How to Look Good Naked

While many self-loathing people might sign up for a reality show that promises makeover, I would be surprised to find people lined up for a self-acceptance experience that involves exposing your flaws and vulnerabilities to the world with no promise of ridding you of them. I wouldn’t do it. So I was pretty shocked by the audacity of this show “How to Look Good Naked” hosted by Carson Kressley. He basically takes women who hate their body and tries to convince them they’re beautiful—by having them get naked and unashamed.

I don’t like to be naked in public.

I guess that’s normal. I have a recurring dream about being naked on an elevated toilet in the middle of the mall food court. And there’s the one where I realize I’m naked in the middle of teaching a class. Vulnerability scares me. Even more than being physically exposed, I think I fear others seeing inside. I can turn deep shades of red just thinking about things I’ve said that may have exposed parts I try to keep hidden. I even go through and delete blog posts periodically when I’m feeling especially vulnerable and fear I may have taken too many layers off in something I’ve written. I’m very careful about what I let you see.

My friend recently said to me, “Let people feel the full weight of who you are,” and I can’t get over it. When I think about it, I’m filled with a million reasons why I should cover up instead—a million reasons why I shouldn’t let you see me naked. It makes me think about our fall and restoration. If, in the garden they were naked and unashamed, then does redemption involve ridding us of this shame that tells us to cover up the full weight of who we are? To stand naked and unashamed, I would have to have full confidence that what was exposed was acceptable—that I’m loved in spite of my damage from the fall. Is that the makeover God has in mind? Is that redemption?

As I was watching Carson gently convince women to take their clothes off, look in the mirror, and be photographed naked, my discomfort was growing. He told them they were beautiful and brought evidence to persuade them they were acceptable, until finally they seemed to trust him enough to take a risk and expose themselves. It reminded me of how I need to hear from God over and over that I am beautiful and acceptable—until finally I’ll risk exposure to let others experience the full weight of who I am. It seems to me that unconditional acceptance is the only thing that can convince us to take off the layers of striving and careful covering—it is the only thing that heals the wounds of shame.

Of course, I’m not suggesting we all become nudist—literally or figuratively. In fact, if the host were a straight man, I don’t think he could pull it off. I, for one, would assume ulterior motives. And the truth is, it’s not always safe to walk around naked in our fallen state. But if we never stand bare before God or others, we can never be fully known, and can never experience the balm of acceptance—we can never look good naked. We have to get naked to look good naked. And that is where redemption takes place.

“Face the facts of being what you are, for that is what changes what you are.” Soren Kierkegaard

Moral Checklists and Christ-less Christianity

You ever have those weeks when your worth and value as a human takes a serious blow? When your personhood is repeatedly called into question based on many legitimate grounds? I just had that week.

It’s like I’ve been keeping score to make sure I still have some hope of making it here among the human race. At times, it is doubtful. I’m failing my Statistics class, I procrastinated too long on getting some things turned in for my grad school program, and I suck at softball. Based on these criteria, some have let me know that I might get voted off the island very soon. On the other hand, I filed my taxes before the deadline, my bills are paid, and my room is clean. But then there’s the fact that I’ve been late a lot lately and most of my jeans don’t fit me anymore. Fail.

I think many of us have a running tally like this to determine our success or failure as a human being—or as a Christian. Others keep a tally of us too, and sometimes we use their tally to determine our worth. Maybe it’s been getting to me this week because, like I mentioned in my last blog, I’ve forgotten who I am and what I’m about.

When I forget, I start judging my life based on all these bogus criteria – what have I accomplished? How have I failed? Am I beautiful enough? Am I responsible enough? Am I smart enough? Am I giving of myself on behalf of others enough? I start trying to live the Christian life according to a checklist of moral achievements and admirable qualities. Sadly, that’s what Christianity is for many of us. We’ve gotten good at living the Christian life without Christ.

So I guess part of remembering includes remembering what it really means to be a Christian—to rest in Christ and believe in his radical acceptance—or what’s known as grace. To surrender the checklist in order to receive that grace. To let go of who I’m trying to be so he can show me again who I am. And somehow in that surrender, my memory gets less and less distorted. I remember. And so I’m transformed.

But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away… And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. 2 Corinthians 3:16, 18

Judging Judgers

If there’s one type of person I can’t stand, it’s people who judge other people. No, that irony is not lost on me.

Over the past month, I have had strong reactions to people who have criticized, mocked, or put others down. I’ve been angry about their lack of grace, and yet I couldn’t bring myself to show them grace. As I’ve been thinking about my unwillingness to love at all times (even when people are stupid), I wonder how circular this all is. I wonder if our judgment of others doesn’t come out of our own fear of being judged. Our inability to love comes out of our fear of not being loved. Our lack of grace toward others comes from our inability to receive grace for ourselves.

I admit that my judgment of others comes out most when I am terrified of being judged— when I’m insecure and feeling like I’m not enough, I’m not lovable. But if I can accept myself as a human who does and says stupid things sometimes (often) and is still loved, then I can show grace to those who, like me, are insecure, judgmental, and self-focused at times.

