Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
Matthew 5:48
At the end of my last post I wrote that humans are imperfect. That’s quite true, but I also like to argue that the opposite can be true: humans can be perfect.
In order for this to make any sense, I have to redefine perfection. The debate then shifts away from whether or not humans can be perfect and toward whether or not my definition of perfection is adequate. If you accept my definition of perfection, then you also have to agree that humans can be perfect.
As a Christian, I view God’s will as perfection. It’s the highest way that the world can operate. If nothing but God’s will happened, then the world would be entirely perfect. All the other definitions of perfection really only grasp at the heels of God’s perfection. When we label flowers as perfect or plans as perfect or a day as perfect, we are judging on a very limited scale. We judge outwardly and at only one point in time. The perfection of God’s will digs deeper than we can imagine and stretches farther into time than we can dream.
If that is “perfection,” then humans can be perfect. At any time, any person can be used by God to fulfill God’s will. It doesn’t matter where you’ve been or what you’ve done or who you are, God can use you exactly as you are to accomplish a part of God’s perfect will, and therefore, you can be perfect.
I’m being careful using “can be perfect” and not “are perfect.” See, humans mess up. At any moment we can be perfectly used for God’s will, but often we miss those moments. We aren’t obedience or we lack the faith to step out and do something or say something. For example, one time I was in McDonalds. I was heading out the door actually, when I saw a teenage girl sitting by herself crying. I knew nothing about her, but her emotion came like a wave over me. Compassion was stirred up in me. And I walked out of the restaurant, got into my car, and drove away.
I was yelling at myself as I drove home. Right then I was perfectly positioned to fulfill God’s will. I don’t know what it would have been. Maybe I should have just walked by and put a hand on her shoulder. Maybe I should have sat in the chair across from her. Maybe I should have asked if I could pray for her. I was afraid of what she’d think or what others would think. I was afraid of getting involved in something that I knew nothing about. I’ll probably harbor a little regret about that moment for the rest of my life. I could have been perfect there. But I wasn’t.
Even if I had been perfect there, I would have been imperfect later. As humans, we can be perfect, but we never will be entirely. I’m a numbers kind of guy and sometimes I wish I knew my perfection percentage. I feel like it’d be pretty low, like 3%. Then I could set goals for myself to increase a percentage point every month or something like that. Although part of me wishes fulfilling God’s will would be that concrete, I’m really glad it’s not.
Here’s the good news: when we aren’t perfect God still loves us. And I think God’s love is the kind that sees our potential in an overly optimistic way. We may fall in line with God’s will 1% of the time, but God says, “I love you and I’ll never stop working you into my will. I created you and I know you’ll be perfect next time.” We may be 1% perfect, but we’re all 100% loved. My little human brain won’t ever fully grasp that, but it’s beautiful.
All of this is why living consciously is so important to me. It’s why my last post tried to encourage people to action. I want to empower people. We can easily hide behind our churches. We tell ourselves, “My church is doing the will of God and I’m supporting my church by showing up and tithing, therefore I’m alright.” I think that’s where we’ve missed Jesus’ point. He didn’t come to create a religious organization for us to hide behind. He came to create followers, disciples, lovers of all. The church is a great way to get involved, but God wants you personally to be faithful and obedient. God wants you to believe and act on those beliefs. Together, with God, we can be perfect.
At least that’s how I see it.
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
Living Consciously: bible reading
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
John 1:1
The bible isn’t enough. It’s incomplete, inadequate. If Christians try to follow only the Bible then we miss out. God existed before Genesis 1:1. God interacted with humans between 300BCE and 0CE. And God was not dead after the early apostles stopped writing letters to the church. What we have in the Bible is a partial story of God interacting with people, but it’s not the whole thing. We need to live on more.
We run a great risk giving too much credence to the Bible. We risk missing Jesus’ whole point of coming to earth. We seem to understand his death and resurrection, the story of God’s amazing grace, but Jesus didn’t come to start a new religion. Jesus came to start a new, loving way of life. I’m afraid that misuse of the Bible transforms it into a prescription for Christian religion. Out of that we may draw the important things, like grace and forgiveness and love, but we also get rules, like you have to be baptized before you can receive Holy Communion, that don’t follow from Jesus’ teachings.
