"My Christianity Sucks!"

“My Christianity sucks!”

It was a moment of supreme transparency, and I couldn't help but feel a kinship with my friend's sentiments. Several years have passed since that conversation, and that’s the only sentence I recall from it, but those words sunk down deep. Though I'm reasonably sure I've never expressed it quite that way, there have many days when translating my soul’s spirituality into electric impulses would have transmitted the weakest of vital signs. If there had been some device to electronically connect my heart to the keyboard of my laptop, Microsoft Word would have received very little communication. In fact, it probably would have typed just one sentence: My Christianity sucks!

Perhaps you've never felt that way, but I would be bold enough to guess that at some point, during some spiritual dry spell in your life, you were tempted to doubt the validity of your whole experience as a Christian. You know the time. Maybe you put on your church face and no one was the wiser, but when you peeled it off in the mirror at home after the sermon there was that vacuous stare from the eyes on your soul. You didn’t think your prayers would get past the ceiling, even if you could think of anything else to say. You didn’t voice, “My Christianity sucks.” But you felt it.

If you’re hoping for some cushy, feel-good , “this too shall pass” dénouement for the “My Christianity sucks” crisis, you will have to look farther than my blog. I don’t have that kind of solution to write for you because, when you are in that valley, some glib, poetic, philosophical resolution is almost entirely useless. “My Christianity sucks” rarely resolves with beautiful, dramatic closure.

One thing kept coming back to me, though, as I pondered my friend’s exclamation: “My Christianity sucks!” The word my. Is it your Christianity? Could that be the problem? My brand of Christianity could be lacking if I acquired, designed, and fitted it on my own. No wonder it sucks—I suck at creating beautiful things out of the unlovely. But wouldn’t you know…God doesn’t. He’s a master at that.

Does your Christianity suck? Maybe it’s time to exchange it for Christ’s brand of Christianity. Throw out all your failures to attain, all your notions of what you must do, and be an empty vessel for Christ to fill. After all, that’s what He is waiting on anyway.

Yes, it’s harder to do than it sounds. It’s humbling to plead with David through the darkness “Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from Thy presence; and take not Thy Holy Spirit from me.” (Psalm 51:10) But it’s certainly better than wearing the façade of your Christianity, hiding behind some past spiritual high and hoping you can revitalize it before it withers. Just let go of it, and ask Christ to give you a new Christianity—His version of Christianity. It may actually be more demanding than yours was, but it will also be more rewarding and less fickle. Take His yoke upon you…and you will find rest for your soul.

Pages!

In a brief departure from my usual blog posts, I wanted to point out that I now have pages listed across the top of the blog to link you to pages including About Me, Quotes, Recipes, Contact Me, Fainting Robins, and Know the Song. "Recipes" has been recently updated with a recipe for Blackberry Cream Cheese Coffee Cake (and a picture ;-) Please check them out at your leisure...Hope you enjoy!

The Way...sans maps or GPS

In general, I have a distinct aversion to using a GPS. The invention was possibly the summit of brilliance and annoyance all rolled into one fantastic and pricey package that offers the opportunity to get given incorrect directions in a voice that conveys less personality than the slam of my car door. Personally, I'd much rather just go the old fashioned way and use a map when necessary.

Bad directions aren't unique to using a GPS, however. In fact, there are times when I might prefer to capitulate to popular choice and use a GPS rather than attempt to follow people's directions. Case in point...

Scenario: Meeting a friend at the Battlefield Mall. Texting upon arrival.

Me: Hey, where are you?

Friend: The mall.

I shook my head and tried to quell the responses coming to mind.

Me: Yeah, you're also in Springfield, MO, but I could use something a bit more specific.

Friend: Macy's

In my experience, department stores like Macy’s on the mall have only slightly fewer entrances than the catacombs. There are dozens of departments, entrances in the mall, out of the mall, upstairs, downstairs.

Macy’s. Really?!

I finally got enough clues in the hunt to locate my friend, and by the time we were going to meet to leave I got a text asking where to pick me up. The golden opportunity to reply "outside the mall" fleetingly danced around in my brain, but I resisted the urge and answered, "Could you just pick me up on the east side at the north end by Hu Hot restaurant? I will be outside on the sidewalk."

Am I asking too much to request reasonable, detailed directions? Probably so. It’s probably why I can identify with Thomas’ question to Jesus in John 14. Right after one of Jesus’ most beautiful promises of going to prepare mansions, a place for each us, Thomas has to pipe up. Listen to the dialogue:

“And where I go you know, and the way you know,” Jesus tells the disciples.