I think our deepest longing is to be loved in spite of how unlovable we are, and our deepest fear is that all that is unlovable in us will be exposed. Ironically, the more fearful we are, the more the unlovable is exposed.

I trace most things back to fear. Fear is a saboteur targeting our relationships and our personal freedom. It manifests itself as control, insecurity, pride, arrogance, suspicion, and judgment. We are all touched by fear. It is part of the human condition and it can only be healed by the assurance that we are lavishly loved, even when we aren’t easy to love—when we act foolishly and don’t deserve it. Perfect love drives away fear.

Fear is the enemy but we treat one another as the enemy. We treat God as the enemy. I think we have such a hard time surrendering to God’s love because we have a hard time letting go of our fear. It is our old friend. We cling to it rather than clinging to each other, to God, to Truth. And so, we resist grace and love. And we make a mess of our lives and relationships. So tragic.

So, I’m learning to pay attention to my own judgment instead of getting angry at others for theirs. It is the warning on my dash telling me that fear is taking over. It tells me that I need to surrender to God’s love so that I can be healed and show others grace. Perfect love drives away fear.

smokers and frauds

I often feel like a fraud. I think it comes from being human. And redeemed. Being both is tricky. It would be much less ambiguous if I was completely perfect or completely screwed up. But as it is, I am neither. Or both, really.

So sometimes, this feeling of being a fraud is valid. Sometimes I am a fraud. I pretend not to be human. Or not to be redeemed.

When I pretend not to be human, I talk about God and myself in a way that impresses church-people. I’m kind of good at it. Actually I’m really good at it. I know the right phrases, what to emphasize, what to leave out—-how to gloss over my humanity while accentuating my perfection. I’ve been trained well in the art of manipulating Christians to get applause and pats on the back. I’ve been doing it my whole life. You might even say I’m addicted to it. I’m addicted to the admiration of Christians.

As a human, I like to smoke. But I’m not a smoker. I learned long ago that smoking would not fit with my strategy of winning the approval of church-people. And since I don’t need competing addictions, I haven’t taken up smoking. Yet, the other day, I smoked a cigarette with a friend—-in front of Christians. Because of my addiction to approval, I agonized over it for a while (although, I have to admit I enjoyed the seeming scandal of it a bit too). Yet it was a step toward freedom.

Freedom looks different for different people. I’m realizing that as my sense of self and worth comes only from being accepted as a child of God, I become more free in my choices because they are based less and less on addiction to anyone else’s opinion and more on a desire to love as Christ loves-–not that our motives can ever be completely pure. So, in pursuing Christ-likeness, making my friend feel welcome and received and helping her to open up by smoking with her was a way of accomplishing that. The sin would have been giving in to my concern over the censure of other Christians.

I was well aware that my choice would not meet the approval of some, yet, I was quite certain that by sharing that moment with her, I was showing grace and hospitality. I am reassured by remembering that Christ himself scandalized the religious of his day by doing things they would have found morally compromising in order to extend grace and love (breaking the Sabbath, partying with sinners).

I've had to change my understanding of the word hypocrite. Instead of conjuring images of those who claim to be Christians, but who smoke, drink, or swear, as I grew up thinking, I now think about those of us who do not give permission for Christians to express their humanity in front of us. I am a hypocrite when I pretend not to be human at all. Then I am the fraud.

I remember when I started going to this church in Portland several years ago, Imago Dei, I thought I might have to take up smoking to get in with the Pastor. He was always hanging out with the smokers on the front steps just before the service—-probably trying to evangelize I thought. Because Christians don’t smoke.

But it was there where I first encountered people who were embracing both their humanity and their redemption. It was there where I first felt that it was safe to be a sinner, and therefore it was safe to admit my need, and therefore it was where I first truly understood the gospel of redemption. I didn’t fit in as a fraud there. There, my addiction was revealed.

So, now, I don’t want to be a fraud. I don’t want to attract frauds. I want to draw those who are open about their humanity by being open about mine. That doesn’t always mean smoking, but it does mean letting go of my need to have the admiration and approval of others—-especially those in the church. If I can be human in front of Christians and redeemed in front of non-Christians, if I can be both in front of anyone, without my addiction to approval, then maybe you won’t want to be a fraud around me, maybe I can be that safe place—where you can be human and where the gospel of redemption can unfold in your life.

How Long Will You Wait?

If happiness results when life is going our way, then I think abundant life results when life does not go according to our plan. If we receive it. Christ came to give abundant life, and it is better than mere happiness. It is our inheritance.

I’ve been reading through the book of Joshua with my life transformation group. It’s a book about dividing land—the Israelites taking their promised inheritance, being restored after their enslavement and desert wandering. And I have to admit that in parts (long parts) it’s like reading a rich man’s will. Kind of boring. But I came to something in chapter 18 that I’ve been reflecting on. It says, “…there were still seven Israelite tribes who had not yet received their inheritance. So Joshua said to the Israelites: ‘How long will you wait before you begin to take possession of the land that the LORD, the God of your fathers, has given you?’”

