It's so Painful!!!!

You know what's a pain in the butt about following one's Christian call? Well I'll tell you: it's that we have to follow Jesus Christ's example.

My favorite chapter in Scripture is 1 John 2. My favorite Scripture verse is 1 John 2:6, which goes like so (well not "like so," it goes exactly like this): "whoever says, 'I abide in him,' ought to walk just as we walked." If we continue on in the chapter we get verses 15-17: "Do not love the world or the things in the world. The love of the Father is not in those who love the world; for all that is in the world--the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eyes, the pride in riches--comes not from the Father but from the world. And the world and its desire are passing away, but those who do the will of God live forever."

Quite honestly I can't remember what in the heck I've written for this blog so far. I prefer to keep it that way. As Oscar Wilde said, the truth one believes in is the truth one believes in at that moment. If we are truly open to God's voice we aren't concerned with contradicting something we said five days ago. We will be concerned with contradicting something we said five minutes ago, though, because God's reason and order are not contradictory. These are things I believe in, and I mention them hopefully once and for all as an excuse for repeating myself (though I can honestly say I don't think I'll be contradicting myself all that often). Side note: if this were an academic paper or an academic book, this entire paragraph up to this point would have been a footnote. And all that is a lead-up to saying something I may have said many times before: I take Scripture very seriously. One of the many themes in Scripture, especially in the New Testament but all throughout, is that of walking just as God has commanded (or asked) us to walk and not taking the things of the world seriously but the things of God seriously. 1 John 2, and all of John's letters, reminds us of that very well.

You may ask why in the world 1 John 2 is my favorite chapter in Scripture if I started this post by saying following Jesus' example is painful. 1 John 2 is all about doing exactly as Jesus did. Have you thought about how difficult that is, though? If you haven't, let's take a moment or two, or three, to discuss how difficult following Jesus Christ's example is.

First of all, as a young male, the whole purity thing mentioned in 1 John becomes quite a burden. 1 John claims that we want to be pure because Jesus was pure and our salvation is in Jesus as the Christ. Now, I am in the Wesley tradition, so I do believe that salvation is a funny and mysterious thing, but we most surely become more aware of God's grace and more aware and more thankful of Christ's saving us all when we act in accordance with Jesus' life and God's will. Disciplining ourselves is a means of living into grace. And so, Henry David Thoreau's statement that "Man flows at once to God when the channel of purity is open," means a lot to me. I think it should mean a lot to all Christians, because it's right there in 1 John and the entire Scripture that we claim is God's Word to us.

But while all this might mean a lot to me, and I might believe in it wholeheartedly, nevertheless I DO NOT WANT to be pure. Deep down I rebel against purity, deep down I say who cares if Jesus was pure and who cares if Scripture tells me to be pure for the sake of being close to God. Bottom line, I DO NOT WANT TO BE PURE. Purity is friggin hard. There's no other way to describe it.

Purity means I have to temper my unending lusts, it means I need to control my urge to flirt with that pretty girl because I can't do anything with her anyway as much as I really really want to. Purity means I don't go out with my friends to a bar to get drunk, but instead try and convince them that the reason Paul and countless other religious leaders have spoken against drunkenness is that, in many ways, it means we are turning away from God (for one, why should we need alcohol to have a good time when we have God's love?), even though I know they'll just laugh at me and insult me and I won't be able to have a good time with them. Purity means I don't start swearing my head off when I'm angry but I calm myself down. Purity means looking at every human being as a child of God with integrity rather than "appreciating" certain body parts or the potential pleasure they may provide us. All that goes against my nature. Anytime I have to say "no" to what's natural to me I get so unbelievably frustrated, because I'm denying what I "want." Even though self-denial and looking beyond the things of this world to the things of heaven is good for us and what we are told to do (because it's good for us), it doesn't change the fact that in the midst of choosing to deny my natural wants or not I get really crazy frustrated. It's hard. And it's painful. In fact, I hate it.

What makes it all even more painful is that if I give in "just this once," which everyone knows will never be just this once, I feel God's looking down on me and asking, "My son, why did you do that?" Whether He is judging me or not, I now am judging myself, and of course I feel guilty, and of course now I regret it, and of course now I am in more pain than the act of choosing brought on. What's more, though, is that if I choose the right thing, I feel God's looking down on me and saying, "My son, you did what was right, and now don't you feel great?" Yes, I do feel great... but then a few weeks later, boy, I'm wishing I just gratified myself, no matter how temporary the pleasure may have been. Again, more pain. Or, perhaps I did the right thing and I feel God's looking down on me and saying, "My son, you did what was right, but did you do it for the right reason?" How the heck am I supposed to know? Did I do it simply because the Scriptures and my religious tradition warn against it? Because I think God will be proud of me? Because I think I'll go to hell if I don't? Or did I do it out of love for God, for myself, and for others? Who's to tell? So, again, more pain.

