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One of my personal mending shifts I have been trying to work on lately is fighting my internal need to label people. What I am finding is how deeply ingrained and automatic this habit really is. Recently, I have began to view not-labeling as a spiritual practice; one in which I try to see a person simply as a child whom God loves. When I practice this, I look at a person and as the labels fly into my mind at light speed I acknowledge them and then mentally try to discard them. Yesterday, this practice was really put to the test.
I had an appointment at the welfare office (yes, you read it correctly, but that’s another story). As I sat there waiting for my name to be called, I looked at the people surrounding me. Identifying and categorizing labels came flooding in— Elderly, white, Hispanic, poor, male, female, black, cute, ugly, well dressed—and no matter how hard I tried, I could not dispose of them. I instantly, within seconds, neatly categorized everyone in that room—Bamm! Done! If I were really honest, I saw them more according to the imposed labels then as a child of God whom he loves. I really tried, but it proved too difficult. That is until she showed up…
As I sat there by myself, surrounded by labels, she appeared from around a square column that was supporting the room. She walked with laughter and the smile on her face was priceless. She was a real cutie. Dark hair, about 3′2″ tall, and around 2 years old. I instantly saw her as a child of God whom he loves. Then a piercing question hit me: Why is it so easy for me to see—without labels—a cute child simply as someone whom God loves and so difficult to see an adult that way? Why does 40 years of aging effect my view of God’s kids so much? Why do I categorize and label them, but simply see her for who she is? After all, in reality, doesn’t God see us—you and me—like I saw that little girl? I sat there and quietly let God’s message sink into my heart.
Then I began to look around at the adults again. This time, I began to see them as God’s kids whom he loves. But I also saw more. I saw kids who were sad, wounded, lonely, scared (and scarred), beat down, and hurting. I saw, in part, the effect those 40 years of life had on them and my heart broke—it simply broke. As it did, I thanked my Father for the generous gift he just gave my heart.
And so my journey and my practice of trying not to label people—simply seeing them as children whom God loves—continues on. As it does, I hope that I can resist the need to label myself and simply see me as one of his, whom he loves.
May you too—’Cause you are, and he does!
And a special shout out to all the 32 year-olds born on this day: Happy Birthday—you’re now 8 years old! (by the way, if you’re reading this, you’re late for school…hehehe).
For whatever reason, some of the rats and mice in our neighborhood thought our house was a great place to spend their winter. Quite often when we go out into our garage, we hear the sounds of scurrying mice and rats as they rustle through our bags and boxes. Every now and then we will actually see them run along the rafters or jump from one cabinet to another; and I have to admit, I think they are kinda cute! But they chew up our stuff, leave poop everywhere, and carry awful diseases (or so I’ve been told). I don’t mind them living out in the wild or even in our backyard. But when they take residence in our residence, that’s when he gloves come off and I depart from Saint Francis’ theology of love-all-of-creation. I’ve had enough and the rats must die (not to mention I really love my wife who keeps dropping hints about our “friends” in the garage).
So here is what I did. I went to the local Lowes store and bought some d-CON Ready Mixed Baitbits (a.k.a rat and mice poison). I brought the poison home. Without reading the directions (I am a guy) I opened the box, took out a bait filled tray, removed the protective film, dumped the poison baitbits into my mouth and quickly swallowed. “There,” I thought, “That will show them.”
I grabbed a folding chair, sat down in the middle of our garage, and waited for the rats to die. Soon the rats emerged out of the dark shadows and began scurrying about. Just the sight of them made me mad! “There they go again, destroying my stuff, crapping in my garage, and threating the health of my kids.” Pissed, I swallowed some more poison baitbites. As I sat there steaming over the rats and waiting for the poison to take effect on them, my stomach began to knot up and my insides began to churn. A sharp pain sent my body into the fetal position as my stomach tried to repel the poison and its bitterness.
As I layed there in the garage convulsing, it dawned on me—this is exactly what happens when I don’t forgive. As Anne Lamott wisely noted:
Not forgiving is like drinking rat poison
and then waiting for the rat to die.
May I (we) deeply experience what it means to be forgiven by God and deeply extend forgiveness to others—even if they’re “rats”.
We took a walk as a family yesterday. As we walked, I looked down and saw one small piece of a torn up, hand written letter on the ground. Allow me to share with you what it said:
FRONT SIDE OF THE LETTER:
every morning
ery weekday
ed Sat & Sun
ery busy! Well a
my permit ar
a down paym
t the car, but
s name because
nued to pay the
ery month. Afte
gan my junio
BACK SIDE OF THE LETTER:
, bu? Just wa
because I am
g I have ever do
with you. I go
advantage of th
end there, I beg
use everyone else
w that is not a
et I did. I have
t me on that
e was such a
So there you have it…part of a two-sided personal letter. Pretty limited, huh? Just a part of the whole, huh?
People are a lot like this letter. I only can see and know a part of them. I just have a small portion of the whole. A torn fragment…nothing more. It is when I judge and label the part that I see as the WHOLE that things get messy. People get hurt. Names are thrown. Fear is induced. But when I have the humility and honesty to accept that I only know them in part, and can only know them in part, perhaps then I can resist the need to label and categorize them as if I know them wholly.
God’s revelation of himself is also like this letter. He has only revealed himself partly to us. He has done this particularly through creation, scripture, and ultimately through Jesus (though, to a degree, he also reveals himself in other ways to us as well). But each of these are only limited revelations of God and who he truly is. When I believe these partial revelations—or worst yet, my understanding and interpretations of them—as WHOLE, that is when things get messy. Lines are drawn. Camps are divided. People get hurt. But when I have the humility and honesty to accept that I only know—and can only know—in part, perhaps then I can resist the need to claim perfect truth, and label and categorize others. Perhaps then I can begin to trust God like a baby trusts her mom—in love, not in knowledge.
