Struggling with Scripture #3: Mark 1:16-20

Sometimes I struggle to simply make it through the day, whether a work day or a day off.   Most of the time it is simply a casual day: free time on my hands, normal chores to cross off a list, simple ideas floating through my mind to be reflected on.  Perhaps it is the normalcy itself that I struggle with - the daily routine, the repetition of  activities, the lack of new or stimulating work - just another day. Thoughts cross my mind about what it would be like to be in a different time or place, doing something different, something "exciting," and I look around and heave a sigh.   Just another day.

It was just another day for the first disciples of Jesus Christ.  Sun shining high in a cloudless sky, slight breeze crossing the sea, smell of salt and fish, the feel of rope in their hands.  Strong backs used to the work still ache while heaving the nets, communication is spoken back and forth, companionable silence filling spare time.  A perfectly normal day.  Then, Jesus walks down the shore, and their lives change in the blink of an eye, never to be the same again as they follow Jesus. 

The most holy, epic,  and strange adventure had just begun for the first disciples on a completely normal day.  No one wrote about the decades coming before this day, nor the weeks before this event, but only this single day when the disciples were called and chose to follow.  It's amazing that the disciples simply got up and left to follow Jesus, that they knew enough to pay attention for his coming, to go about everyday work but ready to leave at a moment's notice.  It is this waiting, this working-until-that-time, that I struggle with.

In much the same way as the disciples, much of our work, family life, chores, and free time goes- unwritten and unspoken about; it simply goes.    Yet each of these routine days are preparatory days, times and places where our character is tested and prepared, where our ears and hearts are opened and attuned to Jesus voice, where we are trained heart, mind, body, and soul to love God and love our neighbors as ourselves.  And in the midst of these days, these simple, ordinary, normal days, we wait for Jesus to walk along our shore and shout out to us.  The question that haunts me is this: will I hear the call and know it, will I see it and believe it, or will I be so bored by normalcy that I miss the day Jesus walks along my shore and calls for me to follow?

"Lord, in the midst of each day, help me to know you a little deeper, love you a little more, and become more attentive to your call."

Cleaning Theology: Prayer and Everyday Life

Like most people, I have a toilet...and a shower...and a bathroom sink...and a bathroom floor.  It is a necessity, being an adult, to clean this bathroom several times a month.  And it is drudgery...there are a million and one things I would rather do than clean the toilet, scrape down the tub, wash the floor and walls, and pour Draino down the sink.  It is not that the task is difficult, or that the bathroom becomes so messy in a week that it's gross to clean- it's simply that I don't want to do it.   However, having a task that must be accomplished, I roll up my sleeves, whip out the sponge and cleaning solution, spray down the bathroom, take a big gulp of air from outside the door, and wade in to do the dirty work of getting the place clean. 

A funny thing occurs while I scrape down the walls and toilet, wash the floor, and make the place clean.  Focusing on such a simple task, clears my mind of the day's work, entertainment, and play.  This frees up room to think, focuses the mind on reality, and brings my attention to God.

Paying attention to God brings to mind prayer, which leads for a perfect time for saying small prayers.  Menial tasks open room for us to think and to pray, to take time for our relationship with God in a powerful way that entertainment, work, and play can deprive us of.  In God's grace and mercy, chores can provide room for the love of God to saturate our daily existence. 

I find that praying while doing these daily tasks, praying in open periods of work, reminding myself that God is whom I am following, brings grace into my life and heart in ways that keeping myself entertained never does.  Chores provide me with an opportunity to pray that I might not have taken if left to my own devices; it is these prayers, everyday, that will lead me to walk with Christ in each moment of life.

"Lord, help me to pray each day as I walk your way."

Reader's Review #1 (in 500 Words or Less)

Richard Foster is a modern legend among those familiar with the field of spiritual formation in Christianity.  Classics such as Celebration of Discipline and Streams of Living Water have been staple works for those seeking to further their journey's with God by positioning themselves for transformation before God through historic spiritual disciplines. With grace, honesty, and knowledge, Foster always writes practical, deep, and 'God-encountering' works that assist people on their everyday journey with God.

In Life with God, Foster continues to write practical ways of experiencing everyday life with God, this time through reading the Bible in ways that expect to encounter the living God the Scriptures talk about and point to.  Spiritual practices such as lectio divina (reading the Bible spiritually) are discussed in detail, so much so that those experienced and inexperienced alike can learn and use the method simply by reading and following Foster's steps. 

However, for me the most insightful part of Foster's work was the final part "Understanding the Means."  Within this section, Foster discusses the process of being spiritually transformed by God through reading the Bible and through spiritual disciplines.  It was in this section that I quickly began to tab down page after page, highlighting one liner after one liner of spiritually potent thoughts that will shape this part of my Christian journey.

