One of my favorite authors is Barbar Brown Taylor.  She was named one of the top 20 preachers in America.  A few years ago she wrote a very honest memoir of her decision to leave her role as pastor called Leaving Church.  She is a person who was willing to ask the hard questions and see where the path would take her.  I resonate with her conclusion:

“I thought that being faithful was about becoming somone other than who I was, in other words, and it was not until this project failed that I began to wonder if my human wholeness might be more useful to God than my exhausting goodness.”

This deeply reflective author bring to us some wonderful questions to consider about our communities of faith and self.  This weeks installment of Walking with Questions calls us to stop and ponder the type of communities and relationships that we are a part of and are creating:

“What if people were invited to come tell what they already know of God instead of to learn what they are suppose to believe?  What if they were blessed for what they are doing in the world instead of chastened for not doing more at church?  What if church felt more like a way station than a destination?  What if the church’s job were to move people out the door instead of trying to keep them in, by convincing them that God needed them more in the world than in the church?”

What if we could listen more?  What if we had the courage of Barbara to unlearn what we think we know rather than continuing to look for things that confirm what we already think?

The journey is about two things.  One getting to know yourself in a clearer way without all the props and distractions we put around ourselves to hold us up.  But the second reason is the most important I believe, to learn to ask different questions.  We do this by coming into contact with people and places that we have never encountered.  The very act of walking into the unknown empowers the ability to question or at least encounter uncertainty which is a prerequisite for asking good questions.  Perhaps our most important life long adventure is to ask better questions.  It is our ability to ask questions that will release us from what we think we know in order to be open to what we could know.

For the next few posts I am going to introduce some people who have made me ask different questions in my life.  I will offer some of their perspective in hopes that you will go and engage them more fully on your own.  The companions you invite into your journey will make all the difference in both the way of the journey and destination you are likely to reach.

So, here we go…

“Christianity is the proclamation of the end of religion, not of a new religion, or even of the best of all possible religions.  And therefore if the cross is the sign of anything, it’s the sign that God has gone out of the religion business and solved all the world’s problems without requiring a single human being to do a single religious thing.  What the cross is actually a sign of is the fact that religion can’t do a thing about the world’s problems—that is it never did work and it never will…” Robert Capon – The Mystery of Christ and Why We Don’t Get It

What is beyond religion?  What would my life be like if I let go of religion?  What do I think I need to do to gain the acceptance of God?

Some time ago, I was reading through the announcements at my church.  Something stood out to me.  If I participated with everything that applied to me, I would have come to eight to ten meetings to talk about God and the Bible.  It seems that we have come to spend much of our time in our communities of faith talking about faith. There is a world of difference between hearing a truth and experiencing a truth. 

 There is a  passage in John’s first letter that calls us to reach beyond talking about our faith and actually experience it as we love others.  But to do so, we must begin in a very paradoxical place. 

             “My dear children, let’s not just talk about love; let’s practice real love.  This is the only way we’ll know we’re living truly, living in God’s reality.  It’s also the way to shut down debilitating self-criticism, even when there is something to it.  For God is greater than our worried hearts and knows more about us than we do ourselves.  And friends, once that’s taken care of and we’re no longer accusing our condemning ourselves, we’re gold and free before God!  We’re able to stretch our hands out and receive… (I John 3:18-22, The Message).

 The place we must begin to live in our faith is being honest with ourselves.  John reminds us that what limits us most is our own doubt and insecurity about ourselves. Our fear keeps us from reaching out, from fully engaging those around us, from really experiencing the grace that has been extended to us. 

 Too often we come to our churches wrestling with our own shortcomings.  We worry they will be revealed.  We worry that we do not measure up.  We too often come thinking we are here to prove something.  I wonder if John, as he was writing this passage, thought of another scene many years before when Jesus was on bended knee beginning to wash the feet of his friend Peter.  Peter struggled with believing the mystery of grace.  He did not want to be served.  He did not feel worthy.  And that is the point.  When we are worried about our worth we cannot receive the love and acceptance that Jesus freely extends to us and we cannot pass that love on to those around us.

 We are asked to come and trust what cannot possibly be true.  We are asked to trust that eating a little piece of bread and drinking a small sip of wine brings life to our spirit.  We are asked to believe that no matter what we bring in terms of our state of faith, God has already seen and known this.  It does not stop him from loving us.

 So as you reach out and consider the people around you, consider that reaching as a reminder that all has been made right for us with God and if we trust it, with each other.  There is more going on than we can understand.  Our job is not to explain it only to trust it.  As we receive what we can see, bread and wine, trust that we are also receiving what we cannot see – unconditional acceptance. When we truly trust this we will no longer live separated and divided.  We will live at ease with God and our neighbor and that will change the world.

Being a father of two incredibly cool kids I am overwhelmed daily with a few quotes, “Hey dad!” “Dad, look at me.” “Dad, come see what I built.” “Dad, look at this, it is cool.” “Dad, watch me.” If I am being quite honest I get tired of hearing the word “Dad” sometimes. However,  I know what my kids are yearning for: Acceptance, Applause, an Encouraging Word, a little bit of Dad’s time and love…

I am also a big fan of the show “American Idol”. Now before you judge me on watching very shallow TV, hang-on. I love the stories. Last week they featured a girl who grew up in a very strict home. This girl basically seemed to live in the shadow of her parents, and at every waking moment she did her best to please them but it never seemed enough. Well, the girl broke free and was now sitting in New York City plastered on the TV waves. She sang and she made it. Tears of joy streamed down her face. American Idol proceeded to tape as she called her dad. The dad said, “Hello” and the first words after “Dad, I made it to Hollywood” where, “DAD, ARE YOU PROUD OF ME?” Now I am not much of a crier but the tears flowed. All the girl wanted was to know that her dad was proud of her.

I have friend that is an incredible athlete. In fact, this kid has more talent in his big toe than most have in their whole body. He was all-conference, all-state, and more in football and ended up playing at the collegiate level for a couple of years. Unfortunately, some bad choices ended it all. While he was struggling with this loss I began asking him tough questions. Who are you? Where you going? Why can’t you move on?  The bottom line was he missed the roar of the crowd. He missed the pat on the back when a fumble was recovered or a pass intercepted. He lived for the applause now it was gone.

As I sit back and watch person after person give to the tragedy in Haiti, I hear their silent, “Look at Me!” pleas for acceptance. Now I am not judging their heart or intentions because I think they do want to help, but if we are honest, we are crying out for the attention, the applause, the moment always. Just like my kids saying, “Dad look at me!” or the girl on American Idol saying, “Dad, are you proud of me?” or my friend missing the roar of the crowd when a job was done well. So the question becomes when the world, crowd, mom or dad don’t give you your acceptance, where do you go? We all want it. We all need it. But where you get it is very important, and it could mean life or death. Lastly, going back to motivation, are you only motivated to serve, clothe, feed, love during tragic events or big sponsored events so you can get the attention or  praise, or can you do it all for no applause, no pat on the back, no acceptance and feel secure in who you are made to be? I can’t  help but think that it is those who never get noticed in the world that make the most impact. What do you think?