Perhaps it’s then, with baby-like trust, that I begin to realize and experience the Kingdom of God.
Trust comes when we accept his love and acknowledge we’re powerless.
Suppose I live in one room of a house my entire life. I never leave this room and this room has only one window looking outside. To me, this window-view of the outside world—the trees, the hills, the sky—is the only view. To me, this is what the outside world looks like: what I see out of my one window. It is all I have ever known or seen of outdoor reality, so to me, it is reality, it is truth. If someone were to ask me what the great outdoors looks like, I would describe (and likely defend) my view from my window…as I should, it is all I’ve ever known.
But one day, I hear a tap at my door. Expecting it to be locked like all the other times, I try to open it and to my surprise, it opens. There is a kind, old man (there is always an old man in good stories) standing in a hallway which I’ve never seen. He greets me and leads me to another door down the hall. He slowly opens it, revealing another room. Cautiously and with great hesitation, I step in and am floored. This new room is very different from mine and it too has a window looking outside. I slowly approach it, drawing back its curtain, and for the first time discover a new view of the outside world. There’s a house and a road and a dog that I have never seen before, but were there all along—simply out of view from my previous all-I’ve-ever-known window. My outside world just altered and with it brings both excitement and knee shaking disequilibrium. Reality as I knew it changed. The old man smiles at the gift he has given me.
He takes my hand and leads me to another room, and another, and another…each a bit different and each with a new window exposing a distinctive and unique view of the great outdoors. After the first few rooms, I begin to settle into the fact that the outside world is much different and bigger than what I had previously known. I actually begin to anticipate that with each new room and window, the actual reality of the outside world will be fuller known to me. What I once feared—or never knew—now brings the excitement of discovery.
The old man sits me down in the living room and tells me that the house—his house—is mine to explore. All the rooms and windows are available to me, and much like Extreme Home Makeover, releases me to joyfully discover my new house. I run off doing just that! Each room and window is a gift of reality-discovery.
After some time, he finds me and takes my hand once more. I am tired. He takes me to a yet another door—a new door. As he turns the knob I am expecting to find another room with yet another window-view. He opens the door. Fresh air rushes in. The streaming sunlight is both blinding and spectacular; my skin reacts to its warmth. Glass no longer separates me from, or limits my view of, the great outdoors. He leads me outside to now finally experience the full reality of the great outdoors…not through windows, but in actual, absolute reality. The scents, the sounds, the breeze, the sun—they all explode with life! Once again, my reality shatters as his reality emerges.
He lets go of my hand and runs outside, stops and turns back towards me, “Come on, what are you waiting for!” he shouts. I snap out of my trance and run, skipping with laughter, into the great outdoors.
How do you react to this story? What does this story mean to you?
To me, this is my analogy of what my experience walking with different expressions of the Christian faith has been like. To me, each expression offered new insight and discovery into God’s reality—that the sum of the Christian expressions were more truth-ful than one sole expression. This is the beauty of the body of Christ and perhaps what Paul meant when he described Christ’s body-parts as eyes, noses, arms, hands, feet, etc. —each needing each other. May we learn to embrace each expression rather than expel it. ‘Cause one day, we’ll see God’s real reality in its fullness and find out that we, as finite humans, were all wrong to one degree or another.
Heck, in the end, I’ll be amazed if I got 7% of God’s truth correct!
So I Googled “emergent heresy” and all I can say is this: Not much has changed in the past 1700 years.
If church-incited murder (a.k.a. burning at the stake) was legal in America, I am sure a number of people would be ashes by now…heck, would anyone be left for that matter? The Baptists would burn the Presbyterians, the Hard-core Calvinists would be burned by the Armenians, Emergents would be burned by Biblicists, and down the spectrum-divide I could go. The Amish might be the only sole survivors of the turn-of-the-century heretic war. Perhaps this is why the law-of-the-land has the wisdom not to let religious people play with matches while those they do not agree with are around… 
However, I did find one playful post at Tall Skinny Kiwi.
OK, so here is my vent. I fully realize that it is in our human nature to label and define and fragment just about everything into tidy boxes so we can then pass judgment, create an “in” and an “out”, an us and them. But just because I get it does not mean I like it. In fact, I even hate it when I see it surfacing in me. The fruit of such efforts usually creates a polarizing and dis-unifying “we’re good, you’re evil” mentality and “false” reality. It allows us to sit smugly back in our thrones casting everyone else into the shadows of our light. It REALLY makes me sick—and when I see it in myself, I feel sicker.
As one who appreciates and participates in the emerging dialogue and friendship, I often get labeled and boxed into a certain corner based on the label given me. As an example, there are a couple diagrams created by Michael Patton, which represent his certain opinion, floating around and generating quite a bit of buzz. Michael also posted 20 signs (and I get his humor, but behind it is a stab of denouncement) that you are moving from emerging to Emergent:
Top Twenty Signs you are moving from emerging to Emergent!
20. You only curse around fundamentalists.
19. You leave your church because the sermon was not obscure enough.
18. You refer to your local assembly as “church,” “synagogue,” or “mosque” depending on who you are talking to.
17. Your blog is a rant about how everyone else rants too much.
16. You brag that you have never been pinned down theologically on any issue.
15. The only thing you are sure of is that others cannot be sure of anything.
14. You bring your own wine to communion.
13. You are offended when someone says they are going to “Preach the Gospel” or “Teach the truth” believing they should just “Tell a story.”
