"Numb"--the new Guilty?

Guilt is out. That’s so Bible Belt Fundamentalist. People just aren’t into it like they used to be.

Guilt used to be stock in trade for clergy types in my trade. Churches thrived on guilt: even a marginally-effective speaker could whip up a deep sense of insufficiency and soon trigger an urge to tithe or serve or pray or even just not think about sexual things or any other Very Bad Pleasures. For preacher, but also for parents and other authority figures, guilt was the fire alarm lever you could pull to get everybody’s attention. That's when Chuch Lady was born.

Guilt doesn’t seem to carry the weight that it used to. People just aren’t interested. Trying to trigger guilt today can feel like trying to offer someone a really good deal on an AM car radio.

And you know…I think that’s probably a good thing. Guilt-induced goodness isn’t really goodness. Ultimately it’s more like a fear response. And it’s kind creepy to think that people in my profession could actually end up bullying people into adopting a certain lifestyle. Shame on you/us…

So, it’s probably a good thing that we’re so much less into the whole guilt thing. How much better for people like us to live without the constant burden of a guilty conscience. To just let us be free to be loved by God, to enjoy the healing and the wholeness that He offers. A big improvement, right?

It would seem so, at least. And yet…my sense is that the majority of us still somehow consider ourselves 2^nd rate followers of Christ.

I think most of us recognize that we’re sinners, at least technically. Most weeks we miss at least one or two of those Ten Commandments—even if we can actually remember what they actually are. That means that we’re sinners on some level. But that doesn’t mean we have to get all fire-and-brimstone about it, right?

And yet, no matter how we may shrug off the idea of feeling guilty for having made some bad choices or for having had too much of the wrong kinds of fun at an earlier stage in life, something inside of us still feels like we need to ratchet our expectations for God down a notch.

I hear it in the awkward wisecracks when someone attends a worship service for the first time, as if they half suspect that the place will be struck by lightning because they showed up. I hear it when someone first begins some position of leadership or authority—almost as if it was some kind of inside joke for someone like them to be considered for any kind of “advanced” Christian role. And I think I hear it when someone cringes at the prospect of praying out loud in a group. If someone like me prays out loud, everyone will hear God not answering!

Seem that no matter how we may shrug off the idea of feeling guilty for having made some bad choices or for having had too much of the wrong kinds of fun at an earlier stage in life, something inside of us still feels like we need to ratchet our expectations for God down a notch.

So, here's the weird situation I think we find ourselves in: we no longer buy the idea of guilt, but we still somehow feel like we need to give ourselves some sort of spiritual “time out”. Like people like us need to make sure that we don’t expect too much from God too fast. Better to keep ourselves on the sidelines for the first little bit. The first few months…or years…or decades. Maybe I’m crazy, but those all sound like symptoms of what we used to call guilt.

We don’t feel guilty as much any more. Maybe that’s good. But I’m not sure we feel all that innocent, either. That doesn’t seem right. If anything we're spiritually numb. What are we missing?

Why Pray? (a better response)

(OK, so not all Calvinist jokes are funny...)

If God has everything in our lives already laid out, then why pray?

Seems to me the question can be re-worded as "why get emotionally involved in something whose outcome is largely predetermined?" (Although that's admittedly a bit clumsier.) God invites us to pray, but he also assures us that He's already previewed and edited the events that will unfold. Clearly the point of such prayers would not be for information (God smacking his forehead as he discovers needs of our He would otherwise have missed). Instead it must have more to do with His desire for us to approach life somehow connected to Him, like branches to a vine.

But still...why whip up a sense of urgency praying over needs which will come as no surprise? It seems that predictability doesn't really have to stifle our emotional involvement or our desire to share something with someone we care about. It happens whenever we gather with friends to watch an old movie. We still turn towards each other at the scary scenes and we still laugh together at the funny parts. Not because anything was NEW, but because it was IMPORTANT to us. Redundancy doesn't really get in the way when something is important. That's why I still laugh at old "Airplane" scenes. Just as we turn to each other when a re-run moves us to laughter or fear, so God also wants us to turn to Him when something powerful moves us in life.

