The Likely Disciple

I’ve been walking around in a bit of a daze. A few minutes ago, as I write this, I finished reading a book. A book that I am still processing. It’s a make-Esther-stop-and-think kind of book. So what do I do in response?? I write.

Imagine this: a young college journalist from Brown University—the Ivy League school, not “my” JOHN Brown University—decides to spend a semester at Liberty University, a Christian school founded by Jerry Falwell of the Moral Majority. No, the student is not a Christian. He doesn’t believe much of what Liberty University exists to teach. But he goes as an experiment, to see if these conservative evangelicals are as crazy as the secular world thinks they are.

And, like any good journalist, he writes about his experience. The result is the 300-page book (in the Kindle edition) that I finished reading this evening—The Unlikely Disciple: A Sinner's Semester at America's Holiest University. My mentor and high school teacher/boss told me about the book and then sent it to me as a gift. Over the past week, in my down-time (sometimes just waiting for something on the Internet to load, or just for the Internet to work again) I dove in.

As I said above, the book made me think. In some ways, that is to be expected. Like the author Kevin Roose, I have practiced journalism. I attended a Christian college. But those are the similarities, not what made me think. What tickled my brain and made me feel the need to do some processing-writing were the differences.

He came at his project as an outsider. He did everything he could to blend in at Liberty because he wanted to get the real flavor there—but he did not naturally buy into any of it. And by the end of the book {SPOILER ALERT}, his experience failed to convince him that he needed to become an evangelical Christian.

If he is the Unlikely Disciple, that makes me a Likely Disciple. Not only did I grow up in a Christian home, I was homeschooled in a conservative Christian home. In all my 23.5 years, I’ve only been outside of the Christian bubble for about nine months—seven months living in China when I was 12 (though the type of community I was part of there makes it hardly count) and two months in a secular study/internship program in Washington, D.C. I attended a Christian college (that was actually less conservative than me), had a second internship with a Christian organization, and now find myself in the African bush with missionaries because God called me here when He shut the doors I had planned on.

So while we have a couple similarities, Kevin and I are worlds apart. What stopped me in my tracks tonight was the fact that he went through all the motions of being a good student at a conservative Christian university—one that was a lot more strict in its rules than where I went! The only thing he admits to getting reprimanded for is falling asleep in the chapel service. He tells about some of the Christian students there who were doing worse than he did during his “study abroad” semester at Liberty University.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that his book made me stop and think about what it is that makes me a Christian, and why it is that I do the things I do. It’s unnerving to think that it was so relatively easy for Kevin’s dorm-mates and class-mates to assume that he was a believer because of where he was and what motions he was going through. No, his book is not making me question my faith or doubt my salvation. But it certainly serves as a reminder that sometimes only God knows the heart, and that no amount of outward good deeds or rule following makes one a child of God.

It was enlightening to read his book because of his outsider-passing-as-insider status. He wrote his tale very well, tailoring it to be accessible to any audience. As he tells of struggling through taking Bible classes and learning the ropes of an evangelical community, he explains things that we Christians just take for granted. He did not naturally approach things with “biblical worldview glasses,” so his book is a chance to see my comfortable environment the way a non-Christian would. He’s honest—sometimes brutally so—about what bothers him; about where his real views clash with the persona he took on for a few months. He doesn’t pull punches, but at the same time he went through the process with a fairly open mind and he came out the other side with a somewhat-revised view of the conservative Christian community.

What I read in that book ranged from convicting to embarrassing to exciting to discouraging. At times, I wanted to cheer as he talked about his dorm-mates who encouraged him spiritually, even when they didn’t know they were witnessing to an unbeliever. In other sections, it bothered me—as it often does—to read a secular opinion of conservative Christian views about homosexuality, creationism, or environmentalism. Those are things that even my Christian college education have made me wrestle with over the past four-to-five years.

Of course, there’s a difference between how I have wrestled with it and how he did. Unlike Kevin, I am convinced of the truth of Christianity. That naturally does not mean that I have everything figured out theologically, or that I always live out/apply what I believe to my daily practice. At the end of the day, our starting points do make a big difference on where we end up on things.

And when I finished the last page of the book, before the swirling thoughts took over my brain, I prayed for Kevin. Because whether he believes it or not—and regardless of the fact that I believe some of his critiques were valid—I know he needs a Savior. We ALL do because we are all sinners. He spent a semester doing all the “right” Christian things. But that’s not going to save him, just as that is not what saves me. Whether unlikely or likely, Christ calls each of us to be His disciple. To follow Him on the path of spiritual transformation—to be conformed to His image. And like it or not, it’s a journey that never ends in this life.

