Heresy of the Month

Well...That Could've Gone More Smoothly

I have found it very difficult to talk about God’s Promises to me.  How does one deal with all of the ambiguity and cognitive dissonance so inherent in following a God on the move?  How can I get friends and family who are reasonably worried about me to understand the security I find in the hands of my nomadic, homeless God?  As the Bible says, it is all foolishness to this world.

My problems with communicating my reality are compounded by the nature of my mind.  I am, without a doubt, a verbal processor.  My wife, and most of the other people I love in my life, are internal processors.  How I wish, in times like this, that I was more like they.  Internal processors do not have people worried about them.  They are not seen as contradictory, foolish, or just plain crazy.  An internal processor has the actual ability to be silent.  What a concept!  They do not speak on a topic until they have arrived at some semblance of an informed understanding or opinion on the subject.  When you ask them about their take on an unexplored subject, you get a “hmmm...I’ll have to think about that and get back to you...”

My friend and mentor, Pat Mulcahy, the pastor of the Vineyard Community Church in Grafton, Wisconsin, just north of Milwaukee, is an awesome example of an internal processor.  I like him as an example, because he is very merciful and grace-filled.  Plus, though I’m sure he thinks me insane, he has stuck by me and loved me through it.  I’m sure I drive him nuts, however.  He will ask me how I am doing one day, and I will dump all kinds of end-of-the-world-I-am-totally-screwed-and-on-the-edge-of-death, emotionally-charged diatribe on him, mixed with resentment that he asked me at that exact moment.  Worried that I am coming apart at the seams, I imagine him dashing immediately to his “prayer closet” to fast and pray that I don’t, actually, face my demise.  He then emails me the next day, seeking to share with me some encouragement from God to help bring some healing and peace to my shattered life.  I then reply with an email with a thanks-but-I’m-doing-great-the-whole-world-is-my-oyster-I-am-invincible-so-your-concern-is-unnecessary, positive theme that confuses and astounds him.  This is reasonable, considering the precarious standing of my state of being less than 24 hours earlier.

When I give Pat my opinion on a subject, he will give me a non-committal “Hmm.”  That’s it.  That’s all I get.  Then, a week or two later, he will call me or email me with a well-thought-out, intentional response.  Depending on my state of mind at the exact moment of his communication, he can get any one of a thousand possible responses from me.  That has to be frustrating for people who seek to be my friends.  What can I say?  I’m like a box of chocolates. 

Pat is always so graceful and loving, and he is learning to not take anything I say as the “bottom line” or my “arrived-at-ending-point”.  When he has carefully worked out an opinion, and it is contrary to mine, he does not ever wield it as a weapon.  This is the danger that most internal processors face.  Because of the emotional and mental investment needed to arrive at a stance polished enough to actually speak aloud, that stance has taken on actual value.  Then, it takes its exalted place as a personal “Truth” that must be defended and must be above questioning and challenge.  Too much has gone into this in order to reach certainty.  It is foundational.  If it gets shattered, the whole person could fall.  So, when taken to an extreme, internal processors can become people who misapply their “personal truth” as “Absolute Truth”, alienating others and labeling those who disagree as “Heretic”.  Pat has never done that to me.  He’s one of the good ones, and I covet his ability to internally process, while still holding on to the output of that processing very loosely.

You can call be bipolar, obsessive/compulsive, or nuts, but, as a verbal (or external) processor, when you ask me how I am doing, you will get an immediate response in real time.  Bill, what is your take on homosexuality and the church?  Are you sure you want to know what I think right now?  Okay, I’ll tell you, but please ask me again tomorrow, because I will have a very different (possibly even opposite) take.  Maybe I am nuts,  but here’s the thing: I need people to ask me and to listen to me.  Many times over.  I shape my worldview based on feedback, questioning, searching, bartering, compromising, believing, doubting, loving, hating, fiery passion, and lame indifference.  In other words, I find myself in community and relationship.  I am willing to dive into ambiguity, because I am much more certain at core truths arrived at in relationship than in any research and opinions I could form in a vacuum.  I am also quite comfortable allowing for another prayerful, thoughtful person to arrive at a completely opposite, yet also valid, opinion or cause.

I am learning that God really likes me.  God doesn’t just love me, because it is in God’s nature to do so.  As freakin’ bizarre as I am, God really thinks I am pretty cool.  I don’t get it, because I drive myself nuts.  However, God must have something that only a weird fool like me can do.  At the same time, I also realize that I have to let go of the idea that God sees me as some kind of “lovable idiot”, like I exist for God’s entertainment.  Such a view fails to take seriously the level of God’s glory revealed through me.  More about that another time, but I felt it was important to note the journey on which God is taking me in this season.

I am starting to realize that, rather than a fool, I am one of God’s favorites.  That may sound like bragging, but I am also learning that such an idea is actually profoundly humbling.  You are also one of God’s favorites.  God finds delight in you.  As a Person.  Not in what you do, your usefulness, your moral behavior, or even your intentions.  God likes you.  God created you and has declared you to be “Very Good”.  You are the image and likeness of the Divine.  If such a notion drives you to try to pick up hot girls or get vanity plates for your sporty new BMW, rather than making you really nervous and causing you to shake in the knees, than you are not grasping the implications of God’s glory in you.

I have, for too long, made the same mistake, but on the opposite side.  I have rejected and held with contempt the Glory of God in me.  I have made choices that limit my power and authority, which is actually God’s power and authority revealed in my character.  So, I have been in denial of just who I was created to be.  I took a job in Seattle that paid well, but was frivolous and silly.  It self-destructed, leaving me in a state of betrayal, loneliness, and shame.  I am far too good to allow myself to be in such a state.  As a child of God, I should never feel shame.

I have been asking myself, since returning home, what have I been doing, subconsciously, to short circuit myself, leading to devastating failure, time and time again.  I have found myself asking this question on many occasions in my history.  I have now realized that it’s the wrong question.  We all fail.  Over and over again, we fail.  Instead of “What the hell just happened?  How do I keep ending up here?”, I am learning to ask, “OK, I just discovered another path that doesn’t get me to B.  That sucked, but I’m still breathing.  What can I learn from this skinned knee and bruised ego, so that this is no longer a failure in itself, but a real stepping stone to wisdom and the shaping of my character?  How can I better reflect the glory of God, because of this perceived failure?”

I have discovered a new life statement that defines just about every stage of my narrative.  It has become my mantra of sorts:

“Well.  THAT could’ve gone more smoothly...”

I think this will be the title of my memoir, if I ever get past all of the obstacles to writing a memoir.

SO, taking all of these scattered thoughts and bringing them together.  A) I am an external processor, saying EXACTLY how I think and feel at any given moment.  This causes a great deal of anxiety and stress for those who mean to love me.  It puts strain on my relationships and pushes people away.  B) I NEVER take the shortest, easiest, proven path to any destination or goal.  This leads to an inevitable string of failures.  C) I have wasted many years hating these aspects of my character and trying to weed them out.  If only I could get rid of these, then I will be useful to God.  D) God created me this way.  Who am I to question the quality of God’s design?  God loves and delights in my freaky and crazy self.

So what do I do with this list of revelations?  Well, I need to learn to love me.  I need to learn that God’s glory, somehow, is best revealed through me, when I embrace my “bull in a china shop” self.  Yet, at the same time, I don’t want to hurt people or strain my friendships.  So, for the sake of loving the people in my life, I tone down my extremes.  I don’t ALWAYS have to spout all that I am thinking and feeling at any given moment.  When the cashier at the gas station asks me how I am doing, she is not actually asking to be burdened with all of my current pain, struggles, fears, dreams, ambitions, and core issues.  This is not changing myself to please others.  Remember, God likes that part of me.  All of our flaws are our gifts taken to extremes.  I just need to no longer feel the need to unload myself on an unsuspecting person, walk away feeling better, and leave them digging through their bag for a Vicodin and a flask.

Now, to be truthful, I am not satisfied with that solution by itself.  I cannot just say, “I’m Great!”, in order to spare others’ feelings if “Great!” is not a true assessment of my current state.  I cannot handle that lack of integrity, if I am learning to live as a loved person.  So, I need to change my state, so that my core self is no longer at the edge of death and despair or at the peak of human evolution and bliss.  If I learn to truly stop holding on to every job as THE JOB, every city as THE CITY, and every land as THE PROMISED LAND, then the inevitable failures and struggles that will come (because nothing is perfect) will no longer leave me devastated. 

Well...That could’ve gone more smoothly.  But, I still made it to this milestone.  I have a few new bruises and scars, but women dig a guy with scars.  None of this was the end of the world.  I can tell people how I am doing, without driving them to scramble for narcotics in order to recover.  I have not wrapped my heart around anything other than God.  There is wisdom in holding everything else loosely.  Then I can truly live loved.  I can live in the joy and freedom of being one of God’s favorites.

How do these little lessons from my experience sit with you?  Are you an external or internal processor?  How do people on the other side of that spectrum affect you?  What freaky quirks has God put in you that God loves?  How do you maintain sanity as a person that God sees as Very Weird and Very Good at the same time?

Turning My Back On The Promised Land

The Promised Land

I arrived, and I discovered that it was all that was promised! I had moved to Seattle, and the city, itself, is everything it was billed to be.  The church community at the Shoreline Vineyard was absolutely amazing. For me, it is truly a land flowing with milk and honey.

Now, as I am writing this, I am working the door  in  my new job as a bouncer at Fox Harbor Pub & Grill, back in Green Bay, Wisconsin. What happened, God? Is there any reason why you showed me that land? Am I to die within sight of the fulfillment of the promise, as Moses did? How is it a promise, if I never get to realize it? 

I want to break all of this down, because I am finally at a place of some clarity on this whole adventure. I have not, by any means, arrived. I still have some frustration, anger, and pain around the whole thing. I have felt, at times, abandoned, betrayed, and lost. I have now, at least, found a bit of a place of peace, because God has given me quite a bit of insight about the nature of promise, covenant, and our participation in those realities. When God gives us a vision for a promise, God fills us with a fire and passion to see, at any personal cost, the fulfillment of that promise. Of course, we will soon face the "buyer's regret" of signing this contract, but that is exactly why God lets us get excited and to burn with an all-or-nothing, consuming desire to see it all.

