I've been re-reading Donald Miller's, "Searching for God Knows What." The first time I read it was the Fall semester of Camfel in 2006. I remember loving it, but it didn't impact me/connect the way it is now. (All quotes are from the book)
For 2 years I've been waiting for the "formulas" I've come up with, to start working. The first one involves the ideas of non-stop praying, fasting, reading my Bible, being at church, putting on my perfect Christian hat and God will fix my crap. Then there's option 2 which involves ignoring God, emotionally disconnecting from God, church, friends and family, but then God will do something so out of left field and hit me upside the head so hard with a revelation about how to fix everything. Have a cry out to God, fall on my knees Come to Jesus moment and then I can move onto being a fixed happy Christian with no struggles or problems.
Miller writes, "Life is complex, and the idea that you can break it down or fix it in a few steps is rather silly."
Life is complex. I know that, I experience it on a daily basis. Yet, why am I trying to fit God into this perfect formula with the end result of Him solving all my problems at once? Why do I think my relationship with Him has to look like an algebraic equation?
This is what I wanted, "Now, there is another recipe! .... "First", she began, you must paint a picture of a great personal misery. You must tell the reader of a time when you failed at something, when you had no control over a situation or dynamic. Second, you must talk about where you are now, and you have control over that situation or dynamic, and how wonderful and fulfilling it is to have control. Third, you must give the reader a three-four step plan for getting from the misery and lack of control to the joy and control you currently have." That's what I wanted, I wanted to have the struggle, to find the solution and then tell others, "This is how you fix it."
My story isn't over, life doesn't work like the formula above. I haven't discovered a mystery about God that now sets me up for perfection and joy the rest of my life. I'm GOING to screw something up, again. Not to use it as an excuse for all my mistakes, but that's what we do. We are continually breaking things and ourselves, always failing, forever messy. THAT is when we start to see the beauty and grace. "The truth is there are a million steps, and we don't even know what the steps are, and worse, at any given moment we may not be willing or even able to take them; and still worse, they are different for everybody and they are always changing. I have come to believe the sooner we find this truth beautiful, the sooner we will fall in love with the God who keeps shaking things up, keeps changing the path, keeps rocking the boat to test our faith in Him, teaching us to not rely on easy answers, bullet points, magic mantras or genies in lamps, but rather in His guidance, His existence, His mercy and His love."
I might not have a dramatic Come back to Jesus moment, I might just have a conversation and leave with a general understanding that my Jesus loves me and that we're in this together, I am not alone and I have to trust and let go of control. Sounds simple enough, because while this life is all in all complex, His love is simple.
"I have this suspicion, however, that if we are going to get to know God, it is going to be a little more like getting to know a person then practicing voodoo"
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