12. Instead of a tract, you carry a can of Play-doh in you back pocket.
11. Your website links to Green Peace and the Democratic National Convention just because conservatives are against it.
10. You start a Christian blog, but leave it blank, fearing that you might offend someone.
9. You are not any good at art, yet you continue to present the Gospel by painting stick figures on recycled paper.
8. When you present the Gospel, Heaven is renamed The Matrix and you call Christ Neo.
7. Your church caters from Whole Foods.
6. Every sermon illustration begins with “The other night I was drinking a beer and . . .”
5. You have yet to read the book of Romans believing Paul was too modern in his thinking.
4. Your car has a bumper sticker that reads “I think my boss is a Jewish carpenter but I can’t know for certain.”
3. You don’t worship on Sundays because everyone else does.
2. You evaluate truth by asking how many people hold to it. If it is too popular, then it is wrong.
1. When someone calls out your name you get angry saying, “Don’t label me.”
I really do not see either the list or the diagrams as being helpful at all—quite the opposite. I have been reading through a book called Dialogue (by William Isaacs) and some of what he says really resonates with me about this whole inherent human need to label. What happens is we label something—give it a distinction, an image—and then we come to believe that these divisions are real, rather than simply our man-made boxings.
Isaacs notes that when a Syrian astronaut saw the earth from space the first time he said, ‘”From space I saw Earth—indescribably beautiful—with the scars of national boundaries gone.” The dividing lines disappear when you get enough perspective. The lines were made in the minds of human beings, in many cases drawn in the boardrooms of Europe and applied to places like Africa and South Asia. Yet now these lines have significant reality to them: Institutions have formed around them, identities are invested in them. The fragmentation on earth remains pervasive. [...] we make divisions like these all the time and then forget that WE have done so. [...] As a result, our social fabric is deeply fragmented. This fragmentation pervades the way human beings talk and think, in families, between friends, in business, in communities [politics, religion...]. It is a reflection of the divisive forces that we have inherited and usually take for granted [...] and so produces relationships based in the fiction of isolation. [...] Whatever image (or label) our minds make up is NOT the thing imagined. It is always both more and less.”
What Isaacs suggests next floored me with its complex-simplicity and possible beauty: That we might “practice the art of looking at something without needing to have a name in our heads for what we are looking at.” Imagine that? When we see something, or someone, or some movement, or—whatever—we resist the need to name it or label it. When we see a pregnant teenager with tatoos wearing all black we don’t label her, instead, we go deeper. We simply look at her and when a label comes to mind, we shuck it and keep looking until we see HER—as she really is—not a label. This enables us to view her and ourselves as participants of each other, instead of judges and labelers of each other. Empathy begins to surface. Then, perhaps, we might be at the place to begin a dialogue and friendship where we can really try to see them as God sees them, to love them as God loves them. We begin to see ourselves as participants with everything and everyone (with all of creation), acknowledging that we are really no different then the thing we are tempted to label.
So instead of asking and feeling the need to determine, “Where does this belong?” may we slow down and practice the art of looking at something without feeling the need to name it…whatever “it” is. Perhaps, like me, the labeling-alternative is making you sick. To that I suggest that perhaps from God’s perspective (which is more than enough) our labels and lines and fragmentations and names and boxes really don’t exist and they are simply images that we have created and worshiped…
Note: I wrote this nearly a decade ago and it was published in Reaching for Life Magazine, Spring 2000. I found it again in an old file cabinet and reminisced. It was really tempting to completely “rewrite” it but I decided to resist and share it here as originally printed, or very closely. So enjoy (or perhaps not, and wish I left it filed away )…
Sheep. They are all around us. We eat them. We wear them. We are them—well, at least according to God. We are sheep. Perhaps this is why I stopped on the side of the road…to take a look at myself and to see me as God saw me—as a sheep.
I had been teaching through the 23rd Psalm and reading the modern classic, A Shepherd Looks at the Psalm 23. So when I saw a small flock of sheep and had the opportunity to see firsthand what I had been studying, I leapt at the chance!
My fiancé [now wife] and I stopped the car on the side of the road, put it into reverse, and parked in front of the sheep. We stepped out into the chilly breeze and watched the sheep. Most of them were eating grass. A few of the lambs were playing and running. The youngest were nursing on their mothers, while a couple were just asleep on the grass.
Nothing fascinating about this; they looked like big fluffy white clouds with four skinny legs—and nothing like me! I could have been just as impressed (or not impressed) with watching a herd of cattle. What they were doing seemed useless and boring.
Eating, playing, nursing, and sleeping—sheep are too simple to understand and fully relate to us humans. They were purchased, they live in a field their whole life, and do nothing of seemingly importance. They may do nothing, but they do serve a purpose. They are here for us. We are here for God.
Eating, playing, working, and sleeping—humans are too simple to understand and fully relate to God. Which is why he chose to relate to us. Because we were purchased, because we stay on the earth, and though we may do nothing of seemingly importance, we serve a purpose—to follow the leading and accept the loving provision of our Shepard and host.
The 23rd Psalm has had a special place in the hearts of people throughout the ages. People have desire (for some, it is an unnoticed need) to have God lead and nurture their lives. That is the heart of this Psalm.
The Psalm is also universal. What person has not walked through the “very dark valley” where death itself casts its shadow? Times of dark depression and hopelessness? Moments when all you can do is look up and cry for the Lord’s help? What follower has not longed for the Lord to lead them in a decision?…has not felt the deep thirst to lie down and be restored by something more than just sleep?…has not had brief encounters of their cup running over with blessings?