I have heard people make gossipy, negative comments about others who, in a moment of overwhelming emotion and desperation, commit their lives to Christ, perhaps in an altar call type of setting. An altar call, for the uninitiated, is a Protestant tradition of making people very aware of their moral and spiritual depravity, presenting the promise of salvation in Christ, and then asking people to respond by coming to the altar in the front to publicly proclaim their repentance for their depravity and their desire to have Jesus become their personal Lord and Savior. It's not my style as a pastor, but what do I know? Who am I to judge? It is precisely the emotional surge in response to the promise of being washed clean and being reborn in Jesus that seems to give us the strength to continue to persevere in living out the relationship during difficulties and while facing obstacles later in the journey. We often forget how that surge drove us to the feet of God in the first place. It's not empty, weak emotionalism that is the birthplace of faith, but the mustard seed of purpose and vision, planted by God and intended for the increase of our ability and willingness to try, risk, move, flow, fail, succeed, learn, and grow. It is not an overriding of our internal self, but an intensification of all that was hard wired in us in the womb.

It seems that Abram, later Abraham, must have been filled with that kind of emotional passion when he left the land of Harran, the land of his family and all he knew, and set out for the strange land promised him by God. He knew nothing about that land, other than God promised to prosper him there. He was an old man, far beyond the age of taking risks and being filled with vision for new adventures. Cribbage, golf, and hip replacements should have been the substance of his life, not starting over. All Genesis 12 gives us is the command of God to go to this new land, the promise of a prosperous future, and the simple phrase:

"So Abram went...".

Was it really that easy? What was going through Abram's mind? Did God show up in person to Abram and then travel with Abram to this new land, eliminating all doubt and fear? There is nothing like that in the passage. It is simply command, promise, and response. Maybe I am different, and I am less obedient than Abraham. Maybe he had that kind of simple faith that I would love to have. God says it, and I believe it. That would be wonderful, but I am much more dysfunctional and neurotic than that. I need a full conversion of my heart to take on a brand new life. I need a personal transformation each and every time God gives me something new. I am still a very, very young man (ahem), but I imagine it would be much harder as an old man like Abram.

I think the first key to unlocking the complex, mysterious reality of interacting with a living and personal God is found in a closer examination of the promise. The promise is the seed of hope and a future of prosperity and purpose. That promise is the spark of fire that launches Abram into a risk-taking uncertainty and a willingness to turn away from all that he knows and finds comfortable. Because of our own punishment/reward mentality, however, we often see the promise as a reward for good behavior. If we do it right and follow the rules, THEN we get the promise. If we don't, the promise goes away. It is a conditional promise based on a proper response. So, it is all on us, and we no longer need God. God, then, stops being King and Lord over our lives, and is reduced to a controllable and ignorable fortuneteller or life coach.

Abram kept God exalted to God's rightful place as Lord. However, I have to imagine that there was at least some questioning and struggling on Abram's part. While it is not in the biblical account, just by the very fact that Abram was human, I would think that he would have wanted to double check the source before leaping. He would want to see that God was actually the one addressing him. At some point, Abram must have reached a place of confidence, because he went.

Upon arriving in the Promised Land, Abram built a huge mansion of brick and mortar, establishing the first suburban, gated community. No, actually, he walked around. He would pitch his tent and then, breaking camp, move to a new part of the land. He wanted to explore the whole area, in order to see what God had given him.

Then God appeared to Abram and restated the promise. Why? We don't know for sure, because we aren't given that information. However, I would guess that Abraham needed to be reassured. The passage tells us that the land was occupied. Abram did not show up with an army. He had his wife and his nephew, Lot, with Lot's family along as well. They were not battle-hardened soldiers of fortune. They were nomadic herders of livestock. I don't know about your experiences with this, but I have learned, through some really awkward moments, that if I walk into someone else's yard and pitch a tent, claiming that God promised that land to me as my inheritance, the current inhabitants tend to protest. The Canaanites, unlike Abram and company, actually had multiple armies. So, once Abram saw that the land was occupied by other, armed people, who would not just kindly apologize and immediately move out upon learning of the promise of a God they did not know, based on the word of a strange, nomadic farmer, Abram probably needed some encouragement.

God showed up to remind him of the passionate vision that had brought him to this strange land in the first place. THEN, finally, Abram was able to build the mansion, and he and his wife were able to live happily ever after, never struggling or moving from that permanent, promised home. Actually, he built an altar, not a home for himself. This action was the equivalent of planting a flag, claiming the land for God. Abram never actually ended up building a permanent structure for himself. In fact, the very next verse tells us that there was a famine in the land, and he had to leave to go to Egypt. I'll talk a bit about that next time, but I want to focus in on the nomadic life of Abraham, a homeless man with a promised land. The only piece of land he ended up legally owning was a field with a cave, where he would be buried next to his wife, Sarah.

Here's my point. Abraham seemed to be aware of a truth that most of us miss. When the promise is given, we become passionate and fired up about pursuing that promise. This is a tool for God to keep us checked-in and intentional. However, the danger in that passionate pursuit is in mistaking the promise for the One who made the promise. We don't pursue the Promised Land. We pursue the Promiser. Our passion is awesome and necessary, but it can quickly become a detriment and even a cancer if it becomes more than a motivational driver, leading us to trust and obedience.

Abram seemed to instinctively know that none of this was about the land. It was all about God. The promise, even after it was shared with Abram, never actually belonged to Abram at all, as something to be possessed and held tightly. Therefore, Abram did not kick, scream, and cry when facing Canaanites or famine. He did not cry out to God about being forced to go to Egypt for a time, in order to continue to feed his family. He just did what he had to do. God didn't command him to go to Egypt, and God didn't punish him for going without a direct order from God to do so.

I have trouble with that much freedom. I want God to tell me, step by step, what I must do every single moment of every day. I often complain to God about how slow and stubborn I am. God, if you want me to do X, don't leave me on my own to do it. I am bound to screw it up. Tell me how to do exactly what you want, and I will do it. I want you to micro-manage my life. That approach is as sinful as trying to take over and do it all on my own, looking at God as a life coach, rather than Lord. Either way, I'm trying to control the divine.

God trusts me. God wants me to make mistakes and fail, so I can learn. Those failures are not detrimental, as long as my heart is fixed on God and not the promise.

The telos (or inherent, core purpose) of each and every one of God's promises is to drive us to the heart of God.

The promise is never intended to replace God as our source of strength, provision, or joy. The land is just dirt. As they say, the grass is always greener. I will not be able to hear God better or have more faith in Seattle than in Green Bay. Seattle cannot bring me joy or fulfillment any more than Green Bay can. God told me to go to Seattle. I went, after double and triple checking. For me, it became a place of famine, so I had to go back to Egypt for a time. God provided a job with SmartRelationships.org for my wife and a job as a bouncer for me. This is not my dream job, nor is it the provision that God promised. However, both positions will keep us alive and paying our mortgage for a little while, at least until the famine ends.

So, I turn my back on the Promised Land, and it is now okay. I know that God has something for us. I believe it is in Seattle, but it could be Boston, Phoenix, Minneapolis, New York, or any number of places. The land is dirt. God is eternal, and God is good. God is the treasure and the point of the promise. If I hold lightly to the "where" and cling tightly to the "Who", I will find the fulfillment and the joy I desire. This has given me great peace in a time of confusion and turmoil.

So, how about you? Have you ever had a "Promised Land"? Did you get it right away? Are you still hoping to get there? How has God dealt with you in this area of your life?

A Sinner in the Hands of Mercy

I think the very quick, knee-jerk response to suffering for us, myself included, is to compare ourselves to Job.  We are just good folks, minding our own business, and then God sends the devil after us for some undeserved torture.  "Have you considered my servant (insert your own name here)?" God asks of this satanic figure.  We didn't ask for this.  Now God is using us for the settling of some cosmic wager?  We weren't even on the devil's radar screen, until God threw us under the bus and put a big light on us!  Betting that Job's fidelity to God would fail, resulting in Job cursing God, Satan kills all of Job's kids and grand-kids, wipes out all of his possessions, and covers Job with burning, itching, open sores.  To be helpful, Job's wife shows up and yells at him for being cursed.  Job's friends all try to support him by trying to help him list all of his sins.

For Job's part, he never curses God.  He questions and searches and doubts and gets angry, but he never turns his back on God or curses God's name.  God addresses Job with a series of questions of God's own.  God takes Job apart, asking him if he was there when the foundations of the world were set into place.  It wasn't a "suck it up, Job" speech.  It wasn't a speech designed to make Job feel worse.  It was an epiphany moment for a very broken man.  God was not rebuking Job.  God was rewarding Job with a glimpse into the big picture of the entire universe!

I do struggle with the very end of the Job story, however.  Job is given everything back multiplied by ten.  Sure, the possessions would be cool, but ten times as many kids and all new ones?  If God allowed my three kids to be taken from me, I am not sure I would feel lots better by getting 30 new ones.  How can 30 new little brats replace the three brats I love so much right now?  I'd want them back.  I wouldn't want to have to feed 30 I don't care about.  But I do not have the universal perspective that Job was given.  I don't know on that one.

Anyway, I think our self-comparison to Job is a poor one.  Job's story was not written to give us some archetype to neatly explain our own suffering.  I have heard many sermons on Job, trying to wrap up the whole thing with the tidy bow of a palatable, edifying, and pithy life lesson.  I think we have to ignore the entire story of Job to accomplish such a feat of theological gymnastics.  We have to dismiss all of the uncomfortable questions that we are left to ponder.  Was Job really sinless before the incident?  Was his blessing really a blessing?  Did Job like these new kids better than the originals, in order to simply be "okay" with the deaths of the ones he raised?  Was Job unaffected, in the end, by all of the loss and pain he had endured?  Was he able to look back on the devastation of his previous life and laugh some kind of wise chuckle, because he was, in that moment, satiated by all of his shiny new stuff?  Was he really like a dog that chews on the couch and stops because of the distraction caused by the introduction of a new chew toy?

No, I don't think Job was written to be a lesson to us all on how to deal with pain and suffering.   I don't think pain and suffering is ever so simple as to be explained away or forgotten because of getting new playthings.  We try.  We work really hard to make suffering that way.  The talking heads of Christianity on television speak of suffering as merely momentary, passing.  God does not desire us to suffer, so it is an "attack of the enemy".  Or else they take the position of Job's friends and declare that it is just punishment for sin.  Many of the Christian TV Stars, remember, took the nonsensical position of the Haiti earthquake being the punishment for their worship of false gods.  The 9/11 attacks were God's punishment for the sin of our country's widespread acceptance of homosexuality.  Fools and idiots.  But we all do some of that, don't we?  "My friend, Joe, was just diagnosed with stage 4, terminal lung cancer.  Poor guy is coughing up blood and is not able to even talk to his children to say goodbye.  BUT, it all makes sense.  Remember 10 years ago, when Joe smoked cigarettes for those 3 months, while struggling with his wife's death?  You can't smoke and not expect to pay the price for that sin."  We all want neat, clean answers.  Unfortunately, our search for simple explanations invalidates and minimizes the depth of our suffering.