See, rules are easier. Especially for western churches, it’s easier for us to organize something if we already have a base set of rules and standards. So we take the most concrete thing we have, the Bible, and we mold it into a handbook for how to live a godly life. And then some of us miss so much because our views are too narrow.
The Bible has great value. Don’t misunderstand me here. I’ve devoted a huge chunk of my life to it; I will continue to read it every day for the rest of my life; and I’m about to start three years of seminary study that will inundate my head with Biblical knowledge. I love the Bible, but as a follower of Jesus I can’t limit myself to its words.
The Bible is our best reference for specific stories and examples of how God interacted with people. It’s our best glimpse into the person of Jesus Christ and the transformative power of his great love for humanity. It’s a wonderful tool for connecting Christians across continents and cultures. We need to know these things, but it’s only a base of our Christianity. This is only a starting point for how we live.
In his teaching, Jesus did not address every topic. Where Jesus did not speak, we look to Paul and hope that he addressed the topic. If Paul didn’t mention it, then we turn to our community, our churches, we rely on the Holy Spirit to discern what we ought to believe, how we ought to live. At first glance that seems OK to me, but I’m not sure it is throughout life. I will not discredit any of those steps of the process, but I want to empower the Holy Spirit speaking to individuals a lot sooner.
People can lie and deceive. Sometimes it’s intentional and sometimes it’s not. I understand why the Catholic Church at the time of the Reformation wanted to limit the public access to the Bible and didn’t want to empower individuals to interpret the Bible. That’s a messy process. Mistakes will be made. That’s still true today, but I think we’ve come a long way since the 16th century. People are more connected; scholastic work is more available. We still make mistakes, but I think we have a greater chance of living Biblically-centered, Holy Spirit-led lives.
What I’m talking about here are personal, daily, possibly mundane decisions that people make. If you don’t know what your church would advocate for or what Jesus would do, or exactly what the Bible would say, then trust the Holy Spirit working within you. Take a step, take action. There are hands to help us up if we fall down. There is forgiveness if we mess up.
I think the Christian church would be so much more obedient to God’s will if individuals were encouraged act without the restrictions of what may or may not be Biblical. We all need to read and study the Bible, but no one can know the fullness of God’s revelation. If something seems to contradict the Bible, then the community needs to step in because a nudging of the Holy Spirit may have been misinterpreted. No one should view themselves as greater than their Christian community, but no one should see themselves as less than an integral part of their Christian community and God’s mission in the world.
Read the Bible. Get to know Jesus and the nature of who he was. Continually ask the Holy Spirit to guide you. Then live and act and make decisions knowing that God will use you and never forgetting that humans (including yourself) are imperfect, but loved nonetheless.
John 1:1
The bible isn’t enough. It’s incomplete, inadequate. If Christians try to follow only the Bible then we miss out. God existed before Genesis 1:1. God interacted with humans between 300BCE and 0CE. And God was not dead after the early apostles stopped writing letters to the church. What we have in the Bible is a partial story of God interacting with people, but it’s not the whole thing. We need to live on more.
We run a great risk giving too much credence to the Bible. We risk missing Jesus’ whole point of coming to earth. We seem to understand his death and resurrection, the story of God’s amazing grace, but Jesus didn’t come to start a new religion. Jesus came to start a new, loving way of life. I’m afraid that misuse of the Bible transforms it into a prescription for Christian religion. Out of that we may draw the important things, like grace and forgiveness and love, but we also get rules, like you have to be baptized before you can receive Holy Communion, that don’t follow from Jesus’ teachings.
See, rules are easier. Especially for western churches, it’s easier for us to organize something if we already have a base set of rules and standards. So we take the most concrete thing we have, the Bible, and we mold it into a handbook for how to live a godly life. And then some of us miss so much because our views are too narrow.
