A little bit of this, a little bit of that

I was reading Gen 1-3 and a couple of things struck me as interesting. In Gen 2 when God created man, he placed him in a garden with all sorts of trees that were visually pleasing and good to eat. In the center of the garden he placed the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. It struck me as interesting that placement; placing the very thing that will bring you life in close proximity to something that will bring about certain death. As I think about it as well, God told them “…for when you eat of [the tree of life] you will surely die.” It makes me wonder if I’ve skipped over the real meaning of this statement. I look at the statement and knowing the rest of the story and human history that that act brought about circumstances that eventually lead to their physical death.

I wonder if I’m amiss, however in thinking that this is what Jesus is countering when he says ‘I come to bring you life to the full’ — There is undoubtedly a reference to the life in the hereafter, but I also have to believe that both of these are referencing a spiritual and quality of life death and life as well.

I know that in my history, I have never felt more dead than when I’ve been pursuing things that are not of God and working to temporarily pacify the arrogant tantrums of my fractured soul. Conversely, I’ve never felt more alive than when I’m doing what I need to do, when my life is in order and I’m working towards being the man God has designed me to be. I think for me and for most of us, God has placed a tree of life next to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil that’s been living in each of us for years. Many of us have eaten of the knowledge tree and while it may be gratifying, it’s not satisfying.

One of the other things that struck me as interesting as well was one of the lines from Gen 3 — Sometimes through the telephone game and not paying attention we can add or subtract details from what God has told us: “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it.’ It’s fascinating to me in reading that again that she has several things that are a bit off about her statement. The first is that she refers to it as ‘the tree that is in the middle of the garden,’ but there are two there diametrically opposed. The second is that somehow she got the idea that not only were they not supposed to eat it, they weren’t even supposed to touch it.

In thinking about this, I think many in the church suffer from this mentality, self included: as we go along, we lose focus on what things are and are not good for us and we get to the point where it’s so bad that not only should we not do it, but we shouldn’t even touch on it.

One of the things that comes strongly to mind here is teaching and talking about sex in church. Sex and sexuality is something that everyone deals with once their biology comes to term. In biology and commonality, it’s something as common as eating, sleeping and going to the bathroom — everyone who has the biological capacity has to deal with sex on some level. Understand me clearly: I am not relegating sex to an animalistic cycle of have need <-> satisfy need, I am saying that it is something that affects everyone frequently. I think that many times inthe church, discussing sex, for instance with your kids or with the youth in the youth group, etc, is something that is so private or even bad that it’s not discussed. And since it’s not discussed with good, holy, honest and God-led authority, our version of what we should or shouldn’t do, how we think about sex and how we deal with our own sexuality becomes very twisted to where we adhere to a rigid set of rules because that’s the way it is, we look at the rules to see which can be bent (because rules generally don’t explain WHY, they just lay out WHAT) or we experiment because we don’t understand the why.

Every one of us has a choice when we’re hungry — we can choose that which brings us life or we can choose that which brings us death. Similarly, I know I need to stay more grounded in the truth so that I know what God says on things so that I can have clarity in what he has for me.

While I was in the area at church last night where they serve food for the production volunteers I witnessed something that was both funny and sad at the same time when it comes to relationships and church life. One of our creative guys was working on something and when I came back there are 4 girls sitting against the wall talking to him — I may have it wrong, but I believe he said he was being interrogated — but I digress. As I listened to the conversation they were talking about an event coming up for Valentines day and was asking who he was taking and whatnot, to which he replied ‘Well, it’s not a couples event, there are guys tickets and girls tickets, not couples tickets.’ While that response didn’t go over too well, the girls proceeded to discuss amongst themselves (by name) who it would be great to set him up with.

When he asked them why they were trying to set him up their response was ‘We’re hoping you will set US up too’. After a few more people joined, he made a comment (that I didn’t hear) and one of the newcomers responded ‘I don’t get it, how did this event become about marriage with guys?’

The girls did by applying pressure about this guys’ private life and wanting to set him up — not because he and someone would be a great match together — but because he “needed” to be set up with someone — anyone! What I have seen over time is that given time and space, people will naturally gravitate to one another. Sometimes a matchmaker may look at two people and see a good pairing and make a suggestion to both parties but that takes into account how both people are and is a suggestion rather than pressure. When applying pressure, it simply illustrates the relational gossip progression that sadly infuses church culture.

The relational gossip progression in church goes something like this: If they’re single, people wonder who they’re interested in. If they’re talking, people wonder if they’re interested or dating. If they’re casually dating someone, people wonder when they’re going to make it official. If they’re official, people wonder when they’re going to get engaged, then married, then kids, etc. Frankly that whole hamster wheel puts pressure on guys and girls and it’s not welcome. When people lack a connection to each other and engage in questions on their personal life it does not foster trust and it doesn’t foster community — primarily because people engaged in information discovery are not motivated by getting to know the other person better, they’re motivated by getting to personal information.

