Usurped by Children

I am called lots of things. Some of them refer to my relationships: husband, father, brother, son, friend. Some of them refer to my vocation: cultural architect, minister, facilitator, evangelist, teacher, pastor, church planter. Some of them refer to my inadequacies: ...well, I better not quote those; they might be a little inappropriate. Much of our roles, in modernity, have been compartmentalized. I am a pastor while I am talking with people in our church. I am an evangelist when I meet new people. I am a husband when I am at home. I am incompetent when I sit the bench on a church softball team. I am a (insert expletive) when I sit too long at a green light.

But alas, the days of compartmentalizing are approaching their demise. Some instances require a blending of my roles. Like when I am leading a spiritual conversation in our church around a biblical text and someone is really struggling with something in her personal life. I see the tears. I see the anguish. Yet I assume the depth of the passage is moving her, despite the fact that she has shared the difficulty moments ago...before the tears began. I focus more on the passage, get excited, and anticipate the spiritual renewal of this poor girl. Blended roles: pastor and moron.

Or when I go to an extended family gathering, like Thanksgiving Dinner...or a Memorial Day cook-out...or my niece's birthday party (as I did this past weekend). At that moment, I am the uncle, brother, son, husband, father, and D.R.P. - the Designated Religious Person. The DRP is the person in the family deemed more spiritual than the others. Somehow we DRP's are assumed to be more spiritual because we have been to school, get paid to be that way, and spend quite a bit of time blogging about things like being the DRP. At any rate, the role of every family DRP, at every family gathering, is to pray before the meal. Sure, we are the brunt of the occasional "take up the collection" joke. And there is the rare occasion when we are consulted as the family authority on some moral issue. But mostly, we pray before meals. It's my blended role: Uncle DRP...Brother DRP...Father DRP.

It is, quite honestly, a hat I wear like a load of gravel. It is heavy. It weighs upon me. The role brings such unattainable expectations with it - at least for me. See, I don't pray well. I am not articulate in my praying. I do not pray for long. I run out of things to say. I have taken those spiritual gift inventories before. Prayer scores consistently last for me. So the inevitable question always makes me uneasy. It is always asked in private, usually in a low voice: "Jonathan, will you ask the blessing for us today?" My response, as the DRP, is always "Yes." And then the worrying ensues. "What am I going to pray about other than the food?" "Am I going to live up to the expectations of the super-spiritual DRP?" "Are there any family celebrations that have yet gone unnamed that I need to include in the prayer?" On Veteran's Day, I was asked by my wife's grandfather to "ask the blessing." It was a big deal because he is a veteran; Veteran's Day is emotional for him. I had to ask my wife what Veteran's Day celebrated. Blended: DRP, Husband, Moron.

As I stated above, the inevitable happened this past weekend at my niece's birthday party. While I was standing outside on the patio, my sister approached me and carefully, quietly, almost in a whisper, asked me, Brother DRP, "will you ask the blessing in a few minutes for us?" My reply? Same as usual: "Yes." I started thinking, - well, worrying really - about what I was going to pray. Do I thank God for all six years of my niece's life? Ask God to give her six more? Or do I try to get all elaborate and articulate about God guiding her steps as she comes to know him more? Or do I just stick to asking God to bless the pizza? I went inside, sat on the sofa and thought about it. Moments later, my sister came in, announced to the children and their parents that we were now going to say the blessing, and gave me the nod. I responsively moved forward in my seat, getting into the more assertive prayer posture. I quickly collected my thoughts, hoping that it would all come to me as I got started, and then the unusual happened. My two nieces announced that they wanted to say the prayer! What? Not the DRP? I know...it almost sounds blasphemous! My sister looked at me; I nodded, and sat back in my seat feeling much more passive. They sang the prayer, and when they started, the rest of the children joined in. I had heard them sing it many times before, but never so many. The simplicity and innocence struck me as they sang these words to the tune of "Are You Sleeping Brother John?":

Thank you God, thank you God
For our food, for our food
Thank you very much, thank you very much
Amen. Amen.

Imagine fifteen children singing that together. It's simple; it's honest; it's to the point; and to this DRP, it was poignant. Can you believe it? Upstaged by children. The supreme spirituality of the DRP with all of his theological degrees, experience in teaching others about the ways of God, and theological conversations...deflated by the melodious-but-often-off-pitch voices of children.

I think maybe we, as adults, have placed too many expectations on the eloquence of our prayers. I think maybe we need to learn from the simplicity of fifteen children singing "Thank you, God" to the tune of "Are You Sleeping." I think maybe we need to make the kids the DRP's.

Enemy Inside the Gate?

Religion departments at universities can be strange places. They aren't like biology departments, math departments or exercise science departments. They can be brutal places full of politics and subsequent debates. I double majored in English and Religion in college, and I can honestly say that the the halls of the English department just weren't filled with debates over Sylvia Plath's use of alliteration. But walk through the halls of the religion department and you'd think you were in the political science department - Calvinists arguing with Armenians, Baptists arguing with everyone else (and often themselves). This is the environment in which my roommate and I spent much of our time. This is the environment that I often forget. This is the environment that I remembered upon a recent visit from my college roommate.

TJ now lives about 500 miles away from me, and we had not seen each other in several years. It was a real surprise when he told me he was on his way to Boone...but a surprise I welcomed. As we talked about the good ole days, the memories came rushing back. And as we talked about our old friends, we shared with each other what we knew of our old friends' current lives they are leading. We talked about a couple friends who have died; we talked about our friends who have been successful in their businesses; and we talked about the ones who have done nothing after school. And we speculated about the ones neither of us had kept up with. Then TJ told me about an experience he had while he was in seminary with a couple of the guys from the "good ole days." These guys had invited him to speak at an apologetics conference for students. He said that he was stunned by their introduction of him to the students: "TJ is a guy that has come a long way; he used to be my enemy."

