I have been reading Christ of the Celts by J. Philip Newell. Last week I shared, via Facebook, the following quote from the book:
"Grace is given not to make us something other than ourselves, but to make us radically ourselves. Grace is given not to implant in us a foreign wisdom, but to make us alive to the wisdom that was born with us in our mother's womb. Grace is given not to lead us into another identity, but to reconnect us to the beauty of our deepest identity. And grace is given not that we might find some exterior source of strength, but that we might be established again in the deep inner security of our being and in learning to lose ourselves in love for one another to truly find ourselves."
A young religious zealot quickly pounced upon the quote, declaring it to be "human-centered, Christ-eclipsing" heretical nonsense, and offered the following "correct" dogma:
"Grace is given to convert us from objects of wrath to objects of mercy."
Well, he was partly correct, drawing from his chosen, isolated proof-text of Ephesians 2:3. But his denouncement of Newell's words demonstrated an extremely shallow (yet widely preached) understanding of the true identity of the human race and the full meaning of God's grace. His dogma relegates human beings to nothing more than "objects" in a celestial legal/penal system with an angry God bent on our destruction, yet appeased by Christ's bloody sacrifice, thus sparing us from the eternal torture He believes we all deserve. I don't blame the young man for his myopic perspective. It's been the centerpiece and starting point of the Christian religion since the birth of the Holy Roman Empire.
Newell, drawing from the fuller body of Biblical texts and a broader scope of historical Christian teaching, draws us into a deeper truth about ourselves.
A better starting point for the human condition is found much earlier in the sacred text.
"Then God said, 'Let us make human beings in our image, to be like us. They will reign over the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the livestock, all the wild animals on the earth, and the small animals that scurry along the ground.' So God created human beings in His own image. In the image of God He created them; male and female he created them. Then God blessed them and said, 'Be fruitful and multiply. Fill the earth and govern it. Reign over the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, and all the animals that scurry along the ground.' Then God looked over all that was made and he saw that it was very good." ~Genesis 1
The identity of the human does not begin with error, sin, expulsion, exile, conviction, a celestial death-row, and eventual execution.
The Book of Common Prayer and the Westminster Confession of Faith provide us with a horribly deformed starting point as beings with "no health in us, opposite to all good, and wholly inclined to all evil."
The identify of the human begins with the image of God within us and His declaration of our "goodness." It begins with what John Eldredge calls The Sacred Romance. The ancient Celtic followers of Jesus saw the genesis of our species as part of a Divine dance of the Lover and His beloved to the song of the Trinity.
Yes, evil entered the picture. The romance was betrayed. The steps to the Divine dance have been forgotten. The song has faded. And we have become the faintest shadow and caricature of who we were created to be. Enter grace...
We are meant, and invited by grace, to once again become radically ourselves: Men and women bearing brilliantly the image of God in our world, swept up once again by the song of God's extraordinary love for us. We are meant, and invited by grace, to rediscover wholly who God fashioned us to be in our mother's womb and living fully out of that understanding. And we are meant, and invited by grace, to return with abandon to the greatest and most enduring of all human expression: Love.
God's message to us is not that we can become something we presently are not. It's that we can be healed and restored to who we were always meant to be.
I saw a story in the news that the third week of January is typically considered by many to be the most depressing week of the year kicked off by what is known as "Blue Monday." A combination of factors bears the blame. The joy rush of the holiday season has subsided. The memories made with family members seen only at that time of the year have begun to fade. Credit card bills from lavish holiday spending are coming due. In many places winter at it's worst has set in.
Perhaps the greatest contributor to this eerily predictable season of sadness is the fact that, after two weeks in, all of our aspirations for a better new year than the last year are suffocating under an oppressive blanket of sameness.
I think most of us look upon the start of a new year with renewed hope, energy, and determination. This will be the year that I improve my health, build better relationships, strengthen my finances, find and pursue a deeper meaning in life! I'm going to be different! Life is going to be different! And it will all begin on January 1st!
The month is half over. You're still still overweight, or still smoking, or still tripping on Meth. Your spouse still thinks you suck. Your friends still see your name on the screen and tuck the unanswered phone back into their pocket, fatigued by your self-absorption. Your credit card debt is actually larger than it was a month ago. And you're still spending hours flipping endlessly through 300 channels of televised pablum wondering if there isn't something more significant you could be doing with your life.