Why were they waiting? God had already given it to them. It seems there were pockets of resistance in the land, keeping them from claiming what was theirs. They would have to drive them out, and that would require intense battles and reliance on the Lord for victory. They had already been fighting for some time. Perhaps they were fearful. Perhaps they decided they were comfortable where they were and would just content themselves with what they had—it was good enough.

I’m thinking of our inheritance as children of God, abundant life. I believe abundant life includes love, grace, rest, freedom, and restoration. This is our inheritance. Our promise. More than being a person of happiness, I want to be a person of grace, a person who loves freely and is at rest in my soul no matter what the circumstances. A person who accepts others without judgment, who embraces brokenness and gives out of the overflow of love and grace given to me. I believe this is true beauty, true strength, and it is the gift God wants to give his children. It is our inheritance. Abundant life.

But recently I hit a pocket of resistance. It’s funny how you can think you’re experiencing rest when really it’s just that everything is going your way. But when it doesn’t, that’s when we have to claim our inheritance. Often I choose to let the resistance have possession of the land –fretting, self-pity, complaining thrive while I live in fear. I settle for good enough because I don’t want to join the fray. But if you look ahead to the book of Judges, it is clear that letting them stay in the land leads to idolatry, addiction.

Problem is, we may even like and enjoy what is in the land. We may be sad to see them go. I read recently that Augustine once said that God is always trying to give good things to us, but our hands are too full to receive them. I have said before that rest is a thief because we can’t hold it and keep hold of our other treasures—unforgiveness, discontentment, greed, pride, etc. We have to surrender the things we’re clinging to in order to receive our true inheritance. Abundant life.

What battle has to be fought in order to take hold of the inheritance? What has to be driven out in order to receive? What has to be surrendered in order to hold abundant life? I’m asking God to search my own heart now. The battle belongs to the Lord.



“Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go.” Joshua 1:9

Becoming Human

Before I joined the human race,
before pain and failure were embraced,
with a heart too flimsy to feel for you
and an image too pure to let you pollute,
as the riddled chaos of this life arrived,
I swept it under rugs of pride—
under doors and in your eyes—
wherever I could find disguise,
just to subsist in blameless bliss,
outside this story’s erratic twists.

Please don’t bleed on my white dress.
Don’t ask me to carry all your mess.
You can take my neat phrases
and try to cover your broken places.
But I can’t afford to suffer with you,
unless you pay me what is due,
because my heart is full of me
wanting you to meet my need.

But as I begin to participate,
I face my pain to taste His Grace,
giving freedom for the task
of holding your hurt and loving your mess
without fear of running dry,
even if our plans should run awry.
Because there’s enough to give away,
in grief or joy or come what may,
since Love came to dwell in this tainted place—
here, among the human race.

Self-Hatred and Sameness

Most of us wouldn’t say we hate ourselves. But, if we’re being honest, we might agree that there are things about ourselves that we hate. There are things about me that I hate. Not just frizzy hair kinds-of-things, but character defects that are deep-seated. But I haven’t really seen my self-hatred as a problem. I figured, there are a lot of things about me that are worthy of hatred—I don’t really hate me, I hate those things about me. But it’s ok because everyone else hates them too—even God. So I can keep on hating them.

But today, as I was reading Brennan Manning’s book Abba’s Child, the thought occurred to me that if I hate something in me, I will hate it in you. And if I truly want to be a person of grace and mercy and hospitality, there is no room for self-hatred. If I hate me, I hate you. If I judge myself, I judge you. If I condemn myself, I condemn you. If I expect perfection in me, I expect it in you. We are the same.

It made me think about how I have always been uncomfortable when people judge and condemn my ex-husband for his affair. Get angry at the tragedy of it, the injury, the injustice – yes – but condemn him, and I’m not with you. An old friend of ours recently messaged me on facebook about it, perhaps trying to commiserate, but it came across more as accusing and censuring my ex. His attitude bothered me. I didn’t know why at first, but now I realize it is because I know we are the same. My ex-husband was the scapegoat, his fault more visible, but we are the same. I am no better. There is something wrong with all of us deep down. We’re the same. When they condemn him, they condemn me. I am a liar. I am a cheater. I am passive. I am weak-willed. I am an idolater. I am unfaithful. Like him. Like you.

When we don’t accept these things in ourselves, we deny them, enabling us to see ourselves as different, as better—allowing us to judge and condemn others and claim superiority. And it all comes back to self-hatred. If we can accept ourselves fully as God in fact does, our whole self including all the things that are unlovely and worthy of hate, then we can accept others because we see that they are like us. If we can extend ourselves grace and mercy, then we can extend it to others.

