I recently started seeing a spiritual director as part of my self-care routine, and plus I never have experienced an interaction like that before. It's been really interesting so far. His recent challenge to me was to notice "rhythms of resurrection" in my own life, and to jot them down as they came up. Meaning: what is God bringing to life in front of me that reflects His care? So before all this, I thought I wasn't going to be a theologian. That academic-intense theology world fascinates me and I love reading it, but I wasn't sure if it was the world for me. But with this fiction getting picked up, I realized God was calling me to be a theologian - but in a completely different way than I thought. Many Friends in our past took pride in their storytelling abilities, and they kept records of their testimonies. Some Friends even wrote poetry. They saw writing as a natural outpouring of God's work in them. Their testimonies and lived faith was their theology. Thus far, the work that has been picked up has also been my most religious work - and it's all about finding Christianity in the messiest places. None of the stories give easy answers, and that's intentional. But the draw to them, I believe, is that they are explorations of faith in a way that feels real and universal. Long story short: I have found that the rhythms of resurrection in my own life have been noticing how God has used this once-dormant creative side of me. Other rhythms I have begun noticing are a love for things I haven't been able to fully enjoy since the beginning of the pandemic. Long walks, for example. With this lens in mind, I challenge people who read this to look at their own lives and notice how God is working. It's less about intellectualizing it and more about being curious. When we open our eyes to see how God is at work, we may find ourselves pleasantly surprised at what's being revealed.
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I'm excited to share that one of my stories, "Step Nine", was picked up for publication for Esoterica Magazine. I don't have a publication date yet because we're waiting on the artist to finish an accompanying illustration for the story. I feel like a fancy boy. Look at me go. I thought it would be neat to share some of the inspiration behind this before it comes out, and share what I intended with the piece. We always tend to think we are the hero in our own stories without really considering when we're the villain. This story, put simply, is about a woman owning the fact that, for a lot of people in her life, she was the villain. And, as part of her sobriety journey, she decides to try to make amends with the person she hurt the most (which is a normal part of recovery and 12-step culture.) I wanted to capture the grittiness of a lot of the experience of someone in recovery - from the blunt language to the pace to the eventual release. I hope I captured it well! What made me approach this story was the theme of forgiveness. I have been reading a lot of Miroslav Volf's work around that theme, as well as studying Scriptures. I find it absolutely fascinating. The practice of confessing our sins and wrongs to each other in the ways the early church did it are not practiced in the same ways today. I also love taking night walks around Chicago, and I'm in the city twice a week. Every time a jogger passed by me, I'd try to imagine what their story was. In my mind's eye, I had this image of a woman jogging and trying to process heavy things in life. The story wrote itself from there - it's based on that feeling of Chicago's night life and that weird mixture of hope and despair in people you walk by. Most of my work is a love letter to screwups. It's the same way with my preaching. I always try to imagine someone going through the worst possible day in their lives stepping through the doors. I pray, and think, about what Jesus would have to say to their condition. A Gospel that doesn't know how to talk to the people hurting the most is not a Gospel worth believing. The editor actually emailed the story back at first and said she wanted me to smooth over a few things over, but she loved the idea of faith, addiction, and forgiveness wrapped up into one piece. This is a non-religious publication, and I try not to be too preachy in my fiction. But the fact that this was picked up during Holy Week, that it was sent back to be worked on so it could be better, and the fact that it took almost no time at all to get picked up, tells me I wasn't alone in writing this. Looking forward to the release of it, and I will keep you all updated on future endeavors as well. Click here for Esoterica Magazine's website. Here
