Rest & Progress

As I lay in my bed staring at my alarm clock radio that is playing classical music fron NPR, the digital numbers change from 10:19pm to 10:20pm, and I think to myself "another minute of this life I can never get back." Then my glance shoots over to my movie poster of Donnie Darko and I daydream about the film I am working on with some friends and think about all the work that needs to be done and how unfulfilled my days seem right now and have seemed over the past 3 or so months. I think about how much more I want to do with my life and all the things I wish I was doing and making and creating. I think about the legacy I am not building.

10:21pm. And I lay in bed.
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First of all, I have to confess that my bed isn't really a bed-bed. It's a futon with a thick mattress that I never fold into a futon. I just thought it wouldn't be fair for you to be daydreaming about my current environment and have that detail be all wrong.

Secondly, I find myself constantly reverting back to a desire for progress.

I want progress in my life. I need to feel like I am going somewhere, like I am doing something larger with my life rather than just sitting and going about my routine while missing all the bigger things I could be a part of.
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I think some of this comes out of a recent narrative theology that I really like to think about. I only call it recent because it is something I came across about 4 years ago, although its been around for decades longer. Basically this theology says that we are all part of the story of this world and that the main plot is about God creating this world and everything in it (like us) and how the world didn't obey God so it got all mucked up. Then God sends his Son to the world to fix it once and for all through a sacrificial, not disciplinary way, and now the world is slowly being fixed through its own efforts, but those are only possible because of what God's son did. And the end of the story is that someday God's son will come back again and really fix everything once and for all and all the progress we will have made will be peanuts compared to what he will do.

Peanuts. All our progress will be peanuts.
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I am caught in between these 2 ideas. This idea that we all play an, all things considered, very small role in the story of this world but it is our role and we must play it. And that is a role where we move in ways that reveal who God's son is and show people what he has done.

But that isn't the only story we think about.

As a matter of fact, it is probably not even the story we think about most often. The story we think about most often is the one where we are the main character. We live that story every moment of our lives, so it is no surprise that it is a big deal to us.

Now, isn't it interesting to think that there are basically 2 billion people all over the world all thinking the exact same thing as us? We have 2 billion people all thinking that the most important story is the one about them. 2 billion more-important-than-everyone-else's stories.
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This blog isn't to talk about how our stories aren't the focus of our lives. I think that is true, but the question that inevitably comes is, "well then how do I live my story in meaningful ways that contribute to the larger story of God and this world while also feeling like my story is worthwhile and fulfilling?" The reason I won't talk about that is because it is going to be very different for every person and there are other people who have written better answers to that question than I could ever dream up.

No, this blog is about rest and progress. Yes, we have work to be done and yes we may always feel like we are not doing all that we should (especially if we are unhappy and antsy in our current stage of life). At the same time, I have found it helpful to think about the way God created us.

Don't worry, this isn't the part of the blog where I start quoting Lady GaGa (although she is awesome).

Just think about all the options and choices God had when he made us. God chose to make us beings that get tired. He chose to make us beings that need sleep every single day. He chose to make us people who needed rest and who couldn't just work and work and work and build and build and build. We get to points where we must stop and our bodies demand rest.

If progress was all that mattered to God, then he could have made us differently.
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There is something to that, I think. There is something that is important to understand that sometimes the clock might just tick and tick and tick and that is okay. Just because we can see the clock ticking doesn't mean we have done something wrong or aren't doing something right. Sometimes it just means that it's bed time. Or it's nap time. Or it's the weekend. Or Ghost Whisperer is on and there are another 14 minutes until Without A Trace comes on. You get it.
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This is not a blog to encourage sloth. Laziness is a captivating and evil little guy that only grows worse and worse until we somehow pull ourselves out of it and feel the sunlight and recognize the err of our ways. All I want to say is that there are seasons in life just like there are seasons in the year and their are different times of day. Some of those seasons may be slow, but just take that to mean that other parts of your story are right around the corner. And I bet you that coming season will be a little more exciting than where you've just been.
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Remember, God rested on the 7th day.

10:44pm. Sweet dreams.
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Peace.

The Christian's Goal

I have often misunderstood what my goals are supposed to be since I have been a Christian. At one time or another, all of the following have been my goals as a Christian: tell others when they were doing something wrong, get others to follow Jesus, be as pious as possible, be nice to others, get to heaven when I die, and help change the world.

I’m sure there are a host of others I was hell-bent on, and to be fair all of these goals are still goals I have in my faith in some respect. They are a lot more complicated to me than the simple list you just read, but they still exist in my faith in and are priorities. I think a problem arises when these smaller tangible goals become paramount and the primary matters in our faith.

We start detaching these little goals from what I believe the real goal of being a Christian is: to present Christ to the world through your life.
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To be fair, in some situations that will mean telling people when they are doing something wrong, or very directly telling a person about who Jesus Christ is, or simply being kind and graceful to a person who needs to be treated that way. All of those goals I listed are actually just little practices that are part the larger goal of showing the world who Jesus is.
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My biggest stumbling block hasn’t actually been being stuck on one of those smaller goals I listed above. My hang-up has been that I have become short-sighted with my own change as a person. I started to believe that the goal of being a Christian was becoming more of who I am supposed to be and less who I am.

Although the process my sanctification and redemption is very important, it shouldn‘t be what my faith is all about.
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We don’t love the process for the process’ sake (although we do start to really enjoy its challenges and rhythms). Instead, we change who we are because we want to point to Christ. Think about what you would feel when someone, anyone, Christian or not, gets a clearer vision or experience of Christ because of something you were a part of.

You will feel joy.

This is the realization that I think fuels the writers of the New Testament; the same people that urge us to endure, to hold on, and to rejoice in our sufferings. It is not only because of a reward we will receive for ourselves later, but also because we truly believe we are doing a service to Christ and others. We are helping restore the most important relationship that could exist; we are restoring people to see Christ.
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I’ve always marveled at the people whose faith has seemed so strong and consistent that they carry this sense of peace and joy with them no matter what. And I wonder if those things come out of a very clear sense of what they are doing, why they are doing it, and how they feel about what they are doing.

And don’t misunderstand me to be using the word “doing” to mean any kind of specific task or project. I mean the way people live their lives holistically. I’m sure there are some very specific things they are involved in or practices they faithfully keep, but I am talking about the way these believers do everything.
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I, for one, have become guilty of being really enamored with the beauty of what I consider the personal process of being a Christian. The subtle, slow, graceful, sometimes painful, sometimes reliving process of being restored and renewed and reclaimed as something I was meant to be. It brings me to tears to think about the memories I have of specific moments where I suddenly became conscious that it was happening in that very moment. It is a beautiful process that I have fallen in love with.

Even still, that process can become so romanticized and euphoric that it is almost like a drug. And when the process is more painful and than relieving, we are stranded on this isle of dissatisfaction looking at the coast wondering where all the joy went.
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That is a malformed lens to see our faith in because we have made it about us (making our faith about us is something we are incredibly good at). To have the source of our joy be our mission to point to Jesus makes it less about us, more about Jesus, and more about others. If we can have confidence that that is why we are here and what we are always working towards, then perhaps our joy won’t be so fleeting. Perhaps, as well, we will be more able to see ourselves as part of something larger than our own salvation; we can choose to be part of the redemption of everything in this world.

Now that is a joyful thought.
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Peace.