what do you think a sixteen year old kid would choose?”
“A hamburger?” I said jokingly.
Evan laughed and Kyle shook his head. “In any case,” Kyle said, “I swore off religion. And I kept my word for a long, long time. And then a few months ago my mom died, and I went to the funeral and felt so out of place. Everyone else there was so sure of God, so sure of Heaven, so sure that my mom had finally found peace… and there I was, ten years later, totally empty. And still wishing I could make God happy.”
“So why our church?”“My sister said, ‘just accept that God loves you and wants what’s best for you’. And then I saw that one billboard, the one that says, ‘God made you freckles and all’. And I thought, ‘maybe God made me gay and all.’ But I guess that wasn’t the message I was supposed to get.” Kyle laughed bitterly.
I could feel the remnants of my mochas wreaking havoc on my insides, but I swallowed that thought and motioned for us to get back onto the furniture. I sat down on the love seat and Evan and Kyle sat beside each other on the couch. “I don’t know who God made you to be,” I said to Kyle, “but I’m absolutely certain He loves you, which is all that matters. We are called to love as God loves, and God loves you, so we are beholden to love you as well. And maybe that means sometimes telling you when we think you’re doing something that could hurt you, but I see the way you and Evan look at each other and I think, ‘of all the things that could lead to death, a love like that is certainly not one of them.’ So, I won’t tell you to leave your lover. I will tell you to try to accept the fact that God loves you, though, because I think you need that. You need to know that God doesn’t want you to be destroyed.”
Remember, you can get it through CafePress, or by emailing me (linkees@gmail.com)
In defense of Gay rights- Civil Law and God’s Law
Note: this is a strategy for subverting the argument that Biblical law bans homosexuality, not necessarily a full portrayal of my own personal beliefs. This argument allows for homosexual acts being sin but still not being a significant argument that society as a whole should adhere to moral law.
_ _ _
In 1st Samuel 8, the people of Israel demand a King, so that they can “be like the lands around them”. This request grieves Samuel, who asks God what is to be done. God responds that Samuel should tell the people what having a King means. So Samuel goes, and tells the Israelites that a King means that their sons will be taken to serve in the army, that their daughters will be taken for the King’s household, that their money and their fields will belong to the king, and so on and so forth.
The Children of God, like all rebellious and donkey-headed children, respond that they still want a king.
God responded, “give them what they’re asking for.”
And what did they get? A king who did not govern according to God’s heart.
So begins the saga of the separation of civil and Godly law. The Bible is clear on the fact that the governments of this world are not appointed by God nor are they God’s intention. God did NOT want Israel to have a king- but humanity is given free choice, and if we ask for government we’ll get what’s coming to us.
As Israel’s history progressed so did periods of Kings who were anointed by God and kings who were not, periods of abundance and periods of drought, times of happiness and times of exile. These lead into the Roman occupation, which is where the New Testament comes into play. “The Kingdom of God is near”. Now, most of the time you see those words what is really being referred to is nothing more than people who adhere to God’s rule. It’s not an “earthly” Kingdom even though it is one that is seen on this earth. It doesn’t have borders, it doesn’t have an earthly ruler- what it has is the hearts of the faithful who truly desire to have God as their ruler. The rules of this kingdom are not like earthly laws, either. They read more like “Render unto Caesar what is Caesars”, “Judge not lest ye be judged”, “Love your neighbor as yourself” and “do unto others…”
I write this post to set the framework for a very simply concept:
The separation of Church and State is a concept found in the Bible, and is part of the cornerstone of understanding what God requires of us. We, as the Kingdom, are meant to be a separate people. This concept comes up again in 1 Corinthians 6, where Paul chastises the Corinthians for allowing internal legal disputes to be settled by civil government. Paul puts forth that it would be better to have a Christian of “no account” settle a dispute than a stranger. Earlier in Corinthians he had also stated, “What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside?” (1 Cor. 5:12) Again, clearly showing a line of separation. We, as Christians, are called to a separate standard than the world. And we are not to judge the world by our own standard.
Even Jesus himself avoided judgment, despite his divinity, saying “As for the person who hears my words but does not keep them, I do not judge him. For I did not come to judge the world, but to save it.” (John 12: 47)
The world is left to the world, and God’s law is reserved for the faithful.
I have even gone as far as to use this clear separation to say that a gay person’s right to marry is one that Biblical concepts SUPPORT, because civil marriage is the province of Caesar, and who are we as Christians to judge the ways of the world? We must keep our rules as sacred to we, the Kingdom, and allow the world the right to govern as it will.
