Radical Love

Christianity is about love. People who say that it's about judgment, righteousness, morality, belief, or even grace have all named aspects of the religion but not its heart. Christianity has judgment tempered by love, righteousness and morality fueled by love, belief that leads to love, and grace that comes from love. Without love, none of the rest of it makes sense. Jesus himself told us that the whole thing boils down to two commandments: 1. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind; and 2. Love your neighbor as yourself. The wonderful thing about these commandments is that they support each other. The more we love God, the more we want to love people because God loves them. The more we devote ourselves to loving each other, the more we understand and appreciate the God who loves us.

There is nothing more important in a Christian life than love. Nothing should take precedence over it. But if we look around us, we see all kinds of things coming between us and love. Cultural values like privacy, independence, self-sufficiency, pride (or self-respect as we call it), and even some standards of propriety become walls between us and our neighbors that limit how we interact with them. We hold people at arm's length because we are afraid of so many things. We don't want others to see our innermost thoughts and feelings because they might judge us. We don't want to ask for help or be asked to give more than we think we have to give. We're afraid of wasting time or energy. We're afraid of getting hurt or letting someone else down. We're afraid that getting close to someone will upset our social structure or community. We're afraid of being seen as presumptuous or nosy. We don't want to interfere or do something that could be perceived as inappropriate. We don't want to risk devoting ourselves to people who might not reciprocate. And I'm not saying that those fears aren't valid or important—but I am saying that they are less important than the absolute necessity of love.

Loving, intimate, and personal relationships with other people teach us about healthy spirituality and being in relationship with God. We learn to trust and to accept and to work together. We learn to give and to take, to admit when we need help and to ask for it. We stop being so afraid when we know we have a network of close friends to support us. We become more generous. We're more willing to take risks and to grow. That's what Christian living is about. Christian love is not the kind of love that pats you on the head and tells you you're perfect just the way you are. It's the kind of love that challenges you to keep striving towards the best possible version of yourself both for your sake and the sake of the people whose lives you touch; it's the kind of love that says "It's going to be hard and it might hurt, but you'll be better for it, and I'll be there to hold your hand and support you every single step of the way." It's the kind of love that doesn't let us sit in our pews thinking about how lucky we are to be saved—instead it sends us out into the world to discover that the treasure we've been given is even greater than we had imagined.

When Jesus came into this world, he was considered by his society to be a radical. Although his message was based on Scriptural themes people were already familiar with, he was taking them to a whole new level. Today's American Christians are used to being mainstream, and it's time for us to remember what it means to be radicals. There's a hymn I love whose refrain proclaims "they'll know we are Christians by our love." Will they? If we want to stand out from all the rest of the mainstream "decent" people, we need to love more passionately, more radically than basic morality demands. We can't just stop at the boundaries of social convention—we need to be willing to break the rules if they get in our way. Right now the only Christian radicals people are talking about are the ones who are screaming about how people are going to Hell because God hates them for their sins. That's not what our religion is really about: "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." (John 3:16) That's the real point. That's what we need to be radical about. God loves us, and He wants us to love each other.

What does this mean? It means that we should be actively working to have more close friends and to be more open and honest with them. It means that we should be finding ways to go out of our way to be kind and helpful to other people. It means that we should be actively supporting our fellow Christians in their faith. It means we should be trying to get to know the people around us on a more personal level and taking more opportunities to tell them how special and beloved they are. It means that we should take the same loyalty we feel to our blood relatives and apply it to every person who reaches out to us. It means we should be thinking more actively and consciously about what's most important in our lives and going beyond what feels comfortable. We should be asking people to help us and offering to help others, including with very personal things. We should volunteer to comfort those who are mourning, celebrate with those who are happy, and support those who are working hard for God. We should be working together with one another to ensure that no one in our community feels alone or unsupported. Be a friend. Be a neighbor. Be a brother or sister in Christ.

If this is starting to sound like a lecture, it's only because I'm excited. The truth is that what I've written here is a message of hope. I am here to tell you that more is possible than we ever imagined. Relationships that we don't yet dare to have could one day be more rewarding than we could ever have predicted. Connections and growth that our cynical minds deem improbable are possible with the help of God. We have not even dreamed the wonders that God has in store for us, the marvelous experiences He is offering for the nourishment of our souls. God wants us to love each other because He knows we will benefit from it. He knows that love will make us happier and wiser and stronger. He will bless our love and make it fruitful in all the corners of our life. We needn't limit ourselves for the sake of fear or social conventions. When we break the rules for the sake of love, for the sake of God, God will support us and carry us far beyond the derision of the world. Don't settle for "good enough". Don't give up. Don't be afraid. There's more. I promise.