The Bible has great value. Don’t misunderstand me here. I’ve devoted a huge chunk of my life to it; I will continue to read it every day for the rest of my life; and I’m about to start three years of seminary study that will inundate my head with Biblical knowledge. I love the Bible, but as a follower of Jesus I can’t limit myself to its words.
The Bible is our best reference for specific stories and examples of how God interacted with people. It’s our best glimpse into the person of Jesus Christ and the transformative power of his great love for humanity. It’s a wonderful tool for connecting Christians across continents and cultures. We need to know these things, but it’s only a base of our Christianity. This is only a starting point for how we live.
In his teaching, Jesus did not address every topic. Where Jesus did not speak, we look to Paul and hope that he addressed the topic. If Paul didn’t mention it, then we turn to our community, our churches, we rely on the Holy Spirit to discern what we ought to believe, how we ought to live. At first glance that seems OK to me, but I’m not sure it is throughout life. I will not discredit any of those steps of the process, but I want to empower the Holy Spirit speaking to individuals a lot sooner.
People can lie and deceive. Sometimes it’s intentional and sometimes it’s not. I understand why the Catholic Church at the time of the Reformation wanted to limit the public access to the Bible and didn’t want to empower individuals to interpret the Bible. That’s a messy process. Mistakes will be made. That’s still true today, but I think we’ve come a long way since the 16th century. People are more connected; scholastic work is more available. We still make mistakes, but I think we have a greater chance of living Biblically-centered, Holy Spirit-led lives.
What I’m talking about here are personal, daily, possibly mundane decisions that people make. If you don’t know what your church would advocate for or what Jesus would do, or exactly what the Bible would say, then trust the Holy Spirit working within you. Take a step, take action. There are hands to help us up if we fall down. There is forgiveness if we mess up.
I think the Christian church would be so much more obedient to God’s will if individuals were encouraged act without the restrictions of what may or may not be Biblical. We all need to read and study the Bible, but no one can know the fullness of God’s revelation. If something seems to contradict the Bible, then the community needs to step in because a nudging of the Holy Spirit may have been misinterpreted. No one should view themselves as greater than their Christian community, but no one should see themselves as less than an integral part of their Christian community and God’s mission in the world.
Read the Bible. Get to know Jesus and the nature of who he was. Continually ask the Holy Spirit to guide you. Then live and act and make decisions knowing that God will use you and never forgetting that humans (including yourself) are imperfect, but loved nonetheless.
Thursday, August 4, 2011
Living Consciously: relationshiplessness
“The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’
Matthew 25:40
If tragedy struck today and the house you’re currently living in burned down, would you have a place to sleep tonight? Can you think of someone who would allow you to live with them until you could get another place to live? Chances are everyone who is reading this would definitely have another place to sleep. Chances are everyone reading this wouldn’t even be able to count the vast multitude of houses they could sleep in tonight if necessary. Family, friends, classmates, coworkers, church members—there are countless people who we could ask.
In Baltimore, where I currently live but know very few people, there are dozens of houses I could sleep in. In fact, in the past few weeks, during the incredibly hot weather, I had offers from several different families to come over and stay with them. See, the house I’m living in doesn’t have air conditioning and they were concerned for my comfort. Without even asking for help, people have been offering it. Relationshiplessness is not a problem for me.
When asked to identify the main cause of homelessness in Baltimore, I once heard a guy say, “relationshiplessness.” He fully acknowledged that it wasn’t a real word, but it communicates the cause perfectly. If current homeless people had a few strong relationships with people who weren’t homeless, then homelessness wouldn’t be a problem. As it stands though, those who are truly homeless suffer from relationshiplessness and do not have any place to live. They don’t know people who would welcome them in.
Now, I could use this post to continue to advocate that we all make relationships with homeless people, but I think that point has already been made. People are needy in this world. And sometimes all they need is us, not what we have, but just a relationship with us.
I admit that this topic is far bigger than anything I could write in one or forty blog posts, but I want to mention a few things. I want us all to think hard about the culture we live in. Generally speaking, society tells us that we should fend for ourselves first. It says, “You are the most important.” It tells us not to worry about the others we push aside as long we’re personally successful at getting to the front. “If you make it to the top, then you’re a success; don’t worry about all those others that you stood on to get there.” We live in an individualistic culture and I know Jesus would have been critical of it.
