nakedpastor

Grace is offensive. Back in this post from December of last year I quoted Merton:

We must be ready to cooperate not only with graces that console, but with graces that humiliate us. Not only with lights that exalt us, but with lights that blast our self-complacency. Much of our coldness and dryness in prayer may well be a kind of unconscious defence against grace. Without realizing it, we allow our nature to de-sensitize our souls so that we cannot perceive graces which we intuitively foresee may prove to be painful.

I’m convinced that it is love that induces the greatest transformation, not the threat of punishment, not the promise of reward, not passion, not effort, not willpower. If it is God’s kindness (read “love” or “grace”) that leads to repentance, then I have to believe that the same goes for me. This is why I and our community teaches and tries to live lovingly and graciously. It’s because I’m convinced this is what sets people free. Paul frequently prayed for his communities to grasp what the full dimensions of God’s love were because he believed this is what brought about the greatest and most profound transformation. Me too.

I was just talking with a friend of mine this afternoon who admitted she had gone through a spell of inexplicable anger and resentment. The usual religious or spiritual response would be to candy-coat her anger with a kind of superficial peace, something that would make her feel better about herself and more presentable to the people around her because a good religious person shouldn’t be angry. This requires a great deal of effort and denial and in the end is pure hypocrisy. Instead, she started to examine her anger and resentment and chased its shoots to the root, which she discovered was her own woundedness, her own fear of rejection and abandonment. She knows God loves her, even in her brokenness and weakness. So, when she calmly saw and admitted this, her anger and resentment instantly began to dissolve. Sometimes it happen this fast, and sometimes this kind of thing can take a lot more time.

Which is why my style and our community’s style is offensive to some: because it looks like we tolerate sin. It looks like we don’t believe in change or transformation. The kind of change that the whole human enterprise seems to admire and encourage is the candy-coated kind. Way more dazzle and impressiveness and instantaneous results. But it is just the candy coating and not the chocolate. I’m going after the chocolate, no matter how long it takes.

The fine art photograph is the creation of my friend Jorgen Klausen.

Lisa and I took our much-needed weekend and went to a nearby city, Moncton. We took our daughter Casile and a young woman who’s staying with us right now… Melissa. We had a wonderful time. I didn’t take my computer. I still can’t believe it, since my computer plays a pretty major role in my life with blogging, my writing, cartooning, my art on ebay, and keeping in touch with all in my sphere through facebook. It gave me space to just enjoy life and love. I also did some important thinking.

I had an experience at once surprising and profound. We bought tickets into Butterfly World. I just thought it would be interesting to see some butterflies. We bought our tickets and entered the climate-controlled spherical building, filled with vegetation, water fountains, and of course, butterflies. Hundreds of them! The astounding array of colors and sizes and flight patterns and behaviors absolutely floored me. I immediately started crying. I admit it. I was embarrassed so I kept pretty much to myself. Lisa found me sitting on a bench, my eyes filled with tears and my heart ready to burst. I can’t explain why it happened except that I was in love with these gentle creatures and their profound and simple beauty, but also their incredible transformation. They flew all around me, landed on me, and filled my eyes with childlike wonder. It was one of the most emotional and spiritual moments I can remember having.

My mind was filled with the urgency of change. The wonder of transformation. The beauty of a new creation. The magnificence of metamorphosis. There were some caterpillars and chrysalides hanging in a special chamber. How do those turn into these? From these crawling helpless or dead-looking things to these free-flying beautiful creatures. I look for this same thing in my own life, the life of those I love, and all the people of the world. I look for this in my church and the whole church. I know what I say is offensive to many people. But I’m tired of painting the old with new paint, of gluing fake wings on the old shell, of rearranging the parts to a more interesting looking but mangled corpse. It’s time for new life! Liberation now!

I decided to come back and be more naked, more blunt, more honest, and more direct. I’m not telling anybody to do anything. I don’t condemn anyone. I just want to be clear: I think I know a way to prevent pastors from burning out. I think I know a way for people to gather with authenticity and joy. I think I know a way to prevent churches from becoming dead reminders. I think I know a way for us to be free, and free indeed. So stay tuned.

The fine art photograph was taken by my daughter Casile (right) and is of her and her friend Emily.

You can read Amaris’ comment from yesterday’s post on No Vision No Policy, to see what motivated me to write today’s post. Here’s what she asked me:

There is a block when we try to move into freedom and I think that some of these reasons are why. So my last question is, what are some practical things we can do to help ourselves and others move into freedom? We are going to feel the slap of the fresh air, we can’t escape that, so now where do we go?

