A Re-Run...

Here's a post that I wrote back in 2005.  It came back to me as I sat through our denominational convention this week - excited by some of the changes happening in our Fellowship and yet still wondering about this weird thing that we call church.  As we work through budgets and by-laws and begin to discuss theological issues (while they are both important and necessary) it is so easy to lose the joy in laying it all our for the Kingdom.  We lose the focus of Jesus in the trappings of running a church.  And, as often happens with me, the same questions surface in my head.  Here's what I wrote about it 4 years ago...

July 5, 2005 - 

The more time passes the less I am sure of and the more confident I am that Jesus is all He said He is. It is encouraging for me to see others at the same point in their journey. My faith has become less about answers and more about quiet trust in the One who is leading. Anne Lamott writes,

“Another problem involves what the light looks like. I have thought over the years, that the light would look like success, a good man, a child, a Democratic president, but none of these were right. Moses led his people in circles for forty years so that they could get ready for the Promised Land, because they had too many ideas and preconceptions about what a Promised Land should look like…We have to sit in our own anxiety and funkiness long enough to know what a Promised Land would be like, or, to put it another way, what it means to be saved.”

So much of my spiritual journey has been about letting go of what I thought God was doing in order to embrace what He’s actually up to.

I never wanted to be a pastor. I thought that they were too secluded from the real world. What an idiot I was. But God is patient (and persistent), and here I am pastoring a church, never more sure of His calling in my life than I am now.

I thought that spiritual leadership was about giving people answers. Truth is that it’s more about walking with people through their questions. I’ve realized that God doesn’t need me to be His agent; He can do His own PR work. He wants me to be His hands, showing compassion, serving, loving, dying. Sure, you speak the truth, but your eloquence and insight aren’t needed, He just enjoys letting you be a part of what He is doing.

I thought that being a pastor was about discerning vision and preaching with passion. I am learning that it’s more about riding the roller coaster we call life. Let me share with you a day from a couple of weeks ago. I got to the office at 9:00am on Friday and spent the next hour talking with a suicidal woman on the phone. Our church has tried to help her repeatedly, just like every other social agency in our town. But she continually burns her bridges, abuses those who help her, and justifies it by saying that God is leading her to do these things. At 10:00 I met with another person. She has every reason to be suicidal and yet God is slowly but surely changing her heart. On my way back to the office I met with a family of a 66 year old man who had just died. They have little or no understanding when it comes to Jesus and what He intends for us. It was an hour of trying to bring some hope to a situation where there is none, or at least it feels that way. When I got back to the office I had to do the intensely spiritual work of responding to emails. That was followed up by an hour of wrestling with Acts chapter 2, asking God to speak to me and enable me to speak clearly to others. At 2:00 I did a funeral. Once again, very little hope, just a deep love and respect for a man who they will miss everyday for the rest of their lives. I wrapped up the day trying to finish off my sermon. And all of this is set against the back drop of hurt feelings and misunderstandings that surround a recent church decision. And yet I love it. I’m seeing God in places that I never dreamed He would be. And guess what, He’s getting the job done. I should’ve known that when He said that He would build His church that is wasn’t some politician’s promise, good only for the time it takes to get them in office. He meant what He said. And He’s good for His word.

I thought that peace was the absence of all these struggles. I am learning that the real peace comes in the midst of the roller coaster. You can only use a parachute when you’re falling to the earth at some insane speed. You can only trust God when it looks as if there is no hope.

So I’m learning to be sure of less, but to be more confident of the less I know to be true. It’s an interesting paradox, and one that’s difficult to explain. I guess that’s what makes it so beautiful. Easy answers lose their beauty when held up to the light. But when you experience something that is beyond describing, or at least describing fully, the truth seems to actually grow in beauty as the light reflects across the surface of the unknown.

That’s just the way God likes to do things.