Christianity is less a journey and more unrest

In college I had a notebook that I kept with questions and quotes. The blue ink contrasts with the yellowing paper and in college I had legible enough handwriting to make out the following question:

I am tired of the metaphor of a journey. Is there any other metaphor that can be used to describe the life of faith?

Even then I found the idea of Christianity as a journey to be somewhat accurate but also boring and overused. Clearly the metaphor works, but it also is limited. It suggests that we are always moving in our life of faith. I have not experienced. I have experienced long bouts of stagnation and even moving backwards. The journey metaphor not only suggests that forward or deeper is better, but also that the journey is a means to an end. It suggests the destination is more important or valuable than the journey itself. Who goes on a trip and talks about the journey unless the journey to get there was fraught with trouble, delays or mishaps.

We want to “arrive” and “get there”, and when there is a delay, it is something to bemoan. No one beholds a delay in a journey.

I just about gave up on the searching for an alternate metaphor when I came across a gem from Soren Kierkegaard who said:

The Celtic Christian tradition imagines the Holy Spirt like a wild goose. Talk about unrest!

“Christianity is the most intensive and strongest form of unrest thinkable. Christ’s coming is intended to disturb life. Where one want to become Christian, there will be unrest; and where one has become a Christian, there unrest follows.”

Christianity is unrest. That sounds more true to me than a journey.

Often times people turn to religion when they experience unrest. The idea is that religion will provide a sense of control or comfort. If I say the right prayers or go to worship then things will work out better for me. The reality is that in Christianity, unrest is a feature and not a bug. It is the unrest that follows Christian conversion that is key and different from other religions.

Other religions (and even shallow Christianity) suggests that the faithful will be able to remove unrest from their life. But authentic Christianity puts unrest at the center of the tradition. It is the unrest that drives us to reach out into the world to care for others. If we were content and “rested” we would not go out into the world and possibly upset our ease and comfort. Unrest comes with Christianity because Christianity forces us to confront the internal and external sin in our lives.

The unrest of Christianity is the itch. It is the very thing that pulls us to our knees in confession that we are not God and that we are in need. As the Amma Synkletike said, “Just as a vessel cannot be built without nails, so it is impossible to be saved without humble-mindedness.” The gift of unrest provides access to humility.

And so, if you are among the unrested of the world, give thanks for this gift from God. And if you are rested, then let us pray that God may give us the gift of unrest. As the desert story goes:

Abba Poemen told a story of Abba John the Short that he asked God for his passions [struggles] to be removed from him. God granted this prayer and Abba John became one without a care. Going to a teacher, John said, “I see myself satiated, with no battle to fight.” The teacher said to John “Go and beseech God for the struggles to come upon you because it is through struggling that the soul makes progress.” The struggle returned, and John no longer prayed for it to be taken away. Instead Abba John prayed, “Lord, give me patience in the struggles.”

"We Christians are a Bunch of Scheming Swindlers".

Photo by Samuel Zeller on Unsplash

The matter is quite simple. The bible is very easy to understand. But we Christians are a bunch of scheming swindlers. We pretend to be unable to understand it because we know very well that the minute we understand, we are obliged to act accordingly. Take any words in the New Testament and forget everything except pledging yourself to act accordingly. My God, you will say, if I do that my whole life will be ruined. How would I ever get on in the world? Herein lies the real place of Christian scholarship. Christian scholarship is the Church’s prodigious invention to defend itself against the Bible, to ensure that we can continue to be good Christians without the Bible coming too close. Oh, priceless scholarship, what would we do without you? Dreadful it is to fall into the hands of the living God. Yes it is even dreadful to be alone with the New Testament.
--Søren Kierkegaard (Taken from Dr. Richard Beck)

To read Kierkegaard’s words might lead one to conclude that we ought to read the Bible literally. Even Kierkegaard would disagree. Rather, the call of Kierkegaard is the critique to read the Bible then use various rationalizations to avoid the ways we are convinced by the Truth and Love of the Good News. Time and time again we read about how God recklessly forgives. We find justifications to measure forgiveness. We hear Jesus place a priority on accepting the “others” the authorities rejected, we prioritize our own acceptance.

We are all able to cite the Bible to justify our current positions and feelings. We are less able to cite the Bible to challenge or critique our current positions. And when we do find scripture that challenges us, we are clever enough to cast it aside.

Sell all your possessions? Pick up the cross? Welcome the widow, orphan and sojourner? Keep the Sabbath? Prioritize love at the expense of truth?

Instead, I find myself saying, “The Bible is so cryptic and difficult to understand.”

Catechism is not enough...

From his book, The God Who Comes, the late Carlo Carretto sates: 

The catechism is not enough, theology is not enough, formulas are not enough to explain the Unity and Trinity of God. We need loving communication, we need the presence of the Spirit. That is why I do not believe in theologians who do not pray, who are not in humble communication of love with God. Neither do I believe in the existence of any human power to pass on authentic knowledge of God. Only God can speak about himself, and only the Holy Spirit, who is love, can communicate this knowledge to us. When there is a crisis in the Church, it is always here: a crisis of contemplation. 

In all the conversation about the future of the UMC. The concern about people not "following the Discipline" and those who "unequally apply the Discipline". The chatter about Love Your Neighbor and the Wesleyan Covenant Association. The chatter around the UMC is one emphasizing the practical, relevant and the immediate. To put it another way, we focus on the things that are not contemplation. 

When we are have the same vigor around the need for silence that we do around protesting. When we are concerned about what pastors are "being still" than where they are marching. When we are more concerned about the Church's relationship with Christ than who is getting married. Then we are beginning to see a Church that is moving from our crisis. 

Until the days of loving and humble communication, we will be in crisis. 

"Reading the Statisticians of Our Predicament Rather Than the Prophets of Our Deliverance"

R.R. Reno

Give and Take is a conversation podcast that can be very heady and wonky for those who love theology. Frankly, the people on this podcast are too smart for me to always follow and I am humbled every time I listen - I just am not as smart as I want to think that I am.

Recently, Scott Jones (the host) had a conversation with R. R. Reno (AKA Rusty). I was introduced to R. R. Reno in Seminary via a book he wrote called In the Ruins of the Church. When I heard this podcast, I wanted to just jot down a few great ideas that came from this conversation, so that I don't forget them. I hope these notes are as inspiring to you as there are for me. 

Among the gems that I found in this conversation was the idea that too much of our time is spent reading the statisticians of our predicament rather than the prophets of our deliverance. I am aware of how much I spend reading about the "predicament" we are in. I know that it is critical to diagnose the illness before treatment can begin. It seems clear to me that too many of us (self included) are parsing diagnostic words but few prophets are discussing what the treatment is for such ills. 

We are not able to listen to these prophets for at least two reasons. First is human nature. Prophets call us to account and call us to change. Humans have done a very good job at killing prophets in our world; this is an ancient problem.

The other reason we don't listen to prophets sharing solutions feels newer. We may not listen to the prophets of our deliverance because we do not have consensus on what the problem is. 

Moses was a prophet and he was not killed by his people. Why? Perhaps it is because there was a consensus on what the problem was - the people were enslaved. There was a deep agreement that slavery is the "predicament" and so it is easier to hear the prophet who is speaking deliverance to that predicament.

I grow frustrated about how much time I spend on understanding the predicament, I also know that until there is a sense of what the "problem is" we will never be able to hear the prophet lead us toward the path of healing.