No Psalm has meant more (or been read more) to the human race then the 23rd. It speaks to people’s heart and souls. It rings of a place and hope far greater then this dreary earth—of a richer pasture. Its words carve out the very essence of what it means to be human—to trust.
Trust. A baby does it by nature. Yet somewhere down the road we’ve gone through one too many potholes and have had too many people cut us off to trust any longer. We have been hurt too many times by trusting someone who was not trustworthy and so we are frightened to trust again. And so we become like sheep. We scurry and scamper away from every rustle in the bushes, hoping to find peace.
Trust. We all long to trust in something bigger than us. We all long for a shepherd to lead, provide, and protect. This is why we love the 23rd Psalm. Somehow, the name alone brings feelings of peace and comfort. But the Psalm is written for those who have the Lord as their shepherd.
Other sheep may long for what the Psalm talks about, but they cannot claim its benefits as their own. They might as well just stop reading at “The Lord is my Shepherd.” After all, they might get their hopes up and end up being disappointed.
If you were to read one of my poems about my dad, you could not read it as though the poem was yours and you could not claim the benefits of having him as your father unless you were part of his family. The same with God; you cannot claim the benefits of having the Lord as your shepherd if he is not your shepherd. Make sure you can say, “The Lord is my shepherd.”
[Wow, so that was—for me—a weird walk down memory lane. It is always interesting to read over things written in the past and see how differently I think now vs. then…to see how differently I would have written it now. Some parts were tough for me to type out and re-post. Typing this “as was” was similar to looking back at old drawings I did when I was 5 years old…I realize how differently I draw now. Thanks for reading!]
On a jagged hill sprouting life, his followers stood around him remembering his life and brooding over his death. This man from Nazareth was the freshest breeze their bodies and souls had ever inhaled. They had experienced his love and grace in such a strikingly personal way that the whole of their lives had been altered. He was their life. Loved and enlivened with a passion for their savior, they freely gave of his love and grace to all who needed it. People the world ‘round began to take in the fresh breeze of Jesus. But soon, Jesus—his love and grace, his life and message—was just not enough. So on the hill, where God used a tool of death to bring life, they began to build.
At first, a wooden sign carved to read, Come See Jesus, Lamb that was Slain!, drew people to the cross—but as time passed, that got old.
So they lined the cross with candles, on either side of Jesus’ blood matted head, to attract people from a greater distance and at night—but soon the candles became just a part of the evening skyscape. Attendance at the cross began to drop.
This bothered God’s people, so they decided it would be best to regroup, brainstorm and strategize. After some debate, they agreed the people needed a more comfortable place to be at Jesus’ feet. They hired contractors and built a grand building complete with air conditioning and a state-of-the-art sound system for ambient music. People got excited and flocked to the building on the hill—but soon the crowds dwindled.
It was around that time that the church leaders began to notice a foul odor…the Jesus and the cross began to stink. “It’s becoming repulsive. That’s why they stopped coming—the cross…it’s too offensive. Besides, it’s outdated. Put it downstairs with those old hymnals.”
As the church on the hill grew nicer and nicer, richer and richer people came, passing the poor, blind, and crippled on their way. They sported their best clothes, brought their best gifts, and flashed their best smiles. The church grew and grew. The cross and the real Jesus, however, were lost—no, hidden—in the dark.
Years passed. On one tedious Tuesday morning, while looking for table clothes for the evening’s banquet, a pastor stumbled across Jesus and the cross in the basement. Their ugliness repulsed him. And that smell! This real, flesh and blood Jesus was indeed growing old. While covering his nose and gazing at Jesus, a thought occurred to him. “If I made him attractive to the world, would more people come into my church?” So the pastor covered him—Jesus—in solid gold. “Now people will like him. Now they will come. Hmm, I wonder if they’ll pay admission?” he asked….
Picture Jesus suffering in front of us, bleeding, dying. His soul is shattered and his mortal body cold. We look on. Seeing him. Yet we don’t see him. We see him as an item: either to gain (purchase) or to sell (market). One after one we appraise him: “Is it cheaper to buy here or there?”……“How much should we charge? We have to pay the bills—water and electricity, not to mention the property and building loans. After that comes the employees’ salaries and we’ll need some sort of cushion fund for the future. 10% of people’s income should do.”……“First thing we’ll have to do is clean him off and dress him up. No person in his or her right mind would buy him like that—bloody and mangled. Mike, hose him off, would you?”……“Look at the shape of the cross, see it? I can imagine it everywhere. I think I just found our branding trademark.” The line stretches out of sight as people—young and old—flock to see what they could do with him. “If only we had this….” “What we need is….” “No one has thought of….” Person after salesperson makes an appraisal.
In our attempts to make a user-friendly Jesus, we have covered him—and his call to mission and discipleship—with precious stones. To man’s wisdom it makes sense. However, Paul says, “The foolishness of God is wiser than man’s wisdom.” He also mentions, “But we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to the Jews [religious people] and foolishness to Gentiles [unbelievers].” From our perspective, there is a certain element of foolishness to the cross. It’s an odd message to people: that God would choose such a gruesome, torturous display of death to help communicate his love, grace and forgiveness—not to mention the vileness of our sin. Why can’t we just accept its oddity and trust in God’s foolishness? Instead, we take “Jesus” into our own hands and repackage him—his life and message.