Jesus never allowed relationshiplessness to continue. In John 4 I think of him sitting down at the well in Sychar and talking with the Samaritan woman who came out to get water. A Jew talking with a Samaritan? A man talking with a woman? Jesus didn’t care. He saw someone who was searching for greater meaning in life and knew a relationship with him could offer it to her.
In John 5 I think of Jesus walking up to the paralyzed man near the pool of Bethesda. Jesus asked him if we wanted to be healed. Though the man wanted that very much, he couldn’t see how it was possible. Apparently the first person into the pool when the waters were stirred would be healed, but this man had no one to help him get in the pool. No one would help him, so he’d never be well. Jesus took the opportunity to be the relationship the man needed, though Jesus’ healing power was much greater than the pool’s.
The stories of Jesus reaching out to others could go on and on. He was a man of relationships. As I said in an earlier post, people mattered to Jesus. I think people should matter to us too. We should emphasize forming relationships with those around us. We don’t have to go anywhere to find people. Let’s get to know the mail carrier or garbage collectors. Find out the name of the janitor at work or school. Offer a gift to a neighbor. As an introvert, these are difficult things for me to do, but as a follower of Jesus, I think they’re important to do.
It’s not exclusive to Mennonites, but as a small Christian denomination, we play what’s called the “Mennonite Game.” Simply put, when you meet someone knew within the Mennonite circle, you try to form as many connections as possible. “Oh, I know your second cousin from that conference on peace building four year ago. We were in the same conversation group.” Or “If you attend ______ church, then you must know my roommate’s brother’s fiancé’s family.” I wonder if Mennonites (and other relatively small groups of people) suffer from a fear of relationshiplessness. To counteract it we prove that we have relationships by making it a game.
I guess the main idea here is that relationships are important. Because we are people, we have something valuable to offer: ourselves. Let’s not get stuck in our own little world and fail to take steps to value others. Some of the posts that are yet to come will elaborate on how we should interact with each other.
Matthew 25:40
If tragedy struck today and the house you’re currently living in burned down, would you have a place to sleep tonight? Can you think of someone who would allow you to live with them until you could get another place to live? Chances are everyone who is reading this would definitely have another place to sleep. Chances are everyone reading this wouldn’t even be able to count the vast multitude of houses they could sleep in tonight if necessary. Family, friends, classmates, coworkers, church members—there are countless people who we could ask.
In Baltimore, where I currently live but know very few people, there are dozens of houses I could sleep in. In fact, in the past few weeks, during the incredibly hot weather, I had offers from several different families to come over and stay with them. See, the house I’m living in doesn’t have air conditioning and they were concerned for my comfort. Without even asking for help, people have been offering it. Relationshiplessness is not a problem for me.
When asked to identify the main cause of homelessness in Baltimore, I once heard a guy say, “relationshiplessness.” He fully acknowledged that it wasn’t a real word, but it communicates the cause perfectly. If current homeless people had a few strong relationships with people who weren’t homeless, then homelessness wouldn’t be a problem. As it stands though, those who are truly homeless suffer from relationshiplessness and do not have any place to live. They don’t know people who would welcome them in.
Now, I could use this post to continue to advocate that we all make relationships with homeless people, but I think that point has already been made. People are needy in this world. And sometimes all they need is us, not what we have, but just a relationship with us.
I admit that this topic is far bigger than anything I could write in one or forty blog posts, but I want to mention a few things. I want us all to think hard about the culture we live in. Generally speaking, society tells us that we should fend for ourselves first. It says, “You are the most important.” It tells us not to worry about the others we push aside as long we’re personally successful at getting to the front. “If you make it to the top, then you’re a success; don’t worry about all those others that you stood on to get there.” We live in an individualistic culture and I know Jesus would have been critical of it.
