nakedpastor

I think we really don’t know what freedom is. We talk about it. We claim to experience it. But do we really know what it is? I’ve become aware of the fact that we can claim to be free when it is very obvious we are not. We might think we are free. We might feel like we are free. But we don’t realize that we are in fact in some kind of bondage. We are not free, and we don’t have the discernment to understand the insidious nature of our bondage, and we don’t have the language to articulate this bondage.

Fear often blinds us. I’ve often said that fear is a gift to prevent us from harm. Fear is good sometimes. If I’m walking along a path in my wife’s home state of Alabama and I see a snake a few feet away, my immediate reaction is to leap backwards. Fear can prevent physical harm in such situations. But I also think fear applies to our primitive reluctance to walk into freedom. We know, intuitively, the cost of such freedom. We know that it means leaving some comforts and securities behind. It means walking into a pathless land beyond theology, doctrine, rituals, tradition, norms and custom.

Which explains why we can be so wrapped up in our theologies, etc., and think and feel like we are free. It is because they provide a warm security against the truth of reality which seems brutal, cold and fearful to us. The truth is, the beauty of Truth and Love lies beyond our fears. It takes courage, insight and honesty to move into this place beyond fear.

1. Can you speak your mind…
2. Can you openly confess your sin…
3. Can you share your perpetual struggles…
4. Can you make a mistake…
5. Can you question the bible and theology…
6. Can you lose your faith…
7. Can you come out of the closet…
8. Can you fail…
9. Can you crash…
10. Can you be chronically depressed…

…without fear of reprisal, alienation, demotion, isolation or removal? If you can’t, find a place where you can. Because there are such places. I know this for a fact.

Yesterday I brought up a subject that caused quite a stir in our community. But first, I spoke for a while about how we are often being prepared something necessary and good in the midst of our adversaries and adversity. God is not flustered by adversity. Neither need we be. The bible assumes we will have adversaries and adversity. It is part of life. It is how we live in the midst of this that the bible addresses. God doesn’t see adversity as a malevolent alien to our life, but a part of our life. God prepares a table for us in the midst of it, not once it is over.

After I spoke on the issue of adversity for a while, I informed the community that the idea has been tentatively raised that the church that split off from us might be interested in renting our building as their meeting place. I don’t think I’m speaking out of school because the issue is now public. There are no secrets. I opened up the floor for discussion and there was lots said and emotions expressed. I loved it… not because we are anywhere near a decision or anything like that. I loved it because these people feel free to speak their minds, no matter how shocking or disturbing or unprocessed it might be. The sign of a healthy community is not having it all together, but being able to speak freely.

I came to the conclusion, almost as soon as people started to share their concerns, fears and questions, that the conclusion isn’t going to be the most important thing, but the process. This will be good to go through all these tangled notions and emotions and pull our forgiveness to a deeper place and our wisdom to a richer expression love. I don’t know how it is going to turn out. I think forgiveness and love can be expressed either way. And right now I don’t care. All I know is that this community will be better for even thinking about it. And for that I’m grateful.

Is it possible to care for someone without having designs for him or her? Is it possible to love someone without having an agenda, no matter how glorious or noble? Is it possible to respect someone without having dreams or wishes for that person? These are very real questions that I ask. They are not hypothetical either, but real and urgent and necessary.

Jesus got angry with the teachers because they were laying burdens upon the people, burdens no doubt birthed from the teachers’ well-informed and studied dreams, desires, wishes, agendas and plans for the people. I don’t think for a second that their intentions were evil, but good and admirable. Could they love and teach the people without burdening them at all? Could they teach them without their teaching being pregnant with expectations? Could they love them with their desires as a community completely detached?

This is the problem: not that we need to purify our wishes for others, but to crucify them; not that we must make lovelier strings to attach to our love, but to cut them off altogether; not that we must baptize our agendas, but to lay them down once and for all; not that we must passionately make our visions more heavenly, but to forsake them now. What destroys true community is the layers of expectation, agenda, vision and wishes that are pressed upon it. This is why love is very much like death… because in both we must learn to let go. And this is why, my friends, we refuse to love… because it is too much like death… death to ourselves and all our desires.