Some say our suffering is all God testing our perseverance and faithfulness.  So, we are no longer God's children, but rats in God's cosmic Skinner Box.  I don't know about you, but I have never repeatedly punched my son in the face to see how much of a beating he could take, or if he could still say he loves me.  Such testing would be cruel and horrible.

Still others say that the suffering is to get us to the reward.  We get back 10 times what we have lost!  Isn't that awesome?  God has chosen us for the privilege of suffering, because God plans to really, really reward us!  I have suffered a lot of loss in my life.  I have never looked back on it and laughed.  I have never gotten to the point where new people in my life have replaced the emptiness of the loss of precious loved ones.  New people are wonderful, but the reward did not make me feel the deep heartache of real loss any less.

I was feeling sorry for myself the other day (I have started alternating days between self-pity and hope, for the sake of efficiency), and then I read an article about the devastating tornado in southern Indiana.  I read the story of a poor woman, her husband, and their three babies, huddled in their crappy trailer, praying for God's mercy and protection.  Their bodies were found scattered as far as a quarter mile away, laying in piles of rubble like human garbage.  What sin did those toddlers commit?  Where is their reward after a lifetime of suffering in poverty?  Well, they are in a better place, right?  They have a mansion, now, in heaven.  I hear it's a double-wide!  We cannot invalidate and dismiss suffering with frivolous and cute explanations of sin and reward.  Sometimes suffering, as in the case of Job, is undeserved, unsatisfying, and inexplicable.  Sometimes it just sucks.

The "problem" of the book of Job is purely an evangelical, dialectical one.  In an either/or, black-and-white worldview, anything gray and messy is unacceptable.  The Book of Job does not seem to be problematic at all in a Judaic understanding of the world.  Since the first telling of this story, Jews have had the ability to live with the Job story as it is, rather than attempting to rescue it from being a mystical, unkempt narrative.  The both/and approach of Judaism is the only valid way to look at the Job story and our own suffering.  Job isn't a lesson.  It refuses to be reduced to that minimalist reading.  So does my life story.  I don't have anything sorted out neatly to have you learn some important life truth, so true that it can be universally applied.

I have made lots of mistakes in my blundering walk with Jesus.  Am I being punished for it?  Maybe, quite possibly, somewhat.  I did everything well this time.  I took my time and waited before making the leap here.  I brought good, healthy closure with Green Bay.  I didn't take unnecessary risks.  Was I actually being too safe and risk free?  Maybe, quite possibly, somewhat.  I have taken unnecessary risks in the past for the sake of following God's call.  I wanted to be wise and not make the same mistakes.  Did I maybe hear God wrong again this time?  Maybe, quite possibly, somewhat.  Am I on exactly the right path, so Satan is attacking me?  Maybe, quite possibly, somewhat.  Is God preparing me for some awesome reward, following a new, universal perspective?  Maybe, quite possibly, somewhat.

My situation, like Job's, has no neat explanation.  I believe I am being attacked by an enemy that is wanting to destroy my faith and trust in God.  I don't think God is standing idly by, enjoying the show.  I think some of this is the reaping of bad risks in the past.  Direct punishment from God?  Maybe some of that, but I don't believe God wants to punish me, anymore than God wanted to punish the family in the tornado-destroyed trailer.  I think we live in a fallen, sinful, broken world.  God has power, but our decisions to embrace the stuff that gets in the way of our journey toward God have led to a great deal of our pain and suffering.  But God, being good, does have a plan to redeem all of it.  God wants to reward us 10, 100, 1000 times what we have lost.  This doesn't mean that God is naive.  God does not believe that we will just be fine, as long as God gives us lots of good stuff to distract us.  God feels our pain and loss much more than we can.  God has all the transcendence of being present at the birthing of the universe, yet is imminent enough to be involved in our pain and suffering to a divine level.  The pain we feel in our limited, human capacity, God feels to the extent of God's unlimited capacity.  In THAT lies my hope.  I am not alone.

That, my friends, is the Jewish understanding of Job.  It is not hopeless.  Every story in the Jewish scriptures has, as its backdrop, the narrative of the Exodus.  This is a God who rescues, a saving God.  Who is like this YHWH in all of the universe?  Hear, O Israel, the LORD, your God is ONE.  Job is not a lesson.  Job is a single person.  We don't look at Job to see how we can suffer better.  That would be the invalidation of the precious, life-transforming experience of this one man and his God.  How God deals with Job is incredibly unique, as it is for every person who gives God permission to move and act as God will.  I am not reliving the Book of Job.  I am writing the Book of Bill, in partnership with God.  Judaism has the Exodus.  Christianity has the Exodus also.  However, we also have the Second Exodus: The Cross.  The Cross is the backdrop of every narrative we see and hear.  For both Jews and Christians, there is hope that our suffering does not end in despair.  There is hope that it all will be redeemed.  How that happens and what that redemption looks like is all in God's hands.

God is a very real, personal, imminent Emmanuel.  God with us.  God is a very big, mighty, overwhelmingly transcendent Almighty Yahweh.  God is Other.  God is both/and at all times.  God is not sometimes personal and imminent, and, at other times, powerful and transcendent.  God is always both/and.

I am completely at the mercy of this God.  I can't go back, and I can't move forward.  I can make nothing happen at this moment.  I am a slave to God's whim and will.  I cannot force my own will here.  I cannot will someone to hire me.  I cannot will money to appear in my mailbox.  I wait on God.  I am being attacked.  I am being tested.  I am reaping consequences.  I am being prepared and shaped.  I am being redeemed.  I am about to receive incredible reward.  I will be forever scarred by this experience, but my scars become marks of God's glory.  An old friend of mine once said, "I don't care if every single door in this life is slammed in my face, as long as the one door that is open to me is the door to God's Presence."  She said that brilliantly.

At the same time, I am not a helpless victim.  I am an active agent in all of this.  I respond and interact with God.  I speak my heart.  I feel overwhelmed by mercy and generosity.  I cry out in pain.  I surrender in worship.  I argue and defend.  I make spectacular mistakes and have great successes.  I grow, and I am shaped, by this living, dynamic narrative that I write with my God.  My friend's quote above is actually, from her own experience and words, an almost direct quote from our friend Job.  He says this:

"Though He slay me, yet will I hope in Him." - Job 13:15

I journey toward an incredible God.  That God encourages me, loves me, corrects my path, and feels every bruise and cut I receive.  Best of all, that God doesn't stay at the finish line waiting.  God runs to meet me and take me into a loving and fulfilling bear hug.  I don't want to walk toward God.  I want to run, fully embracing all of the implications of every victory, learning from the consequences of every failure, and seeing this whole journey as a redemptive pilgrimage of grace.

 

What has been your experience with suffering?  Do you think our dealings with suffering shape us and make us, or are they to be endured and gotten over as quickly as possible?  I would love your thoughts!

Like a Child

I haven't had a lot to say for the last couple of days, because I have been a bit overwhelmed.  I want to thank all of you for your generosity and love.  Your prayers and support have been incredible.  We even received gifts and prayers from people we didn't know, and it is a wonderful thing to make new friends and connections.  We were able to get through all of our payments for March.  In a couple of weeks, I may be a little worried again, but God is good!  Thank you.  From our whole family, sincerely, thank you. 

We still have no idea where all of this is headed, and I have expanded my search to include the rest of the US.  If I need to go global, I will.  I have always fancied myself an "International Man of Mystery", so we will see if God confirms that.

 

This leads into what I want to talk about today.  In my small group the other night, we were talking about the faith of a child.  Jesus seems to affirm and bless a child-like faith.  We had the chance to discuss it a bit in small group, but, as always, I cannot just let it go at that.  I have been thinking about it ever since.

I was contemplating these questions as the core of my prayer and searching:

1. What is a child?
2. What, specifically, are the central characteristics of the prototypical child that Jesus is focusing on encouraging us to emulate?
3. Where are the gaps between those characteristics and those that are typical of myself and other, sincerely seeking adults?
4. Ultimately, is it possible for those gaps to be bridged?  If so, what aspects of that bridging work are in our area of control, what aspects belong to God alone, and how can we cooperate with God in that movement toward health?

My goal is to come to a solid and clean, all-encompassing answer to all of those questions in the next 700 or so words.  Okay, I'll maybe settle for scratching the surface in this post, and we'll leave the rest for next time.

Children are wonderful, miraculous gifts of God.  They are constant reminders to us of the need to discover and mine this life for all of the magical and awe-inspiring realities it can offer.  Life, for a child, is an adventure, driven by an insatiable curiosity and infused with an openness and surrender that reshapes life into a constant, all-or-nothing proposition. 

Do you remember what that was like?  Did you ever even have that in your life?  I have trouble, myself, digging through the years of mortgages, failures, hurts, ruined plans, fatigue, and betrayals to re-engage with the younger Bill.  The one who was not afraid to dream and try.  I need to make plans.  I need to know what is expected of me.  I need to know that my efforts will result in success.

The main characteristic to which Jesus was pointing in children, I believe, was their innate trust.  You cannot ask a child if their father is good.  Of course he is.  He's the Dad.  Even if the guy is the biggest scum on the planet, a child will still say that their Dad is Dad.  Of course he is good.  There seems to be a shift in thinking for the child that comes with adolescence, but that is also when a child learns about the adult realities of addiction, blame-shifting, and manipulation.  Dad no longer gets a free pass.

However, Jesus was talking about little children, yet untainted by the realities of a sinful world.  The trust of a little child goes hand in hand with their openness.  They are little sponges, absorbing all of the information and stimulus they can receive in their hearts and minds.  They eventually hit capacity, and they crash into a deep sleep, ready to do it all again in the morning.  Because of their youth, they have no tools for processing what they have absorbed through the day.  That requires critical thinking and the ability to step outside of their realities a bit to look at their lives in any kind of meaningful self-assessment.  Those tools will not be developed for quite some time.  In fact, there are many middle-aged adults I know who still don't have critical thinking capabilities.  In the meantime, children are free to take in everything, their minds like a huge aqueduct, free of any gates, valves, or other controls.  Children receive everything unfiltered and unchecked.  And the key term in this is "innate".  It is who they are.  It is their identity.  They are, by their hardwired makeup, open and trusting.