So really, my show of condemnation toward others is a show of self-hatred. And all my self-hatred is a condemnation of others. It is the same because we are the same. Henri Nouwen says, “It is not proving ourselves to be better than others but confessing to be just like others that is the way to healing and reconciliation.” Until we recognize our sameness, we will not be people of grace. And ultimately, grace is what transforms us.

True Hospitality

I started today knowing I would have to battle perfectionism.

See, I had a dinner party for 15 neighbors and friends at my apartment tonight—to be in community and connect. Perfectionism tells me that hospitality means making everything Martha-Stewart-perfect. But when I go that route I get all psycho and bitchy about everything being just right—to the point where I forget to love people. I make it more about stuff than people. But lately, I’ve got this new idea about hospitality. And it has nothing to do with place-settings or cakes or centerpieces.

The hospitality industry is marketed on perfectionism. Perfectionism really is just a cover up, a sham. But true hospitality is openness. Hospitality is a way of living where I share openly my true self, my mistakes, my joys, my sorrows—not in a needy way, but in a way that invites people into who I am really, that invites people to share who they are. Hospitality is a show of grace not perfection. I show grace to myself (especially if things don’t go according to plan) and thus I show that grace is available from me to others.

This morning I decided I want to be a person of grace not perfection. I want to be a person of invitation not expectation. So, I started with me—I decided to show myself grace and lower my expectations, to invite myself to enjoy and love others and not worry so much about everything coming together just right. And I did. I loved, I laughed, I ate, I drank. And someone had to sit on a laundry basket because I didn’t have enough chairs. And the cake stuck to the pan. And the food wasn’t ready when everyone arrived. And all the plates didn't match. And I ran out of salad dressing. And it was all perfect.

book review: the prodigal god

Sometimes, I need to get the gospel flowing through me again. Tim Keller describes a person who is so struck with a fresh apprehension of the gospel that they feel as if they have been “re-converted.” This was my experience when I read Searching for God Knows What by Don Miller two years ago. And a couple of weeks ago, as I read Keller’s The Prodigal God, the same beautiful message accosted me. Like an addict, I so easily return to my elder-son tendencies (Luke 15:11-32)—I am drawn toward religion— to do everything right, but without living in relationship with the Father, without receiving the love and grace He freely offers. Or I live with the condemnation and shame of my younger-son rebellion. I need the gospel.

“…even after you are converted by the gospel your heart will go back to operating on other principles unless you deliberately, repeatedly set it to gospel-mode.”

As Keller fleshed out the lostness of both the younger son and the elder son in the parable, and revealed the recklessly extravagant love of the father, it shook me with life-changing truth, but more than that, with heart-changing grace of the gospel message. He shows how both of the sons are wrong, and both are loved and invited into relationship.

The picture of the father running to meet his younger son—not waiting for his speech of contrition, or for him to pay the due consequences, not expecting him to earn his way back into the family, but restoring him, and lavishing him with love, grace, and acceptance freely—is one that always astounds me.

“It’s not the repentance that causes the father’s love, but rather the reverse. The father’s lavish affection makes the son’s expression of remorse far easier.”

But Keller doesn’t stop with the younger son. He goes on to look at the plight of the elder son and the costliness of the father’s lavishness. Like the elder son, I am often motivated by fear-based moralism rather than out of assurance of the Father’s love. I fall for an easier pseudo-gospel message which, upon closer scrutiny, reveals that much of what we do for God we are really doing for ourselves—because it is to our own advantage (The Principle of the Path… hmm?). But when we understand our need and the price Christ has paid to pursue and rescue us, our self-righteous incentive is transformed into grateful love.

“How can the inner workings of the heart be changed from a dynamic of fear and anger to that of love, joy, and gratitude? Here is how. You need to be moved by the sight of what it cost to bring you home.”

Keller packs a very short book (only 134 pages) full of gospel truth and grace. The gospel is a sweet fragrance that can permeate the rotten stench of religion and rebellion. We all need to be infused with the true gospel of grace so that it overflows from our lives onto others. The Prodigal God can get you reset to gospel-mode. I hope you read it.

Who We Are For Now

In our overlapping lives
We loved each other badly
As our fears fed on fears
And yet we healed
And understood
As best we could
Broken and wounded
As we are

Each one we’ve met
As we breathe we affect
We love and bless
And hurt and mess
And break
And disappoint
Broken and wounded
As we are

You’re invited to this place
To join the human race
To suffer and fail
And come off the hill
Where you’re looking down blindly
At us loving badly
Broken and wounded
As you are

Forgive me
I have loved you badly
Forgive me
I will love you badly
Not an excuse
Just the truth
Broken and wounded
As I am

Unguarded Love

Being loved improves my sense of humor, among other things. I’ve been waking up every morning and thinking about how I am loved by God. It’s like being free. I love life again. I love people. I love without fear. I lost the plot there for a while, but now I am loved.

