I Hate You God!

"I hate you, God!"  The words poured out of his mouth.  Bill and I were sitting across from each other, but I had stepped aside.  I said, "Bill, let your heart speak.  Don't try to think about what you're going to say.  Just let it out."  And as Bill looked out into the empty space of my office that anger at God that was inside of him rose to the surface like a volcano.  

His words shocked him, but they were also a relief.  He had become increasingly uncomfortable in his own skin.  Daily life was a chore.  Prayer was a fruitless exercise.  He did not know what was the matter. Bill was moving closer and closer to despair.

I wasn't surprised.  Bill is a pastor who is perennially funny.  He would have been a terrific stand up comedian.  He always has a punchline ready.  He makes you laugh.  I love being around him, but the more I got to know him the less comfortable I became with his humor.  I knew something else was lurking beneath the surface. 

It's not a new revelation.  Many of us manage our anger by making a joke.  It was Richard Pryor who famously said, "I had to stop drinking because I was tired of waking up in my car driving ninety miles an hour!' This is Bill.  His  humor is both hilarious and heartbreaking. 

There can be something quite valiant about humor in the face of tragedy.  It is more than merely looking on the bright side (cue Monty Ponty, please).  It is quite courageous,  and a sign of an indomitable spirit- laughing in the face of the seemingly absurd. We admire the tenacity and the toughness of it.  This kind of humor is the fuel of perseverance.  

But, as is sometimes the case,  Bill's humor was a cover for despair and quite the opposite of faith.   There was no joy.

So Bill and I made some time to talk together.  For too long Bill had lived under the tyranny of what he "should" do.  My prayer was for God to give Bill a safe space where his heart could speak.  Once Bill faced his profound anger at God- the God whom he served, Bill could begin to think about a different kind of life and discover a different kind of relaitonship with God- a life based more on love instead of mere obligations.  

A life of joy, instead of bitter humor, is a life filled with love- ravishing, soul satisfying love.  That is the kind of love God desires to pour into our hearts.  This is the kind of love we see in Jesus. 

This soul satisfying love is the fruit of a life lived out with Jesus rather than the stale bread of religious obligations.  A life filled with this kind of love can still laugh in the face of absurdity, but it is a laugh of joyful triumph and not despair.  For this kind of love tells us that tragedies of this life do not have the last word- God does. 

 

Nuns with Guns

Yea, I know.  As a title for a blog post it's a cheap shot.  Bu there really was this picture of nuns holding rifles right beside an article entitled, "Why I Hate Religion!  47 Reasons that will Send me to Hell!"  The article was the usual rant about Christianity- the Roman Catholic Church in particular, with small comments about Hinduism, Judaism and Scientology to justify the article's title.  The list of complaints revealed nothing new:  mean nuns (hence the satirical picture), eternal damnation as a scare tactic to get you to behave, anti-gay attitudes, humiliating confessions, and lots of guilt.  There were a few well written lines like, "the virgin birth set an impossibly high standard for the rest of us," that brought a smile to my face.

Then the tone of the article shifted.  The author wrote almost wistfully about the beauty of church architecture and songs, and then he wrote, "but the thing I hate the most is that I have met some religious people who are not petty or bigoted at all, and that gets in the way of a lot of my theories."

Institutional anger can only get us so far, even when it is cultivated through remembering some painful, personal encounters, and anger at an institution doesn't answer our longing for God.  There is a longing to touch the eternal inside us that is deeper than our anger.  Anger can bury that longing but not eradicate it.  If we take the time to listen to our hearts, that longing is there, in spite if our being mistreated by the church, or some Christian we know.  We intuitively get that God is so much bigger than any one's unjust or miscreant behavior.  We know (if we're willing to admit it) that the failures of a religious institution cannot contain or even define a God who still whispers to us in those uncynical moments when we see something beautiful and our hearts soften- just a little, even if only for a moment.

Those whispers register.  They are like an old catalog we keep around even though we haven't ordered anything.  These whispers don't go away; and no matter how much we fill our lives with accumulation, experiences, activities and relationships they are still there.  "We were made for more," they tell us; and deep inside we know it.

Can you listen to those whispers?  Start a dialog with the Infinite?  Ask God to reveal God to you?  Jesus says, "Come to me all you who are weary and carry heavy burdens."  It's an invitation.  The whispers don't have to be one way.