Jesus never allowed relationshiplessness to continue. In John 4 I think of him sitting down at the well in Sychar and talking with the Samaritan woman who came out to get water. A Jew talking with a Samaritan? A man talking with a woman? Jesus didn’t care. He saw someone who was searching for greater meaning in life and knew a relationship with him could offer it to her.
In John 5 I think of Jesus walking up to the paralyzed man near the pool of Bethesda. Jesus asked him if we wanted to be healed. Though the man wanted that very much, he couldn’t see how it was possible. Apparently the first person into the pool when the waters were stirred would be healed, but this man had no one to help him get in the pool. No one would help him, so he’d never be well. Jesus took the opportunity to be the relationship the man needed, though Jesus’ healing power was much greater than the pool’s.
The stories of Jesus reaching out to others could go on and on. He was a man of relationships. As I said in an earlier post, people mattered to Jesus. I think people should matter to us too. We should emphasize forming relationships with those around us. We don’t have to go anywhere to find people. Let’s get to know the mail carrier or garbage collectors. Find out the name of the janitor at work or school. Offer a gift to a neighbor. As an introvert, these are difficult things for me to do, but as a follower of Jesus, I think they’re important to do.
It’s not exclusive to Mennonites, but as a small Christian denomination, we play what’s called the “Mennonite Game.” Simply put, when you meet someone knew within the Mennonite circle, you try to form as many connections as possible. “Oh, I know your second cousin from that conference on peace building four year ago. We were in the same conversation group.” Or “If you attend ______ church, then you must know my roommate’s brother’s fiancé’s family.” I wonder if Mennonites (and other relatively small groups of people) suffer from a fear of relationshiplessness. To counteract it we prove that we have relationships by making it a game.
I guess the main idea here is that relationships are important. Because we are people, we have something valuable to offer: ourselves. Let’s not get stuck in our own little world and fail to take steps to value others. Some of the posts that are yet to come will elaborate on how we should interact with each other.
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
Living Consciously: music
Meanwhile, the older son was in the field. When he came near the house, he heard music and dancing.
Luke 15:25
I wonder if I spend more time listening to music than not. I don’t listen to music while I sleep, so that’s a huge chunk of “not” time, but most of my waking hours are spent with music playing in the background. Still, I bet the majority of my day is spent without listening to music. Unless, that is, “listening to music” includes listening to music that I’m creating. I’m that annoying person who’s always humming or whistling whatever song happens to be stuck in my head. Often the notes pouring out of me are subconscious. I guess I’m so accustomed to hearing music that I create my own in the absence of another source. That’s just how I work.
I wonder if Jesus was musical. As far as I know, we don’t have evidence pointing in either direction. If I had to guess though, I’d say that Jesus was not musical. From the Gospel accounts, we don’t see music playing any size role, considerable or not, in his ministry. He and his disciples didn’t attend concerts or form a band to rock out in their garage. They probably heard a bit of music at religious feasts occasionally, but that’d be it.
Don’t you feel kind of bad for people in the 1st century Palestine? They didn’t have most of the instruments that we take for granted today. They had voices, percussion, and harps. I guess there were shofars too, but weren’t they more for communication than music? Music wasn’t a staple of their society. It didn’t define them, or give them an identity. It didn’t entertain them or touch their emotions. It wasn’t a way to escape life or bring meaning to it.
Unfortunately, music isn’t all good though. I’m pretty critical of music. Jesus doesn’t necessarily back me up on this, but from what I know of Jesus I imagine he’d be critical of some music we listen to. The diversity of styles and genres would excite him. Jesus loved people universally, so perhaps he’d love music universally too. But, just as Jesus was critical about the inward motives of people, I imagine he’d be critical of the meaning of songs too. The music—the rhythms, pitches—would be lovely to him, but the lyrics and deeper messages might not be.
That’s where I think we could afford to bring a little more consciousness to our lives. Music is powerful. Even background music has impact on us. Stores attempt to control your mood with music. Elevator music tries to make you more relaxed, and therefore, more patient. How many songs can bring back memories to you? How many songs can completely change your mood the instant they start playing? Even if we don’t give music our conscious attention, it’s influencing us subconsciously. That’s kind of scary and I don’t want to leave what I hear up to chance.