Bringing Revolution

As with many of my blog posts, this one has been rolling around in my head for a while. I’m finally getting it down on “paper” – well, paper being the white space of a Word document at least….. ;-)

There are two songs that I can’t help but place in juxtaposition in my mind when I listen to them. They’re very different, but my overly analytical intellect makes a connection {which may or may not make sense to anyone else…}

So – the two songs are “Radioactive” by Imagine Dragons (which I got introduced to by Lindsey Stirling :D) and “God’s Not Dead” by Newsboys.

Both talk about revolution (“It's a revolution, I suppose” and “bring a revolution somehow” respectively). They also refer to another similar theme: the Imagine Dragons frontman said “Radioactive” is “a song about having an awakening,” while “God’s Not Dead” refers to “shak[ing] the ground / With the sound of revival.”

But while the songs may be trying to address the same topic, I believe they do so coming from quite different angles. “Radioactive” describes a post-apocalyptic world, one of “ash and dust” and “breathing in the chemicals.” A picture of a world which has been decimated and killed by radiation. The singer can “feel it in my bones / Enough to make my systems blow.” Yet the song promises that this is a “new age.”

“God’s Not Dead,” on the other hand, centers around the living power of God (unsurprisingly) and it starts with the love which brings the dead to life. This song tells the story of hope and revival based on resurrection power. So the songs seem to have opposite starting points and to make progress in opposite directions.

In both songs, the singer can feel a difference in himself. In the former, he is declared to be “waking up” and finding himself “radioactive.” In the latter, God is discovered “living on the inside / roaring like a lion.” Both hint that this inner change can either precipitate or indicate a change in the environment as well.

Hopefully I’m making at least a little sense and you can see where I’m coming from….I’m not really sure how to put it in words….but I guess it’s just that “Radioactive” seems to be trying to ignore the truth. The singer seems to think being radioactive is a great thing, but we know that radiation is poison – that it is an agent of death, not life. It makes sense from a worldly perspective – if all you’ve got is what’s dealt to you, you may as well see it in as positive a light as possible.

But I’m not looking at it from a worldly perspective. I know that even when I was dead – even when the poison of sin had pervaded my body like radiation – that even then God stepped in and brought resurrection. We aren’t stuck in whatever situation we find ourselves. Instead, God is alive and He brings hope and freedom and the victory to overcome the world.

So that’s what I’ve been mulling over whenever I hear either of these songs. Which source do you draw on? Do you try to make the best of a bad circumstance on your own? Or do you recognize the redemption which God offers? If the latter, do you take the time to share that? Does the love which has set you free spread from your life to others?

“Let heaven roar and fire fall

Come shake the ground

With the sound of revival.

My God's not dead

He's surely alive….”

The Man Who Lived Twice

One of my classes last semester focused on reading American poetry with our University's president. It was only a one-hour, honors colloquium class, which basically means it was just for fun. At the end of the semester, our final was to write a poem imitating one of the authors we had read. I chose T.S. Eliot, specifically his Christmas poem "Journey of the Magi."

I hope you enjoy this artistic attempt. And if you want to know a bit more about my imitation, I did also write a 4-page paper explaining it! Let me know if you're interested.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I was falling, falling, falling,

As in the dream, which always ends

With the crashing realization of lying in bed.

But the jolt never came:

Instead, a gentle slowing, drifting down like a feather

Until darkness turned to soft light and I found myself

Reclining at a feast table with him.

Instinctively I knew: here was my forefather,

Abraham, the great friend of God.

Surrounded by beauty and comfort and rest we lay

No need to end or hurry away.

The smells of the food and the décor of flowers

Flooded my nose with a glorious melody of scents.

So much better this than my last conscious memory:

Of heat and fever burning me up,

Of pain all around aching in every limb,

Of concern on my sisters’ faces, and of hushed whispers

Of the darkness closing in, blacker than any unlit room;

And then the fall, and finding myself here

I could stay forever.

But then came the voice

Like a blast on the shofar, clarion and loud

“Lazarus, come forth,” the call was for me.

Abraham nodded: “The Master calls, His voice you must obey.”

Suddenly I found myself again floating away

I came to in the dark, my nose pricked now

By the fading smell of an old body.

Wrapped tight, I could barely move

Shrouded as I was, a cloth over my face;

Yet the summons had come and I must go.

I heard their gasps as I felt the light change

From the dim tomb cave to the bright outdoors

Martha, Mary, unwrapping me, holding me tight

Scores of people: friends, neighbors; startled, withdrawing

And there He stood, His face wet with tears.