A lot of hype and marketing gather many followers to themselves. Games, bands, magnets, camps, mints, books, schools, t-shirts, record companies, hats, computer programs, stores, key chains, bumper stickers, posters, candy, publishing houses, ties, paintings, gimmicks, conferences, tablecloths, DVDs, license plate frames, CDs and MP3s, bookmarks, fliers, ornaments, napkins, rings, daytimers, coffee mugs, pins, calendars, statues, book ends, concerts, necklaces, parchment paper, toys, aprons, figurines, board games, cartoons, conventions, music videos, movies—if you name it, chances are the secular world has it! Oh, did you think this was a list of Christian items?……interesting.
There are many who create and follow gimmicks, ideas, people, authors, bands—people frenzying to whatever is new, hot, “in” and attractive; whatever glistens as gold to the eye and tickles the ear. But I pose these questions. If the gold were stripped away from Jesus and his message, would we still follow? Would we follow God if the glitz and glamor of doing so were removed? Would we be his disciples—truly engaging him, others and ourselves—if the protective-comfort of modern Christianity was shed? When Jesus no longer turns a profit, either with money or ego, would we follow? Would we follow Jesus without the hype and hip beat? Where would we stand in the midst of persecution? If there were nothing left but him, would we cling to Jesus—as he really is, not as he is marketed?
How long do we think God is going to sit back, restraining his whip and watch his name be sold and his temple desecrated? Or maybe he has already given us “over to the sinful desires of [our] hearts.” Perhaps we have “exchanged the truth of God for a lie and worshiped and served created things rather than the creator,” even if they are “Christian” things.
William Shaw, a secular writer for Details magazine, noted that Christianity “is a religion of bumper stickers and t-shirt logos” (10/96).
What have we done? What are we doing? We need a mending shift here, no?
Here is a poem I wrote:
Blood
drips
on the
ground
silently.
Onlookers cringe at the view.
Coins spill in the ground wastefully as
Christians
market
something
new.
Believers
look on,
appraising
without
a plea;
covering
our
Savior
in solid
gold.
What a sell
—Resounds the shout of hell—
What a sell!
A while ago, a good friend of mine and I were hanging out in his driveway shooting the breeze when a man approached us on foot. He had very casual clothes, a gold tooth, rags and cleaning supplies. He strikes up a conversation with us, cracking jokes and overall just trying to connect with “the guys”. Then out of the blue, he sprays the driveway with some “magic” cleaner and wipes it with his rag—the result is a pristine white spot surrounded by the dark-grey driveway. He sprays the car tire, wipes it. My friend starts to protest. The last thing he wants is little clean spots sprinkled around his property. We, though laughing with our new friend from Florida, make it obvious that we are not interested in his product. Our friendly salesman then sprays his shoe and a window before we shake him and go into the house. Wow! Was he persistent!!…and incredibly disrespectful.
Fast forward. Our doorbell rings. I open the door. Oh no…they are back. I quickly tell him that I have seen his product and am seriously not interested. He says that was his competitor and his product is better. He cracks some jokes, tries to connect with me and sprays my window. Within a few minutes I manage to talk him down and he leaves.
Here is the thing. If a good friend of mine, or someone I had a relationship with, recommended the same exact cleaning product to me—heck, even gave me a demo—I would probably be using the product today. But when a complete stranger comes to my door, I don’t care what they are pushing, I am not interested. Why? It’s not the product; it’s the lack of relationship and trust.
Fast forward to last night—Valentine’s Day. Our doorbell rings. Oh no…they are back. Jen opens the door and I am sitting on the couch. I hear a man, who peaked through our window and saw our ultrasound pictures on the table, comment about the ultrasound pictures and Jen’s pregnancy. He begins to crack some jokes and try to connect with Jen. I hear him ask if she knew where the baby came from. (Huh?). And Jen tells them time and time again that this is not a good time, she is preparing dinner and its Valentine’s Day. Another man joins in and begins talking about Jesus. Again, Jen says it is not a good time. He hands her a handout and they leave. Same approach, different product. Same lack of respect, same end-game, same result—please leave, we are not interested.
Relationship is everything!! And I am talking REAL relationship. But before we judge our gold-tooth-cleaning-guy or LDS friends, how often have we been guilty of pushing Jesus without relationship? How many tracks? How many 5-steps, lines and canned approaches have we used? How many times have we tried to “connect” in an obviously false way in order to win them over? Sure, we may not go door-to-door, but that is not the issue……the lack of true and authentic relationship is. Without it, we are just another gold-tooth-cleaner-guy trying to push our product.
May we seek and build relationships with those who need to hear Christ’s love and forgiveness. It takes a lot of time and hard work, but in the end, if nothing else, you, I, and they get a real friend and a chance to be restored through Christ—together.
For more about relationships and “evangelism”, I highly recommend the book More Ready than You Realize.
Love makes your soul crawl out from its hiding place.
~ Zora Neale Hurston
Language has created the word loneliness to express the pain of being alone, and the word solitude to express the glory of being alone.
~ Paul Tillich
So being Valentine’s Day and all (here in the U.S.) I thought I’d look into some of its history and roots. I came across two legends:
One legend contends that Valentine was a priest who served during the third century in Rome. When Emperor Claudius II decided that single men made better soldiers than those with wives and families, he outlawed marriage for young men — his crop of potential soldiers. Valentine, realizing the injustice of the decree, defied Claudius and continued to perform marriages for young lovers in secret. When Valentine’s actions were discovered, Claudius ordered that he be put to death.According to the legend, Valentine actually sent the first ‘valentine’ greeting himself. While in prison, it is believed that Valentine fell in love with a young girl — who may have been his jailor’s daughter — who visited him during his confinement. Before his death, it is alleged that he wrote her a letter, which he signed ‘From your Valentine,’ an expression that is still in use today.