So I’m picky when it comes to music. I don’t want to fill my life with hate or violence or unfaithful relationships, so I try to avoid those things in music. I want to fill my life with encouragement, motivation, and praise. And there is plenty of music that emphasizes those things. I have a feeling that the content of music has a much greater impact on our lives than we’ll ever know. I want music to make me live more like Jesus instead of less and I’m grateful that my parents chose that kind of music for me long before I could make the choice for myself.
Christian music isn’t all good. And secular music isn’t all bad. I would never tell someone to cut out secular music from their lives because that’d mean throwing out many songs that are lovely. I don’t agree with all of the music that falls under “Christian” labels either. There are some songs on the local Christian radio station that cause me to turn off the radio. In general though, I feel better listening to Christian bands and radio.
I wish I had more to say on this topic because it’s extremely important to me. Alas, I have no more to say. Maybe someone else does . . .
Luke 15:25
I wonder if I spend more time listening to music than not. I don’t listen to music while I sleep, so that’s a huge chunk of “not” time, but most of my waking hours are spent with music playing in the background. Still, I bet the majority of my day is spent without listening to music. Unless, that is, “listening to music” includes listening to music that I’m creating. I’m that annoying person who’s always humming or whistling whatever song happens to be stuck in my head. Often the notes pouring out of me are subconscious. I guess I’m so accustomed to hearing music that I create my own in the absence of another source. That’s just how I work.
I wonder if Jesus was musical. As far as I know, we don’t have evidence pointing in either direction. If I had to guess though, I’d say that Jesus was not musical. From the Gospel accounts, we don’t see music playing any size role, considerable or not, in his ministry. He and his disciples didn’t attend concerts or form a band to rock out in their garage. They probably heard a bit of music at religious feasts occasionally, but that’d be it.
Don’t you feel kind of bad for people in the 1st century Palestine? They didn’t have most of the instruments that we take for granted today. They had voices, percussion, and harps. I guess there were shofars too, but weren’t they more for communication than music? Music wasn’t a staple of their society. It didn’t define them, or give them an identity. It didn’t entertain them or touch their emotions. It wasn’t a way to escape life or bring meaning to it.
Unfortunately, music isn’t all good though. I’m pretty critical of music. Jesus doesn’t necessarily back me up on this, but from what I know of Jesus I imagine he’d be critical of some music we listen to. The diversity of styles and genres would excite him. Jesus loved people universally, so perhaps he’d love music universally too. But, just as Jesus was critical about the inward motives of people, I imagine he’d be critical of the meaning of songs too. The music—the rhythms, pitches—would be lovely to him, but the lyrics and deeper messages might not be.
That’s where I think we could afford to bring a little more consciousness to our lives. Music is powerful. Even background music has impact on us. Stores attempt to control your mood with music. Elevator music tries to make you more relaxed, and therefore, more patient. How many songs can bring back memories to you? How many songs can completely change your mood the instant they start playing? Even if we don’t give music our conscious attention, it’s influencing us subconsciously. That’s kind of scary and I don’t want to leave what I hear up to chance.
So I’m picky when it comes to music. I don’t want to fill my life with hate or violence or unfaithful relationships, so I try to avoid those things in music. I want to fill my life with encouragement, motivation, and praise. And there is plenty of music that emphasizes those things. I have a feeling that the content of music has a much greater impact on our lives than we’ll ever know. I want music to make me live more like Jesus instead of less and I’m grateful that my parents chose that kind of music for me long before I could make the choice for myself.
Christian music isn’t all good. And secular music isn’t all bad. I would never tell someone to cut out secular music from their lives because that’d mean throwing out many songs that are lovely. I don’t agree with all of the music that falls under “Christian” labels either. There are some songs on the local Christian radio station that cause me to turn off the radio. In general though, I feel better listening to Christian bands and radio.
I wish I had more to say on this topic because it’s extremely important to me. Alas, I have no more to say. Maybe someone else does . . .
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