Be Still And Know That I Am God

I spent last weekend at a hermitage center called Pacem In Terris in St. Francis, Minnesota. I went there at the recommendation of a coworker to spend some time alone with God. I sat in a tiny little cabin with no electricity or plumbing (just a gas heater and light from a gas lamp) or out on the attached screened-in porch and I walked around in the woods and the prairie. I even sat down by a lake for a little while and looked out over the loose chunks of ice still dotting its surface even though it was 55 degrees out.

The point of the center is to give Christians a place to be alone with God. I was there to have a private conversation with God, to bask in his presence, and to rest from the hectic life that sometimes distracts me from him. I digested a lot of things that have happened in my life and talked with God about what was coming next. I asked for guidance and I thanked God for everything I have received so far. More than anything, I embraced the peace of being alone with God and recognizing that He has everything under control. He is my refuge, my strength, and my help in times of trouble.

Something very important happens when I am quiet and calm and fully aware of God's presence and His majesty—I stop being afraid. I'm not afraid of the challenges that are coming in my life, because I know God will be with me. I'm not afraid of failing at my calling, because I know that God designed me specifically for it so that I could do His work simply by following my deepest instincts. I am not afraid of being defeated or destroyed by naysayers or adversaries because God will give me strength. I am not afraid of being thought foolish for the choices I make in following God because God's wisdom so far surpasses ours that human wisdom is like foolishness in God's eyes. I am not afraid of being alone, rejected, or unloved because God loves me. I am not afraid of Satan or even of my own sinfulness because God saves me.

So many fears creep into my life when I am busy and distracted. Will God make my monthly budget work out? Will God get my husband a teaching job in this lousy economy? Will God help me get pregnant? Will God help me say the right thing when I am nervous about telling others about Him? Will God cure the nagging self doubt I feel or give me a future worth working for? The truth is that God will do much more than any of those things. He has given me life and a purpose and is providing every single thing I truly need to grow and thrive as a living soul. He does not spare me from all trials and challenges, but He rides them with me and carries me through to the other side. With God in my life, there are no limits—all things are possible.

God is more than I could ever imagine, and it is only when I am quiet and in communion with Him that I fully appreciate that concept. No matter what I learn or don't learn in this life, God will know more. No matter how well I understand myself or those around me, God understands us better. No matter how weak or strong I feel, God will lend me the power to do whatever He has asked of me. If God is with me, who can be against me? What is there to be afraid of?

Psalm 46
God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging.
There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy place where the Most High dwells.
God is within her, she will not fall; God will help her at break of day.
Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall; he lifts his voice, the earth melts.
The LORD Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.
Come and see what the LORD has done, the desolations he has brought on the earth.
He makes wars cease to the ends of the earth.
He breaks the bow and shatters the spear; he burns the shields with fire.
He says, “Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.”
The LORD Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.

WINNING!

Actor Charlie Sheen has been making headlines for months now with his rants about what's wrong with everybody but him. He's coined several interesting catchphrases which he's trying to get trademarked so that he can use them to make more money, now that he's no longer the highest paid actor on television after getting fired from Two and a Half Men. One of Sheen's favorite new catchphrases is "WINNING!" This has caught on and now lots of people are saying it—some in jest and some in support of Sheen.

From where Charlie Sheen sits, he may actually think that he is a winner. After all, he's been earning piles of cash for years, he has access to all the drugs he wants and the delusion that he can "handle" their effects, and he's got two live-in "goddesses" who don't seem to mind that he's still married to Brooke Mueller. Big house, lots of money, lots of attention. Plenty to sate his various appetites. What more could a man want, right?

The sad thing is that there are actually people besides the drugged and delusional Sheen who think that he's "winning". Even those who don't think drug use is a good idea often agree that being famous and having piles of cash, a big house, and a hot girlfriend are goals to aspire to. Our society encourages to look up to the haves and to look down on the have-nots. People who can sell themselves effectively get admiration and people who cling exclusively to their integrity are labeled fools. American culture tells us that rich is better than poor (or even middle class), leading is better than following, praise is better than silence, beauty is better than kindness, having stuff will make us happy, and everyone prefers "winners".