I smoke with a priest. We are outside church talking about Your mysteries and grace. Remember that cigarette I had, next to that moonlit pond? We were talking about redemption. In between drags, I prayed: "Make sense of my life. Help me to find hope." With the extinguishing of sparks in the earth, You gave the ashes a new meaning. "Here is where hope is. Here is where resurrection happens. Here is where love grows. Here, things can begin again in places hidden and unseen. So stay Here. And trust." Eleven years later, I smile. I want to thank You, You see. For being There. I don't smoke much anymore. But when I do, I remember what that night felt like. You were right. Here matters. The priest laughs with me. I breathe in, breathe out. "Thank You for this moment," I silently pray and think. "And thank You for Here." (The picture is the actual pond where this prayer took place. I came across it in old journals. I remember being almost drowned in an overwhelming sense of love and suddenly wanting to pay attention to that moment. The rest wrote itself.) One of the few times I attended a writer's group in Madison had writers bashing on Leo Tolstoy and James Patterson. I like Tolstoy. I'm indifferent towards Patterson, mostly because his stories aren't my thing. I rolled my eyes a few times. While I'm not into Patterson, I admire that he is making reading such a joy for both kids and adults. We need more literacy in the world. And Tolstoy could have cared less about what they thought because he was living in communes filled with people who were obsessed with his work. Borderline cult leader and apparent lady's man, that Tolstoy fella. That's when I said, "You know, I don't yuck people's yum. I can't judge. I like Dean Koontz, and so many of his books have magical dogs as the main characters. I think Walker, Texas Ranger can be a solid way to kill time. I love it when Chuck Norris fist fights a bear." Art is 100% subjective with taste. I believe in criticizing toxic messages and how minorities are displayed if there's an issue, but if it's just a harmless piece of fun then I don't see the need in mockery. Critique is great when it's accurate or done out of a balanced perspective, but there should always be a recognition of how much hard work was put into something. In other words, don't be a jerk. Recently, I found myself genuinely struggling with a book I picked up by one of my favorite writers. Instead of simply tossing it aside, I decided to stick with it and finish it and figure out what kind of mistakes the author made so I don't make them. The book was called The Good Life by Jay McInerney. One of my favorite books of all time is also by him called Bright Lights, Big City. Very few books left me as deeply moved as that one did. It chronicles the quarter life crisis of a 20-something year old writer who is recently divorced and is battling depression in 1980's Manhattan. He is getting sick of the party scene and trying to find his way back to his own humanity. Without giving too much away, the redemption found in the book hit me right between the eyes because I wasn't expecting it. I couldn't believe how well-executed it was and how much it packed in for a shorter book. I think it should be required reading for every healthy deconstruction period or life crisis. The literary scene at the time was notorious for its nihilistic portrait of yuppy, upper class culture. Most of the novels that come from this period are bleak, because the overarching message in almost all of these books is that consumerism, desensitization from violence, addiction, a disrespect for life, and classism has detached people from their own humanity. What made McInerney's book so amazing to me is that he somehow snuck in a glimmer of hope in the mess - that a better life is absolutely possible when we open ourselves up to the reality that we are redeemable. So when I picked up The Good Life, I was expecting that same kind of impact. It's about 9/11 and the aftermath between two couples who are having affairs in response to the trauma (and their paths back to redemption too.) McInerney served at a soup kitchen at ground zero and got the idea while serving first responders. I was expecting something like that. It was also difficult to get through because I found it so melodramatic. The thing of it is that McInerneny's first novel has followed him in an almost detrimental way, and every book of his has been compared to it. He was catapulted into fame when he was married and settled down. Because the image of a writer losing control of his life felt so real to people, his readers assumed he was just like the main character. In reality, he is a quiet guy who spent some time sowing wild oats in Manhattan before becoming a nice, nerdy suburbanite who enjoys wine tasting as a hobby. Perhaps that's why Bright Lights has an optimistic feel. Then I took a further step back from these considerations I realized that, objectively, the book was good. It had all the right ingredients and it was well-written (according to my own standards.) If I hadn't been exposed to Bright Lights before this, I probably would've enjoyed it a lot more. In fact, if it ever gets turned into a movie, I think it would be great. This book also tied in as I was reading a Christian book by a famous author. She talked a lot about her own life and testimony, and I appreciated hearing it. However, I absolutely hated the way it was written. It was way too flowery and buried with cliches. But the main message was important, and I realized with that book that it is helping tons of people on their spiritual journey. I don't want my personal snooty opinions to interfere with someone else's potential encounter with God. If I can apply that same kind of appreciation for teaching, I should