There are some aspects of children that Jesus would most likely not want to see emulated as well.  Children are completely myopic and self-absorbed.  They only know how to take care of their own needs and desires.  There is no existence outside of their immediate, personal environment.  The world belongs to them, and it exists to serve them.  Little brats.  They are also almost completely ignorant.  As sponges, they are a blank slate.  They have no way of thinking through action and consequences.  They simply cannot process, because of a lack of ability to think critically, the deeper implications of words, thoughts, and actions.  I am not sure Jesus would want us to give up being thinking people, checking our intellect at the door of our churches.  But, as is often said, ignorance is bliss, and kids are blissful.  They should be locked up.

I say that a bit tongue-in-cheek, but I did not really like kids before we had our own.  As a matter of fact, I still, for the most part, do not like other people's children.  I have trouble refraining from casting silent judgment on the approach of other parents.  So, there's some of my ugly sin.  If you are a parent and know me personally, and you are worried that I may have judged you, let me calm your fears.  I probably have.  At the same time, I am a messy, broken, sinful idiot, who has been blessed and just barely lucky enough to keep my kids from killing each other or themselves in freak accidents.  If you are parenting to get my approval, you have bigger problems than knowing the right way to raise your children. I'm the LAST person who would be qualified to judge other parents.  In other words, you are doing great.  Don't worry about me.  Just please keep your kids from running around the restaurant, thinking everyone else in the place has raised eyebrows as a result of how darned adorable your kids are.  I have a few other things, but lets start with that. ;)

Okay, I can hear my wife, though she's 1800 miles away, admonishing me to get back on track and wrap this thing up.

The openness of children can be met with mercy, love, and endless grace.  Unfortunately, it can also be met with betrayal, cruelty, and abuse.  We pour our very adult fears, anxieties, frustrations, and dysfunctions into our children.  Yet, because of the defining characteristic of open trust, our children will keep coming back, time and again, always believing that we are good.  As we grow to adulthood, we begin to think critically, and that causes us to become cynical.  We always wait for the other shoe to drop.  We hesitate from running into the open arms of a father figure, because we have been met by a fist, rather than an embrace is the past.  I mean that metaphorically, though many of us have had our trust rewarded with a literal fist, causing untold damage and disintegration of our personal realities.  I really believe that God's judgment will be all about how we, as a people, have treated our children.  That will be a scary day.

I think back on when my kids were small, and they would make up incredibly involved games, usually involving a ball, trees, bikes, a net or two, sticks, the dog, and usually some random, very sharp object.  Like I said, my parenting philosophy is based on dumb luck.

My mission statement: Help them survive until adulthood.  Save up to help them with therapy. Quit while you're ahead.

Their games were very intricate with no discernible rules whatsoever.  There was a lot of running, falling, screaming, and giggling.  Now that I think about it, it was amazing that they were all able to play the same game, often for hours, without any difficulties.  They weren't bothered by the fact that there were no rules, evidenced by the fact that my late removal of the afore-mentioned sharp object from the field of play did not affect the game at all.  I would think the object would be a pivotal part of the game, with how often it was wielded, but they were fine with its absence.  They also had no sense of competition.  I have realized recently the level to which competition is an adult-introduced concept.  We take children who are delightfully unaware of rules, and we put them in organized sports, because it "teaches them discipline".  Sports are good for that, but they are also learning competition and a dependency on rules for guidance.  Once our kids did sports, free play ended, and fighting with each other about fairness and rule-breaking ensued.  I love sports, but I am raising the question.

Back when they were little, they would be running, screaming, laughing, kicking the ball, hitting the dog with the bat, jumping on and off bikes, catching each other in the nets in a tumultuous vortex of mud, sweat, fur, barking, laughter, tears, and shouting.  Then, suddenly, Grace (my eldest) would jump up and yell, "We all win!"  They would all let out a huge cheer, hug each other, hug the dog, and then come and ask me for food. 

It's just amazing to me.  I think the key to this might be identifying exactly why, as adults, we need to have rules, a planned outcome, or even a point in order to move forward.  God kind of brought me up short this weekend about this very topic.  As the generosity and love of the people in our lives helped us get caught up on March, I was immediately thinking like a well-trained adult.  We are already halfway through March, with rent and mortgage due again in two weeks.  I was also close to the Kingdom, thinking like a child.  I was completely feeling sorry for myself, because my current situation overwhelms me.  I have no control.

I approached God and asked why this all happened.  God, you told me that I should go to Seattle.  Everything fell into place.  I had a good job, and affording an apartment wasn't difficult.  I would have that job for at least a year, giving me time to find a new job, without desperation or stress.  I would move the family here, and we would settle in Bellevue, where our kids could attend great schools, and Eli could play football.  We would be close to the church and to work.  And, you know what God?  Since you did such a great job setting all of this in place, I might even be willing to plant a church again one day.  That's how impressed I was with you, God, upon coming out here.  You promised me all of this, and it is all gone and up in the air now.  Why did none of this work?  I followed the rules, it was supposed to work out.  Why did you promise me all of this, only to take it away?

God did not smack me or shame me for asking these questions.  God put on my heart, in a very clear and strong impression, "I never said any of that.  I said, "Go to Seattle."  You obeyed and went.  Good job!  You are faithful to me, Bill.  You did exactly what I asked you to do, but the rest of those plans are all you.  What if I only intended on having you here for a couple of months?  What if I have something even better for you somewhere else?  Remember, I am good.  You are mine.  My plans and my reasons are mine.  You will get your next instructions at the exact right time.  Obey, just like before, and you will see my glory."

Okay, God.  Got it.  I am supposed to be like a child.  Regardless of circumstances pointing to the contrary, my God is good.  Enjoy the game.  Play.  Stop trying to figure out the rules, what's expected of you, and how to win.  Very often, in this fallen world, people who play by the rules are not rewarded with the win.  Stop making elaborate game plans for winning in the first place.  Those just set up your expectations and your vision to be too small, and then you miss what God is doing.  Stop caring about the rules.  Stop thinking like you have to do "A", in order to receive "B".  Sometimes people do "A" very conscientiously and well, only to die in a car accident right before receiving "B".  Sometimes people give no time and attention to "A", and they get "B" anyway. 

God keeps counsel only with God.  I need to work on being open to being transformed by God to have trust and openness become innate and characteristic of my identity again.  I do "A", because God told me to do "A".  "B" is completely God's domain, and it is none of my business.  If I let go of my clinging to cause-and-effect rule following, but I discern and think clearly and critically along the way, I can truly be like a child.  I can play for the love of play, rather than to have a point or a desired outcome.  My desired outcome is that, at the end of the day, I said "Yes" to God.  Ultimately, my hope is in the fact that God is good.  God will give me all I need to do "A", and, instead of "B" (my idea of desired outcome), God will give me 

"B" (God's desired outcome).

I just want to play!

 

So, what do you think?  Am I on to something here, or is this just wish-fulfillment and silliness on my part?  How can we exist as children in a culture filled with rule-following cynics?  What are some other key gaps between childlike faith and our adult faith that need bridging?

An Appeal - With a New Update

NOTE:  Hello everyone!  Teresa and I want to thank all of you for your kindness and care.  We were overwhelmed by the outpouring of love and support.  It looks very promising!  We are fairly sure that I will be able to pay my rent this weekend.  Your kindness was amazing!

We are not completely out of the woods yet, with a number of bills due in Green Bay.  Also, many of you have said that you'd still like to help.  I have added a Paypal "Donate" button to the right side of this blog, because a number of people have told us they would like to give through that.  You don't have to be a PayPal member to use it.  A number of people emailed us and told us they weren't sure if they even knew how to write a check anymore.  That's awesome!

You have really touched us and blessed us today.  Thank you.  Teresa kept texting me to say that this was "like being in a Frank Capra movie".  I was moved to tears a number of times today.  Thank you from all of us.  Words fail me.  Words never fail me.  Or...rather...I never fail to keep using words...  I'll stop.  May God touch your hearts even more than God touched ours today.  My you all be filled with wonder and awe at the immense lavish love of God today.

 

Well, in the ongoing saga of Bill and Eli, things continue to move very quickly in the relative direction of nowhere.  We have no idea where we're going, but we're making good time! 

 

Update:

My meeting with the manager of our apartment complex was pushed off until yesterday, because she had commitments all day on Monday.  When I went up there to talk to her, it was a good conversation.  It was also difficult.

Here is where it all stands:

1) No matter what, rent must be paid for March with some late fees and bringing all utility payments to current.  This will be around $2000, and I have until Friday to come up with those funds, or it goes to the attorneys.  This does not include our mortgage, car payment, utilities, etc. in Green Bay.  Since we are a month behind on our mortgage, we will need approximately $5000 total to get everything in both places up to current.  Then we have to face April, but I will hopefully have work by then.

2) If I choose to go back to Green Bay, thereby breaking my lease early, the $2000 is still due by Friday.  On top of that, I will owe quite a bit in penalties, another month's rent, and another month's utilities.  They do not do a payment plan on all of that, so the total amount will be due the moment I turn in my keys.  On top of that, there would be a truck rental of around $1000, with gas, lodging, and food for the ride home.  All told, I calculate that option to be around $10,000.  If I were to load a truck in the middle of the night and run, that would result in an immediate lawsuit against me, requiring me to return here for court appearances.

3) She also said that they won't actually kick me out.  Eviction costs them too much money, so, by the time that my owed rent would reach the point of being worth pursuing legally, my lease would be up anyway.  I would have some severe problems getting credit again for quite a few years, but Eli and I wouldn't be homeless.  Of course, the credit problems would make it very difficult to get a lease or home loan for my family.

4) We got our first eviction notice posted on our door yesterday.  That was very humiliating.  She didn't go back on her word.  These notices are required by law before sending us to collections.  They are also required to be posted on the outside of the entrance door.

All of that said, I called Teresa after the meeting, and she and I both felt that the best thing would be to just stay here.  If I could somehow get together $10,000 (in my current situation, the equivalent of getting my hands on 5 wild unicorns) for the move back to Green Bay, incurring a hit to my credit for breaking the lease anyway, for that price I could pay rent and utilities here for another 6 months.  Eli and I are staying, and we are praying for $2000 by Friday (in my current situation, the equivalent of being approached by Microsoft to be their new CEO).

 

The Appeal:

We are really in need, and Jesus seems to have people be his hands and feet on this earth.  We are reaching out to all of the people in our lives and our community all over the world.

First, please keep praying for us.  Your prayers are more cherished than you can know.