Though this is a quaint legend full of chivalry and romance, I prefer this second one:
The second legend is that the Christian church may have decided to celebrate Valentine’s feast day in the middle of February in an effort to ‘christianize’ celebrations of the pagan Lupercalia festival. Lupercalia, which began at the ides of February, February 15, was a fertility festival dedicated to Faunus, the Roman god of agriculture, as well as to the Roman founders Romulus and Remus. To begin the festival, members of the Luperci, an order of Roman priests, would gather at the sacred cave where the infants Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome, were believed to have been cared for by a she-wolf or lupa. The priests would then sacrifice a goat, for fertility, and a dog, for purification.The boys then sliced the goat’s hide into strips, dipped them in the sacrificial blood and took to the streets, gently slapping both women and fields of crops with the goathide strips. Far from being fearful, Roman women welcomed being touched with the hides because it was believed the strips would make them more fertile in the coming year. Later in the day, according to legend, all the young women in the city would place their names in a big urn. The city’s bachelors would then each choose a name out of the urn and become paired for the year with his chosen woman. These matches often ended in marriage. Pope Gelasius declared February 14 St. Valentine’s Day around 498 A.D. The Roman ‘lottery’ system for romantic pairing was deemed un-Christian and outlawed.
How cool is that? Babies being raised by she-wolfs, goat and dog sacrifices, blood soaked strips of hide that were used to gently slap women to heal infertility, a love lottery to find true love for the next year, and the church outlawing such festivities! I have never been a big fan of Valentine’s Day, but after reading this legend, I say…
…screw flowers and cards, let’s bring this back! We can start with my dog (did I just type that out loud?)…anyone got a goat? LOL
Source: History.com
…combating boredom. I am in my last few days at my current job and am bored stiff. So comment away…anything…any topic…bring controversy…pick a fight…make up false-doctrine…spew hateful words…pretend to know something and wax eloquently…broach politics…do anything!! Please!! I can’t stand it!! Agh!!
Church. Interesting word.
To some it is a place to go. To some it is a place to avoid. To others it is an identity; a people to be. To Paul and Jesus, it seemed to be the latter. Paul wrote to the church in such-and-such city (hardly one building) and Jesus called his church a bride (last time I checked my wife was a person). But to most in our society, church is a thing. We go to church. We plant churches. We build churches. We choose which church to go to (often based on the quality of the preaching, singing, or children’s ministry). This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it can be. It becomes so when we go to church to avoid being the church. (By the way, a friend of mine, Jonathan, helped identify categories of those associated with church.)
There is a large percentage of people who do just that. They feel that if they faithfully attend the right church (as defined by them or their culture) then they have met the requirements of being a good Christian. Typically, their definition of church is an established building with an established name within an established denomination (or association). There must be preaching and singing and tithes collected and paid pastors to pray and children’s church and youth ministry and, and, and… (in fact, this definition is so ingrained in them that they feel there must be something wrong, or cultish, with a Christian who does not attend such a church). In addition to attending such a church, they feel in order to be a great Christian they must serve the church in some internal capacity and join a small group.
The Christian equation is this: Attend + Serve + Tithe + Small Group = Good Christian.
But here is the subtle deception. They feel that since they have met the requirements, they are free from being the church. They are free from true engagement with Jesus. They are free from true engagement with other people. They are free from pursing their identity as priests and saints. They are free from real life-changing discipleship. They are free from seeking God’s healing justice (not judgment) in this world and society. They are free from radically living and serving and loving and following the at times insane leading of Jesus in their daily lives as they interact with the world around them. They are free from taking up their cross daily. They are free from the demands and persecution that Jesus promised to hi followers. They are free from BEING the church, the bride, and the dynamic-life-changing-people God wants to restore in order that he can restore others through them. They are free from all of this because they park in a certain parking lot to go into a certain building at a certain time to sing certain songs and to listen to a certain man (in most churches) talk about certain topics using a certain book, and to give a certain amount (the faithful give 10% of their pre-tax income), and repeat this process week after week, month after month, year after year until they die and have entirely succeeded in avoiding being the church simply because they went to church.
There are some that are saying “enough!” They feel like there has to be more. They sense that this church-thing system is stifling them from truly being the church. They desire to be his bride without all the trappings of the church-thing. They are tired of attending church sit-n-watch. They want the radical restorative community life they read about in the New Testament. They don’t want to be counted among those who ATTEND in order to AVOID. They want to a community that helps them embrace their identity as Jesus’ bride. All the things the others want to avoid, they want—and they want it so bad they are willing to go to great lengths to get it. Often, they abandon their family’s traditional church-thing, self-ostracizing themselves from friends and family who don’t understand. Most of the time, there are no other alternatives and so they are left with an unfair choice: continue living in the church-thing tension or stop going, both of which are internally painful—and often lonely—decisions.
The there are some who are trying to build an alternative to the church-thing. A few blogs ago I compared this process to my son and I building our tree house. We are trying to dream of a third way. The options of going or not going are not good enough. We need community. We need others. But we need a different—some would argue better—approach to being the church. What will it look like? We don’t know. But it will not be for those who want to ATTEND to AVOID. It will be for those who want to ENCOUNTER in order to EMBRACE.
What of those who want to avoid being the church? I would point them to the yellow pages and they can choose a church they want to attend. A search-tip for those wanting to avoid: the bigger, the better.