apply that for storytelling too. So while I didn't enjoy The Good Life, I ultimately recognize it as a gift that McInerney gave us based off of firsthand experiences. And that's the way most art should be treated - as a presentation into another person's created world and insight. There are also so many factors in how we choose to enjoy something, whether we're conscious of them or not. For instance, Christoper Nolan's Batman movies were called masterpieces until Robert Pattinson's Batman came out, and suddenly Nolan's movies aren't as respected among fans. It's fascinating to see people's reactions who, less than a month ago, had shrines set up to Christian Bale's performance. (I love both adaptions, but they're completely different - that's another post for another day.) It speaks to the many ways we enjoy art, and it's something we should continually be conscious of with every piece we enjoy or watch. Criticize, love, hate, etc, any piece of work you want. But be aware of your own nuance and your own lens. It colors more than we think. This Lent season, I've been reflecting on what it means to sacrifice and give up things to God. This passage in particular from Matthew 6: 5-6: “When you pray, don’t be like hypocrites. They love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners so that people will see them. I assure you, that’s the only reward they’ll get. But when you pray, go to your room, shut the door, and pray to your Father who is present in that secret place. Your Father who sees what you do in secret will reward you." (CEB) A lot of people get the basic meaning from this passage that a hypocrite is someone who does one thing and in private is a completely different person. That's only part of the picture. The word has its roots in a Greek term called "hypokrises" which has a variety of meanings. It was mainly applied to people who were actors for a living, but other euphemisms for it were "coward," "jealous," "play-acting," and "dissembling." (At least according to the handy dandy Pocket Oxford Classical Greek Dictionary.) Jesus wasn't preaching against people who were open with their faith, or actors. He was preaching against a mentality that made religion a commodity to gain social status. That leads to dangerous things later down the road. Hypocrites, in this sense, are people who base their entire lives off of the applause of others. It's also a universal truth: growth and character can't be faked, because it's something that happens inside us amd it eventually comes out in one way or another. That's especially true for spirituality. So when Jesus tells his followers to not be like the hypocrites, he is asking us to stop paying attention to the applause around us, and the things that cause that applause, and focus on our inner condition. In the same applicable way, on the opposite end of the spectrum, there are some people who absolutely thrive off of being controversial for the attention of it. I believe Jesus would say the same thing to them, because the only reward they get are the temporary reactions they want to see. Again - authentic faith can't be faked. Eventually, when the rubber meets the road, we eventually see how people's faith influences what they do and how they respond. Usually the most spiritual people I have ever met are the people who don't know they're that spiritual. They dwell in spiritual practices in secret and it flows out naturally. In the age of social media, it's especially important to be aware of this - because we're all guilty of it to some extent. But where Christ comes in is that He shows us a better way. He points to people who thrive off of that attention and says, "That's not healthy. The reward is temporary. Imagine how much better it will be when you spend time with Me instead." When we enter into that Presence, we don't have to worry what others think of us. We don't have to think about images to maintain, social media validation, or keeping up with trends. We learn that we are loved, uniquely and wonderfully - and there's no better place to be. When I was nineteen, I wrote a full book-length memoir called Life Starts Now. It's taken from a Three Days Grace song, because I was trying to communicate that it "wasn't like those other memoirs." Spoiler alert: it's exactly like those other memoirs. Someone at my licensing interview for my denomination made the comment: "You had a fully lived adolescence." And that pretty much summarizes what I wrote down. I was pretty naive, as are most nineteen year olds. The piece tried to blend a rigid form of Christianity with gritty realism. There were more f-bombs in it than in Pulp Fiction (literally - I did the math.) I hung out with some pretty blunt street kids back in the day. But what made it strange to read was that it endorsed a borderline legalistic form of faith with a slew of profanity and partying. I didn't fully understand how grace transforms people, or the depth of God's love and character. I'm not a prude about my stories, but at least my beliefs and theology are wide enough to consider how God works in that brokenness. I also didn't have the insight I have today to understand what was going on during those years. High school kids do stupid, reckless