Can we change God's plan? It seems that we can, judging from some of the examples in the Bible. Look at Abram negotiating with God over the future of Sodom. Or look at almost anything in the minor prophets. To what extent is God's logic fuzzy enough that He can handle multiple scenarios, or to what extent is God simply pre-aware of just how we'll change our mind, having seen this movie before? I don't really know. And I'm not sure I need to.

Why Pray?

A friend emailed me with a valid question: if God has our days all planned out...why pray?

I responded promptly, sensing the importance of the question. I told him that the moment I read his email I knew that this was my moment: that I was MEANT to offer him a helpful, insightful response.

And then I didn't. (psych!)

In Step?

I wonder if Jesus became easy to overlook after a while. Maybe that's why He spent so much time in the gospels trying to help his disciples get at least a little clue.

To cut to the chase, I suspect I overlook him. Not in a larger cosmic sense, so much. My belief in Christ is pretty settled and I've arranged a lot of my life's furniture around Him being in the house. But sometimes I wonder how much I still miss.

For this week's sermon I've been thinking about Galatians 5:25: "since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit." That comes at the end of the passage listing the whole cornucopia known as the fruit of the spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, and a number of other traits I'd like to see more of. Ever since Jesus returned to the Father, he deputized the Spirit to be His presence. And it sounds like that Presence is planning on being present every step of the way, like He's planning on walking me through the various experiences each day brings.

As much as I'd like folks to think that I live in constant communion with my Savior, I have to admit that His interventions still tend to catch me by surprise. You know, since I'm periodically straightened out by the Spirit, maybe I should try to periodically stay straight with Him.

So...makes me wonder how much more easily all this love-joy-peace etc. might come if I were to check in every step or so. I'd probably stumble a lot less.

Worrying Like an Atheist

If I was an atheist I'd be worried.

By definition, an atheist lives with the conviction that there is no one "out there" watching over him/her, much less our world as a whole. It's like a cosmic remake of the Home Alone movies--we get to stay up as late as we want and eat junk food, but when the bad guys show up we're on our own. While atheism has its appeal, in the face of problems like a recession, crime, personal struggles and the garden-variety aches and pains of life I think overall I'd prefer to have a deity on the job somewhere.

This is not to say that we should get to choose our divinities, I'm just noting the advantages and disadvantages of the various worldviews. In the long run there definitely is something to say for the Providence of God, even if His overall purposes can be a little hard to figure out. If I was the only one in charge of my world, I think I'd have reason to be worried. Fortunately, that's not the case.

Which brings me to my main point here: why, then, do I still worry? Why do I allow myself to get wrapped in knots as if my own efforts were needed to get all things to work together for good? And why do I periodically wake up during the night thinking that if I could somehow strain toward success I could make things in my world go more smoothly? Seems like there ought to be a lot more days when I feel like a spiritual lottery winner.

Fact is, I still end up worrying like an atheist. I believe...but God help my unbelief.

Fortunately, God's wired an automatic warning signal into me that can prompt me to re-align my worldview. To remember Him. It's called stress, and when it works properly it leads me to pray.

And I think it's working.

Should God Be Reasonable?

Should God make sense?

This week I've been thinking about some of the less-conventional aspects of the Holy Spirit's work: at least as seen from my Midwest-America, western-European sort of perspective. You know--the whole idea that He might lead people to speak in tongues, break out in prophecies or produce some flat-out miracles.

The God I grew up with was fairly predictable. That was nice, you could count on Him to be reasonable. Later on some friends introduced me to a God who couldn't always be figured out. That sort of stuff always bothers me.

A big wild card in this, of course, is the fact that we human beings ourselves have a tendency to distort things...and that's not God's fault. Just because some wacky things can end up happening in Jesus' name doesn't mean that Jesus is necessarily signing off on every spectacle.

And yet...well, "Aslan is not a tame lion", as the story goes (if you've read the Chronicles of Narnia). I wonder how often I accidentally limit some amazing things God would love to do, just because of the narrowness of my expectations. Actually, push-come-to-shove, I'd rather expect too much from God rather than too little. I'm adjusting.

To be honest, though, Mr Beaver's little grin makes me nervous ("No, he's not safe...but he's good, I tell you.")

Nervous, but I'm intrigued.