Second, if you have ever been blessed as a reader of this blog or have ever been blessed by the direct ministry and friendship of Teresa and myself, can you help us get through this time?  We are asking for a financial gift of faith to sow into us and our future ministry.  Whatever you can give would be a wonderful blessing, and we'd be eternally grateful.  Not to be pushy, but we really need it in hand by Friday. :)

If you want to be used by God in this way, please write to my wife, Teresa, and she will give you the info. 

She can be reached at:  teresa.sergott(at)gmail(dot)com

Thank you for your friendship and love.

So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish

Well, doomsday is finally upon me.  This morning, barring a last second call from the governor, I will be dead man walking on the green mile.  I'm not looking forward to it at all.  I will have to walk up to the rental office in my apartment complex and explain that I cannot pay the rent.

First, I want to thank all of you who have helped us out with very generous gifts.  You have helped sustain us, and I thank you.

The hardest part for me will be telling Eli after school.  He still believes in the goodness of God, and he is absolutely convinced that God will come through for us.  I, admittedly, have fallen into total despair on that one.  I love the idea that God is with us.  However, God is not the one who has to talk to the manager.  God is not the one who has to break my son's heart.  God is not the one who will be humiliated.

I'm sorry.  I'm just sad and pissed.

I don't get it.  If there's something I am supposed to learn in all of this, fine.  I admit it.  I'm an idiot.  Hit me in the head with the lesson so I can learn it.  I didn't take unnecessary risks.  I didn't foolishly squander my money on booze, gambling, and loose women.  I did everything asked of me.  We were broke when I moved here.  Now we are broke AND in debt.

The frustration is overwhelming.  The hollow in the pit of my stomach that had been absent during my time of working on getting healthy is back in full force.  I am, again, alone and abandoned.  The football has been pulled away, right before I was able to kick it.

The thoughts and feelings I have going through me are scaring me a bit.  I feel like I, again, have failed my wife and kids.  I feel like I can't win, even when I do everything perfectly.  I continuously flunk life.  I feel like a shitty husband and father.  I have felt this way many times in the past, but this time there is a finality to it that goes beyond the norm.  I have always been an eternal optimist, but now I feel no hope.

Church was difficult for me yesterday.  They talked about giving and generosity, which was fine.  The problem came in the prayer time.  I held my hands open to receive whatever God had, and I felt completely lame.  The pastor spoke of releasing the financial and personal burdens that are on us and trading them in for the grace and mercy of God.  Surrender them and don't carry them anymore.  Awesome prayer and message.  I have prayed that as a pastor for others many, many times.  I was dismayed and afraid, when I realized that I have no idea how to do that.  What does that even mean?  If I think really hard.  If I concentrate just right.  I won't have to walk up to the office in a little bit?  I won't have to borrow money to rent a truck to get Eli back to Green Bay?  My wife and kids will suddenly be better off with me than without me?  I will suddenly be a productive member of society?

No.  I just felt lame. 

No matter how much I set my jaw in determination.  No matter how I did all I could possibly do to find work.  No matter how much I try to will myself to believe.  I am just left lame.

Sorry, folks.  I tried.  I tried harder than you can imagine.  I simply have no fight left in me.

 

Sorry for the bummer post.  I am naive and stupid enough to, most likely, start dreaming again as soon as I'm back in Green Bay.  I'm also sure that I will be all excited again soon, and I will share all of that with you.  I'll even race back to the heels of God.  I'm like that fool, mongrel dog that keeps loving his master, no matter how many times he gets kicked.  I'm too dumb to leave God and stop following Jesus.  Besides, where would I go?  He's the only one with the words of life and truth.  Plus, in spite of all my efforts to stop it from happening, Jesus has completely captured my heart.  I am his slave.

So, another dream is dead.  I couldn't make this one go either.  Edison screwed up 9999 light bulbs, Lincoln lost a whole bunch of elections, and all of that crap.  Right now, I just feel lame.

Tomorrow, as they say, is another day.

Lenten Strain

Well, Lent started on Wednesday.  As usual, I am armed with my Lenten devotionals (three this year), planned days of fasting and prayer, a number of very holy and righteous goals planted unshakably in my mind and heart, and a set-jaw determination to not only enjoy Lent this year, but to virtually Conquer it!

OK, that's all a load of crap.  I do have a couple of devotionals, and I did plan a few days of fasting, though I may end up doing a fast from planning.  Actually, that's kind of crap also.  My church planned the days of fasting, and I am going to try to go along with those days.  We'll see.

Normally, I embrace Lent with passion and vigor.  I have a knack for compunction.  I am self-critical and self-condemning enough, that I have usually seen Lent as a time that gives free reign to those tendencies.  That is actually not what Lent is about, but that is the part the got the majority of my attention and energy in seasons past.  It's what I am good at.  Go with what you know, right?

A lot of my self-pity, self-flagellation, and self-obsession was shaken a bit yesterday.  Today is my son, Eli's birthday.  Happy Birthday to the greatest kid on the planet!  He's 11, and he is totally pumped about all it means to be 11.  I brought him out here to live with me, and he has embraced this area and his new school with a fierceness that I can only envy.  After I was laid off from my job two weeks ago, I told him that we may have to move back to Green Bay for a while.  He said that I could go ahead and do that, if I thought that was best.  He would be staying.  He wasn't going anywhere.  This is now his home.

Well, back to me (as usual).  So, yesterday I was in a foul mood.  I had gotten a rejection from the car dealership where I had interviewed.  I am not the right fit.  Out of desperation I had applied for a Senior Pastor position at a Vineyard in Raleigh, North Carolina.  They wrote and told me I wasn't as qualified as their other candidates.  Seriously?  As a degreed pastor in the Vineyard for a decade, I just don't have the qualifications to pastor a Vineyard church?  Oh well, it probably wasn't right for me anyway.  Raleigh is pretty Bible Belt, and I would just make those poor people angry.

So, here I am, working my tail off to work.  Facing daily rejection.  No longer having enough to pay either my rent or our mortgage in 5 days, much less both of them.  No way to get a paycheck by then, anyway.  Can't afford to bring the girls out here.  Can't afford to go home.  No jobs in Green Bay anyway.  Thankfully, there is a small grace period on our mortgage, though we just got all of that caught up, and I am not wanting to get behind again.  Unfortunately, there is no grace period on the apartment, so Eli and I will be living in a Toyota Camry in a few days.  How disappointing.  It really looked good this time.

Yesterday, I wasn't so resigned to this.  I had failed.  That was all I could see.  I was fine with failing myself.  I have done that my whole life.  It was failing my son, who is loving his new school.  It's the conversation I will have to have with him on March 2, that will be ultimately soul-crushing and humiliating for me as a father.  To look him in the eye and tell the kid who worships me as a hero that I am incapable of providing for us is really grotesque.  Yesterday, I was pissed.  Today, I am sad and ready to face whatever comes.

I had stuff I needed to sign, so the girls can get food stamps and such back in GB, and I couldn't find another form.  I kept looking and looking, and I couldn't even accomplish that!  That was the point, yesterday, when I snapped.  I was throwing stuff all over my office in a total rage.  Eli was in the other room playing video games, and I managed to do it in silence.  Then, before I started screaming in front of him and in an apartment with thin walls, I quietly mumbled to him that I had to go run some errands and quickly moved out the door.  It was too rainy to punch-dance out my rage in a Footloose-esque gymnastics/dance routine that I need to somehow "butch up" to make it seem manly.  I was left with just driving and screaming.  I found a back road to a local mall, where I could get Eli a couple little trinkets for his birthday.

I then screamed at God with all of my might.  I broke, and I wept.  Sometimes God seems really cruel.  God took my dad away (or gave me a dad who was useless and didn't stay), when I was little and needed a dad.  That was right after we had moved to Iron River, Michigan.  As kids, my brother and I saw the place as magical and full of promise and hope, until that happened.

God took my grandma away with cancer, with me needing to change her bedpan from time to time.  She was the one who had raised me while my mom worked to support us, and I had to see her in a state of indignity, as a merciless disease slowly consumed her bones, blood, and tissue.  Though my mom finally had a good job, we still struggled because of all of the medical stuff and the constant care that was necessary.  That was right after we moved to Green Bay, and that move was full of hope and promise, as my mom would no longer have to work 3-4 jobs to make ends meet, for the first time since my dad's departure.

God took the person who was my youth pastor and my mentor away, again with cancer.  This was right after she was really improving, and everything was in remission.  There was so much hope.  We had stayed with her for over a week less than a month before her sudden decline and death.  We were talking about huge plans we had to start a retreat center and covenant community.  We were going to minister to youth and in healing people in professional ministry.  We had goals.  We had written them down.  We had that horizon and the assurance of God's hand and God's blessing.  At that time, I had sworn I would never trust God again, if God decided to take her away.  "God, if you take her, you lose me!!", I shouted to the silent heavens.  Within two days after making that vow, I rescinded it and went back to gearing my whole life for following Jesus.  God's culpability apparently easily forgiven and forgotten.

God wasn't satisfied killing people I loved.  He moved on to my finances and security.  I had a very expensive degree, because there are no Theology degrees from the local tech school.  Yet, ministry didn't pay anything.  It demanded more than 100% of my time and energy, but it seemed bent on just using me and throwing my carcass away.  We went broke.  For the first 10 years of our marriage, our best year was $25K combined.  We had to start charging groceries and necessities to credit cards.  We had no kids, though we desperately wanted them.  Without kids, we didn't qualify for most programs.  So, we eventually had to claim bankruptcy.  We both found ourselves wishing that we had at least lived it up and had gone way, way into debt buying a bunch of frivolous, expensive crap.  As it was, we only had around $12,000 in debt (not including student loans).  That is less than half the credit card debt that the average American carries.  Still, it was too much for us to overcome on our income.

God took away my job opportunities, right after we moved to Grafton, Wisconsin to train to be Vineyard pastors.  In those three years, I had 5 jobs.  I did lots of stuff.  Only one of those jobs was lost because of poor performance on my part.  I wasn't fired, but we both agreed that it wasn't working out.  I was supposed to sell $25,000 copiers to churches all over Wisconsin.  Every pastor I met would inevitably ask, "Do you have anything around $200?"  The rest of the jobs were limited gigs or were lost because of company closings.

Then, when we were moving back to Green Bay, full of hope and promise, and a great job waiting for me, ready to plant a church, God took that job away right after we signed a lease.  We had to actually beg people back in Grafton for the money to pay rent.  Got a great job as a controller for a paper company, and the day after our daughter, Maggie, was born, I went to work to find everything dark.  "Oh, didn't they call you?  We're out of business."  No, they didn't freaking call me!  More begging.  More food stamps.  Now the government was taking our tax refund every year to force us to pay my student loans.  They have to see that we are WAY below the poverty line, right?  They won't take it this year.  We desperately need this money.  Crap! They took it again.