things. Working at a Boys and Girls Club showed that to me so many times. That's just life. If I were to try to tell the story today, it would be more about how God was faithful to me during that period. And that is 100% why I'm grateful that every agent or publishing house I tried to submit to turned me down. The Christian agents especially. Even the version I rewrote in college is a version I disagree with today. My theology changed dramatically through studying Quaker history and Scriptures, with the inclusion of my encounters with peacemaking and community development. My faith grew to understand the wider picture of what God was doing in the world, and what He was calling me to do. There is a ton of wisdom in giving pieces of work, or even a letter, time to breathe. I wrote a few short memoir pieces down recently about what it was like to minister in 2020, and then I put those pieces away. I won't touch them again for three years, because I know by that time I'll have a more sober perspective. And memoir is one of those tricky things where it's not necessarily supposed to be history as it happened - but rather it's an exploration of life with certain themes in mind. Even so, with that understanding, I want to make sure I have a good grasp on what was really happening in my life - no matter what the period was. I don't think it would've become a bestseller at all by any stretch of the imagination, but I also look at people like Joshua Harris whose own toxic purity culture theology led him out of faith. He was 21 years old and the publishing industry, and fundamentalist churches, absolutely took advantage of him. Then there's Bret Easton Ellis, who was 19 when Less Than Zero was published. He was suddenly thrown into a fame he wasn't ready for, and almost ruined his life because of it. There's wisdom in recognizing your own limits, and considering the thought that maybe you don't know as much as you think you know. And when it comes to writing about your own life, I've learned to let time do its job and allow me to get a wiser perspective before touching anything. I love memoir as a genre, but I think a piece of advice I've rarely heard that I've learned myself is that it takes time to get a wiser perspective. I don't regret writing down what I wrote down. It's an amazing accomplishment for a teenager to do. But I'm also so, so glad that I didn't have the confidence to try to query it around further than I did or self-publish it. Of all the things I was cocky about back then, it never occurred to me to be cocky about that. I consider that a God thing that it didn't happen. I think it's the unanswered prayers that we learn to be the most grateful for in the future. (For this story, I asked myself a simple question: "What would happen if a frat bro wrote a really pretentious memoir piece?" It's the stupidest thing I've ever written, and I refuse to even try to shop it around. You're welcome, world.) Consider the Quesarito I walked into a Chicago Taco Bell in the South Loop at midnight. I heard the Religious Studies kids liked to hang out there and observe people. Before that night, I didn't want any of that nonsense. I went to college for business and to hustle. Gary V for me, sir, none of your whimsical kumbaya crap. But that particular night, I had a yearning inside of me. I couldn't put my finger on it. Maybe it was the edibles I ate. Maybe it was my roommate's loud snoring. Maybe it was unprocessed trauma. Maybe it was everything. I ordered my usual quesarito with a Baja Blast and found my way to a familiar face. He was sitting at a table reading a book in what I assume was Arabic. "How long have you been studying?" I asked as I sat down. "Time is of no essence in the realm of the Divine," he said. I took a sip of Blast, "What?" "My name is Steve," he offered his hand. I shook it, "Patrick. So, what are you reading?" "I'm not sure," Steve closed the book. "I like looking at the writing. I can't read Arabic." I stared at him blankly. "Haven't you ever stared at someone to admire their beauty before?" "Like, to get laid?" "No, to just admire them. You've never looked at your world or others and admired the beauty of who they are?" I looked at his book and then at him, "Can't say that I have?" He grabbed my quesarito, unwrapped it, and then waved it in front of my face. "Consider the quesarito," he said, "how it defies definition. It's both a quesadilla and a burrito. What a mystical world we live in where something like this can exist." "I've never thought about it like that before," I leaned back. Steve took a bite, "Yes, friend, we never think. We go through life not observing beauty, and only seek ways to exploit it," he grabbed my drink and took a sip. "I think I get it," I cleared my throat. "I've been studying for a career, but I haven't taken the time to really absorb what's going on around me. I never appreciate it for what it is." "Nothing is permanent, friend," Steve took another bite. "Enjoy it while you can. One day, you'll regret not being in the moment." Steve stood up, patted my shoulder, and said, "I'll see you around." "You're forgetting your book," I held it out to him. "Am I, friend? Am I?" Steve caressed my face slowly. "I… uh, guess not," I