So He returned me to the Life I used to live;

But nothing now is the same.

Rabbis don’t know what to do with me

No rules are there for one brought from Death to Life.

People come and stare and stare

And all I can remember is the feeling of peace;

I long for that peace. And now,

Now the chief priests want Him dead. Him,

And me also; we threaten their authority.

I know not what He thinks

Though I do feel from Him a special kind of pity;

Yet for me, Death holds no more fear

They can kill me if they want, I’ve already died

I would be glad to live that truer Life again.

Jan. 23 CQI - Developing a Spiritual Rule (Webb S.1, Pt.1)

Our reading for that day came from a booklet written by Christopher Webb and printed by Renovare.

Claim 1: Webb takes the six streams of Christian tradition from Foster and makes them into categories for the shaping of a rule of life. He says, “as our passions and character are aligned with those of Jesus, so we increasingly become intentional about expressing each of these aspects of his life in our walk with him” (pg. 7). I took Integrated Theology last semester, and we read parts of Foster’s Streams of Living Water to cover the spiritual formation section. Foster seemed to be much more focused on providing a  descriptive look at these six areas, while Webb is seeking to turn them into a prescriptive guide for creating Christ-likeness in our lives. I don’t know if I just don’t remember correctly or if this was actually the case with Foster. At any rate, while I really enjoyed reading Foster’s book (particularly the Sacramental section), I can’t say it changed anything in my life. I’m hoping Webb will be otherwise.

Claim 2: Gradual change is more effective than sudden shifts. As Webb writes, “You are far more likely to successfully build a modest rhythm of prayer into your day than to utterly reorganize your life around hours of devotion” (pg. 9). He later provides an example of this by discussing how his almost simplistic rule of life has “had a profound impact on every important area” of his life (p. 13). I can certainly see the wisdom and common sense in Webb’s statement. But I don’t like having to keep working at something. I am much more of a pendulum person. My tendency is to attempt making a drastic change, get it all taken care of, and have it done–crossed off my checklist! I don’t naturally like being in a gradual process.

Question 1: Given Mulholland’s definition of spiritual formation (the part about “for the sake of others”), why is it that the monastic desert fathers tend to be so revered? Their idea of holy living frequently lacked the horizontal plane of interaction. They often tried as hard as they could to never be around people, though that was typically a difficult task because people would try to flock to them. Webb describes Anthony’s life – he tried “to strip away every distraction this world had to offer so he could seek God with his whole heart” (pg. 4). Clearly, that sounds like a noble and good ambition. And his commitment was admirable. But what happened to “for the sake of others”? From later parts of the chapter, Webb clearly believes in being in relationship with other people. But when I read this early bit on Anthony it just made me wonder why it is that we tend to put monastics on such a pedestal? If we look at it holistically, they were, in some ways, trying to be very selfish in their holiness. I am certainly prone to do the same as an introvert – so it’s a good reminder to me to be aware of that.

Insight 1: “Every day we live is like a miniature picture of our whole life…” (pg. 4). This was a really important point for me to hear. As I mentioned in class, what I actually do with my time is frequently quite different than what I would say my Rule of Life is. I need to remember and to seek to live out the fact that my daily, moment by moment choices are what shapes who I am in fact.

Insight 2: As a recovering practitioner of Christian legalism, I greatly appreciated the way in which he differentiated between commands/regulations and the guiding principle of the quest for a regula vita which he advocates (pg. 5). It’s like he said. If we want to shape our life to a particular pattern, it is very helpful to have a ruler to guide our pencil. Without it, our shape is much more likely to not match what we had in mind. BOTH flexibility AND guidelines – a balance that is so much fun to try to maintain for an extreme perfectionist just barely beginning to recover, like me!

Jan. 21 CQI - Into the Image of Christ, For the Sake of Others (Mul. Ch. 3-4)

Claim 1: Mulholland argues that the culture around us tries to fit us all into the same mold, and that the image of Christ does not treat us that way. “It is only in Christ that we find our individuality,” he wrote (pg. 34). I don’t know quite why this strikes me as a new idea. It makes sense that the God who created each one of us uniquely with an individual set of gifts and talents would want us to develop in that. Maybe my thought process wasn’t consciously reaching that conclusion because of the tendency to attempt to follow set formulas for spiritual formation. Or maybe because it seems as though Christ would have one image to which we must all conform. But instead, “We become compassionate persons in an infinite variety of models. We love and serve like Jesus in unique ways” (pg. 34).