I moved our church into a "free" building, only to see the gift withdrawn a few months later.  Yet, it wasn't really fully taken back.  Rather, I was teased with it for a year and a half.  "I'm donating the building.  Nah, I think I'll sell it.  I'll sign the deed by Friday.  You need to move out, so I can auction off the building."  It was such an incredible miracle.  What a gift!  Then it was taken away, and something in me died.  We were talked into having me leave my day job and go full time with the church.  Not long after that, my father-in-law passed away, and we were given a wonderful inheritance.  Of course, that was tainted as well, as a family member of Teresa's selfishly tried to grab as much as he could.  However, we were finally going to be ok!  We started an investment portfolio.  We started college funds for our kids.  Then, I had to sign a lease that was very affordable, at the time, in order to have a place for the church to meet.  That killed us.  Good friends left.  The economy fell out, and most of our leaders with solid educations and incomes had to find work in large cities.  We had to live on our savings for more than a year and a half.  We told God that we would stick it out, until the money ran out.  It did, without the promise being fulfilled.  When we started having to spend our children's college funds, we knew we had to move.

I got this awesome job, right when we were hitting the point of being 3 months delinquent on our mortgage.  With the signing bonus, we were able to get caught up a bit, and at least to be current.  It was looking great!  So much hope and promise!  This time it really was going to be different!  OK, so we were starting at zero.  God was faithful to keep us from having to start from the negative!  God is SO GOOD!!  It was a little rough moving here and adjusting, but I was really starting to get the business and was really flowing in it.  I was able to move Eli here, so I wasn't so lonely, and his presence really helped me focus on the job, rather than worrying and being alone with my obsessive thoughts.  Will the other shoe drop?  Maybe not...  It seems to be holding this time...  It's helped that I have been too busy to really rejoice publicly, because I didn't jinx it...  We are doing so well, on our way to a record year, and it's only the beginning of February!!  Our supplier is refusing to sell to us anymore and I am laid off.

I poured all of this out to God, as I screamed and cried and punched the steering wheel and screamed more.  I waved off a concerned police officer, as he looked over and saw tears streaming down my face.  THAT was embarrassing.  Get it together, Bill.  But I told God how mean he seemed.  Not only that, but I couldn't even feel bad for myself with all my pain and humiliation and loss, because my new pastor's son is suddenly riddled with cancer, and the prognosis isn't good.  Me and my job troubles were nothing compared to that!  Rather than giving me proper perspective, that thought filled me with more rage at the unfairness of not being able to enjoy a guilt-free screaming session.  Even the validity of my pain was being taken from me!  I am invalid.  I am an invalid.  A cipher.  (That's how bad it was!  I was being so selfish as to, in my mind, even try to make another person's terrible illness and pain all about me)

Why does God do this?  Why not just kill me?  Why do you have to tease me and torture me, like a cat playing with it's prey for hours before finally biting the poor mouse's head off?  I feel like Charlie Brown, and, God, you are Lucy.  You hold the football for me to kick it, promising to not pull it away this time.  This time, I can kick the damn football!  I am that naive, and that stupid.  I'm that pathetic.  I run at that football again, full of hope and promise.  I have bet my safety, my security, my family, and my whole life on that promise.  It has to be true.  God cannot lie, right?  Before my awareness catches up to the event, I am on my back, looking with cloudy vision at the autumn sky, as dying leaves fall all around me.  I hate Charles Schultz and that STUPID, DEPRESSING COMIC STRIP!!!  WHERE IS THE REDEMPTION FOR CHARLIE BROWN?!?  GOOD GRIEF!!!

I even pictured myself yelling that with my head tilted back and my uvula in full view, as my screaming mouth fills the screen.

Then I saw a Vietnamese noodle soup restaurant, called "Pho Shizzle", and it struck me as so non-sensically funny, that I laughed until I swore that my stomach muscles were ripping.  I was still laughing when I got to the mall, and I turned a corner and almost hit a guy in full construction gear, helmet and everything.  I yelled in surprise, "CRAP!!  I almost killed one of the Village People!"  That cracked me up even more.  My face was all splotchy and tear streaked and red, and I was hysterically laughing.  I was also completely alone in the car.  People must have thought I was a lunatic.

Last night I checked out a new small group, and it was wonderful.  We talked about Luke's account in the Bible of the temptation of Jesus.  The time was brilliantly led, and we all seemed to get in touch with some very real stuff.  God really spoke to me in kindness and mercy.  He was not rebuking me at all for my earlier episode in the car, which surprised me.  With some of what I was saying, I would have kicked my butt.

We talked about how this event in Jesus' life took place right after his baptism.  God had affirmed the identity of Jesus, saying, "Behold My Son, in Whom I am well pleased."  As that happened, Jesus was filled with the Spirit of God.  That same Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness to be tempted by evil.  The Spirit led Jesus into temptation, no matter that Jesus would soon teach us all to pray to Our Father, asking Him to, specifically, lead us NOT into temptation.  Hmmm.  Filled with the Spirit, Jesus was led into the wilderness to be tempted...  To face trials...  Then, those temptations were directed right at the core of Jesus' recently-confirmed identity as God's Son.  Also his authority was attacked.  Most of those things the devil used to tempt Jesus wouldn't work on me.  Other than the food, that is.  Jump off the Temple?  Not me.  From a high place, being promised authority over the whole world?  I can't even find my stupid check stub for a social services form.  All of that responsibility seems exhausting.  Besides, I'm scared of heights.

I was hit, again, that God doesn't seem to be as invested in our comfort and self-established security as we are.  God doesn't seem as focused on the impropriety of God leading His Son right to Satan.  He doesn't care that Jesus, himself, was led around the wilderness by evil and didn't immediately cast it out.  God seems to make plans to allow the devil to have his way again, "at the opportune time".  Gethsemane.  Nothing left, and it is all stripped away.  It is Jesus and his own death.  Brutal, raw, and as profane and repugnant as feces.  That is evil and death as it is.  That is me.  I am facing the same.  We all are.  At some point, we all arrive at Gethsemane.  We are all stripped bare and are led around by our own mortality.

Someone in the small group wisely observed that Jesus seemed to really engage the devil as the devil.  When confronting demonic or evil influences in people, he would deal with the evil as itself and then engage the person as exactly the person that they were created to be.  Wow!  The implications of that are amazing.  By engaging the devil as the devil, Jesus took care of that, so that we would never have to engage the devil as the devil on our own!  Of course we will have to confront temptation and evil in ourselves, but Jesus faced the ultimate evil and the last enemy, death, directly as they were.

The question I face in my Gethsemane has nothing to do with my job skills or qualifications or history.  It has nothing to do with any of my gifts or hopes or comfort or security.  It is me.  And I am afraid, but determined.  Why?  Because I don't face death.  I face Jesus.  He is engaging me as me.  The excuses are gone; the self-pity has no value or influence.  It is only me: naked, raw, and afraid.  Is that person worthy of engagement by the King of Kings?  Probably not, but at least more so than the devil.  I hope.

Maybe that's what Lent is really all about.  Maybe it's not about how many devotionals I can simultaneously do.  Maybe it's not about whether I am good at fasting.  Maybe it's about the journey of my heart from the temptations and evils of this wilderness existence to the Gethsemane that awaits me under the shadow of the Cross.  Because Jesus faced evil and death, I get to face him, rather than those adversaries.  Yes, sometimes facing him can be scary, but, regardless of the circumstances, He's good.  He's the King!

So, I still don't get why he keeps pulling the football away, but I need to engage him as Jesus, not as Lucy.  I think the answer may somehow lie in that engagement.  I'm still jobless and broke, and it is now impossible, barring a miracle, for me to not be homeless in a week.  I don't want to be exposed and humiliated.  He may allow that to happen, I don't know.  That's none of my business.  All I can do is continue to obey and put one foot in front of the other, walking toward my Gethsemane.  I no longer have any hope in my ability to get a job and make money in time to save us.  Maybe that's exactly where he wants me.  I don't know.  I just press on with my cross, and His presence is all around and in me.  I am satisfied.

May the King engage you this Lenten season.  Be blessed!  He is good!

 

Ahh, Life.

As many of you know, I have moved to the Seattle Area to start a job in a home theater company. We act as a manufacturer's rep of sorts for some companies that make high end electronics. These are not the items you buy off the shelf at Walmart or Target. These are true technophile fantasy pieces, many of the single components beginning in price at $5000 each.

I was hired as the Director of Operations for this company by the owner, a good friend of mine. This was a solid company, doing more than $3.5 Million in sales last year alone. I started on the second Monday of January.

I was so excited, because I was coming off of many years in a ministry position, and, frankly, I was very tired of struggling financially. Taking care of a family of five on a pastor's salary is no picnic, and we were actually forced to receive a number of different forms of assistance from you, the taxpayer, just to make ends meet. Now, I had finally landed a job that paid well. VERY well. This was to be a bit of a sabbatical for me, allowing me to work with the electronic stuff that makes me a real nerd, but I wouldn't have the emotional drain that comes from full time ministry. To be honest, I really needed the Gospel to be Good News for me again. I had gotten to the point where my livelihood relied on preaching. We were always broke. Therefore, since sharing the Gospel was what was to feed my family, and the Gospel seemed to need the help of the state food stamp assistance program to do so, I was finding that I was rather disappointed and disillusioned with the lackluster "good news" that seemed to apply to my own life in Jesus.

Now, I know this is faulty thinking. I also know that at least one of the readers of this will respond that this kind of thinking is heretical and blasphemous. So be it. I see a long and healthy tradition in Scripture of people approaching their God with questions and serious seeking of Truth. There is no blasphemy here. As to the charge of "heresy", I say this: What did you expect when you read a blog entitled "Heresy of the Month"? Get over it. :)

So, I thought I would work during the day making enough money to no longer struggle, and in the evenings I could pursue my writing dream. By the way, all this talk about money, you'd think I was into a prosperity gospel, where blessed people are rich people. This could not be further from the case. I'm merely saying that I was burned out on always being poor. I was not burned out on ministry itself.

I moved here, feeling like a bit of a drug dealer. In a recession, with people jobless and hungry, I was selling overpriced home theater equipment, frequently at a price of $40,000 for a whole system, to people with too much money. I'm quite the opposite of prosperity. I came out alone, and I quickly missed my wife and 3 kids. They were planning to move here after the school year was out. It got to the point where my son was surrounded by a surplus of estrogen, and he was really missing me. I was missing him as well, and I was starting to talk to my dishes. So, last week I moved him out here with me. He loves the local school, and we both fell in love with this city.