But let us consider for a moment how these ideas compare to the goals of a Christian life:

As Jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him and fell on his knees before him. “Good teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” 

“Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone. ¹⁹ You know the commandments: ‘You shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, you shall not defraud, honor your father and mother.’ ” 

“Teacher,” he declared, “all these I have kept since I was a boy.”

Jesus looked at him and loved him. “One thing you lack,” he said. “Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” 

At this the man’s face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth.

Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!”

—Mark 10:17–23

This young man would have been considered a winner both in his society and ours. He was rich and he was morally upstanding. He was young and presumably healthy, and he addresses Jesus with respect, not arrogance or sarcasm. He seems like a pretty good guy, doesn't he? Jesus even loved him—and that's why he tried to tell this young man about true victory and how to obtain it. The things that we think of as victories here on Earth—amassing wealth, fame, security, or public approval—can actually hinder us from reaching the true victory of eternal life with God. It's like winning a battle only to lose the war. What good is that? Where was this young man's wealth going to get him in the long run? Where is Charlie Sheen's "winning" going to get him? 

From a Christian perspective, the truth is that we have to be willing to be losers to find true victory. We have to be able to risk being poor or unpopular. We have to be at peace with losing our lives in order to save them. True victory comes from God and may not always be apparent here on Earth. John the Baptist, who prepared the world to receive Jesus, lived out in the wilderness and ate locusts and wild honey and dressed in camel's hair. A lot of people thought he was crazy. And yet Jesus said that "among those born of women there has not risen anyone greater than John the Baptist." (Matthew 11:11) 

Would we be willing to leave everything we own behind and follow Jesus? Would we leave our families and our lives as the disciples did when they were called? Would we live out in the wilderness and preach a message that the respected leaders decry as insanity if God asked it of us? Can we give up everything we've gained in this life in order to inherit a better, truer kind of life, even if that life is invisible to most of the people around us? God is going to ask all of us hard questions, and every one of us is given tasks that challenge us. We will face hardships and temptations. But through all that we will gain a stronger relationship with God, and that will bring us true life. We will be REAL winners then.

You Are Qualified

Yesterday at Bible study, our small group was joined by a visitor I hadn't met before. At the end of our hour-long conversation, he asked me if I worked at the church. I told him no, and he said, "Wow! You can really testify!" He asked me if I was a minister or if I had ever thought about becoming one. I told him that perhaps I would be a sort of non-traditional minister. In a way, I already am.

Some of the people who have visited our Bible study have been a little intimidated by all the retired pastors in the group talking about old seminary classes or quoting Martin Luther. "I'm not a theologian," some of them have said. "I don't know if I can really add anything to the discussion." We would assure all of them that anyone can contribute something to a Bible study discussion, no matter how much (or how little) education or theological training they've had.

The truth is, anyone who approaches Scripture with respect and humility is qualified to interpret and discuss it with the help of the Holy Spirit. None of us, no matter how educated we are, are smart enough to uncover all of the wisdom God has hidden in His Word on our own, anyway. It's the Spirit who guides us to make sense of it all. Sure, any academic can tell you that secondary texts can be very helpful, but the most important thing is the primary text—in this case the Bible—and we all have access to that. Theological theories and writings can add depth to the discussion, or they can distract from key areas. The only absolutely necessary components to a fruitful Christian understanding of Scripture are the Word itself and the Holy Spirit. Lucky for us, the Holy Spirit isn't just reserved for the leaders and learned.

Just because you aren't a professional priest, pastor, or preacher does not mean you aren't a minister. Through the power of the Spirit, any one of us can minister to anyone else. When I inspired that man in Bible study with my insights and testimony, I was ministering to him, just the same as if I really had been an employee of the church as he initially assumed. When you take the words of Scripture to heart and live them out in service to others, you are ministering to them. When you share God's love or encourage someone's faith, you are a minister.

You are qualified to make a difference in the lives of others—not only that, but you're expected to. We can't just designate ministering to the paid pastoral professionals. We all have a role to play in the body of Christ—otherwise we'd just be dead weight. Each one of us has special God-given talents, and each one of us has access to the Spirit who will show us how to use them if we pay attention.