And generally when we do the wrong thing we, as Christians, do more than just look forward hoping to not repeat our sins. Maybe I'm only speaking for myself here, but I look back constantly and regret the damage I did to other people's lives. Especially when it comes to sexual misconduct our impurity generally ruins the lives of others, and when it comes to sexual misconduct we do so by shaming their sexual integrity and identity. That weighs heavily on me. More pain. If ever I don't look back in regret, then I still feel pain for not looking back and asking for forgiveness. If we live our lives without looking back and asking for forgiveness, just hoping in God's saving grace, then we are apt to continue hurting ourselves and other of God's children day after day, without remorse.

The more pain there is, the more I hate living the Christian life. The more I hate living the Christian life, the more I feel it necessary that our religion is about a way of life more than merely a faith we cling to. For if we have faith but do not live the life we will feel the pain and guilt and pain and regret and pain that I am so accustomed to, and we are probably all accustomed to.

So, why is 1 John 2 a favorite Scripture of mine? Why should I continue believing that as Christians we are all called to live as Jesus did? Why, if it only causes pain to ourselves for not being able to live up to the lofty goals of living as Jesus did? The reason is found in 1 John 3. Verse 1: "See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God; and that is what we are." Verse 18: "Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action." We live as Jesus did not simply because we are commanded to, but because we love God so much that we can do nothing else.

Love is the key. Love for God, love for ourselves, love for all neighbors and all other children of God, for everyone is precious and everyone is loved by God. If we try living out of a sense of duty or obligation we might succeed, but then even success will breed pain in us if not in others. If we live in love then even our failures will be a success and there will be little likelihood that we do anything that can bring pain to others. And if we do bring pain to others, we are living knowing that our Father's love is everywhere and we are, in fact, forgiven.

So what am I saying exactly? Well... I'm saying that living out our call is a really hard, painful thing. Let's admit that. But I'm also saying that if we don't keep on just doing it because we feel compelled to from a sense of duty, and do it instead out of love for God and everything God has created, we will live as Jesus did. Love love love and we will walk just as Jesus walked, and when we walked as our Savior did, there's nothing we can do wrong. When we walk as Jesus did we will always be on the right path, even if we may have doubts. But it all comes down to love.

Now love, of course, can be it's own obligation. But let us try and remember why our call is to love--God has first loved us. That's truly amazing, if we really take a step back and think about it. So often I intellectualize those words and all other holy words, interpreting them and fitting them into a theology, and then that pains me. If we really think about how God loved us first and thank Him for it... the pain of living into the call will disappear.

For me, that's also incredibly hard. As I said, I intellectualize. Nothing really means anything to me. I struggle with the whole "faith" thing. Faith is nothing but a theology to me most of the time. Hence, I'm really afraid of death, it's really hard for me to believe in the resurrection as hard as I try. Love is hard for me. If we can remember, though, that we are all called to love because God first loved us and has created us and all His children, then our paths will be made clearer and more free of thorns.

When the Fan has been Hit by Crap...

Our fearless leader has asked us to write in response to a quotation from Dietrich Bonhoeffer. I will most certainly do that, but work it into what I wanted to write in the first place, since it all works together, I think.

First of all, to the other blog writers, I apologize for not reading your posts. I think that if I expect other people to read mine I should be reading all the posts, too, which would then potentially make my posts even more interesting. Woops...

Anyway, believing in a God who intervenes in our lives on a regular basis is not as great as you might think. First of all, I hate the word "intervenes" in this case, because it's not as if God stops us from doing anything or enters into our lives for the worse. He always provides us with signs and guidance, but then steps away to let us do our own thing.

But doing our own thing can be very painful when it's not in accord with what God wants for us. Must we always do what God wants for us? No. And sometimes I believe there are many choices in our lives that God doesn't really care about. For instance, I doubt God cares a whole lot about whether we attend Metropolitan United Methodist Church or First United Methodist Church of so-and-so. (By the way, it's unbelievable how often these blogs automatically save drafts, wow...) When God does care, though, He cares not because He wants to dominate our lives and prove to Himself that He owns us, He cares because He truly wants us to be happy, peaceful, and loving. When we're making a choice, consciously or unconsciously, that may have serious impact on our well-being--physical, spiritual, and emotional-- God enters into our lives to guide our choice. I also believe God enters into our lives sometimes just to be with us, like a father would with a child. No father is only going to talk to his son or daughter when they need help.

Again, we don't always need to do what God wants for us, but most of the time we will be very frustrated with ourselves for not listening. Even if you don't believe God enters into our lives, don't you sometimes have that, "My Savior Jesus Christ probably didn't die for me so I could do this..." thought? I have that thought all the friggin time... though it rarely stops me, so I go ahead and do the thing anyway, and then feel terrible afterward. God doesn't want us to feel terrible, that's why He has given us a book to live by and that's why He tries guiding us. Thankfully, that's also why He sent His son to die for us, so we can repent and be forgiven.