The first three weeks were an extremely tough transition for me. To go from a life of ministry to this was a huge leap. However, I was writing down and developing some great ideas for increasing out customer base and growing the business. That is, until I was laid off this morning.

Our main supplier decided to cut us off, because, apparently, selling product the way we were selling it is against their internal rules. They had so many, it was difficult to know which one, if any, we were actually violating. It was more of a general suspicion that, since we were selling so much product, we must be somehow cheating. We weren't, but they can choose who they will supply with product. Without any proof or any hearing, the company that provides 90%+ of our products had determined that we could no longer sell their stuff.

So, my wife has been packing the house. I have a lease on a place out here. My son is thriving in his new school. We are not going back. So, what the heck is the deal with my inability to ever make any money? I've raised money for others fairly successfully, but I could never do it for myself.

Now, I am not negative about this, because this is way too much of a coincidence to be coincidental. I believe God used this job to get me out here. What comes next? I don't know. We have rent and a mortgage. We have been cut off from aid, because I started making too much to qualify. Now, I qualify again, but resending all of our info can be a chore.

I'm sad, because I think this company could have been great. However, I'm starting to think that God may have other plans for me. God is good like that.

So, please pray for me. I am right back at square one, and that is after burning my ships and deciding to stay here. Very practically, I need a job. Soon! I will take any prayer you are willing to bring before God. If some of you want to fast, that would be great also.

Thank you, my friends. I have a lot more time to write again, so you will hear from me soon.

Peace.

Big Changes

Well, I am here today in Seattle.  I had an interview yesterday to be the operations manager of a company in the Snoqualmie area.  The owner is a friend of mine, and he made me an offer that is very difficult to refuse.  In fact, I don't really even want to refuse the offer.  Also, in this area, I would be very well connected with people and organizations that are alive, dynamic, and progressive.  I am taking a bit of time, while we are here, to seek God and pray a bit before making a decision.

You see, I have struggled in the past with obeying God.  I was talking a bit about this at our weekend service for church this Sunday.  Forgive me, but I am going to use this post as a bit of cathartic and therapeutic work.  I could really use some of your thoughts and input.

Anyway, like I was saying (before I rudely interrupted myself), we talked a bit about this subject on Sunday.  We were discussing Abram (later Abraham) and his call to leave the land he knew and move to Canaan.  God promised him the land as his inheritance.  God also promised that he would have many descendants, who would multiply and fill the land, subduing it and taking possession of it.  I notice two distinct responses from Abram that are rather striking in terms of his faith.

First, he just went.  He was a stranger in that land.  He was leaving his family and friends behind.   There is no sense that he struggled with it at all.  God told Abram to go.  Abram went.  He didn't walk around, seeking counsel and support from wise friends and neighbors.  He didn't do a "recon trip" before deciding whether to obey.  He didn't ask God for lots of signs and confirmations of this call.  He just went.  It is almost Forrest Gumpish in how Abram just seems to wake up and do what God says.  I am actually pretty good at this first part.  As I have sought to be a man who says "Yes" to God with my whole life, I actually have a fairly strong gift of faith to just unquestioningly obey.  It's Abram's second response of faith that is the one with which I struggle.  It is also the one that I think has to be the most difficult for all of us who consider ourselves human.

Abram pitches a tent.  He has been promised this land.  It is his, and he is secure in that.  He builds stone altars and permanent memorials to the God who sent him, but he builds nothing permanent for himself.  In fact, for his entire life, the only permanent structure that Abram will own will be his tomb.  Now, I have heard people say that this was a bit of a lack of faith on Abram's part.  Abram had no idea what God meant by possessing the land, and he had no descendants, so he only trusted enough to go there.  If he had truly believed God, he would have settled in a permanent home there.

I think it's just the opposite.  I think Abram acted in a faith that I can only dream of having.  He trusted God enough to get up and go where sent.  Awesome.  I've done that as well.  But Abram trusted God enough to NOT take the promise into his own hands!  He remained mobile, based on the information he had, which was limited at best.

In 2001, Teresa and I felt that God was calling us to go and plant a church in Green Bay.  We went, with the promise of a great career position that would support our ministry very well.  We were excited for a future full of hope and promise, as we loaded up the truck (and moved to Beverly).  I would have the best income of my life, I had solid networks in Green Bay from my Catholic ministry days, and I felt like God was sending me with the promise that I would inherit the land.  God would do incredible things, affecting the entire city of Green Bay, through our ministry there!

When we got there, the job offer fell through.  I had signed a lease, because I had my plan for how the "inheriting of the land" would go.  We were not starting the church for another year, because we were going to take a full year to pray and work, building a united leadership team.  Suddenly, with two very young children, a pregnant wife, a year lease on a place, and no income, I panicked.  My plan was being messed up.  In Green Bay, with winter coming, I could not just pitch a tent like Abram.  So, I did what I knew how to do: I started the church.  After all, God had promised me the land, right?  So, I wasn't going back with my tail between my legs.  I would behave as if the promise was for right now.  I was going to will it to happen.

That, right there, is why I say that Abram had great faith.  "Name it and claim it" approaches to faith are held up by many believers as THE way to claim the promises of God.  In other words, as I am a person with a very powerful will, I get my orders and promises from God, and then I make them happen.  That is not faith, I now realize.  That is pride.  We were created to rule and to reign.  We were given dominion.  But we were not built to independently reign apart from God.  The power, the glory, the reign is all God's.  Even the perfection, the righteousness (or being in right standing), and the mercy are all God's.  We simply move in it.  We have the authority to use that power, as long as we submit our reign and will to that of God.

It is a lot like a police officer.  The police officer is not the law.  The law is the law.  The law has power and force of will to guide and govern a society.  The police officer is bound (theoretically) by that same law.  At no time does the officer obtain or possess the power of the law.  As a sworn officer, he or she has the authority to carry out and apply the will of law, as long as he or she is in a state of compliance and submission to the law.  As soon as they move outside of that state of submission, overstepping their authority, the law-breaker is set free.  We say all the time that no one can "take the law into their own hands".

That is what it means to have free will and authority in the will of God.  God gives us parameters and direction.  God's will is done in our lives when we submit to that will, and only that will.  That is what we pray in the Lord's Prayer: "Thy will be done".   Abram had an order and a promise.  The order: Go to the land I will show you.  The promise: I will make you into a great nation, and you will have many descendants, who will take possession of the land.  Now, Abram has the authority to obey the will of God.  He also is a free agent in the deal, in that he could easily choose to obey or to just stay in his homeland.  He has free will.  Everything he knew was in his homeland.  He was comfortable and established there.  God did not say there would be a punishment for Abram if he disobeyed.  He would just cut himself off from the promise.  He may still have been abundantly blessed if he stayed.  He may have had many descendants that ruled and reigned over the land of Harran.  Abram's father, Terah, had taken the family toward Canaan, possibly on the orders of God, but he had settled in Harran on the way there.  He seemed to have been blessed with offspring and possessions anyway.  It is not as simple as the black and white idea of "obey or be punished".  It would almost be easier if that was the M.O. of God.  Faith is much more gray than that, even if we wished that reality were otherwise.

So, armed with a clear direction and a broad promise, Abram left for Canaan.  The simple obedience of going there was within Abram's domain.  The promise was in God's.  He understood that, so he was a man of great faith.  He did what he was told, and then he stayed mobile.  He had no idea how God planned to fulfill the promise, and he didn't seem to be too bothered by living in that tension.  God said go, so I went.  Now, rather than falling into triumphalism and claiming the fulfillment of the promise immediately, as if it were some act of great faith to do so, he merely remained mobile, ready to obey again.  You see, "name it and claim it" is not faith.  It is overstepping our authority.  It is a battle of wills against God.  Pride.  God makes promises in order to encourage us, as a deposit to help us persevere in obedience.  How and when God plans to fulfill that promise is none of our business.  This is evidenced in the very next passage, where there is a famine, so Abram goes to Egypt where there is food.  Upon getting there, he has a failure of faith, fearing for his life.  He did not consult God to ask if he should go to Egypt.  He just goes, in the absence of further orders.  But, because he was open to hear what God wanted next, even though he was going away from Canaan and the promise, God used Abram's sin to bless him!  This is the opposite of the sin/curse dynamic.  When we are submitted to God, even our sin can be redeemed by God for blessing.

So, we have felt like God was uprooting us from Green Bay for quite sometime now.  I really believe the God is calling me to increase my writing, coaching, consulting, and speaking dream.  I have the best opportunity for that in a more progressive area like Seattle.  I also need to do that outside of the role of pastor.  So, we have been called to move to the Seattle area.  Now, I have a job offer.  That job has nothing to do with writing, speaking, or ministry.  It is a completely secular position.  So, what do you think?

When I went to Green Bay, I took things into my own hands and steered them toward the promise.  I missed the mark.  In my obedience, I trust that God will still fulfill that promise in Green Bay after we are gone.  We were faithful in obedience to work hard at laying the foundation there.  God will fulfill the promise through those who come after me, just like the experience of Abram.  Many descendants meant only one heir for Abraham, but God multiplied and expanded that deposit into a great nation.  God will do the same with me.  This is a wide open door for me, and it will provide a nice home, more income than I have had before, and the time and flexibility to continue to pursue my dream.  As far as day jobs go, it looks really good.  It is away from the dream right now, but God can make connections and bring me to the fulfillment of the dream as God sees fit.  That's God's department, not mine.

I am moving here in 10 days.  Teresa is following with the kids in June.  I am obeying.  I actually hesitated too long, sweating out whether it was God's will to give up the church to others.  I get nervous about losing all of the networking connections I have made in the Vineyard Churches.  The cost of living is higher here, and I worry about moving my family all this way, only to struggle again.  All of that made me drag my feet.  I just wanted to do it right this time.  But even that is out of my hands.  I need to obey God's lead to the best of my ability.  If I do so, I am freely submitting my will to God's will.  Then, even if I'm making a mistake, I am in God's will.  Instead of being punished, I will be blessed.  So, I let go of the worries, and stop looking everywhere for confirmation, signs, and reassurance.  I move forward, and I let God work out the details.  I am not running around here, trying to promote myself.  I am letting God promote me.  I am learning how to trust.  Maybe that's the freest way to live.

When have you had to just obey God in your life, without knowing all the details of how and when?  What was that like?  Are you taken aback a bit by my assertion that God's will and the details are none of our business?

Where Are All The People?