Walking on a Tightrope

Today I was reminded of a life changing conversation I had years ago. At the time  I was 23 and in grad school- rethinking my relationship with God.  I was talking with a Christian friend, more wise that me and he listened intently as I was describing my struggles.  Then he made this observation,  "When I listen to you I get this picture:  I see you walking on a tightrope.  You're in a high wire act at the circus.  That tightrope is your life.  Your job as a Christian is to summon the courage and skill to walk safely across that tightrope from one end to the other.  Sure, God put a safety net under you, but it will still hurt if you fall, even though it won't kill you.  You're way up in the air and everything is up to you."

Sure, I could quote Scriptures that said differently, I had been a Christian for a while.  But what my friend observed was actually what my heart believed.  So- his vision was accurate.  I believed that striving to be good as a Christian was hard.  I was way up in the air and it was scary.  I didn't want to fail and failing was painful- I had done it too many times.  So I learned from my failures that God was not around to help, only forgive.  In the end,   it was all up to me.  I had no sense that God was my companion, just an observer who watched my struggles from beyond earth's horizon.   Yes, I believed that God forgave me, but I still paid a high price for each and every failure.  Being a Christian might be the right way to go, but it was no fun!

When I actually looked at what this meant, I was shocked. I realized that I didn't know the God of the Bible at all. I believed in a different god- one who was demanding, perfectionist, distant and unrelenting.

Immediately I confessed to God that I knew almost nothing of what the Bible teaches about God:  his infinite creativity, his wondrous joy, his tender companionship and his life changing mercy.  Sure I had sat in the lap of the church all my life, but what I learned from the church was not, at all, what the Scriptures taught.  I wanted to know the real God- not the God I had created in my head, not the God that I had been taught to believe.  I asked God to removed this false god from my life, heal my heart and lead me to the "truth that will set you free."  I wanted to know the God who is infinitely creative, imaginative and full of joy.  I want to know the God who stands with me, no matter my faults and whose companionship is eternal.  I want to know the God I see in Jesus.

Since that conversation happened years ago, all of this has happened.  Not that I know all that there is to know about an infinite God.  The more I know, the more I realize I don't know.  I'm standing in a precipice that has no bottom.  I'm staring up into space that is without boundaries.  But I am also coming to experience God's wild embrace that answers the longings of my heart.

I kept noticing the pain in his eyes

Mike and I were sitting across from each other at a table in a busy restaurant.  I wanted the conversation to go at the pace that Mike wanted.  It was his time and he was setting the agenda.  I reached out to Mike because, in a relatively causal conversation, I kept hearing something else in his voice- a testing of the waters;  "Can I trust you?" And I kept noticing the pain in his eyes.  When I suggested lunch,  he eagerly eargerly agreed.

We chatted amicably about easy topics- mostly about food since both of us like cooking for other people.  Our lunch arrived at the table.  He exhaled deeply and gave me this look like, "OK.  I'm ready."  So I asked, "How can I help, Mike?" Then he started with his story.  As I listened, I kept feeling like it was not particularly out of the ordinary- you know, a young guy struggling with porn. So what?  What young man  hasn't?  He saw himself as an occasional addict- every three months or so. "Not too bad," I thought to myself.  He had gone the "accountability" route with very little impact.

Even though he said he knew he was forgiven that didn't seem to matter.  He still felt  condemned and that he felt "seperated from God" when he indulged.  So he tried to push the guilt away and act like it never happened.

The fear in his eyes told me that he was expecting me to get up from the table and walk away.  Instead, I looked straight into his eyes and said, "It doesn't have to be this way."  For me, the real issue was not his occasional indugence in porn, but his incomplete view of God.   He doesn't know that when God forgives the slate is washed clean.  He doesn't know that no how many times he comes to God for forgiveness, God never tires of hearing his cry for help.  He doesn't know that  God accepts him as he is.  He doesn't know that through healing prayer God can heal him of the pain of condemnation.  He doesn't know that God wants to speak truth into his life and help him look at why he needs porn in the first place.  

The church has failed Mike.  Mike grew up in the church but has never really received anything like acceptance and mercy.

I"m no addiction specialist.  I'm just a listening friend.  But maybe this conversation (and those that will follow) might be a starting point.  I doesn't have to be this way, not for Mike or anyone else.