Yet, I wonder how long it will last. Not that God’s love runs out, but I know that I will leave. I will be seduced by lies and forget that I am loved. I always leave. Like a spouse with Alzheimer’s, I will forget who I am and will treat the Lover of my soul suspiciously, as if He’s my enemy. It will take time for Him to pursue me and convince me once again that He is on my side, but He will. Again and again. In spite of my hostility, my rejection, my foolishness. He loves me.

I’m realizing another reason I have a hard time understanding God’s love for me. When it comes to love, we have to—we’re told to—do something that God himself doesn’t do. We guard our hearts. The more you expose yourself to people by loving, the more you expose yourself to pain. They go hand-in-hand. God doesn’t guard His heart from pain. He endures pain because He loves us. He endures our leaving, our forgetting.

Among us, love and grace extends only so far and then we begin to want a return, a payment; we begin to protect ourselves from hurt, pain, and damage to our heart that comes when we love. We begin making demands. We withhold love. We limit what we give away. Or we leave.

I’ve had a lot of discussions during the last couple of years about when divorce is ever justified—in cases of adultery, abuse, abandonment? Self-protection always comes into play. But I’m struck by the truth that God never divorces, no matter how justified. He never leaves; He never requires anything in return because self-protection is never a thought for Him.

God risks hurt, pain, and inevitable damage to his heart. He continues extending love and grace even when there are no returns, even when we reject Him and use Him. He pays the price Himself; He meets the demands of love Himself. He doesn’t guard His heart, but takes all of it on Himself because He never stops loving.

Our love, our grace, our forgiveness can’t look like God’s perfect love—it’s impossible. We can’t bear the pain, we can’t handle the betrayal. We can share in his suffering by loving, but at some point as we love, self-protection kicks in. Then we walk away or demand payment. God, at that point, pursues and pays. We give ultimatums. He lets us go and woos us back with love and grace. He endures the pain of our leaving because He loves us.

Still, I think the more we are filled with His love, the greater our capacity to accept the consequences of loving others because He takes some of the hits for us. Our returns on love come from Him, so we don’t have to demand them from others. Our hearts are guarded by His love so we are free to love. His love is a protection that enlarges our capacity to love instead of limiting it. I’m going to enjoy it while I can.

I'm in Love

I’m going to go ahead and say this at the risk of sounding cliché ... love changes everything. I forgot about love. I was reading recently Henri Nouwen’s book Here and Now: Living in the Spirit, and his descriptions of joy and experiencing eternal life now thoroughly convinced me that I didn’t know what he was talking about. Joy has eluded me for some time, and even the happiest times have been tinged with sorrow. I’ve become so taken with the idea that this world is broken and incomplete and that all our hope lies in life with Christ after this life, that I’ve forgotten that we can have a taste of that here and now. I forgot about love.

It’s been a long time since I’ve been loved well. And those who loved me well are the same ones who wounded me most. I’m not unique in this. I’ve wounded those I love. Our love is a poor reflection. It’s only in part, only a taste of perfect love. And at other times, it leaves an altogether bad taste. But we begin to think that that is what love is. The poor reflection becomes the reality and prevents us from accepting perfect love because we are accustomed to striving and qualifying and compensating and wounding.

Yet His perfect love covers all our wounds. “When perfection comes, the imperfect disappears.” (1 Cor 13:10)

The assurance of perfect love is a beautiful and powerful thing. It allows us to let go of all the other things we’re laboring for and rest in God’s embrace. It allows us to have joy in the midst of difficulty. It gives meaning to our work and all we do. And the opposite is also true, without the assurance of God’s love, everything we work toward is a futile effort to prove our worth or fulfill our obligations or just to survive. None of it matters without love. Love changes everything.

I have always thought of the passage in 1 Corinthians 13:1-8 as referring to my love for others. But for the first time today I read it differently. I used to read, “If I have eloquent words, prophetic gifts, superior knowledge, boundless faith, if I give all I possess to the poor, or sacrifice myself… but don’t do it out of my love for others, it means nothing.” But today I read, “If I have eloquent words, prophetic gifts, superior knowledge, boundless faith, if I give all I possess to the poor, or sacrifice myself … but don’t have assurance of God’s love, it means nothing.” I guess they are very similar ideas, but the difference is in my inability to love well. I can’t work up love for others. Only through the assurance of God’s love do my motives change. Only then am I able to do anything in love.

“If I have not love”—if I don’t have God’s love, if I’m not convinced and assured of His love for me, none of my ministry, or sacrifice, or insight, or success, or faith means a thing. Love changes everything. Today, I woke up loved. What a difference it has made.

Offerings

You know, we choose most things in life based on what it can offer us. A car, a job, a home, a city, a college, a spouse, a church, a friend. In the same way, we are chosen based on what we have to offer—as a spouse, as an employee, as a friend, as a leader. So, we begin to think that this is where our value lies, in what we have to offer. In beauty, in wisdom, in wit, in skill, in knowledge, in charm, in character. And we go about trying to prove what we have to offer, to prove our value.