stammered. Steve wandered away, eating the rest of my quesarito. I walked home from Taco Bell that night confused, frustrated, and hungry. I went to bed angry. The next day dragged on. I couldn't get Steve's pseudo-wisdom out of my head. There had to be some kind of meaning to the nonsense. Some kind of logic. Late night came around again, and I found myself wanting that quesarito that was stolen from me by that sneaky hipster monk with a non-descript spirituality. I walked in, "I'd like a quesarito with a Baja Blast, please." "We're sorry, sir," said the woman at the cashier. "We stopped selling those." My heart sank. Steve was right. Nothing is permanent in this world. I turned my head and saw a hippie woman reading the book that Steve left behind. She looked at me and smiled. I gave a little wave and ordered something else. Of course someone like her was there. After I got my order, I sat down and stared into space. I realized all the broken dreams, lost causes, manic late night phone calls… They were all one giant quesarito. Here today, gone tomorrow. The only things that are guaranteed it seems are the shells and tortillas that are willing to accept the ingredients with grace and dignity. Perhaps I could be a shell, I figured. Perhaps I was not meant to understand these things but rather to accept them. Perhaps there is freedom in realizing that not everything on the menu is permanent, and there is wisdom in savoring every ingredient until it's gone - or even finding other ways to rejoice when those same ingredients are redone twenty-five different ways. Steve may have exploited my late night cravings, but the lessons he left behind will remain with me for a lifetime. This month, I was introduced to the works of Raymond Carver. I fell immediately in love with his short stories and poetry. He had a minimalist style. His characters felt real and they were accurate snapshots of blue collar life in crisis. As usual with every writer I come across, I have to find out what their personal life was like. And, per usual with almost every famous literary author from that period, there were addiction issues and depression. I found out that Carver spent most of his life as an alcoholic. One of his last published poems was him reflecting on his life before he passed away. The last ten years of his life were the richest moments he had. He writes in his poem "Gravy," No other word will do. For that’s what it was. Gravy. Gravy these past ten years. Alive, sober, working, loving and being loved by a good woman. Eleven years ago he was told he had six months to live at the rate he was going. And he was going nowhere but down. So he changed his ways somehow. He quit drinking! And the rest? After that it was all gravy, every minute of it, up to and including when he was told about, well, some things that were breaking down and building up inside his head. “Don’t weep for me,” he said to his friends. “I’m a lucky man. I’ve had ten years longer than I or anyone expected. Pure gravy. And don’t forget it.” (Source) Carver had a rich, full life near the end of his career. His best published works were during his sobriety. Reading about these writers finding constant redemption after hitting rock bottom makes me wonder why it's so easy to ignore the richness of life before hitting dark spots. It reminds of a line in The Color Purple by Alice Walker that says: "I think it pisses God off if you walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and don't notice it." As a Christian, I'm reminded of all the various points throughout the Bible that speaks of God's presence, and signs of His presence, all around us. Romans 1:20 which says, "Ever since the creation of the world, God’s invisible qualities—God’s eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, because they are understood through the things God has made. " (CEB) It's mysterious, but it's so easy to miss if we decide to let ourselves be distracted. When we view life through an intentional spiritual lens that's both present and discerning, we also see that life is gravy. We don't need to lose everything to see it for ourselves. It's hard to pinpoint Carver's spirituality, but he has said some things that point towards that kind of reality. He said in an interview once, "No, but I have to believe in miracles and the possibility of resurrection." One of his last works was also a meditation on a line from St. Theresa's poetry. (Source) And I think that's what it means to be present in this life: to be open to miracles and the possibility of resurrection. The worst word is the never the final word, and as a Christian I can take that in confidence. But for today, I have to take the invitation to listen to my life - with all of its complexities and nuances, and celebrate it for what it is today. And when I view my life with that lens, I echo Carver's words: It's all gravy. Passage: Exodus 16:1-17 Audio: Link There was a famous movie made in the 70's called The Way We Were about a doomed romance between characters played by Robert Redford and Barbara Streisand. Redford plays a writer who doesn’t take himself, or life, seriously. Streisand plays a Jewish left-wing activist who is passionate about everything. (In other