(note: the following comes from a line of theory and theology that you may not agree with; please comment at the bottom of the post to add to the discussion!)
My personal tendency when I feel far from God is just to keep running away. I can do this by myself, right? I've done it before...surely it can't be that bad to try again. It's dark and I cannot see, because God is light and I'm running without bringing the light with me. I stumble over rocks and run headfirst into walls and crash into trees and fall into bushes. And I sit in the dark and I wallow and wonder where to go from here.
How could God ever want me now?
It sometimes just feels that way when we're not even trying to run away, that we look at everything around us and some days it all just seems bad and we ask ourselves, "In the midst of all of this, where is God?"
Divorce. Tragedy. Pain. Trauma. Struggles. Destruction. Financial problems. Starvation. Hopelessness. Death. Illness. Depression. Routine. Abuse. Disasters. Etc.
How could God ever allow all of this?
I get the feeling that these questions and others tend to be interrelated, and that the answers to these questions are neither easy nor necessarily the ones that everyone looks for. The same God that allows your pain by running a specific direction (away from Him) also allows your pain when you don't. It seems to make no sense, right? I follow up these questions with a series of mini-news-flashes, not necessarily in any particular order or relation to the aforementioned questions.
News flash #1: It's not about you. It's about God.
Ouch, right? It hurts our ego to read it so bluntly. But it never has been, and it never will be. God created an entire universe before He created our world, and He created the Earth before He created us. Essentially, He made an environment with fixed properties and rules, our own personal playground, and set us loose to enjoy it (see this old blog post for my fixation with the world as a playground). It was a perfect environment, but the rules were fixed, and to interact in the world was to interact within the bounds and rules set by God Himself. See The Problem of Pain by C.S. Lewis for further theory.
Humans were perfect, too, and obedient to God, but then sin happened (sin = our rebellion and deciding to do what we think is best for ourselves yet is actually not in line with God's will for us). Sin created separation from God. Because God created humans as sovereign creatures and would rather have them choose to love Him back freely instead of it being a robotic love, He allows humans to continue to turn to their own ways, away from Him, and sin. Sin is painful. Sin hurts ourselves. Sin hurts others. But like the most perfect superhero and prince ever, God sent Jesus to atone for all of that and, no matter our decisions and choices, bridge the separation between us and God (see my previous post on grace for a better layout of what "bridging the gap" means). When we admit our faults and desire to sin, believe that Jesus really can bring us into relationship with God, and commit to that relationship, we are able to come into it. But sinning is still a conscious act that we can choose to take. And when we do, it still hurts us, and it still hurts others.
News flash #2: Even though it's not about you, God cares deeply and wildly for you. (See Furious by Jeremy Riddle for a song version of this news flash)
Like a father for his children and a groom for his bride, God loves you! And nothing that you do and nothing that happens to you as a result of others' doing escapes His sight. He hurts when you do, because He loves you that much. He also hurts when, instead of coming to Him for healing, we try to find it elsewhere. I am very guilty of this. When it comes down to it, God wishes that even when we sin against Him time and time again, we come to Him and ask for His mercy instead of trying to make it better on our own. He made us. He made all of this. He's had enough practice to get the hang of things by now, don't you think?
News flash #3: Relationships are always two-way streets. Including a God-human relationship
This means that even as God is passionately pursuing you and trying to win your heart over, even as He sacrificed Himself as His Son for you, even as He'd do anything for you, He will not do anything that you do not consent to (He's a gentleman!). Furthermore, if we do not pursue Him back, the relationship is completely one-sided. How well does that even work out in our everyday interpersonal relationships!? Not to mention a spiritual one! On this final news flash, I leave you, dear Reader, with a word of encouragement: God has amazing plans for you, and they are not plans to harm you. They are plans to prosper you, give you hope, and give you a future. Call to Him, pray to Him, because He will listen! And in seeking Him with all your heart, you will find Him! (Jer. 29:11-13).