One such one liner was this: "Let's be clear on what discipline is: the ability to do the right thing at the right time for the right reason.  This is not the same as the ability to accomplish the desired result through human effort.  God is the One who brings about our inward transformation into Christ likeness" (136).  Foster's intent behind this passage is potent and applies to the entirety of our walks with Christ. It is not the mere act of sitting down and reading our Bible's every day, or reading twice a week, that will make us like Christ.  No - if we force ourselves to read the Bible every day, we mine as well be reading the local newspaper for all the good it will do us.

Instead, we must read the Bible with our hearts open to God, expecting a radical encounter with Christ. This will not look the same every time, nor be of the same intensity, but we read with the hunger to experience and continue our relationship with God, not to simply press through the routine.  (This is not to say there is not a time to persevere in daily readings in our Dark Nights, but I digress...)

One Line Summary:  If you are in need of encounters with Christ through the Bible, buy this book, read it, and keep it on the bookshelf to re-read.  Foster does a fabulous job of helping readers explore the Bible with new eyes - this book is good enough to keep!

Book Reviewed: Richard Foster.  Life with God: Reading the Bible for Spiritual Transformation.  New York, NY: HarperCollins, 2008. 

Struggling with Scripture #2: Romans 8:28

In my last post, I shared my perspective of life, particularly what we as Christians have control of in life - our own actions, whether initiating or reacting.  I also stated that I believe the only one who has the world "in hand" is God.  However, I do not mean that I think God controls everyone like a master puppeteer, or that God controls everything that happens in the world.  No, God allows life to happen, acting and reacting to events and free will in a similar fashion that humans do.  The question I then ask is this:  "How do I have hope in hopeless situations?  Will life get any better if God isn't controlling what's going to happen next?!"

Romans 8:28 is one answer to that question, but is also a passage of Scripture I struggle with deeply.  Romans 8:28 states, as a matter of fact, that "We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose" (NRSV).  What does this mean?  To me, it means that all things, good or bad, normal or weird, splendid or terrible, will somehow accomplish God's purposes for good for those who love God...whether it's immediate, ten years down the road, or in eternity. 

But how can I say this? How can I believe that all things will work together for good when someone's child dies?  When a grandparent passes away?  When cancer begins to eat at the body?  When someone is left naked and beaten in a strange place, being kidnapped, raped, and sold into child slavery?  How can these things ever work together for good for those who love God?

We know that God has the world in hand; though God does not cause evil things to happen to people that God can still weave together a beautiful life tapestry out of those evil things for those who love God.  Sometimes, when the tapestry is our lives, we may not think it's beautiful - ever.  We may struggle with what happens to us or what we have done for our entire lives.  Yet, all lives lived with God in love are beautiful...and somehow God will work the evil strands of our tapestries into one marvelous work.  How?  I cannot say...but I hope and trust in God.

"Lord, may I hope and trust in you, even when evil things happen, because I know all things work together for good for those who love God...somehow.  May I trust in you."

Theology for Living #1: Choice

I have an odd habit of naming different periods in my life under three varying labels: I am "In Control" or life is "Spinning Out of Control" or I have "Lost Control."   These three categories have many synonymous phrases which help illuminate them, such as "life is going well" or "I need to get a grip" or  "Life is falling down around me." 

Yet, as a Christian, I proclaim that all of these labels and categories are simply faulty ways of looking at the world.  In fact, God is the only one who has the world in hand, and even then not every molecule is controlled by God!  Life, for the most part, just happens...for better or for worse.  Car batteries die, jobs are lost, jobs are gained, cars are fixed.  Relationships are made, relationships are broken, the sun goes up, and the sun goes down.

Sometimes we are forced into terrible predicaments brought on by other humans or nature - such as being raped, or being beaten to a pulp, or being very sick.  Other times, life goes on "as normal" until an amazing, or a horrendous, event turns our lives around and reshapes our perspectives and ways of thinking.  Most of life...simply happens without us asking for it to happen, without us liking what happens, and with us praying for life to change.

We, as Christians, are not in control of life.  So what are we in control of? What can we gain control of?  The answer is this: ourselves.  We control how we act in life and how we respond to life when life happens to us.  One day, we will be held accountable for every choice we make and action we take.  There isn't always one right answer, but there is always one right question: "Am I acting as Christ Himself would act?"

Let's take a moment together and breathe...breathe a deep breath before we speak a word, take an action, or respond to a situation.  Let's think about what Christ would do...for ultimately we cannot control what life does or brings to us, but we can choice how we will act and respond in the midst of those situations.

"Lord, help me surrender to your will, so that I may act and respond like you."

A Life of Intention

"It was this...intention that made the primitive Christians such eminent instances of piety, that made the goodly fellowship of the Saints and all the glorious army of martyrs and confessors.  And if you will here stop and ask yourself why you are not as pious as the primitive Christians were, your own heart will tell you that it is neither through ignorance nor inability, but purely because you never thoroughly intended it." - Williams Law, A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life, found in Richard Foster, Life With God (New York, NY: 2008), p. 55.