The problem: You entered January with aspirations for a better year, a better life, but have failed to set in motion the mechanisms that actually create that change. Life is not altered by resolutions, but by actions. And the most effective actions are not grandiose, but the small, repetitive ones that gradually move us forward.
It's been quite cold here. Most evenings my first task upon arriving home is to build a fire in the fireplace. A few nights ago, while laying in bed, I noticed the smell of burnt wood and smoke on my hands. This immediately transported me back to multiple times in my childhood when my family would spend several days and nights camping. Those were wonderful experiences that remain embedded in my memory, not because they were comfortable (mosquitoes, poison ivy, no air-condition), but because they were filled with differentness. For several nights I slept in a different place. I listened to different sounds while drifting off to sleep. I ate different food. I enjoyed different activities. I had different neighbors. My family and I had interactions around the campfire much different than our interactions around the television.
The most depressing week of the year is coming to a close. It's time to move on. It's time to now actually become the person you set out to become as the ball dropped, fireworks filled the sky, and Auld Lang Syne arose from the crowd. And that will only happen when you begin to inject some small but significant doses of differentness into your life.
Here are some of the actions I plan to take in my own life:
I'm an avid reader, but every book I read tends to fall into the same genre. I'm beginning the year by reading something different, a biography, the first one being about the life of Ernest Hemingway.
I like weekend road trips, but tend to always go to the same places each time. I plan to make several short, inexpensive trips to places I've never been.
I'm going to spend more time being quiet and still. When spring arrives I'm going to begin spending more time outside.
I'm going to step outside of my comfort zone and visit a spiritual community different from those I've spent time with in the past.
Though I refuse to set a goal of doing this daily (goals can be self-defeating), there will be more mornings in 2012 in which I get up around 5:00 am to simply be quiet, pray, read, or write.
Finally, and I admit I don't know what this is yet, I will find one venue in which to meet strangers and get to know them.
This is not an exhaustive list for me. But, for the sake of writing discipline, I have a rule to not write posts longer than 800 words. I'll share more with you as the year progresses. :-)
What small, simple doses of differentness could you inject into your life this year to finally begin moving you in the direction of significant, long-term life change?
For about a month now I've been working on building a new online presence called You 2.0 where I, along with guest writers, will focus on topics such as career, money, relationships, religion-free spirituality, and personal transformation. Nothing would make me happier than for the audience here to join me there. Click here, or the banner below, to be magically transported to the new site.
"So the image of God is not simply a characteristic of who we are, which may or may not be there, depending on whether or not we have been baptized. The image of God is the essence of our being. It is the core of the human soul. We are sacred not because we have been baptized or because we belong to one faith tradition over another. We are sacred because we have been born."
~ J. Philip Newell; Christ of the Celts
The narrative of the first few chapters of the first book of the Bible introduces us to the first days of creation, the first animals, the first garden home, the first man, the first woman, the first evangelist, the first sermon, the first eucharist, the first conversion, the first "witness", the second conversion, and the first betrayal of the Creator and all that was meant to be.
As the story goes, Creator God spoke into existence all that is with it emerging from His being perfect in every way, brilliantly demonstrating the beauty, love, and kindness of His nature. He gave life to man and woman and inbred His image into them. All that was needed for absolute fulfillment and happiness was given freely and abundantly. They knew God face to face. He walked with them in the cool of the day.
One day the evangelist entered the Garden and approached the woman. The narrative names him as the serpent.
The first sermon began with a question intended to throw all that was and all that God had said into confusion. "Did God really say you were not to eat from any tree in the garden?" The sermon continued, distorting the true words spoken by God to His beloved and promising an outcome that sounded delightful but was never intended. "You will not surely die. For God knows when you eat from it your eyes will be open and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."
I wonder about the thought process of the woman in that moment. "You mean there is something missing? I am incomplete? I am not whole? My Father has withheld from me something good and necessary? I thought he loved me. I thought he had given me all. Behold the fruit. It is beautiful. It will satisfy my hunger. And most importantly, it will give me what my Creator withheld. I must take action to complete the creation of me and become greater than I am, even equal with my Father. I will take matters into my own hands. I will eat.
And thus the first religious meal took place. A deliberate partaking of something for the sole purpose of elevating oneself and becoming like God. In that moment the Daughter of Creation converted to the way of the evangelist.