I remember doing that little hand game as a small child, but I could never get it right.  You know the one, right?  You interlock all of your fingers, so that each second knuckle sticks up in a sort of roof.  Then, in a sing-songy voice, you say, “Here is the church…” Lifting your two pinkies from the rest, you continue, “Here is the steeple…”  You then move your two thumbs out 90 degrees, and say, “Open the doors…”  At this point, the observer (usually a parent, because all of your friends have seen this a thousand times, and only your parents are actually patient enough to let food burn on the stove to watch your dumb, little, pre-PowerPoint presentation - they kinda have to…they’re parents) seems to be filled with edge-of-their-seat, goose-bumpy anticipation.  What could possibly come next?  You take a pregnant pause to let the tension percolate.  Then, you release with the big payoff, flipping over your hands, triumphantly declaring, “And Here Are the People!!”  You wiggle your now-upturned fingers for added affect, as if full revival is breaking out in your little hand church.

But not for me.  I would have had my audience eating out of my hands for the whole presentation, if they hadn’t been clenched in church formation.  My lead in was excellent.  I would build and build up to the great payoff which would be….nothing.  I couldn’t figure out how to lock my knuckles correctly.  I had some kind of hand church disability, I think, because it would never work out.  The problem was, I could not get through my thick head that I could not fold my hands in a prayer formation and have people be inside my church.  Every time I did that little game in our house in Iron River, MI, there wouldn’t be people.  I would be disappointed and sad, having let my mom down (everyone else had given up on me as the pastor of my hand church), and she would console me by patiently teaching me, again, how to do it.  By that point, I was so frustrated that I had to set the whole endeavor aside and go play Legos until supper.  I would try again tomorrow.  It finally got to the point where I gave up and made my own version of the game.  Instead of the classic punchline, I would, instead, say, “Where are all the people?”  In that way, I was able to deliver an ending that was even more shocking and gripping than all of those other, finger-people-producing schmucks.  They could keep their little finger revivals.  My way was cooler, more surprising, and it provided social commentary on the decline of Christianity in the West, especially among steepled churches.  I don’t know, though.  In the end, I think my way was much less satisfying overall for myself and my audience.

I should have seen that game as prophetic.  My inability to “do it right” left me feeling like something was wrong with me.  I had some kind of internal flaw that prohibited my ability to accomplish what others of, in my estimation, less social and cognitive prowess could do without much effort.  It was easy for them!  I understood Poe and Shakespeare.  I taught myself multiplication and division, even doing some rudimentary algebra, while my peers were still counting wrong, misspelling simple words, and leaving school after wetting their pants.  Why could I not get that freakin hand church thing right!?!?  My mom was always supportive.  I think she was only teaching me over and over again, because I seemed to have a driving need to conquer it.  Besides, who wants to go to the mom’s prayer group and admit that your kid is the only one who can’t get the church thing right?

“Get the prayer chain fired up, Gladys!!  Jan’s kid either has a demon or he’s one of them “special” kids!!”

This whole thing continued well into adulthood.  I never got the whole church thing right.  Every Sunday, after working extremely hard all week to prepare an awesome sermon and a gathering that would be sincere enough to attract the lightning and thunder Glorious Presence of the Living God, I would find myself asking, “Where are all the people?”  I would joke about it with the few people who showed up.  I would make sure they knew how happy and grateful I was that they made it and just how important and precious they are to me and to God.  I would smile, even though I knew we weren’t going to get paid again this week.  I would make excuses.  I would sincerely ask people what was wrong with me and my vision, submitting myself to them for critique and my vision to them for approval.  I would get on my knees, crying, and beg God to PLEASE bring me some people!  Please!  Pretty Please?!  I would tinker with the format.  I would lament the space and environment.  I would read books on church growth and models for successful church.  I would get therapy and take medication.  I would have my mom get the prayer chain fired up, because Jan’s boy is still demonized and special.  I think my mom was even thinking of opening a healing center called, “The Jan Sergott Center for Mothers of Adult Children Who Don’t Do Church Good (JSCMACWDDCG for short).  Where are all the people?  I just couldn’t get my damn fingers to interlock correctly.

Then, I realized that all of those things I did to cope or change my circumstances were missing the mark.  God showed me that somewhere along the way.  I had to embrace the fact that I am a failed pastor.  However, in embracing that, I also have to die to it.  I cannot carry that as my identity.  What makes me awesome?  OK, so I can’t do the church thing right (though I did finally conquer that hand church thing….4 years ago, I think).  I have no idea how to fix a car, and mechanics look at me with that “prayer-group-Gladys” look of pity, concern, and confusion as to what they should do about me - pat me on the head, feed me a doggy treat, or give me another pill. All I know is that the stupid car doesn’t work, and I want it to work.  I feel like our black lab, Greta, when she was playing with a bunny in the backyard and accidentally killed it.  Apparently a 110 pound dog wrestling with a 4oz rabbit is not a good prospect for the rabbit.  Greta was so sad, as she brought us the contorted carcass of her playmate, set it down at our feet, and looked at us with an expectancy that said, “It’s not working anymore.  Fix it?”  I also suck at plumbing, gardening, home maintenance, general yard work, carpeting, cleaning, and, more than anything, making a living for my family.  What the hell is wrong with me?  I can’t say, “Well, I am just not a gifted provider for my family, so I’m not going to do that.  I also struggle with the brain stem skill of pumping blood, so I’m quitting that as well.”  I used to think I might just be lazy, but I’m not.  I work my tail off at everything I do.  I have been quickly promoted at every job I have held.  I just can’t seem to make money.  All of my peers have always seemed to be doing great, and I just can never seem to make it happen.  Maybe I’m just a late bloomer.  I am almost 41.  Maybe I just need another decade or so to soak up some wisdom.

Recently, I noticed a shift.  Yes, there was a shift in myself, as I have worked very hard on getting healthy and strong.  I wanted to be one of God’s superstars, taking over this world for Jesus!  Now, as long as I’m dwelling with Jesus, I could dig ditches and be happy.  However God wants to use me is fine, and I am very free in that.  If, in this season of my life, God wants me to be a failure pastor, I will be that with boldness and zeal.  I will continue to train, prepare, work, and strive to be the best failure pastor I can be!  That was a big shift in my life, but the biggest shift I noticed came in those around me.  People started looking to me, many of them fellow pastors that I saw as being radically more gifted, intelligent and equipped than I, for counsel, direction, prayer, and hope.  Now, in my poopy moments, I think that maybe they come to me to feel better about themselves and circumstances.  “Man, my life and ministry and family and marriage and finances all suck right now.  I’ll go talk to that “special” guy, Bill.  At least I’m not as bad as he is…”

In reality, this wasn’t the case at all.  After the fall of the economy, people got really messed up.  Bad.  Why?  Because the model of our economy was one of the solid, everlasting Truths of American Life.  It was a holy symbol and a reminder that God is in His Heaven and all is right with the world.  Our confidence started to be shaken during the Vietnam War.  The United States doesn’t ever lose wars.  You can hang your hat on that one.  OK, we lost a war.  But, if we call it a “conflict” rather than a “war”, we are still undefeated.  Well, the one thing we are sure of: No one would DARE attack Americans on U.S. Soil.  Then came 9/11.  The whole of reality was uncertain.  Safety, itself, was questioned.  Well, one thing we can still hang our hat on is the U.S. Economy!  We have American Spirit and American Dreams!  We will continue to make money, because THAT is what we are awesome at doing!  Yes, things are a little more difficult, but the CEOs of Wall Street are Capitalists and True Americans.  Surely, they we steer us back to prosperity, hope, and the fulfillment of dreams!  If things get more difficult, they will sacrifice some of their own gains to help the country push forward.  They are patriots!  Besides, it doesn’t matter who’s in those places of power, the model, the economic machine, never breaks down!

All of a sudden, all of these pastors and leaders are in the same boat as I am.  It turns out that they always were.  I was just the only one dumb enough to always talk openly and freely about my failures.  They would just switch models.  I have seen many pastors get all the books and materials from Willow Creek.  They study them, highlight them, teach them to their leadership teams and staffs, do conferences and seminars to learn them better, and even take pilgrimages with their entire board of directors to Barrington, Illinois (Mecca) to see the Dali Lama of the Higher Way of Churchness that is Willow Creek.  They hope to catch something that sparks the success and power of the Willow Creek Model.  They go racing home, excited to tell their whole church what they have caught in fresh vision, hope, and purpose!  We have to get this model in place today!  Is it too soon for an all-member church meeting?  We’ll give it a year.  We are going to see hearts come alive for Jesus!  Lives will be changed and transformed!  This is it for us!  God led us to this place for sure!  A year later, they have two new members to show for all of their visional renovations.  Unfortunately, a family of five that had been with them for 10 years and 10 major visional renovations, finally got tired and left for a mainline denominational church that just wanted to find Jesus.  So, this church netted −3 people in this year of vision and growth.  “Wait!” shouts the youth minister during the depressing evaluation meeting, “I heard Rob Bell has stepped down as pastor in order to put together new models of church!  He is doing a seminar in a city only 200 miles from here!  It starts tonight!  I have my keys, and we can grab food on the way!”  They argue over who gets “shotgun” as they race to the parking lot with real hope this time.

Willow Creek is not the problem in this hypothetical scenario.  Bill Hybels is an incredible leader, pastor, and visionary.  Their church has been wildly successful.  Many people have come to know Jesus in an authentic and life-changing way through their ministry.  There is a great deal we can all learn from Willow Creek.  Also, I don’t think Rob Bell is actually doing seminars on new models of church.  The problem: Models fail.  Always.  There are people everywhere searching for the perfect program, model, or formula.  The diet industry is worth billions every year, each individual diet guaranteeing immediate and dramatic results.  None of them work, but no one takes advantage of the money back guarantee.  Why?  Because we find it much easier to believe that we are the problem.  The problem couldn’t possibly with the system.  I suck.  The diet is perfect.  This model of church is perfect.  I’m the failure.

Those are all lies that I, and most of the human race, have adopted into our minds and hearts.  As a result, We have lost all sense of innovation.  I have started reading the new Steve Jobs biography.  He was an amazing man.  He had incredible issues and could be a really lousy human being, but he was amazing as an innovator and creator.  Rather than making cookie cutter copies of computer models already in the marketplace, he designed and built technologies that the public was not aware they needed or even wanted!  We need more innovators.  The problem is not with you or with me.  The problem is with our models.  I’m just starting to grapple with this, but I have a tiny suspicion that maybe I’m not defective after all…  Those are just some thoughts from a failed pastor.