Further reading and study: Where Is God In Tragedy?, Jeremiah 29, Even When I'm At My Darkest
Thursday, May 30, 2013
Tuesday, January 8, 2013
Grace
"God's grace has a drenching about it. A wildness about it. A white-water, riptide, turn-you-upside-downness about it. Grace comes after you." -Max LucadoJust what is grace? I sat down in a bookstore on Saturday night and picked up the book Grace by Max Lucado and realized that I always think I know what it is, and I learn about it time and time again, and yet somehow the definition always seems to escape me, and just when I need it most I realize I need to relearn yet again what grace is. What it does. Why it's so important.
The Greek word for grace charis literally means "free gift"; Strong defines it as "the divine influence upon the heart, and its reflection in the life." The Bible goes even further and says in Ephesians 2:8-9 that "it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God--not by works, so that no one can boast."
Another creative way of looking at GRACE:
God's
Riches
At
Christ's
Expense.
Grace is separate from salvation and faith in that when we have faith in Jesus's sacrifice on the cross, we receive salvation because of God's grace. Grace is not works, and cannot be achieved by works. What are works? Anything someone does to try to be a "good person" or to try to be righteous. When we try to work for grace, we end up "frustrating" grace, as Paul says in Galatians 2:21. True salvation through faith places the Holy Spirit in us, and it is His grace that changes us from the inside out. He doesn't need our help.
However, don't think that we can continue living our same lives, that we can say "yes" to Jesus but not let His grace affect us. That, too, is "frustrating" grace. Our desire to know God, our pursuit of a relationship with God, our profound recognition of who God is and what He has done for humanity...when all of this is internalized, when the extent of His love for us begins to sink into our very core, it doesn't leave us unchanged unless we then choose to run the exact opposite direction. "Never mind, God, I don't want your free gift."
Max Lucado in his book Grace uses water imagery to say that "God's grace has a drenching about it. A wildness about it. A white-water, riptide, turn-you-upside-downness about it. Grace comes after you." Todd Agnew in his song "Grace Like Rain" sings, "Hallelujah, grace like rain/Falls down on me/Hallelujah, all my stains/Are washed away, they'rewashed away." John Mark McMillan's lyrics in "How He Loves" say that God "loves like a hurricane, I am a tree/Bending beneath the weight of His wind and mercy...Drawn to redemption by the grace in His eyes/If grace is an ocean we're all sinking."
Have you ever been hit in the face with an ocean wave before, been drawn under by it? I have. And then trying to get air, I was thrown back under the surface of the water by yet another wave, and so came up coughing and sputtering and trying to clear my lungs of the warm, salty sea water so that I could actually get a mouthful of air.
I think when we are truly wrecked by grace, when it truly hits us, it's kind of like that. We are smacked with it, drawn under by it, overwhelmed by it, and it just comes back for us again and again in different ways at different moments. And it's one of the most powerful and beautiful things I've ever experienced. And when I find myself most unworthy of it, even more than usual, that's when it hits me the hardest, and I let it draw me under and take over me and work in my heart, let it wash over my soul.
Further study: Romans 5, story of "How He Loves", examination of grace like a check
Monday, December 24, 2012
Musings on Christmas
Sometimes the Christmas story just sounds too much like that: a story. It's got a setting, principal and secondary characters, a plot, a climax, a resolution that leaves room for a sequel. Sometimes I fall into the routine around this time of year and even get swept along by the whole glorified aspect of the baby Jesus born to a virgin to save the world thing. It sounds like it could be a movie, too, and guaranteed there are hundreds of movies out there about this very theme. Approaching it cynically, it's enough to make one wonder about the validity and even the meaning of Christmas. But what I need to remember is the fact that no matter how often human beings take this story and make it even more of a story, appealing to the general audience, it's more than just a story.
It happened.