I always wonder, how much do I truly intend to do the things I do?  When I intend to work out by stepping outside of my room and into the main room of the apartment and I turn on the DVD player and P90X, I have pretty much conquered the desire to not work out and committed to the desire to work.

Living for God seems to be the same way.  Days that I intend to pray I take a moment to sit down and pray.  Those days in which I battle a desire to not pray and those days in which I simply, "don't feel like it" or don't have the time, I find that I do not pray because I began the day not intending to pray at all.

Am I truly committed to becoming perfect as my heavenly Father is perfect?  Or did I never intend to strive for such heights from the beginning?  This is a question I must challenge myself everyday...

"Lord, help me to be intentional in living for you, each and everyday."

Struggling with Scripture #1: Judges 19:22-30

Scripture is the main tool that God uses to reveal God's self to humanity today.  When we read Scripture, we read it not to gain facts or information, but to gain a sense of the God whom we have devoted ourselves to with the purpose that we may enter into a deeper relationship with the One who loves us so much.  However, there are a lot of Scripture passages that make me struggle because they don't make sense.  Some of them are simply horrifying, such as Judges 19:22-30. These nightmarish passages raise questions and doubts, not faith.  What in the world can this passage say to us as Christians in the twenty-first century? 

As a Biblical scholar, I am aware of the variety of methods which can illuminate the reason for why this text exists in the Bible.  Yet, one question rips apart all method and shoves itself to the fore: "Why?  Why does this person have to experience betrayal by her husband, wanton rape by villains, and have her body hacked apart by her husband in the end (19:25, 29)?"

All of humanity struggles with this issue, the question of theodicy: why does God allow bad and evil things to happen to this world? To me?  Why does our world have to disappear in one terrible, wretched moment?  I wrestle with the ache that comes when this question is asked, I see the pain in the eyes of friends and family dealing with life-shattering issues, and I hear the pain of breaking hearts when family members die, when children die, when a life-threatening disease is discovered in the body, and when everything from the car to work to familial life crashes in a single day.

And the answer, the only answer I hear from God, is this: "I Know, and I love you."  In response, my hands raise themselves high, and crash against the desk below me with a resounding bang.  Tears flow down my face, and I raise my head arrogantly, pointing upwards, and with seething rage I shout, "HOW?  HOW DO YOU, GOD, KNOW?"  And then I hear the cry of my own heart, and the heart of aching humanity, scream with pain: "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?" rip from the mouth of Jesus - God's own Son (Matthew 27:46).

And I understand...God does know the pain, the feeling of being forsaken, alone, crushed, and destroyed. And God has shown us the way to victory, by conquering death and bringing life through the resurrection of Jesus.  It doesn't make it better, or easier, or calm the pain.  But it gives hope for a brighter day, even if that day is not today. Judges 19:22-30, a text grasping its way up from the bottom of broken humanity, screams our pain.  Matthew 27:46 echoes that pain.  And the resurrection of Jesus breathes life.

Prayer for today: "Lord, help me to have faith and hope in You, even when my faith and hope are lost in what little remains of my once whole life."

The Snowball Effect

One of my hobbies that I enjoy is working out - specifically "getting in shape" using P90X, which is a difficult home-workout program.  Today as I was struggling through the Plyometrics (jump-training) routine, I finally realized something that identified itself immediately as the "snowball effect" in my mind.  I was panting for breath about 20 minutes into the routine, watching enviously as the people on the P90X DVD began jumping in double-time (going twice as fast), and I correspondingly began jumping in one-half time (going twice as slow), the thought came to me that the reason the people on the DVD could do what they did was because they built up to where they are slowly.

As this obvious thought entered my mind, I thought about my own struggles with "getting in shape."  I thought about the slow drop in weight, the switch in eating lifestyles, the agony of initial workouts.  I also thought about the development of this lifestyle to the point where I now am. Initially, everything was difficult and progress was slow - agonizingly so.  Then, as I got more comfortable with eating healthy foods in proportion, and as I began dropping weight and struggling through more of the workout-routines, my progress actually sped up.  I lost more weight faster, became stronger quicker...and all the while working out and eating healthy became easier!  As I develop, I find that development happens at a faster pace with increasing results than during the initial period.  This is what popped into my mind as the "snowball effect" - the culminating progress that occurs as disciplined training is steadily done over time.  

In my life as a Christian, I struggle to initiate various activities which would help me know God more, walk stronger and healthier in the faith, and live for God through every moment.   I struggle to initiate the snowball: to take time out for prayer everyday for more than a week; to pray over each customer I assist in my occupation each day; to be disciplined in my reading of Scripture.  Instead, it comes inconsistently, sporadically, waxing and waning like the ocean tide.  

So, my prayer for the next few weeks will be this: "Lord, help me, teach me, to struggle through the initial development of the disciplines of praying and Scripture study in the midst of ordinary life - create in me a "snowball effect of holiness" to help me walk with you.  Amen."