Claim 2: God does not force that process of transformation upon us. This is one of those things that we’ve all heard is true, and Mulholland simply reiterates it. It’s also something I often wish weren’t true. I wish God would knock the fleshly me out of the way and just fix me up the way I ought to be. But instead, He asks us to surrender to Him, calling us to join Him in partnership with His work in our lives. This is part of the individuality thing. God is not trying to make all of us into cookie cutter versions of Himself. Instead, He takes individual people through a process, based partly on their willingness to offer “a consecration, a release of ourselves to God at each point of our unlikeness to Christ” (pg. 38).

Question 1: What are the ways in which I am practically carrying out the transformation of Christ in my life? I am to be looking more like Him in my relationships with others, as Mulholland said (pg. 42). It’s so much easier to focus on my inner self and to simply hold onto everything I’m learning and experiencing. But that’s not why it has been entrusted to me! I am to carry it further out to others – how am I to measure and practice that without it becoming a rote, legalistic practice? Well, that’s partly dependent on whether or not I am allowing God’s love to fill and overflow from my life. Because when I am truly participating in Christ’s love, I won’t be able to help but share it with others.

Insight 1: God picks the places of our life that our unlike Christ to work on (pg. 37) and furthermore, these parts of us are not some sort of parasite that must simply be plucked off the surface…they are a deeply embedded part of who we are (pg. 38). Both of these things make perfect sense – it’s just that we don’t typically think of it that way, probably because it’s prone to be discouraging. We don’t like that God picks our worst places to be most heavily at work. This is probably in part because we want to be able to think we are doing a pretty fair job of it on our own, with just a touch of helpfulness now and then. But the fact is that the problem is far too deeply engrained within us for us to ever be able to root out the problem on our own. Taking up our cross requires death because we must daily die to ourselves in order to become more like Christ (pg. 38).

Insight 2: God doesn’t just call us to some theoretical learning about being like Christ. He calls us to live it out through the practice of loving other people (pg. 43). I think this would definitely be a potential weakness of the monastic movement. By being so cut off from all the other people in the world, they can be acting in a very selfish manner. They are entirely focused on themselves and being changed inside. But if that is never carried out in the real world by interacting with those who need to receive God’s love, it is purposeless. God does not desire a relationship with us merely so that we attain some sort of perfection, but so that we can bring Him glory by living out His love in relationship with others!

Jan. 16 CQI - Methods of spiritual formation (Mul. Prologue-Ch. 2)

Claim 1: Mulholland is already making me uncomfortable even before I get to the first chapter. Not because I don’t agree with what he is saying, but because I can see the truth of it—Truth that would be easier to ignore. In the prologue and later in chapter 2, Mulholland points out that we as humans like to be the ones in charge of our lives, including our spiritual formation. We see it as a “static possession,” attainable by “the acquisition of information techniques” (pg. 12). We seek to control everything about it – when we can “set the limits on its pace and its direction” we don’t mind it too much – but being willing to hand that control completely over to God is outside of our comfort zone (pg. 26). As Mulholland says, “The hidden premise behind all of this is the unquestioned assumption that we alone are in control of our spirituality” (pg. 12). Even though my head knows to instantly fire back “that’s not true!” it is still how I have tended to live my life.

Claim 2: Later, Mulholland makes another point that I hadn’t necessarily thought much about before. He points out that “the process of spiritual shaping is a primal reality of human existence” (pg. 23). That means that even unbelievers are practicing spiritual formation. This makes sense, but it’s just not something we think about much. We always view spiritual formation as moving toward God, and something Christians do. But Mulholland’s right – there’s the other side of it. As Christ said, “Whoever is not with Me is against Me” (Matt. 12:30). There is no middle ground of spirituality. We’re going forward or backward on the road of life.

Question 1: In chapter 1, Mulholland discusses the fact that God often works in ways we cannot see – that even what we believe are the dry times of our lives are actually fields of preparation for a spiritual “quantum leap,” that God’s grace is steadily performing His will within us (pg. 22). I can certainly see evidence of that in my life. During high school and the first three semesters of college, my relationship with God felt very dry and dark. In the past two years, however, He has blessed me with the ability to see and feel Him at work in me. But the question I thought of while reading this section was not a very fun one. Am I willing to go through another dry spell if that is part of God’s plan for me? I’ve been in a honeymoon stage for a long time—not constant of course, but underlying none the less. It feels as though I could never go back to that dark place. But what if that’s what God required at some point to continue His sanctifying process in my life? Would I accept that?