And, of course, we want to keep concealed those things that we consider shameful—the things that we fear might reduce our value, the things that might give us away by revealing we’re not worth as much as we first appeared to be because we offer ugliness with our beauty, brokenness with our charm; the package of who we are includes what is wounded, scarred, insecure, and selfish. These things reduce our likelihood of being chosen. They reduce our worth.

This is how we are programmed to think of value and worth. It’s as if everyone has a price on their head. Maybe this is why it is so difficult to accept a love that isn’t based on what we have to offer.

I want to prove to God what I have to offer—my moral record, my faith, my ministry efforts, my spiritual maturity, my insight, my good choices, my penitence, even my suffering on his behalf. It all becomes part of my attempt to prove my worth. It also becomes part of my self-salvation project, as Tim Keller calls it. It is an affront to the cross and is anti-gospel. I can’t accept God’s love because I want to be my own savior, to be enough on my own. Yet I never will be. It takes accepting this to receive God’s love.

I was reminded today of Brennan Manning’s words that I read back in April, but they have taken this long to sink in. He said, in essence, forgiveness doesn’t follow repentance, but repentance follows forgiveness. This is so essential to grasp. All my penitence, and faith, and character, and beauty comes as a response to God’s love and grace, as a result—not as a way to earn it or be worthy of it. God’s love and grace and acceptance and forgiveness is offered before I wallow in contrition or say the right words or fix myself up.

We so badly want to offer something. Yet Christ is the only reason we have anything to offer. As Eugene Peterson says from Ephesians 5, “Christ's love makes the church whole. His words evoke her beauty. Everything he does and says is designed to bring the best out of her, dressing her in dazzling white silk, radiant with holiness.” Christ’s love gives us our value and worth—it doesn’t require our value and worth. This means we can accept His love without concern for what we have to offer Him.

For most of us, we’re not used to being loved like this. We’re used to being loved for what we have to offer. Perhaps we’re even used to being cut off from love when it seems we have nothing to offer. Being loved by God requires reprogramming. We have to learn to be loved freely. Once we can accept that love, we can accept our true value, our true identity—an identity and value that comes from the assurance of His love. A value we don’t have to prove to anyone.

I think our reprogramming has to be constant because it’s so easy to go back to default mode. I wake up in default mode, and it’s not like I can press a few buttons and be assured once again that I am loved. It’s like having to do a total system restore—wiping clean what’s there and writing program all over again. I have to be convinced all over again of God’s love for me, not just to know it, but to taste it. Without that assurance, everything else is warped. Maybe Manning is right when he says, “There is only one thing God asks of us—that we be men and women of prayer, people who live close to God, people for whom God is everything and for whom God is enough.” I’m finding that without this, nothing else matters.

book review (sort of): the principle of the path

I don’t really think it’s fair to review a book that I didn’t finish, so I am only claiming to give my first impressions here. Before I had to return it, I read the first five or so chapters of Andy Stanley’s The Principle of the Path because it was recommended, but as I was reading so many red flags went up for me. It’s a teaching I’ve been running away from for several years after mistaking it as the central message of Christianity for too long. The main idea here is that your choices now affect the path of your life in the future. True. I agree with his basic premise, but I have a problem with it as the way of life—especially the Christian way of life.

Instead of embracing brokenness and depending on Christ for transformation, the message could be interpreted as make right decisions and you’ll get what you want in life. He goes as far as to say that if you have cancer, it is because of the bad choices you have made. There is some truth to this, but it seems to me to set us in a place of pride if life is going well for us—as if it’s all our doing—and a place of judgment toward those who are suffering. It could also bring self-condemnation for our own failures.

I agree that you reap what you sow—it’s a truth that shouldn’t be ignored. I really appreciated how he showed the correlation between our desires and our decisions. We often want one thing but don’t make decisions that will get us there, and then we’re shocked when things end badly. For example, wanting a spouse who loves God, yet dating any person who shows interest. Or wanting kids who follow Christ, but never teaching them the Word or modeling it for them. Wanting to be financially stable, but making decisions that take you deeper into debt. Then we blame God.

I have to go back to the problem of balance again. What Stanley wrote in this book is what I’ve been swinging away from because it led me to judgment and away from mercy. Maybe some need to swing toward it if it’s a principle they’ve not embraced—if they’ve been thinking of God as a sort of an escape hatch so we can do whatever we want and He’ll work things out for us. And if He doesn’t, it’s all His fault. That’s a problem.

Yet, if it’s all up to our good choices, we’re screwed. We’re lost. We’re like sheep. Sheep are stupid. We screw up. We make a mess of our lives and others’ lives. Thank God that He rescues. It’s not all up to us.