The words we use are very important. But often, whether intended or not, there is another message being heard that lies beyond our words. This message is often subtle and remains unseen to its conveyor and subculture, in this case Christians and Christianity. But to those listening that reside outside of Christianity’s subculture, the unseen message is clear and often times disrespectful, unsettling, and very inconsistent from its stated intent. These messages are at times verbal, but more often they are written: bumper stickers, t-shirts, license plate frames, church signs, bulletins, and visitor packets.
Here are some:
Too Blessed to be Stressed: Seen on a license plate frame. Unseen messages:
- “So if I am stressed, I must not be blessed.” And who isn’t stressed reading this? God’s blessing, like rain, is given to both the just and unjust.
- “Jesus’ blessing results in stress-free living.” Says who?
- Very self-centered blessing. God didn’t tell Abraham, “I will bless you so you will not be stressed,” but rather, “I will bless you so you will be a blessing.”
Real Men Love Jesus: Seen on bumper stickers and t-shirts. Unseen message:
- “If I don’t love Jesus I am not a real man.” This one is laughable to most men.
Welcome to Church, Prepare to be Assimilated: Often said behind the scenes in church staff meetings or on visitor packets as “Our Assimilation Process”. Assimilation is the new catch-phrase for moving a church visitor through a process into membership, service, and small group involvement where a visitor is now assimilated into the church. All I have to say is Star Trek and most of you know where I am going.
The Borg is one of the more notorious villains in Star Trek. They are a civilization of beings (turned cyborg) who have been assimilated into the Collective, a term used to describe the many beings that have lost their individual identity and operate as one mindless mind. This mindless Collective is controlled by one ultimate cyber-being, the borg-queen, whose main goal is to assimilate as many beings into her Collective as possible. She sends out her cyborg minions who declare to their intended victim, “Prepare to be assimilated”.
Is this really the message we want to send? That when a person visits a church the leadership’s intent is that they become assimilated? That they become mindless beings of the Christian collective (often viewed as conservative Christian and right-wing republican), losing their unique identity in the process, and being controlled by some white man in some office somewhere? That once assimilated, they exist only for the purpose of the church-collective, which is often times to assimilate more and more and more people into the church-collective? That they become some androgynous person void of personality and identity?
Now you and I both know that, in most cases, this is not the intended case. So why use this term? Because when we do, this is often the picture that is painted of the church’s intent. The church has enough trust issues with people to be throwing around a term like assimilation when talking about people becoming a part of the church. We can do better than this. But blindly, church leaders grab onto a popular pithy phrase and use it without thinking. I mean, who really wants to be assimilated into anything? I don’t, do you?
So again, the words we use have dire consequences. It is important to really consider what is being heard beyond the words we use. The world is listening, what are we saying?
Tree houses and the emerging church have a lot in common.
This is a picture of my son and the tree house we built—together. It stands about 7 feet off the ground and it began with a dream. You see, we have this very large tree in our suburban backyard that ached for a tree house. Every time my son and I looked at the tree, we saw how perfect it was for a tree house and would envision what it could look like. We dreamed together of a ladder, of a platform, of walls, of a roof. We pictured camping out in the tree house under the stars, of friends coming over and scurrying up into the tree house to do what boys do in tree houses, of guns being mounted, and curtains being drawn, and stories being told, and memories being built. But all we had was a tree and a dream.
Then one day we decided to get out the tape measure and begin to practically envision what a tree house in this particular tree would might look like. We took some measurements of the space in the tree. Then we measured Caleb’s old wooden platform bed and realized it would fit perfectly, with a few modifications. We went to the lumber store and picked up some rope, a few 4×4s, and some screws. We hoisted the platform up into the tree, placed the 4×4s, drilled some holes and cinched down the rope. After one full afternoon, we had our tree house base.
We dreamed some more. Put up some railings. Added a ladder and some steps. When his friends came over, the first thing they did is run to the tree house. Is it what we pictured? Kinda. But that is the beauty of it. It is becoming the dream over time. And over time, we are building the dream together, father and son.
In fact, this last weekend the sun decided to come out. We hadn’t added on to the tree house all winter, but the dream kept percolating for the right time and the time had come. We grabbed the old pulley system we got from Great-Grandpa’s garage and mounted one end on the tree and the other end to a bucket. Now Caleb could put his stuff in the bucket, climb into the tree fort and hoist his stuff up—pretty cool. We then went to the lumber store, picked up a few more 2×4s and began framing a roof.
After framing the roof, we sat up there and were talking about how not many kids have a tree house and how special this was. Caleb said that some of his friends had trampolines and swimming pools, but only he had a tree house. And it hit me…trampolines, pools, toys…these are all things you buy and install. But not this tree house…this is something that we are building together, one season at a time. It began with a tree. Then a dream. Then a platform. Then a ladder. Then a pulley. Then a roof-frame. Next a roof. Then some walls. Then some more dreaming. And through it all, our tree is being transformed into something more than a tree. Memories are being built as memories are being dreamed. We are doing it together as we dream.
If you were to ask me what our tree house was going to look like next year I couldn’t tell you. But come into our backyard next year and you can see for yourself. In the same way, if you were to ask me what the church was going to look like 25 years from now, I couldn’t tell you. But some of us our dreaming together. Some of us are looking into the backyard seeing what could be built. Some of us are taking measurements. Some of us are talking about possibilities. Some of us are dreaming of memories to be had and stories to be told. And right now, we are not quite sure what it will look like. We are simple looking at the particular tree in our particular backyard and dreaming with our father what his church might look like built there.