words, Barbra Streisand seems to be playing herself.) It doesn’t end well. There was a song that came from the movie that’s since become a classic, and it’s also called “The Way We Were.” Streisand sings about this fictional romance and reflects on it. She sings: “Can it be that it was all so simple then? Or has time rewritten every line? … Memories may be beautiful and yet what's too painful to remember we simply choose to forget. So it's the laughter we will remember whenever we remember the way we were.” How many of us find ourselves missing the past like that? Nostalgia can be deceptive, and make us misremember what was really going on. Some of my most fond memories of Wisconsin are when I would go to a friend’s house to play board games and watch movies. Their names were Shaun and Ashley. I would go over every Thursday and we would choose something to watch. I spent Christmas with them one year. I got into Dungeons and Dragons, animated Batman movies, and learned an appreciation for video games. Their house was like a museum dedicated to everything nerdy. I loved going over to their house to spend time with them. But the thing is that friendship developed when COVID first broke out. We were both temporarily furloughed from our jobs at the Boys and Girls Club. When I look back at that time now, I don’t tend to remember the fear or the crazy political tensions in my area. I don't remember trying to formulate sermons to speak to everyone's condition during a pandemic. I don’t remember worrying about the kids. I don’t remember being so stressed that I had a terrible sleeping schedule for eight months. I don't immediately remember sitting with my colleagues on Zoom as they processed COVID and the rise BLM in their contexts. All of those things were happening and they were extremely important, but it’s not what my mind clings to. Instead, what I find myself remembering are those cheesy movie nights and laughter. I reflected on this when I read some past journals, and I realized that what was a pleasant time for me wasn’t so pleasant for everyone else. And it’s a weird feeling to know that the closeness I felt at that house was only because a worldwide crisis was happening. In a lecture I once had in class under John Perkins, a black Christian activist. He told the story of when someone made a comment about returning to the good old days. John, being the blunt guy he is from a black Baptist heritage, asked the man: “Tell me, are those the days when I wouldn’t be allowed to sit and eat with you? Are those the days when I was a slave? What good old days are you talking about?” And leave it to John to put things in perspective like that, but that’s what nostalgia tends to do: it downplays the negative experiences to uplift the positive ones. Nostalgia is often a stress reaction for the brain to look back at the past and idealize it when things are going wrong in the present. Dr. Laurie Santos in her podcast The Happiness Lab points out that nostalgia can often be bad for us, both as people and as a culture. When we think that we had things a lot easier back then, we ignore the struggles and challenges that were there. Our brains tend to forget those moments when we get stressed. It’s a defense mechanism letting us know something is wrong. In other words, our brains are trying to find a way to soothe the anxieties we feel often when we remember these things. But part of being faithful is believing God’s promise that the best is yet to come, while also recognizing the Kingdom of Heaven all around us. God was present with us in the past, yes, but imagine how much more so He is present for us now. There is value in remembering the past in how God delivers us. Scriptures always point back to stories of God’s faithfulness in spite of the mess.The point of those passages isn’t to idealize what happened, but rather to show that God will continue to be faithful. When we try to return to the good old days, we often frame those ideal times to the detriment of everyone else and reality. All the Hebrews could think in that moment was an idealized version of their past. If you notice in God’s response, there is no condemnation. There is frustration that they aren’t noticing the blessing, but He doesn’t hold those feelings against them. Keep in mind these were people who were enslaved. This was probably one of many trauma responses. They were so used to an order of life that God was patient with them and provided for them, regardless of what they’ve said. When we idealize the past too much, we ignore how God is working today - and that includes how He is working in the marginalized parts of the world and our own communities. I have a friend who lived in a country when a civil war broke out. She is a French diplomat’s daughter. She talked about this positive childhood experience, right up until things started happening in her own backyard. She talked about riding in a school bus seeing the devastation of the war going on all around her. She said, “I lived this life of comfort and serenity for most of my childhood, only to realize I was living in a bubble and that the people I was friends with were experiencing horrific things that I didn’t understand until I saw them myself.” Part of