Perhaps not on December 25, but still it happened. Perhaps not with Mary riding into Bethlehem on a mule and pausing at different homes, taking her time to ask every single person if they could spare a room for the night, but it still happened. Perhaps not with exactly three wise men or los tres reyes magos like we always see and have grown used to seeing, but still it happened. Perhaps not with everyone lined up neatly around the manger in picture perfect lighting, baby Jesus sleeping silently in a pile of clean hay and tidy swaddling cloths, but still it happened.
In fact, we tend to glorify this event so much. We forget that Mary was just a teenager, and probably freaked out of her mind for multiple reasons: a) she witnessed an angel come to her and tell her she would be pregnant (how many people see angels, again?), b) she was pregnant at a young age, c) she was pregnant by means that had nothing to do with normal conception, and d) she wasn't even married to Joseph at this point. We forget that Joseph probably assumed that Mary had been unfaithful to him at first, and that he was probably furious with her for a little while before an angel also came to him and told him what was going on. We also forget that Mary was very pregnant when she had to travel with Joseph to Bethlehem for the census, that they probably didn't have a mule available to them and they had to walk the entire way across treacherous terrain and probably without proper footwear (sandals, anyone?). We forget that Mary could have begun to contract at any point during her arrival in Bethlehem and simply would not have had the time to amble around with Joseph looking for a neat little inn, and that odds are she just ducked into the nearest stable because nobody was willing to take in a stranger. We forget that there were no painkillers.
We forget that this, in fact, definitely did not occur on December 25, since the fact that all the sheep were out in their pastures at night lends to the thought that it was probably springtime and mating season for them. We forget that hundreds, if not thousands, of shepherds and magi who traversed miles to be able to see the Savior of the world in baby form. We forget that King Herod tried to use this whole sequence of events to murder the child so that he would not overthrow Herod's reign (even though this was never Jesus's intention, since His kingdom "is not of this world" [John 18:38]) and in fact ordered all children under the age of two to be executed in order to try to avoid this possibility.
We forget that Jesus, though He was born entirely God, was also born entirely human, and human babies cry. A lot. We forget that a manger is a feeding trough, usually for pigs, and not the most sanitary location for a newborn baby. We forget that Mary may or may not have anticipated Jesus's birth on this journey and therefore may or may not have thought to have brought clean cloths to wrap him in; in fact, from such a long journey, they were probably as dirty and sweat-ridden as she and Joseph, and the cloths may have been taken from their own backs. We forget that Mary and Joseph probably hadn't eaten much of anything and had hardly slept any up to this point.
We forget why Jesus was even born to begin with. We forget that God created humans and loved them as His favorite part of all creation, and yet we with our free will decided that we wanted to go our own way apart from God, and not live in relationship with Him, not listen to Him, not have anything to do with Him. We forget that a rift created by such "sin" (anything that "misses the mark" of God's absolute perfection and relationship with Him, like a bullseye in a target) can only be filled and bridged by a deep, personal sacrifice of some sort, and that for centuries humans tried to make up for it with their own perfect animal blood sacrifices. We forget that love came down to Earth, that God so loved the world that He gave the world Himself as His son that we might forever live with Him and be in perfect relationship again with Him through an absolutely perfect, eternal sacrifice to trump all others (John 3:16). We forget that, ultimately, this is why Jesus was born: to die one of the worst deaths, if not the worst death, that humanity has ever recorded.
We forget that all of this is more than a story: It's history. And we forget that grace is not just a gift given for the whole of humanity, but that it's also personal. It's for me. And it's for you. He loves me. And He loves you. He loves you. You. Just as you are. You, with all your imperfections. You, with all your problems. You, with all your unfulfilled goals and dreams and wishes. You, not because of anything you've ever done or ever will do. You, simply because you are. Simply because He chooses to love you, because He thinks you're wonderful and marvelous and lovely and an incredible nuance of creation.
Let's consider thisaspect reality of Christmas a little more, shall we?
It happened.