Enter the man. The message of the evangelist became the message of the woman to her companion. The food of conversion passed from her hand to his. He ate. And the second conversion away from perfection into religion doubled the "church," and captured the entire human race for all of the ages to come. Over time the new narrative would twist and turn and morph into tales of other gods and goddesses and incorporate grotesque liturgies, sacrifices, offerings, and murderous missions to win their approval.
The Creator, betrayed and broken hearted over the dreadful new condition of his beloved set in motion a mission to free them from their self-imposed captivitiy, return them to the dance of the Divine, and restore them to the state of perfection in which they were created before religion raped their souls. When you read the Bible, you are reading the story of this rescue mission.
There are some who believe that if, while driving or walking, a black cat crosses your path, you will have bad luck. There are some who believe that breaking a mirror, walking under a ladder, or waking up on Friday the 13th brings misfortune. There are individuals who believe that leaving the house and being in public is dangerous. Some are certain that being in a high place will lead to disaster.
These are people who endure each day in bondage. They are superstitious. They are phobic. They are controlled by beliefs that have been instilled in them by others, or by past random experiences. Their lives are shaped by fear of something that is unlikely to ever happen.
The Christian religion seeks to help by preaching to them that if God is for them, no one or no thing can stand against them. No weapon formed against them can prosper. Those whom the Son sets free are free indeed. Fear and worry is not only unnecessary, it signals a lack of faith and some even call it a sin.
Old superstitions are dispelled. But then, new ones are formed in them by none other than their fellow Christians.
There are those who will, at any cost, make sure that they never personally encounter the numerical sequence of 666. I recently engaged in a conversation on Facebook with an elderly lady (and graduate of Rhema Bible Training Center) who was absolutely terrified of an insurance bill she received in the amount of $666.00. Can you see the bondage in this post?
WOW !!! EVER GET UR INSURANCE BILL 4-- $666 --I COULDNT BREATH --I CALLED THEM TO SEND ME A NEW BILL EXPLAINING WHY --THEY REFUSED -- I SENT THEM A CHECK 4 --$670 N TOLD THEM TO KEEP THE EXTRA COZ I REFUSE TO TAKE IT BACK
Here are some of the stories that followed in the comments from other Christians who applauded her for doing "what the Bible says."
"I am careful around cars with 666 on the license plate so I know what you mean" ~Stephanie
"One day I placed an order at subway and it cost $6.66 and I made them change the order from small drink to large one." ~Ella
"When I got a new cell phone number it was going to end with 666, I refused and they just changed it for (sic), no problems." ~Sheila
These poor ladies have all been placed under "Christian" bondage by misguided, fanatical, end-times doomsayers. And they are quite certain that their beliefs are Biblical.
Another common form of "Christian" bondage involves money.
Some believe that failure to give 10% of their income to the church will release "the devourer" who will cause all kinds of bad things to happen to their finances, their possessions, and their health.
Then there are others who believe that their donations will protect them from all misfortune and unleash blessings of gold and silver upon their lives.
One of the most disgusting moments I ever experienced as a pastor occurred one evening while answering phones during the fund-raising week at a local Christian television station. I knew better. I really wanted nothing to do with it. But one of the ladies in our new church plant was the prayer/phone bank coordinator for the station. She loved to whine, cry, metaphorically stomp her feet, and stir up trouble when she didn't get her way. Because I was a weak leader at the time, I agreed to answer phones just to avoid her drama.
I sat listening to the rantings and manipulations of one of the most despicable televangelists I had ever encountered. The phones began to ring after he announced the secret "Biblical" formula for the amount that needed to be pledged to unleash the blessings.
I took call after call. I started feeling sick. I began to hate myself.
Finally, a little old lady phoned in. She was crying. And she said something like this. "Sir, I just don't have the amount the preacher is telling me to give. I can give $x.xx. But that's honestly all I have. If I just give that amount, will God take away my blessings?"
At that moment I breached all telethon protocol. I told the lady that God loved her. That she was precious to Him. That He did not need her money. I told her to keep it and sleep well, in peace. And then I prayed with her over the phone that she would be released from the bondage of guilt and the power of false teaching. I hung up with her. I didn't take another call. I left the television station. And I vowed to never again participate in the process of converting people to "Christian" superstition.
The self-important part of my psyche imagines that you, my faithful readers, have been wondering where I've been. The realist in me realizes that when you see this post in your feed your response will be something like, "Oh yeah, him."
Nevertheless I wanted to write a brief post to greet you and tell you about the last few weeks.