Question 2: The other similar question I had related to Mulholland’s discussion of Jesus’ temptation, and how our culture places so much value on what we do rather than the “quality of our being” (pg. 28). As a senior, I’m almost constantly bombarded with that horrid question, “So what are you going to do when you graduate?” God’s been bringing me on a journey to where I am ok with not knowing right now. I do know that I belong to Him and that He’ll guide me. I guess the question is just more of a prayer. Will I continue to be willing to accept the fact that what God has for me may look completely different than what the world sees as success? I have often focused on what I do as the measure for how I feel about myself. How can I make choices which put my personal primary emphasis back on who Christ is making me to be instead?

Insight 1: Back in chapter 1, Mulholland discussed the way that people practically speaking try to be in charge of their own spirituality. He talked about trying to “create the atmosphere for the ‘right’ spiritual moment” (pg. 20) or trying to look back to a growth spurt and “reproduce the setting” to repeat the feeling (pg. 21). Over the past couple of years I’ve come to dislike “mountain top experiences,” I think for a similar reason. While I always appreciate the mountaintop when I’m there, it’s always more of an emptiness when it ends – a letdown. Life can’t be made of all high points. We can’t always be in a spiritual euphoria. Like Moses, we have to come down off of the mountain top. And then, if that amazing experience is going to actually mean anything, we have to make choices in our everyday life which are consistent with the lessons we learned up higher. It’s not easy…

"Here I Am" - A Spiritual Biography

In high school, I would have told you that in some senses I’ve always been a Christian. I have spent most of my life in an almost exclusively Christian environment. It took me some time, however, before I began to take personal ownership of my faith, allowing God be at work in my life instead of me making my life perfect for God. Due to my personality and the way I grew up, my early spirituality was based a lot on theological knowledge and not much on religious experience.

One night in February of 2000 (age 9.5), our family read a devotional based on 1 Peter 2:24, “He Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree.” I recognized for the first time the weight of my sin and the great cost of Christ’s redemption. I started crying. I had previously prayed a prayer of repentance, as many young Christian kids do (I don’t remember it), but that night my dad read Acts 2:38 to me. In that moment, I felt a call to respond by being baptized, which I did a couple months later.

In 2002, my life changed (age 12). Our family decided to teach at a Chinese university for a year. I loved our time in China. While there, I witnessed the other foreign teachers worshipping and experiencing God in a different way than I had ever known. Somehow, God became more real to me there, and I learned experientially that He wanted to be involved in our lives.

In September 2003 (age 13), we were starting to get settled back into our normal lives – new job, new house. But within a month that fairytale blew up in a complex explosion that is still painful to me. Long story short, there was an ugly church split. My dad also lost his job, and was severely under-employed for two years. I ended up holding onto bitterness and anger toward Dad and God.

Last night, as I was thinking about that period of my life, I realized I expected God to fix it all. I believed He could, and would. When things got worse instead of better, I unconsciously began to doubt and question God’s goodness, I guess. I had never before seen sin and evil so wreck a community of believers. I don’t know exactly how to explain the correlation, but it created some sort of break down in my relationship with God. That, combined with the need I’ve felt all my life to earn love and favor by making sure I meet people's expectations, developed in me a twisted picture of spirituality.

I had tons of head knowledge about God, and from the outside I looked like a really good Christian kid. But inside, I was a mess. I trusted no one, no one felt safe. I wasn’t willing to admit the brokenness inside. There were numerous nights when I would cry in my room, not understanding why I felt the way I did. I was so hungry for a relationship with God, like I had tasted in China. But I could never feel Him – He seemed distant and I knew that couldn’t be His fault, so it must be because of sin in my life. I just wanted to die and be done with having to fight to have a right relationship with Him. That is the overarching memory of my spiritual journey between 2003 and 2009 – pain and unfulfilled hunger.

Coming to JBU (August 2009) was the best thing that ever happened to me. God knew exactly where I needed to be for Him to do His work in my life. Through a variety of new worship experiences, He started breaking outside of the careful boxes I had packed Him into. Then on January 25, 2011, He changed everything. By His grace alone, I finally came to truly know that I didn’t need to earn His approval because He gave it freely as a gift. He revealed His overwhelming love, and He reoriented my whole life.

Since that day two years ago, there have still been plenty of ups and downs. But always underlying has been a deeper, more real knowledge God accepts me. That He loves me no matter what. That His call is to trust, not to understand; to accept grace, not to work to deserve it. And though my spiritual life is still very much a journey, I now know that He is at work and that He will not leave me alone. He is faithful, and He works in His time and His ways. Praise be to His name, Amen.

{To read more about my more recent spiritual learning, start here and read more at my spiritual blog.}