Let me get to my story. As of a week and a half ago, I had a girlfriend that I really loved and cared about more than anything in the whole wide world (well, except for God and His Creation). Because of certain aspects of my personality, I was worried that I would really hurt her irreparably and I didn't think it was something we could work out. Since hurting her immensely is the last thing I wanted to happen, I decided to break it off.

The decision had been looming darker and darker for about a week, starting right before football playoffs began. All the teams I wanted to win that first weekend lost, badly. Then all the teams I wanted to win the second weekend lost, badly. I was 0 for 8.

Now, I believe I said in my last blog that I believe God works through football and sports in general, whether you do or not is up to you, but I believe it. Being 0 for 8 was very strange. Add to that the fact that I was hurting being separated from my love more than I thought I would be. You see, I thought I had done the right thing for her, and therefore the right thing for me and for us as well. Thinking that, I didn't expect to be such a wreck. I expected that God would be happy that I did the right thing and grant me some peace. Peace never came, though I tried stubbornly holding onto the thought that I had done the right thing. Of course, I should have known I had done the right thing when I had the thought, "Hmm, are all my teams losing because God wants me to know that my mind isn't in the right place?" I didn't acknowledge that thought, though I had it wandering in the back of my mind quite a bit.

It comes as no surprise to me that, after telling my certain someone (soon to be my Valentine) the real reason why I had broken it off and she said we should work through it and we got back together yay!, both the teams I wanted to win in the playoffs won this weekend. Again, maybe I'm just superstitious, but I really believe that God was sending me signs that I was doing the wrong thing and it was inconsistent with His plan for us. And when I finally acknowledged that, I do believe God sent me a sign that things were back to normal, that I was back on track. And I do believe that the immeasurable pain both she and I felt was a result of my rejecting God's plan.

It is nice having something to hold onto, to believe that God is up there and cares about us. But it's not so nice sometimes. I now scrutinize every little thing I do. "Did God want that, or not?" I am constantly battling depression, desperation, confusion, guilt, regret, and heart-ache like I did this past week because I just don't know what God wants sometimes. Most of the time, actually. And it kills me. Sometimes I wish I didn't believe that God comes down to us and gives us signs and guidance about what to do because then I wouldn't be so obsessed with following His plan. I can't let it go, because believing what I do I feel obligated to follow God every step of the way. I can't reject God's call for me. Sometimes, though, I question whether I've read the signs correctly, or whether the "signs" were really God at all. This week has made me question everything I believe has led me to this point in my life to be at seminary. Does God really want me to be a pastor? I don't friggin know. All I know at the moment is that I did the right thing with my girlfriend, but I have to reevaluate everything else in my life. Hopefully that will make me stronger in faith, but we shall see.

Also, sometimes, like at the moment, I feel as if I've been swimming along in a dream world, acting upon impulse and not consciously in faith making any decision. That, too, brings guilt and depression. Maybe it's a sign that God is guiding me along, carrying me, but then I feel as if I don't have free will; maybe it just means that I'm not consciously paying attention to God's will, and then I feel depressed for not pausing and spending time with God.

At this point, I'd like to finally talk about Kate's prompt, which I'm hoping she's posting so I don't keep talking about with no reference. You can only answer your call alone. I believe that. I believe I am alone with God trying to figure out what He wants me to do, not just with my general call in life but with every major choice I make. No one can help me. All people can do is ask, "How do you feel in your gut?" Oftentimes that's not what I want to hear. I don't want to hear it because what I feel in my gut and what I think in my head are most likely at odds, especially if we add to the mix my natural inclinations (a.k.a. "the ways of the world"). The earthly side of me often wants one thing and my gut wants another. The earthly side often wins, and then I feel terrible.

It's an inner struggle that must be dealt with on my own with God. In my particular situation I've been telling about, I should have listened to my gut, to God. Again, I didn't. I listened to more earthly things, and my mind backed it up. That struggle between God and my own natural wants was not easy. It's never easy. It's not easy standing before God saying, "Here I am, broken, defeated, now tell me what you want because I can't do this on my own," and then actually listening. What I most want is for God to back me up, not tell me something completely new. But there I am, alone before God, having no one to blame but myself for not listening. But if I don't appear before God alone, then I will never know what He wants. I would never have known that I did the wrong thing and I would have gone through life feeling empty because I had broken God's plan.

And alone I must reevaluate my life. Alone I must purify myself of all this is earthly so that I can listen to God's plan, really listen. It will be a long struggle. A struggle strife with doubt over whether I'm hearing God correctly or not, if I'm reading His miraculous entries into my life correctly. A struggle I'm not worthy to undertake... as I write this I become more and more aware of my unworthiness, more and more aware that I cannot stand alone before God because of what I've done in my past. But I know that the only way I can have joy back, to have my freedom back, is if I ask for forgiveness and return to God and His path.

"I want to be free. I want to write my own ticket. But I know I can't. There is this voice haunting me, and it keeps repeating the same thing in my head, over and over again. I have no choice to succumb to it. There is no freedom in this world, this life, apart from Me."
-Andrew Schwab, Project 86