following Jesus is learning how to pop that bubble, both in our minds and in our experiences. Because if we don’t pop those bubbles and have a willingness to learn, we miss out on what God is doing now and where He actually is. We miss out on that bread from heaven that he wants to give to us, or we can’t hear the voices that we need to hear. I’m sure at least most of us can remember hearing a sermon or two or dozens about how the past had everything right. But another danger about idolizing the past is that it seems to isolate the people who need to hear that there is a future. What’s unique about the Anabaptist tradition is that there’s an underlying invitation to live in the present moment in the Kingdom of God that is continually unfolding. It’s an emphasis that we know that Jesus has already had the final word on the things that break our world today. A dormant faith is a faith that thinks God is absent because things seemed better in the past. And ultimately, that’s what makes so many people miss who Jesus was when His ministry began. We find several times in the Gospels where people didn’t understand the full depth of Jesus’ message because they were too focused on preserving the past instead of letting God work something new. Something I noticed about working in rural Kansas and Wisconsin was that there is a deep attachment to the past, and in some ways that is a strength. Traditions are important, and history can be a great motivator to keep things going. However, there are some things that should pass away to allow new ways for God to work. There was a revival meeting back in Kansas I was invited to preach at. I was about 21 years old and I had a regular preaching position at a small Free Methodist church. I thought a revival would look cool, so I decided to participate. There were five other pastors there, all much more fundamentalist than me. But I was given the opportunity to be the one that offers people to come up to the altar to accept Christ. I sat in the background and tried to hid how intimidated I was by all these fundamentalist preachers yelling behind the pulpit. When it came my turn, I gave a short message about grace and God’s forgiveness and then I looked out at the crowd: “Would anyone like to accept Christ tonight?” There was dead silence. No hands were raised. Nothing was happening. I sat back down and the last pastor ended with a prayer. I asked one of them if that was normal. “Yeah,” he said. “I haven’t seen anyone come to the Lord at one of these things in ten years. We just keep doing them because the community likes remembering the old days when this was more normal. Sometimes a congregant will switch churches though.” On the drive home, I couldn’t help but think of how odd that was. But isn’t that the way it really is often when we idealize the past to the detriment of what we could be doing now? So what’s the solution to this? It seems that God offers it later on in this chapter. In Exodus 16:23-25, it says: Moses said to them, “This is what the Lord has said, ‘Tomorrow is a day of rest, a holy Sabbath to the Lord. Bake what you want to bake and boil what you want to boil. But you can set aside and keep all the leftovers until the next morning.’” So they set the leftovers aside until morning, as Moses had commanded. They didn’t stink or become infested with worms. The next day Moses said, “Eat it today, because today is a Sabbath to the Lord. Today you won’t find it out in the field. Six days you will gather it. But on the seventh day, the Sabbath, there will be nothing to gather.” God’s solution to this was to have them remember the Sabbath. In other words, God was inviting them to rest in who He is and to pause everything they’ve been doing. Rest is often the solution to the anxieties and worries we face in this world. A common thing I’ve heard around therapy circles is that rest is 50% of mental health. If you’re finding yourself in this rut that things can’t possibly get any better, remember what God promises us and also remember that God is with you in the mess and He isn’t judging you for it. But just remember: Jesus has the final word, and there is beauty and redemption to be found still. The everyday invitation of God to see things differently is always there - to experience Him in a way that is fresh and real. But part of that is accepting that Jesus has already conquered everything you’ve been through and deal with. All of that was nailed on the cross. And in His resurrection, we see a promised future - that even if things may not work out today or in this life, someday God will make things right. As the author of Hebrews so eloquently puts it in chapter 12:1-2: “So then, with endurance, let’s also run the race that is laid out in front of us, since we have such a great cloud of witnesses surrounding us. Let’s throw off any extra baggage, get rid of the sin that trips us up, and fix our eyes on Jesus, faith’s pioneer and perfecter. He endured the cross, ignoring the shame, for the sake of the joy that was laid out in front of him, and sat down at the right side of God’s throne.” By all means, remember the way we were - the good, the bad, the ugly of it all. But don’t forget to look forward to the way we will be, because