A week or so before Thanksgiving I began to seriously consider and outline a path forward in my life toward the work that I believe I am meant to do. Writing, speaking, teaching, and coaching are to be the central elements of my life and work in the days and years ahead. In addition to the novel I am currently working on, my plan for 2012 involves the writing and publishing of twelve short Kindle books.
While visiting my parent's home for Thanksgiving, inspiration for the first of these Kindle books dropped into my heart and mind with such urgency that I had to drop everything, begin immediately, and push through to completion. This weekend my second book, and the first of this 2012 series of Kindle books was published and is available for purchase here.
So, what does this new path forward mean for this blog? Non-religious spirituality is certainly one facet of the writing, speaking, teaching, and coaching that I plan to give myself to. So, I will continue writing about this subject. For a while, my writing will continue to appear here. But in the weeks ahead I will be launching a new website and eventually my writing about spiritual matters will migrate there. I'll continue to post here through a period of transition. But over time I hope the readers of this blog will migrate to the new one and remain part of my tribe.
Thanks so much to all of you who have enjoyed and contributed to this on-line conversation this year. I look forward to many more years ahead getting to know you, hearing your stories, and journeying alongside of you.
It's a quiet morning filled with sound. The soothing melodies of Kazuhiko Ikegami's Mau, compliments of Dish Network's Aura station, are drifting through the house. The door to the back porch is open as it's an unseasonably warm autumn day. The trees of the backyard and the woods behind my home have been turned into nature's woodwind section as a strong wind brings their voices to life. Yet, there is a spiritual silence in the sounds around me at the moment.
Most of the leaves are gone from the trees now. Yet smatterings of burnt amber, and yellow, and fading green, still adorn the woods. It's a mostly clear day with the sun beaming through the woodwind section. Big puffy white clouds are racing across the sky, faster than usual.
The taste and aroma of scrambled eggs, toast, orange juice, and coffee still lingers. Mysteriously I found satisfaction in working to prepare my breakfast this morning as opposed to simply pouring a bowl of cereal. I drew energy and focus from dicing the onions and green peppers, stirring the ingredients together, folding and chopping as the concoction transformed from liquid to solid. It was as if I was participating in the creation of my own sustenance. And I found myself wishing that I was busy preparing breakfast for a house full of friends.
I feel the warmth of the sun on my face and hands as I type, interrupted...no that's the wrong word...accompanied by the occasional errant, cool gust that manages to find it's way through the screen door. My dog lies sleeping under the table, his fur between my toes as I massage his lazy self with my feet.
As I sat here moments ago experiencing and thinking about all I described I was reminded of one of my chief complaints about God and the spiritual life. I've often said to others, in frustration, that I don't understand why God would create us as seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling, feeling beings and then invite us into an intimate relationship with his invisible, audibly silent, non-physical self. Every other relationship we have, on a human level, is experienced through our five physical senses. Yet this, the highest and most important of all relationships we will ever have, cannot be experienced through those five basic senses. I want to see God with my eyes, hear him with my ears, inhale the aroma of his being, touch him with my hands, and taste his holy kiss. Yet none of this is possible, in this life anyway.
Or is it?
As I watched the clouds race from southwest to northeast above me, a thought came. There are more than five senses. We are born into this world with not one, but two sets. One set, the physical set, was given by God to experience the natural world in which we live. The other, the spiritual set, was given to experience the supernatural world to which we belong. And if we pay close attention, the physical senses are a gateway to the spiritual senses.
What has happened to me, and what I think tends to happen to all of us, is that as children both sets of senses are strong and acutely active. Have you ever noticed the wonder and amazement in a young child's eyes as he observes the world around him and seems to effortless intertwine what he sees and hears and feels in this world with an unseen reality known only to him? The realm of magic, fantasy, and the supernatural are primarily the child's realm, because that is where such unseen reality remains welcomed. Over time the spiritual senses are subtly set aside in favor of that which is more rational. With the passing of years they atrophy, wither, and all but die, leaving us with only the ability to see, hear, feel, taste, and touch and the inability pass beyond that veil.
Have you, as an adult, been able to revive your spiritual set of senses? What are those senses? How do you experience God through them? Tell me your story in the comment section.