This kind of gossip fishing is damaging to relationships and communities because it attempts to seduce intimacy from someone with nothing in return. It doesn’t build the other person up, it doesn’t encourage growth and it acts as a hinderance to actual relationship because it puts a block both between the seducer and their victim as well as the victim and the person being discussed.

I’m not going to tolerate it in my life, I encourage you to examine yourself to see if your conversational ethics are in order.

I was reading the Spaz’ blog yesterday and she inspired some follow-on thought. Before I get started, go check out her entry here and then come back.

I believe the western church today has meandered into irrelevancy through a combination of the masturbatory pursuit of the warm fuzzies, self absorbtion, rules and “no trespassing” signs. Our world and culture are full of the conditional: People will like/love you — if you’re thin/attractive/rich. People will be friends with you, meet with you, do stuff with you — if it’s convenient, if you can do something for them. Marrriages will break up over “irreconcilable differences,” men will leave women because they’re not attracted them anymore or “just don’t feel it,” women will leave men because they’ve “fallen out of love.” Why would anyone want to be in a group of people where not only do they have to deal with that, but also have a stack of rules of what they have to do and be in order to be accepted there and by God?

The church has missed the point and have succumbed to the pharisaical pursuit of spiritual police officers who care more about the rule being broken than they do about why the rule exists. The church is supposed to be the place where people not only come to know God, but WANT to know God because they have seen God through how the church loves one another and specifically how it loves them. When Jesus walked the earth, he didn’t congratulate the church leaders for following the rules; he more often than not rebuked them for their insulated self-righteous thoughts and actions. He didn’t seek out the guys at church, he sought out the most likely to not be in church — the poor, the crippled, the prostitutes, the johns — not because he wanted to beat them over the head with what they’ve been doing wrong, but to experience a taste of real relationship, of real love and real acceptance and to give them real inspiration to live.

Most of the time, to enact real, positive change and the motivation to do things better and right is to provide a positive, encouraging environment where the person is inspired to change rather than coerced to change. I have seen this in my own life — when the “I am loved and valued” need is met, I don’t have to focus any energy on meeting that need, I can throw away the things that I was using to ineffectively satisfy the need to be loved, valued, worth something and going somewhere, pull my head up and see the others with needs around me — and what I can provide is to not only tell them, but to show them they are loved and they are valued. I’m not especially good at it yet, I know there are people in my life that would hear that and laugh and think you’ve got the wrong guy, but I don’t care — I know I’ve made mistakes and will make mistakes as I continue to learn, but I also know that I’m way better at that today than I ever have been and that’s what matters. I know I’ve missed the point. I’ve intentionally hardened my heart and walked by those who are asking for help or money, simply because I didn’t want to and didn’t think they were worth it. For years, I went through life treating God like spiritual booty call — get in contact, get what I want and go back home to my regular life, not really interested in any real give-and-take relationship with Him. Unfortunately, when you develop a pattern of treating God that way, you unintentionally can begin treating those whom you really want a relationship with in the same way, hardening my heart to them and not giving them what they really want: me.

I can see where the church has gotten off track is with the whole idea of salvation, why people need to be saved and saved from what. Christ did not come in order to simply persuade people from bad actions into do-goodery, Christ came to give life and give it to the full, not once people die, but right here and right now. What does that mean? I may be far off base, but what I understand it to mean is that as I mentioned above, a full life in Christ gives us relief from the survival struggle, relief from trying to force relational ends to meet, from trying to strive for getting what we need to quench the unmaskable cravings of our souls. The heartbreaking fact is that millions of people will shuffle in and out of church on Sundays and never know the life-changing love of Christ in their lives and will never experience that life here because nobody is willing to draw them in and to embrace them for who they are right now.

The western church has to wake up and start the change or it will die of either old age or asphyxiation. Culture change is a must to rid the old attitudes of “this is how it must be because this is how it has always been,” “those people don’t belong here” and “someone is in my spot.” I feel like there are many in the “christian right” who try to legislate morality rather than changing the hearts of those with whom they believe are trying to solve their problems immorally. Unfortunately, because of the rigidity of many in the church, the church cannot adapt itself into relevancy because they are uncomfortable with change. Let me speak clearly: If one is a true Christ follower, change is inevitable and welcomed — change may be painful, but living with the friction of cruft in our lives only slows us down from where we want to be. I’m inviting change…I know it will be hard, I know there will be tears and I know that there will be a bit of temper tantrums thrown down….but it’s better than who I was and where I was, it’s going to take me to a new sense of passion, of joy and of destiny and I’m excited to be different than I was 2 minutes ago, yesterday, last week and definitely last year.

Who’s with me?