So we dream and as we dream we build and as we build we dream some more, together—as friends, and brothers, and sisters—in community. We are creating something that previously did not exist. Something that we will build together, with our dad, for all of us to enjoy.
What will it look like in 25 years? Don’t know. Right now all we have is a tree and a dream. But we invite you to come and be a part of its creation, or at the very least come back in 25 years and see how the dream evolved. I hope you choose the first option, pick up a tape measure and hammer, and let’s dream-build together. Let’s dream of guns being put away, of dividing curtains being opened, of stories being told, of memories being built, of lives and relationships being restored. Perhaps, in the end, we will have built a place where friends come over to do what we are supposed to be doing, joining God in the healing restoration of his kids.
I am looking forward to the memories!
“When you stand at the Pearly Gates, would you rather be told you were too forgiving or you were too judgmental?”
~Leonard Sweet
There are few moments in life that I remember as vividly as the one I am about to share with you. Though I do not remember the names (I’ll make them up), the images of the story are imbedded in my mind.
The year was 1995 and we were in a barrios on the outskirts of Tijuana, Mexico. My cousin and I decided to take a trip to Mexico to serve with Spectrum Ministries. We had been there for about a week and this was our last day. We had spent the afternoon bathing kids, providing clothes and food for families, making snow cones, giving haircuts, providing health care, and running mini-carnival booths, among other things. We were all tired but had been blessed by the joy and gratitude of the poor surrounding us.
A few of us began loading up into our white van. Efran, who had become a good friend during the week, was the leader of our group. He works for Spectrum and is one of the funniest, hard-working men I have met. Our doors were open as we sat in the parked van, just talking and regrouping at the end of a hard day. I was sitting shotgun and he was in the driver’s seat when a young Mexican man, perhaps in his early 20s, approached Efran.
His appearance made the poor we had been working with look wealthy. His pants were shredded from the knee down, revealing his mud-caked legs. His white tank top was light brown. His hair, mud caked. No shoes. As Efran spoke with him, I learned his story and that his name was Miguel. Miguel was a drug baby whom his mom kicked out at a young age. He had no home. No family. And thanks to drugs, not much of a mind. Currently he lived in a literal pig-pen with over a foot-deep of mud, urine and crap.
Efran continued to speak with him and as the conversation came to an end, Miguel walked away. As he did, Efran took off his flannel jacket and removed his boots. He whistled for Miguel, who turned and came back to the van. My eyes were glued to the scene unfolding before me. Efran took his flannel and draped it over Miguel. He then took his own work boots (nice ones, mind you) and handed them to Miguel. Miguel bowed his head and a nervous smile formed. He rotated his chin slightly upward and, glancing out of the corner of his eye towards Efran, nodded gently. He quietly turned and left.
I was rendered motionless by what I just saw. After a few moments of appropriate silence, Efran said very humbly, “That was the first time I’ve done that. He needed those boots more than I did and I can go buy another pair. I just couldn’t picture him trudging through pig crap barefoot.” I nodded, at a loss for words.
There is a worship song that reads, “I can only imagine what my eyes will see when your face is before me.” That evening in 1995, I did not have to imagine. Jesus’ face was before me and he took the name of Miguel. Jesus received from Efran a new jacket and new boots. In return, Jesus blessed us with a deep sense of “this is what a life of love is about.”
May we look for Jesus’ face today. And when we see him, may we bury our ego and respond out of love. May I.
Super Tuesday……(11am) So I go my little sticker, but not without its difficulties.
I walked into my local polling place (which happened to be my son’s school—how convenient is that?) and told the name-lookup-girl my name, “Jeromy Johnson.” She began looking through the binder. …looking…looking…looking…“You said it was Jeromy or Gregory?” “Jeromy, Jeromy Johnson”…looking…looking…looking…“Oh, here it is,” She said as she pulled out a small single piece of paper underneath the binder. Sure enough, there I was. Why I didn’t make it into the fancy binder and was relegated to a scrap piece of paper, I don’t know. I digress.
As I sign my name, name-lookup-girl leans over to the gentleman in charge of the ballots—the Ballot Guardian—and says in a loud voice, “Non-Declared”. He begins to rummage through the ballots (not sure if he was looking for the mysterious “Non-Declared” ballot). As I approach him, I ask for a Democrat ballot. He looks at me confused and leans over to the name-lookup-girl and tells her I want to vote Republican. Ugh, wrong. I gently correct him saying that as a Non-Declared (I feel like an illegal alien or something) I can request a Democrat ballot. The Ballot Guardian looks confused and asks me to go talk with one of the gentlemen dressed in blue suits over in the corner. OK. I walk over to the Blue Suits, tell them that I am a Non-Declared voter and, if I understand it correctly, I can ask for a Democrat ballot. The Blue Suits agree and point me back to the Ballot Guardian. I go back to him; he looks back at the Blue Suits, who nod, releasing him to give me a Democrat ballot. Ballot Guardian then leans over to the name-lookup-girl and says in a loud voice, “Mark him as a Democrat.” Oh, got to love it! Even as a Non-Declared they feel the need to “declare” me—quite loudly at that. Oh well.
I take my hard-earned ballot, walk over to the not-so-fancy voting booth, grab the high-tech Bic pen and cast my vote. I grab my ballot and turn to face another sentry who is guarding a giant black lock-box with a slot cut to the exact millimeter of the ballot. I slip my ballot in, smirk and nod to the sentry who smiles back and hands me a little sticker that read, “I Voted”.
Barely, but I did. You?
Today is Super Tuesday. If you live in the 22 states that are holding primaries today, don’t forget to vote. I’m going right now to vote and get my little sticker……
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