Don't Give Up

As humans, we have limitations. Our bodies and our minds can only take so much stress before we become sick or injured. We generally don't like to get anywhere close to our breaking points because it's excruciating. We are more inclined to stop when we get tired, to quit if our task becomes to punishing. In many cases, this is a very reasonable thing to do. If we commit to something that we cannot do, it could destroy us. In general, we only push ourselves to go past where it hurts, to work through the exhaustion, when it's something that we feel is genuinely important, something that matters more than any price we could pay to achieve it.

Following God is one of those things. Sometimes being a Christian is downright exhausting. Sometimes it hurts. Sometimes we American Christians mistakenly believe that it should be easy for us since we don't face much in the way of direct persecution, but being a Christian will always be hard, even if we live in a community full of other Christians. When we invest in God's work, our hearts will hurt when we see people suffering. We will cry when we want to do more than our resources will allow. We will be frustrated when there aren't enough hours in the day or enough volunteers to help with important work or enough ideas to solve every problem. It might feel tempting sometimes to give up, to say we don't care, to argue that the things that are going wrong aren't our problem.

It is true that all of God's workers need a little rest sometimes. Jesus went off by himself to pray on occasion, and the apostles must have put their feet up from time to time after a long day's work. But they didn't exit God's kingdom or leave their paths when they took a rest. They didn't throw up their hands and say, "I quit!" or decide that it just wasn't worth it anymore. If they had, their stories might have gone differently.

God charges each on of us with two things: love him and love our neighbors. God leads each of us on a personalized mission to fulfill those two commandments in a way that utilizes the gifts and spirit He gave each of us. But Satan doesn't want us to follow God's plan, so the number one thing he can do to stop us is convince us to give up. Here are a few of the lies he uses to try to do that:

• Something else is more important. So God wants me to give to those in need—what about my retirement savings? So God wants me to spend time supporting other people in my community—what about how I want to spend my time? So God wants me to stand up for marginalized people—what if that destroys my precious popularity? So God wants me to leave everything behind and follow Him—what if I don't want to? We may find ourselves tempted to give up on God's plan so that we can pursue our own plans instead, but nothing we can devise will be of any lasting help to us if we shut out God.

• I can't make a difference anyway. The problems of the world seem so big and we seem so small. We may not feel smart, talented, our powerful enough to make a real difference, but that's exactly why our participation is so essential. None of us can change the world alone, so it only works if we all work together. The more of us there are, the better work we can do. Every act of love counts. Every time any one of us helps someone else, we empower that person to make a difference too. We feed off each others' faith, and we all grow in God's spirit together. Every person makes a difference.

• The world is nothing but pain, and I just want out. Sometimes we may feel like nobody loves us, that the world is a dark place, that there is no hope that things could get better. We stop working for the future because we don't believe that it holds any promise. We become depressed or bitter. Some of us may even attempt suicide. We don't just want to give up on God, we want to give up on life. We don't want to hurt anymore. But God is good, God is love, and He is moving through the world and in our lives even when we cannot feel Him. God loves us. Our brothers and sisters in Christ love us. There is a lot of violence and pain in the world, but there is also love and kindness and hope. There is the promise of a future in heaven if we can only persevere to the end, and there is also the promise that the Spirit will sustain us along the way and will heal our pain and sorrow little by little. 

• I'm a screw-up, so I'd just mess it up. Well, yes, you will—but then God will fix it. Nobody but Jesus was perfect. All of us move both forward and backward on our faith journeys. We will do some really helpful things and we will also make mistakes. God will use all of our earnest efforts to create something good. Nobody is a total screw-up. God made all of us with special qualities and talents, and He imbued us all with the potential to do good in this world. So what if you've done a lot of bad in the past? That doesn't inhibit your ability to work for good in the future. God will stick with you, so stick with God.

What I write here I write for myself as much as I write it for anyone else. We mustn't give up. I have fallen prey to every lie I've listed above from time to time, but God always pulls me back to a more peaceful and productive place. I trust God. I know that somehow He's going to take all of the mess I see around me and make it right. I know He's going to give me the strength and the will to persevere, even when part of me wants desperately to give up. I believe even when I don't want to, and that's why I never give up entirely. We must all cling to God's love and use it to banish the lies of the devil.

I want to end with a link that a friend shared with me this week when I was hurting and I felt like giving up. I hope it touches you like it did me: "You Are Loved (Don't Give Up)" by Josh Groban