that is something that Jesus looks forward to celebrating with us. And friends, what a day that will be - when every tear is wiped away and every injustice made right. A day of rejoicing and peace will visit us, and we can see glimpses of that in our everyday lives. Hold onto those promises, participate actively in the Kingdom of God, and you will see them come true too. When I lived in Wisconsin, I briefly attended a writing group that met in a small library. There was an older man there who brought his knitting needles and yarn to every meeting. I figured he wrote wholesome poetry or was there to cheer people along when I first met him. When it was time to share stories, he cleared his throat, put his needles down, and passed around his story. My jaw dropped as he read one of the most graphic horror stories I think I've ever read. I'm not a prude by any stretch of the imagination, but this made my eyes widen. Everyone around the table was nodding their heads in approval, as if this was a normal Tuesday night for them. Like the entire room's posture was: "Yes, bestie, the same mind that makes light blue winter scarfs is also the same mind that created this story about cannibalism. He's also a beloved grandpa. This is normal here. This is Madison. We do this." After we offered feedback, he pleasantly smiled and picked up his knitting needles again and went to work. I could tell whether or not he liked someone's story by whether or not he put down the needles as he listened. While I didn't stay at that meeting, I still think about him sometimes. Truth be told, I was envious of his confidence to just knit in public and that he found a hobby that suited him so well - damning both unused free time and gender norms in a swift click of the knitting needle. Even in the writing community around Chicago, I haven't found someone with nearly that same kind of confidence and self-acceptance. What a guy. I started thinking about more hobbies I could add in my free time. My doctorate ends soon, and I'm imagining my life without being a student. It's freeing thought, but I've also realized I was given a unique opportunity to explore things I've been putting off. And one of those things has been sketching and art, which I stopped doing when I was eleven when I found out I was a good writer. I won a short story context about Santa quitting Christmas, and the rest is history. This was also inspired from a documentary I saw about one of my favorite writers, Hubert Selby Jr. Hubert is a unique writer. He uses slashes instead of apostrophes, and writes according to a ryhthm. He didn't care about proper punctuation or grammar. He wrote as he felt it. Here is a glimpse into that style from Requiem for a Dream: “You see, you have feelings. You can appreciate the inner me. Like right now I feel a closeness between us that Ive never felt with anyone before … anyone. Yeah, I know what you mean. Thats how I feel. I don’t know if I can put it into words, but— Thats just it, it doesnt need words. Thats the whole point. Like whats the use of all those words when the feelings arent behind them. Theyre just words. Like I can look at a painting and tell it, youre beautiful. What does it mean to the painting? But Im not a painting. Im not two dimensional. Im a person. Even a Botticelli doesnt breathe and have feelings. Its beautiful, but its still a painting. No matter how beautiful the outside may be, the inside still has feelings and needs that just words dont fulfill.” Hubert became a writer after a near death experience and decided to dedicate his life to a new goal. A devout Christian in drug recovery, he decided to use his own work to graphically, and bluntly, write about his experiences growing up in Brooklyn. His work shocked audiences everywhere as he revealed a side of the world that nobody really paid attention to. He was an eighth grade dropout with no serious goals, other than to just write what he felt. And he made his own rules as he went along. When it comes to writing, a lot of people have made the comment to me that they wish they could write well. But the truth is, the only way to really write well is to first write. Most of the time, I carried around this impression that I wasn't a good artist because I believed that it was another inherent skill. Howevever, I have realized since that everything done with skill is something that needs to be practiced over and over again. I started drawing again tonight while watching some Youtube tutorials. They're laughably bad. But I'm having a good time learning, and that's all that matters. If there's a hobby you've been putting off or a dream that you think you can't do because you think you won't be good at it, the truth is you won't be good... at first. Practice means everything. And while I'm looking at my sketchbook now and laughing hysterically, I know perhaps there will be a day when I will know halfway what I'm doing. And that'll be awesome. Be like Hubert. Do what's on your heart and let it flow from there. Be like that guy at that writing meeting who knits and don't care what other people think. Be a legend. (If you want to see that documentary on Hubert, click here. It's free, and narrated by Robert Downey Jr. You can't lose!) |