As silly as it sounds, I was really struck by this when I watched Confessions of a Shopaholic this weekend. It shows what a mess we can get into—ruining relationships, finances, career. Addictions are like this. Sin is like this. And sin is so deceptive, so enticing. We need a Savior. Is God the kind of Father that bails us out every time or the kind that tells us we made our own bed and have to lie in it? I think neither. Maybe he is like the father in this movie (not in every respect)—when she realizes the pit she’s in, he stands beside her in love, he sacrifices for her, he shows mercy and helps her face the consequences and make the hard decisions that get her out. Reminds me of our need for Christ in order to find freedom—he empowers, he transforms, we cooperate. Maybe the church should be more like her support group—they walk with her as she painfully trudges her way out of her mess. But often, we shoot the wounded.

We need to recognize our capacity to be both victim and villain. Only then can we both accept consequences and mercy. We can take responsibility for our choices and receive grace. In turn, we can extend the same to others. But this is another of those things that is so tricky to balance!

I am wary of teaching that points to our ability to choose well rather than pointing to the cross. To me, it smacks of humanistic moralism and is void of the Gospel. I fear this unbalanced teaching has flooded the church, leaving us dependent on ourselves for our own salvation and with excuses not to love others and show the kind of mercy Christ gives. Perhaps in later chapters, Stanley did indeed point to our need for Christ so I don’t want to disparage his teaching entirely. Yet, in the chapters I read, he several times knocked the concepts of repentance and forgiveness as bailouts. As bailouts, they should be condemned, but as part of our response in relationship with Christ, they should be upheld as part of the principle of the path—as they key to returning to the path. Can we return to the path any other way?

I think we need to take another look at our motivation for making good choices—is it promised success and good consequences alone? This should not be mistaken for Christianity. Paul David Tripp wrote, "There really is no place for Christ in many people’s Christianity. Their faith is not actually in Christ; it is in Christianity and their ability to live it out." If we’re not careful, leaning hard on the principle of the path could look like that. We need the balance that only Christ gives.

Poetry

Some poems I wrote last year, but never posted...

Chisel and Pour

10/2008

Soon after this heart of stone shattered,
with pieces still scattered and strewn,
I poured fresh cement, resolved to rebuild.
And then I invited you in.

I let you swim here in my center,
I let you make waves in my heart,
until the stone set, and there you were trapped
with only one way of release.

Defenseless, I knelt at His chisel,
relinquishing my right to pour.
This breaking in me, it’s setting you free,
leaving cracks that need to be sealed.

He fills, pouring pure living liquid.
It floods and it cleanses debris,
inviting all in, with freedom to swim,
swim here in my heart in His blood.

Image

2/2008

I raise my hands for you
While I push God aside

I spend my cash for you
While the least of these get by

I wear my best for you
While I cover up my heart

I learn more facts for you
While God becomes a chart

I serve the church for you
While I should light the dark

I weigh my words for you
While I don’t speak to God

I choose my path for you
While in reality, I’m lost

Hey Man

2/2008

Tell me I’m pretty
Tell me I’m smart
Don’t make me beg
Or give up a lot
Teach me a lesson
Give me a word
Don’t leave me groping
Alone in the dark
Say that I please you
Say that you care
At least let me think it
Even if it’s not there
Without you I am nothing
Without you I am spent
Now that you’ve gone
I’m empty again

Redemptive Disappointment

Over the past few days, I’ve been contemplating the beautiful result of tragedy. I spent this past weekend with four incredible women in the mountains of North Carolina. This is the second year I’ve gotten together with my childhood friends for a weekend, and both times I’ve found it to be a healing and restorative experience. Some of the girls I’ve known since we were in the nursery together. Until last year, we hadn’t seen each other for nearly ten years. What I’m struck by as we share our stories and catch up on life, is that, for each of us, life is not what we thought it would be ten years ago. We’ve each experienced loss in different ways and suffered in different ways. We’ve each been in a place we didn’t expect to be. Grief and tragedy has plagued each of us. At least for me, my idealistic romantic notions of the way the world is supposed to work did not do me any favors in coping with the realities of life.

As I started a class on crisis counseling yesterday, my professor spoke about how we need to teach children to fail. We need to teach them to suffer. Otherwise, we grow up with this expectation that things should always go well for us—that things are supposed to go right and well all the time. I remember thinking in my twenties that life was fun and easy and perfect, and wondering if I could manage to get through my life without pain. I thought I was probably due for a tragedy, but I was pretty sure I could avoid it by living right and being good. Only people who make bad choices should have to suffer. Not me.

This translates into expectations of God. Like Job’s friends, I thought God owes me something because I’ve been good or faithful. I followed the rules. He would not allow me to suffer. A sense of entitlement is created because we don’t expect to have to suffer or feel bad. I thought that only a cynical view of life says that life will inevitably disappoint you, that people will always eventually let you down, that failure and suffering are a fact of life. I guess nobody wants to believe that when they’re young and full of hope for life.

But isn’t that part of the gospel really? It’s not cynical—it’s the givens of life in a fallen world. Perhaps it takes suffering, it takes failure for us to really understand the gospel, to be able to receive grace. We misunderstand the abundant life until we’ve been frustrated with life as it is. Only then do we really understand true hope. Until then, we’re satisfied with what C. S. Lewis refers to as mud pies in a slum because we can’t conceive of a holiday at the sea. I’m reminded of my high school students saying they didn’t want to go to heaven yet because they hadn’t had sex. But the pleasures of this life aren’t as good as it gets. Maybe we have to be disappointed by them before we realize the reality of that truth.