This is my quick answer:

1. First of all I think we need to have an honest appraisal of ourselves. We need to observe honestly all that is going on in our brains. I think we need to realize how enslaved we are. I know so many people enslaved by a vision of what they think they should be or what others think they should be. I was just talking with a young woman this morning who doesn’t feel free to make her own life-decision out of fear of disappointing her parents’ dream for her. We need to recognize, in our own minds, the things that we are enslaved by… even the very noble and acceptable things. That is the first step.
2. The next step is automatic. I believe that when we recognize our enslavements, we are immediately before an open door and within an opened room. About 11 years ago I was feeling completely trapped and hopeless in a church situation. I had a dream one night and woke up the next day a free man. Nothing had changed except my thinking. My mind had changed, and I was free. Life’s never been the same since. When we recognize and name our captors in our own minds, they immediately turn into vapor.
3. The next step is to practice your liberty. Act free! Expect opposition. Expect to disappoint people. Expect to get shot at. A truly liberated person is often quite offensive. But those who hunger and thirst for freedom are inspired by such people. Live free and speak free and others will take their cue from you. You can’t make people be free, but only describe what this freedom is and live it. Take marriage for example. Lisa and I have been married for over 27 years. I prefer young lovers to watch us live and love each other rather than sit down and be counseled and taught by us. Same with freedom. If you think, live, and speak as a free person, others around you will explore the possibility for themselves.

I’m sorry if this is way too simplistic. But I honestly believe it is as simple as that. This isn’t to say it isn’t hard. It requires much courage and energy to examine ourselves. That is the hardest part. If you succeed here, the rest is gravy.

The fine art photograph is the creation of my daughter Casile (on the right), and is a photo of herself and her friend Emily.

Years ago I read David Herbert Donald’s, Lincoln, and found it profoundly applicable to my own life and situation as a pastor. Lincoln himself knew what it meant to be accused of not having a vision, of having no moral standard and of being a poor leader. I don’t think Lincoln had a vision except for the freedom of all people. But I don’t think that is necessarily a vision as in a corporate goal to achieve. Rather, it is something to be proclaimed and practiced. The freedom of all people is a reality only cloaked in the evil of humanity and this world. The emancipation of ourselves and others is an urgent and instantaneous necessity that must be manifested at every instance. No vision is required. There’s also no seeing ahead but to the next immediate point. Here’s one of the quotes from Donald that impacted me most:

From Lincoln’s fatalism derived some of his most lovable traits: his compassion, his tolerance, his willingness to overlook mistakes. That belief did not, of course, lend him to lethargy or dissipation. Like thousands of Calvinists who believed in predestination, he worked indefatigably for a better world—for himself, for his family, and for his nation. But it helped to buffer the many reverses that he experienced and enabled him to continue a strenuous life of aspiration.

It also made for a pragmatic approach to problems, a recognition that if one solution as fated not to work another could be tried. ‘My policy is to have no policy’ became a kind of motto from Lincoln—a motto that infuriated the sober, doctrinaire people around him who were inclined to think that the President had no principals either. He might have offended his critics less if he had more often used the analogy he gave James G. Blaine when explaining his course on Reconstruction: ‘The pilots on our Western rivers steer from point to point as they call it—setting the course of the boat no further than they can see; and that is all I propose to myself in this great problem.’

Both statements suggest Lincoln’s reluctance to take the initiative and make bold plans; he preferred to respond to the actions of others. They also show why Lincoln in his own distinctively American way had the quality John Keats defined as forming ‘ a Man of Achievement’, that quality ‘which Shakespeare possessed so enormously… Negative Capability, that is when a man is capable of being in uncertainties, Mysteries, doubts, without any irritable reaching after fact and reason.’

Living the definition or defining the living. That’s what most all people do. As well as communities. This has been my observation.

Living the definition is very very popular. I try to live the life of a Christian and what a Christian looks like. Or pastor. Or father. Or mystic. Or saint. Or artist. Or writer. Whatever. So for instance, when I encounter someone who is suffering, I check out my inner dictionary to see what a christian pastor should do when he meets someone like this. It’s living a prescribed life that is constantly being measured and tested and edited. This is a life filled with fear, ambition and hypocrisy.

Defining the life is when we look back on our lives and think about it or write about it or talk about it. We are always looking behind us to see how we’ve done, to discern how well our actual lives measure against our definition of what it should’ve or shouldn’t have been. This is a life filled with either indifference, remorse or pride.

I have decided that few people actually live. We don’t live the moment. We are either trying to live up to some definition or trying to define what we’ve already lived. Something genuine, authentic and real happens, and immediately we define it so that we can sell it to someone who will live by it’s definition. We try to encapsulate it then use it again as if for the first time. It’s like great sex. Our immediate response is: “Let’s do that again exactly the same way!” Of course it’s impossible to experience the very same thing again. We can’t just live the moment. We are not free. We are not alive.

Our poor communities suffer under the same dilemma. We persuade them to live according to a definition of what we think a successful, influential, vibrant and growing community should be, rather than just letting it be what it already is. And we are constantly measuring our communities against the definition of what we thought it should or shouldn’t be. If something wonderfully real happens, then we try to sell this definition to other communities to live by. How many times have I been accused of not looking like a christian or acting like a pastor? How many times has our church been accused of not looking like a church or not fitting into the Vineyard movement? More than I can count. It’s because people freak out when you don’t fit the definition. And if you do happen to do something wonderfully refreshing and creative, even more people rush to tell you to publish it so that you can profit from it and so that others can do that too.

I believe when there’s talk of being a new creation, being a new man or woman, that there’s another way of being human… a way that’s entirely free, that’s entirely bold, that’s entirely beautiful and unique. The same for communities. Free of definition! They are enigmas and anomolies. But the fear or ambition of definitions prevents us from being this kind of new person or this new kind of community.

The fine art photograph is the creation of my friend Jorgen Klausen and is from his Mask series.