“Thomas said to Him, ‘Lord, we do not know where You are going, and how can we know the way?’” 

“Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.’”

The sad part—I can just hear myself asking the same question Thomas did. I want to know exactly where we are going and how we are getting there; is that so unreasonable? Do you have a map, Lord? I’d really like to know the ETA…What about a GPS? I know you know the latitude and longitude coordinates, so just plug those in and I’ll be ready to go.

I can see Jesus smiling sadly. They missed it. He had been showing them The Way and telling them where He was going for three and a half years, ever since His initial command “Follow Me,” recorded in eleven different places throughout the Gospels.

You see, if there is one thing better than detailed directions, it’s having someone lead you directly to your destination. No worries about taking a wrong turn, confusing one exit for another, or accidently entering the wrong end of a mall’s department store. Just follow the one who knows the way already.

When Jesus asked anyone to follow Him, it wasn’t merely “Let’s go this way today and see what we can find to do.” It was a calling that went far deeper. As they followed Him literally and figuratively He was showing them The Way; they saw it each day, like a map written in the dust of Capernaum or Nazareth or Jerusalem, and so, as Christ’s ministry drew to a close, He knew they had seen where He was going…and they knew The Way. It was simple—all they had to do was keep following Him.

So long after the days of the Apostles, I have a little Thomas inside me persistently wanting further directions. Lord, don’t you know I could get lost if I don’t have step by step instructions? Where are you going, and what is the way? Maybe you, like me, find yourself demanding detailed directions from God for your life.

I can just see Jesus smiling sadly. You missed it. Where I go you know, and the way you know. Remember that I said to follow Me? Just follow the One Who knows the way already.

Remember Me

I pulled into a parking space at Springfield's botanical gardens Sabbath afternoon, and Daniel roared his motorcycle into a spot a couple spaces over. Since we had both driven into church that morning and were planning to attend the evening program, we decided to save the gas expense of a trip home and back again. The somewhat less gas efficient alternative to simply waiting at the church was my idea--spending the afternoon at an awesome park.

We wandered down the paths toward the lake which separated us from a couple in wedding attire being posed and photographed by two zealous photographers. The paths divided trees and carefully chosen plant life until they led into a clearing centered with a figure on a bench. At first glance I thought it was a woman watching the geese at the edge of the lake, but the plaque on the back of her bench revealed that it was a statue, a memorial to a lady I had never heard of before.

Photo Credit to M. Daniel W. Wilson

For a while we sat on the bench with her, took a few pictures, and moved on. Down the path was a spread of plants and flowers framing another bench with the inscription, "Sit Awhile With John and Mary." I was beginning to understand why the botanical gardens were also collectively referred to as the Memorial Park. It was an odd sight, all the life humming and growing around silent memorials to individuals who had passed away, all of them complete strangers to me.

The lesson I have been discussing for the last couple weeks with the youth class that I lead at church has been about the Lord's Supper, and somehow I found Christ's choice of words oddly striking--"This do in remembrance of Me." (Luke 22:19) Never was there a life of more significance than Jesus' life, and the same is true of His death, so it makes perfect sense that there should be a memorial to Him of equivalent significance. So I wondered how it was that He chose the memorial that He did...the observance of His final supper, from the foot washing before to the exact meal that followed.

It's not the typical memorial, to be sure. Lincoln has his memorial, Washington his monument, and Sojourner Truth has a statue to commemorate her as well. I've seen them all. Historically, even the Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar, chose a massive golden statue as a tribute to his achievements. When Jesus chose a memorial He might have had any kind of monument He wished; if He wanted a statue of Himself calming the waves, or a crucifix, a nativity scene--perhaps made of gold or marble or pearls--He could have commanded it to be. But instead He gave us something alive: an experience. It's an experience involving emblems of sacrifice, a living testimony to His undying love. Every time we observe the Lord's Supper we can experience His love and forgiveness in a new way, which is infinitely more moving than a statue and far more meaningful than a plaque, picture, or commemorative phrase.

"This do in remembrance of Me," Jesus said. And then He led His disciples from the upper room to a garden...If it had been the botanical gardens instead of Gethsemane perhaps there would be a bench under some trees inscribed with the Savior's plea, "Tarry ye here, and watch with me." (Matthew 26:38)