Perhaps not on December 25, but still it happened. Perhaps not with Mary riding into Bethlehem on a mule and pausing at different homes, taking her time to ask every single person if they could spare a room for the night, but it still happened. Perhaps not with exactly three wise men or los tres reyes magos like we always see and have grown used to seeing, but still it happened. Perhaps not with everyone lined up neatly around the manger in picture perfect lighting, baby Jesus sleeping silently in a pile of clean hay and tidy swaddling cloths, but still it happened.
In fact, we tend to glorify this event so much. We forget that Mary was just a teenager, and probably freaked out of her mind for multiple reasons: a) she witnessed an angel come to her and tell her she would be pregnant (how many people see angels, again?), b) she was pregnant at a young age, c) she was pregnant by means that had nothing to do with normal conception, and d) she wasn't even married to Joseph at this point. We forget that Joseph probably assumed that Mary had been unfaithful to him at first, and that he was probably furious with her for a little while before an angel also came to him and told him what was going on. We also forget that Mary was very pregnant when she had to travel with Joseph to Bethlehem for the census, that they probably didn't have a mule available to them and they had to walk the entire way across treacherous terrain and probably without proper footwear (sandals, anyone?). We forget that Mary could have begun to contract at any point during her arrival in Bethlehem and simply would not have had the time to amble around with Joseph looking for a neat little inn, and that odds are she just ducked into the nearest stable because nobody was willing to take in a stranger. We forget that there were no painkillers.
We forget that this, in fact, definitely did not occur on December 25, since the fact that all the sheep were out in their pastures at night lends to the thought that it was probably springtime and mating season for them. We forget that hundreds, if not thousands, of shepherds and magi who traversed miles to be able to see the Savior of the world in baby form. We forget that King Herod tried to use this whole sequence of events to murder the child so that he would not overthrow Herod's reign (even though this was never Jesus's intention, since His kingdom "is not of this world" [John 18:38]) and in fact ordered all children under the age of two to be executed in order to try to avoid this possibility.
We forget that Jesus, though He was born entirely God, was also born entirely human, and human babies cry. A lot. We forget that a manger is a feeding trough, usually for pigs, and not the most sanitary location for a newborn baby. We forget that Mary may or may not have anticipated Jesus's birth on this journey and therefore may or may not have thought to have brought clean cloths to wrap him in; in fact, from such a long journey, they were probably as dirty and sweat-ridden as she and Joseph, and the cloths may have been taken from their own backs. We forget that Mary and Joseph probably hadn't eaten much of anything and had hardly slept any up to this point.
We forget why Jesus was even born to begin with. We forget that God created humans and loved them as His favorite part of all creation, and yet we with our free will decided that we wanted to go our own way apart from God, and not live in relationship with Him, not listen to Him, not have anything to do with Him. We forget that a rift created by such "sin" (anything that "misses the mark" of God's absolute perfection and relationship with Him, like a bullseye in a target) can only be filled and bridged by a deep, personal sacrifice of some sort, and that for centuries humans tried to make up for it with their own perfect animal blood sacrifices. We forget that love came down to Earth, that God so loved the world that He gave the world Himself as His son that we might forever live with Him and be in perfect relationship again with Him through an absolutely perfect, eternal sacrifice to trump all others (John 3:16). We forget that, ultimately, this is why Jesus was born: to die one of the worst deaths, if not the worst death, that humanity has ever recorded.
We forget that all of this is more than a story: It's history. And we forget that grace is not just a gift given for the whole of humanity, but that it's also personal. It's for me. And it's for you. He loves me. And He loves you. He loves you. You. Just as you are. You, with all your imperfections. You, with all your problems. You, with all your unfulfilled goals and dreams and wishes. You, not because of anything you've ever done or ever will do. You, simply because you are. Simply because He chooses to love you, because He thinks you're wonderful and marvelous and lovely and an incredible nuance of creation.
Let's consider this
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