Monday, October 22, 2018

Out of the Dark

Journal entry from October 11, 2018

Feeling overwhelmed by things at work and the idea of trying to buy a house has sent me into a dark cloud of despair.

As I sat in what felt like a dark cave, I felt afraid to ever trust or dream again. As I presented myself before God in silence, I sensed the Lord was with me in the dark. My emotions calmed down a bit and I began listening and watching for what the Lord might do or say.

I started the silence feeling convinced of the “tragedy” of my life, that I was well justified in thinking that all was indeed hopeless. The evidence seemed incontrovertible! I am a weak puppet at the utter terrifying mercy of a cold, malicious, dark world. The message at the forefront of my mind is:

“No one cares or looks out for me.”

As I sat with the Lord, a descending progression occurred - 

I began to realize that the “incontrovertible evidence” I had cited was more interpretation than fact; it was a collection of my assumptions and beliefs about events and emotions that were keeping me confined to the darkness, hidden from light, space and freedom. The problem is with the way I’m interpreting/seeing God, myself and my life.

Secondly, it became clear that self-will was indeed the interpretive grid that was causing me so much pain and despair. Self-will is the need or demand to have my own way. When my sense of safety and security is threatened, I double down my efforts to regain control over my circumstances and my world. No longer trusting in God, I am sinfully taking the burden of the world on my shoulders. My self-protection in this situation was strongly triggered, causing an “interpretation cascade” that blinded me to reality - the reality of God and his faithful care.

The Lord spoke, asking me if I would be willing to let go of my self-will and trust him again. Here is the invitation I heard:

“Beloved, when have you ever trusted me and lost your sense of self? I know giving up self-will and self-preservation feels like losing your identity and significance, but when has protecting yourself ever given you life and space to breathe? Think of the times in the past when you surrendered your life, your very self to me - has that diminished you or enlarged you? Has that led you to feel constricted or spacious? Don’t believe the lies, dear one - though the whole world seems driven by fear and self-promotion, those things will never be true, real and life-giving.

I know you feel small and abused in a harsh world, but that has more to do with your vision of reality than reality itself. Think of the birds, the flowers, the mountains - what reality, what world are they a part of? They thrive without fighting or grasping or demanding their own way; at the heart of their identity and vocation is trusting rest in my order, my Kingdom. You have a dignity far greater than they, because they don’t have a choice which world they will live in - you do.

Radically re-think your life, beloved. Remember who you are - your belovedness, your destiny, your dignity - Christ in you, the hope of glory! Remember who I am - your good Shepherd, your loving and attentive Father, your compassionate Savior and ever-present Counselor.

Trust me once again, beloved. The cave you are in is already in the Field of my caring vision. Just let go of the need to have your own way and step out into the light of day.”

Monday, July 02, 2018

God's Invitation in the midst of Suffering

I recently had the opportunity to preach through Romans 5:1-5 in light of my story of suffering and a "dark night of the soul" I experienced from 2003-2013. It was very difficult to summarize and teach from this time in my life, since mystery always attends suffering in all its forms. We never know fully why something painful happens to us, even if we have all the best doctrine and teaching in the world. Scripture provides us with many handholds though, one of the clearest being found in Romans 5.

Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. (ESV)

In my sermon prep I worked on paraphrasing the passage in my own words. I didn't get to use it in the sermon though, so I thought I'd share it here.

Since we have been made right with God through confidence in Jesus, we have all our well-being secured, now and forever. Through Jesus, we have immediate and abundant access into his kingdom of grace. Grace is God at work in our lives to accomplish what we can’t, and it is absolutely free to all those who live by their confidence in Jesus. We rejoice in hope that God’s glory is and will be our atmosphere and home. This glory is intimacy with God. The same glory that God the Father shares with God the Son now becomes ours! We participate in the glory of God through Christ!

This experiential knowledge is powerful; it completely changes the way we see things. I know that God is good, so much so that every trial and trouble I face is an opportunity to taste and see his goodness and greatness. We are able to re-interpret and translate our sufferings, both the everyday and life-shattering kinds, into tenacious endurance; endurance, if properly nourished with that same love, can produce character. Endurance can shape us into a specific kind of person – the kind of person who is inhabited by God. We have become people who trust God in every situation and have thus found real hope. This hope is the byproduct of his love poured out in our hearts by his Spirit, enabling us to let go of shame. (my paraphrase)

Wednesday, January 17, 2018

Living in Trinitarian Community: A Sermon

Loneliness is a universal human experience, and it is getting worse as technology fills our lives with noise and "ease" devoid of relational interaction. Britain has recently recognized that their country is experiencing an epidemic of loneliness and has appointed a Minister for Loneliness, finding that loneliness can be deadlier than 15 cigarettes a day!

Our experiences of "church" often don't help our loneliness unless the vision and practices of the church are intentionally geared toward fostering relational connection - removing obstacles and nurturing genuine connection with others who share our trust in Christ. For many of us, engaging with church activities often makes loneliness worse, not better, because they fail to be intentional in such ways. How can we set a different course?

This past weekend I preached a message entitled, "Living in Trinitarian Community." My text for the morning was Ephesians 4:1-16.

My main point was that we need to have a broader vision for "church" (doing church, being the church, etc) if God's purpose for the church is to be realized. The vision of the life and work of the Trinity (Father, Son, Spirit) as they expand their giving/receiving love into the broken and sinful rubble of fallen humanity through Jesus Christ is what provides us sufficient experiences, resources and categories to find and cultivate life together. Though this "Trinitarian overflow of life" re-defines every sphere and activity of human life, here I only focused on some ways it can redefine church.

I hope that those who have been hurt by the church and wonder whether or not it's a "thing worth doing" might find hope here.