This weekend, each of my friends painted for me a beautiful picture of hope and faith—of trusting God through the unexpected tragedies of life in a fallen world. For a long time, I thought that faith meant believing God for what we want. Now I think it is about believing God is good and faithful when we don’t get what we want. Though he slay me, yet will I trust him. There is no question of whether we will suffer—it is only a question of how and when. And yet, we experience abundant life in a way unexpected. And we’re not done. What we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we will be like him, for we shall see him as he is. This is our hope.

Grace and Cigarettes

I’m thinking of taking up smoking as a spiritual discipline. Maybe I’ll sit with God and have a cigarette. I’ve just been very struck this week with my need to embrace my humanity, my limits, my imperfection. It’s so easy for me to get into a brand of Christianity that is all about image, saying and doing the right thing, having it all together. I think of the saying, “don’t smoke, don’t chew, don’t go with girls that do,” and I want to radically break out of a Christian culture that would whittle the Christian life down to that.

Most Christians I know don’t think that way, but I just don’t get enough reminders sometimes of my need for Jesus, my humanity, and my brokenness in the Christian culture. Sometimes it seems more like it’s not okay to be a sinner …or a smoker. Often I experience an expectation of perfection—maybe it’s just my own expectation of myself. I wonder if a cigarette with God now and then could be the reminder I need not to bow to those impossible expectations, but to breathe in grace (and tobacco ...and toxic chemicals).

I think my problem comes when I regard holiness over grace. Only through grace can we ever be holy, so a pursuit of holiness must never come first. (And I’m not convinced that holiness has anything to do with not smoking, not swearing, not drinking, etc.) I wonder what it would be like if churches looked more like AA meetings sometimes—no pretense, everyone aware of their own failure, confessing openly, admitting our need, holding each other up, but full of grace and understanding for everyone’s broken condition.

I want to love and accept others as Christ did, but a preoccupation with personal holiness prevents that. I have such a hard time loving people when I’m perfect. My desire for perfection makes it impossible to love because love is messy. Perfection is my point of need. And it is the very thing that keeps me from admitting my need. I am resistant to receiving grace because I don’t want to need it—to be limited and imperfect. So, I don’t want to be human. I want to be God. How like Eve. How human.

On hearing this, Jesus said, "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice.' For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners." Matthew 9:12-13

John MacArthur on smoking, drinking, etc.

Out of the Boat

How eagerly I jump out
Full of faith devout
Yet when my feet hit the sea
Doubt provokes my panicked plea

How quickly confidence fades
Inviting all these waves
So suddenly you shrink
Eclipsed by my uncertainty

How promptly I fall asleep
When the watch I need keep
Prayer vows are so easy to break
When my desires are at stake

How hastily I lop off ears
When to me your plan is not clear
I create a bloody mess
Instead of entering your rest

How swiftly I flee in fear
I deny you when they sneer
Refuse to call you my friend
Though I swore fealty to the end

How exhausted you must be
With this fickle fool that is me
I can’t seem to hit it half the time
But that work is not mine

How patiently you repeat
You invite to feed your sheep
From broken vessels made of clay
You build your Church for your display

So I believe that you’re not done
That the work of the Son
Is alive so I will see
All you’ve made me to be

Honesty

So now we come to it
The really deep-seated shit
The stuff I can’t quit
The me that I hate
My native state
So much for truth that dazzles
This truth just unravels
All my facade

Then there’s Your blood

You say that’s what it’s for
Still I treat it with scorn
A last resort
I don’t want to need
I prefer to sit here and bleed
Just get it together so I won’t have to ask
So I can keep on the mask
But behind my back
I secretly pray

Please don’t leave me this way

Then my dam breaks
I’ll do whatever it takes
That’s when Love falls
Because You see it all
And You stay with me still
So do what You will
My desire is for You
Only Love can undo
The me I won’t miss

You died for this

Far From Home

Only a remnant of our royalty remains.
Now daughters of the King
roam like desperate beggars
in a foreign land.
Homesick—
forgetting who we are.
Searching for sustenance
in a wasteland.
Impatient in hope
for the palace prepared.
Frustrated from futility
brought by the bondage of decay.
Drawn to doubt the glorious freedom
the King’s children receive.
Wait, O daughters!
Persist, you sisters in slavery!
For our betrothed nears,
and he will cleanse the stains of vagrancy.
He will clothe us anew
with splendor profound.
We will feast with him,
feast from the guarded tree
on the day of our new song,
the day of completion.

Hosea 6:3 "Let us acknowledge the LORD; let us press on to acknowledge him. As surely as the sun rises, he will appear; he will come to us like the winter rains, like the spring rains that water the earth."