Maybe I need to go back a little...

TJ and I often found ourselves in the middle of those religion hall debates. We looked up to a professor there in the religion department that many of the other students saw as a little "unorthodox." I guess some would even have called him a heretic. Needless to say, as disciples of this prof, some of the other students took issue with some of our assertions and ideas. We didn't really associate with their group, and neither did they with ours. Our only real interaction was in the halls between classes as we exchanged and debated ideas. College changes people, and TJ and I are no different. I changed; TJ changed. But we did not change together. TJ went to a Seminary that focused on classical apologetics. Mine focused on spiritual formation and leadership.

That's what the guy meant when he said TJ had "come a long way." He meant TJ had moved closer to their camp. He was saying that TJ was no longer his enemy.

TJ said he was stunned, and when he told me about it, I was disturbed. I told him that I would have said, "He may have thought of me as his enemy, but I didn't think of him as mine." It's hard for me to understand that. I just don't get how another follower of Jesus Christ can be my enemy. If this thing we are living is indeed a war, then my guess is that we are supposed to all be on the same side. But so many of us want to make it into a Civil War. We lose sight of the real enemy.

Why is it that Religion Department Halls sound like Political Science Departments? Why are we so focused on our disagreements? Why do we lose sight of the important things we do agree on? Why do we search out the things that misalign us? And why do we label people (ourselves included) by the things that divide us?

"I am a liberal."

"I am a Calvinist."

"I am a Pre-millennialist."

"I am a Lutheran."

"I am an Evangelical."

"I am a Postmodern."

"I am a Traditionalist."

And so it goes as we misalign ourselves. Why can't I just be a follower of Jesus who doesn't have everything figured out? Why do I have to be someone's enemy?

Resurrection of the Will

"Are you nervous?" he asked. I was preaching my first sermon, and it was in front of a bunch of people in Lexington, NC that I didn't know. I answered with an understated yet truthful, "Yes." This seasoned pastor's reply was one that would shape much of the way I think about preaching: "Good. Preaching is such a serious task that you ought to be nervous. You are being the mouthpiece of God. The day you stop being nervous is the day you need to stop preaching." Interestingly, I still get nervous; but that's not the point. I'm sure we could argue such a definitive statement, but the spirit behind the statement is what haunts me. I want to preach the Truth. I would hate to stand in front of people and preach a fallacy. Now I'm sure I have, at some point, unknowingly said some things that were untrue. And to be perfectly honest with you, I have at times been tempted to knowingly "contextualize" some passages incorrectly. If you've ever taught a Bible study or preached a sermon, you know what I'm talking about: you know your idea is right but you can't find any scripture to support it. Then you find this verse that really has nothing to do with what you're trying to say, but, out of context, it seems to work. Yea...I've been tempted to do that. I've always withstood that temptation, but it's been a temptation none the less.

Then there are the times when I, out of ignorance, preach something that is false. Deep down I don't even want to know about those things because it plays with my mind. Deep down I hope never to come face to face with those fallacies. Deep down I wish they would just float off into oblivion never to raise their ugly heads again. But that's not always the case. And this is one of those times.

One of my favorite things to talk about has been the "death of the will." I like talking about "dying to ourselves." I like talking about this "death" as a metaphor for an abandonment of our own personal will. I like talking about giving up our own desires in order to yield to God's desires or the desires of others. I like talking about the assassination of our own will in favor of yielding to the will of God. Like I said, it's been one of my favorite things to preach. That's the way I've interpreted John 21:18 -

"I tell you the truth, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go." (NIV)

Then I had to go out and buy Tony Jones' book The Sacred Way. Tony is great for people like me who have grown up in a Protestant tradition but find the Protestant practice of spirituality to be a little shallow. The book covers all these spiritual disciplines found primarily in Catholic and Orthodox traditions. My plan was to read about all of them and pick out a couple that really jumped out at me to give a try. I read about Silence & Solitude, Lectio Devina, and the Jesus Prayer. Then I got to the chapter on Centering Prayer. The following section jarred me:

"In the seventeenth century, some in France took the writings of St. Theresa of Avila, who promoted a "prayer of quiet" to extremes. Quietists taught the pray-er to become utterly passive, to the point of annihilating the will. Any thought, even of Christ or the cross or one's own salvation, was rejected. This led to great moral laxity, since outward behaviors had no influence on the inner quiet of the person. For good reason, Quietism was condemned in 1687 and died out shortly thereafter." (page 72)

Did you catch that? Annihilating the will? Have I been teaching heresy? Maybe the annihilation/assassination of the will really isn't what "dying to the self" is all about. As a matter of fact, I can see the problem. To remove one's will is to remain open to all sorts of influence. Embracing the will of others is not the answer. Come to think of it...to live life with no will is to live life with no purpose. Life is meaningless. What if, however, we could resurrect the will. Rather what if God could resurrect our will? What if our resurrected will was healed in the same way that my relationship with God is healed? What if it is restored to what God created it to be much like the Kingdom of God restores humanity and the earth to what God intended? What if, in the salvific process, my will is re-embraced. And what if my resurrected will is completely in sync with the will of God?

Maybe going where I don't want to go is really "going where my old, dead, empty will doesn't want to go." Maybe going where I don't want to go is really "going where God wants me to go." And maybe "going where God wants me to go" is precisely where my resurrected will wants me to go.

I'm human, and left to human rationale, preaching will be flawed. I'm sure it won't be the last time I find out I've preached some form of heresy. Thank God for a worldwide faith community full of people like Tony Jones and St. Theresa of Avila who help us keep things straight. Thank God that, eventually, he will resurrect my intellect much like he resurrects my will.