“Let the children come to me. Don’t stop them! For the Kingdom of God belongs to those who are like these children." ~Mark 10:14
"But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. And you will be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere—in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” ~Acts 1:8
I had lunch today with a pastor whom I've somewhat gotten to know over the past year and a half. We ate Chinese. It was a buffet. And I ate too much. But the tapioca pudding for desert was really good. It was nice and cold. Usually the tapioca pudding at Chinese buffets is more room temperature, which just won't do for me. I've often wondered why I frequently find tapioca pudding for desert at Chinese buffets. Is tapioca pudding Chinese?
That's not the point of this post.
We've met a few times since I moved to this area in the spring of 2010. He's had a casual interest in my journey. I'm not sure why. But I do appreciate that he wants to get to know me. And I do tend to always walk away from our conversations with at least one thing he's shared that I've never thought of or seen before.
Today, over piles of rice and General Tso's Chicken, he shared how he's teaching through the book of John in his Sunday morning messages. He shared various insights from his study that make for an interesting sermon. The underlying theme of his series of messages is "being the dwelling place of God." I pressed him. I wasn't satisfied with his sermonic nuances, his mystical and symbolic observations from the book of John, as clever and insightful as they were. I said to him, "Okay John, that all makes for a very interesting sermon. But as someone sitting here in this little Chinese restaurant today trying to make sense of the the way of Jesus in the stuff of life, what does it really mean to 'be the dwelling place of God?' I get the concept. I understand the theology. I've preached it myself. But I don't care much about concepts and theologies anymore. I want to know on a heart level, in my psyche, in the living out of my life, what does it mean?"
Somehow the conversation took us to the the first chapter of Acts, wherein Jesus said to his disciples that when the Holy Spirit came upon them, they would be his witnesses. Orthodox Christian teaching holds that the Holy Spirit takes up residence, or indwells, the follower of Christ. So, we become the dwelling place of God's Spirit. And what this means is, that we become his witnesses.
During much of my time in the Christian religion this verse was used to rally the troops to proselytize their friends, their family members, their coworkers, their classmates, their neighbors, and even strangers. This was our job. It was our duty. Jesus said so. Right? And if you aren't "witnessing" and winning souls to Christ, well, you are being derelict in your duties and you will be ashamed when you get to Heaven. You won't have as many "stars in your crown." Or maybe you won't even have a "crown" to throw at Jesus feet. Won't you feel stupid?
There are two facets to being a witness. Consider the following three definitions of the word from Dictionary.com:
1. to see, hear, or know by personal presence or perception.
2. to be present at an occurrence as a formal witness, spectator, bystander, etc.
3. to bear witness to, testify to, give evidence of
The first facet is for our benefit. We see. We hear. We know.
The second facet is for the benefit of others. We tell about what we have seen, heard, and know.
We cannot witness about something until we have first witnessed it ourselves.
The point my pastor friend was trying to make was that in Acts 1 Jesus is not giving us an order or a job description, or a task through which to earn points and advance to the bonus round. It is an invitation to observation. In other words, when the Holy Spirit comes upon us and we become the dwelling place of God, we will then be able to witness (see, hear, know) what God is up to. What he is doing in our own hearts, in our own emotions, in our own minds, in our own dysfunctions and brokenness.
Then, and ONLY then, will we have anything worth talking about to others. Religion has turned "being a witness" into a scripted conversation about Heaven and Hell and a "sinners prayer" that can be reduced to the pages of a mass produced and circulated Chick Tract.
We are trained well and sent out quickly to tell everyone we know about the horrors that await them after death.
I wonder if we should spend more time quietly witnessing (observing) what God is doing in our own being, our own existence, and the world around us.
Perhaps then we will become more adept at inviting others into the life that is possible, that we ourselves know from experience, as the dwelling place of God, instead of trying to frighten them about death and the ways we believe God will torture them in Hell.
The first chapter is almost done. By tomorrow evening all of the main characters of Underground; The Novel will be formed, with life breathed into them, and the story will begin to unfold. I've always been intimidated by the the idea of writing fiction, but I'm actually finding it easier and more exciting than I ever dreamed it would be. I can't wait to give you glimpses into this story as it unfolds.
Moments ago, at a Barnes & Noble in Bolingbrook, Illinois, I launched the Kickstarter project for the book. I want to invite you to visit the project page and take a look around. If you've resonated with the theme of this blog, I think you will love the story and want to follow along. Even if you're a devoted adherent to the Christian religion and have not resonated with the things written here over the months, I believe you too will identify deeply with the characters, their struggles, and story they find themselves in.
Thanks so much for taking a moment to visit the page. And I sincerely hope you'll consider giving me a kick! :-)