incarnational
of logs and stones
“let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” john 8:7
“why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?” luke 6:41
“do to others as you would have them do to you.” luke 6:31
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i have been reflecting a lot about these words from Jesus this week in light of our conversation about equality.
i think they are possibly the least-applied-passages-that-could-actually-change-the-church in the Bible.
honestly, it’s a little comical, how much time and energy has been spent picking apart passages about homosexuality, of which there are few, and women in leadership in church, of which they are even fewer. book after book and blog after blog have been written about those ones, that’s for sure.
i wonder how come we prefer those to Jesus’ powerful words in the sermon on the mount? how we’d much rather talk about who’s right & who’s wrong than live out the beatitudes? how we’d much rather spend time & energy defending what’s a sin and what’s not a sin than feeding the hungry or loving the lonely?
umm, i’m pretty sure of that answer (and i’m not certain of much): it’s a helluva lot easier.
laying down stones, worrying about our own logs & treating others how we long to be treated is some seriously heavy lifting. one of the things i love the most about the 12 steps & recovery is that people are focused on our own stuff, not someone else’s. one of the most important rules of the process is to stick with our own struggles, our own hopes, our own work and do what we can to stay on our side of the street as best we can.
it’s really quite beautiful. and freeing.
and really hard to do in human skin that loves to control.
control is a way to protect ourselves, to distract ourselves from the bigger work of looking at our own painful patterns that keep robbing us of life, of love.
but offering ourselves in humility is what Jesus told us we needed to do–to worry about our own logs instead of anyone else’s. to worry about the inside of our cups not the outside. to offer mercy instead of sacrifices to satisfy the law. to love our neighbor instead of judge our neighbor.
my theory is we’d much rather talk theology and ministry theory than be spiritually transformed ourselves. it’s a great distraction.
spiritual and personal transformation is painful. loving our neighbor is easier said than done. loving God & ourselves, sometimes even harder. reading blogs & defending positions is a piece of cake. looking at the logs in our own eyes–pride & control & ego & self-protection & a whole-bunch-of-other-character-defects–isn’t nearly as fun as defending a couple of Bible verses to the bitter end.
i also wonder for all who love using the Bible in every conversation, how come not much time is spent on passages that challenge us on greed? or power and control? or comfort and pride? or sacrifical love? or humility?
those ones aren’t nearly as fun to rattle on about because they are seriously convicting in our own lives, not just the lives of others.
i get the irony here of me being a hypocrite, of pointing the finger, of throwing stones in a blog post but that’s about not doing that. and i guess in this moment i would say “yep, i often am”; but i’m being convicted, too.
i can’t help but think that the world is crying out for hope while we’re talking about theology.
people are starving while we’re feeding on blog debates.
women & children are being violated while we’re haggling over whether a woman should be called “director” or “pastor.”
refrigerators are empty & electricity is getting turned off for people while we’re giving money to pay for flat screen TV’s.
if we layed down our stones and worried about the sin in our own lives, i have a feeling we’d be having radically different conversations out here.
if we tended to the forest in our own eye and didn’t give the speck in our brother’s another glance, i have a feeling we’d be plenty busy.
i think Jesus told us these important words for a reason. he knew we’d much rather throw stones & worry about others’ specks than be radically transformed.
the church has so much it can learn from the 12 steps and the incredible wisdom of the beatitudes. they embody an attitude of humility & mercy & meekness & purity of heart instead of an attitude of pride & judgment & control & division & finger pointing.
they help us lay down our stones.
they help us focus on our own logs.
they help us let go of needing to be in control or be “right.”
they help us be set free.
free to follow Jesus instead of defend Jesus.
free to learn instead of have all the answers.
free to listen instead of talk.
free to love instead of hate.
God, help us lay down our stones & worry about our own big ol’ logs so we–your body here on earth–can be wonderfully transformed.
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love’s the thread & it’s stronger than we think
i love the book of colossians; i’ve shared here before that when my kids were little we had the NIV kids club cassette tapes (yes, we’re old) and i can pretty much sing all of chapter 3. each of these verses is a separate song:
“13 – therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselveswith compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. 14 – bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. forgive as the Lord forgave you. 15 - and over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.”
in the wild and crazy conversation last week about equality, the verse 15 song came to mind–“over all these virtues put on love, which binds them together in perfect unity.”
my friend & copastor at the refuge, karl wheeler (who just started a new blog–check it out because it’s going to rock, details below), often says that we mistake unity for uniformity. this is so true! we think that when we are all on the same page, we have unity. but that not true unity; instead, it’s homogeneity that was never the idea. the kingdom of God is about holding our differences in love.
real unity is honoring our differences and being bound together by love.
it’s the virtue that binds us all together.
one of the things i most deeply respect about life in our little wild refuge community is that we do not agree on everything. we don’t have a statement of faith that automatically discerns who believes what (you can read what we do have written down; it’s one of my most favorite things we’ve ever written) and weeds people out. we don’t espouse a “here’s what we are sure God says about this or that” or a membership class that people need to sign in on before they can be part. when it comes to some of these tough issues of our faith, we are all over the map, with far left & far right and everything in between all tangled up together.
it’s honestly one of the prettiest things i’ve ever seen.
rich & poor alongside, even though life is so different from each other. educated & uneducated alongside, because people are people no matter how much schoolin’ we’ve had. liberal & conservative alongside, because love supersedes political viewpoints. gay & straight alongside, even with different views theologically. married & single alongside, because we need each other desperately. men & women alongside, because friendship is a way to practice & learn the ways of love.
we don’t see each other through any of those labels. we see each other as human beings, created in God’s image, all with the most important thing in common–a desire to love & be loved.
when it comes to last week’s conversation, i want to highlight an important point about our life together. our gay friends aren’t here making sure everyone agrees with them & our straight friends with a more scriptural conservative bent aren’t trying to prove anything. the same is true about any of our other differences. the reason this works is because love is the thread that binds us all together. as a leader in this community, that’s what we work our asses off to try to cultivate: a culture of safety (not of comfort but of real safety in a loving, challenging christian community).
and in a true culture of safety, we can disagree.
in fact, disagreeing is good. when we don’t allow room for seeing things differently then we are in danger of creating more pockets of conformity and not living humbly in the tension of being uncomfortable. our discomfort & differences force us to rely on God’s spirit to help us let go & trust & learn & wait and love more freely.
the world doesn’t need more pockets of conformity. there are plenty of those to go around.
what we need are more brave expressions of little pockets of love & freedom, where Christ’s restoration of human dignity and value is at the center despite our differences. where humility is practiced in a very active way. where submission, one to another and not just one-way-that-works-for-those-with-the-most-power, is embedded into the fabric of life together.
but even though i think the refuge is awfully pretty (it’s ugly to the un-Jesus-trained eye, though, i promise), it is also a very tricky space to hold.
some have left over time, frustrated that we hold the tension between differing views on the Bible & theology. they want us to draw lines in the sand and make things clearer. some get annoyed at having to make friends with people who aren’t like them. others really want better music & teaching & comfier chairs & something a little more predictable.
we refuse.
because we think there’s much more to learn about the ways of Love through our differences and discomfort than through our we-all-think-and-believe-the-same-thing and church-is-about-being-comfortable default.
my hope for the movement in the body of Christ and community cultivation is not that we sway everyone over to a new side on any of these issues and then all camp out together. that would be way too easy (and is what i fear these hot topics will tempt people to do). my hope is that we find a way to be together in our differences. to create a culture of true safety that bravely lets go of telling-others-what-to-believe-with-utter-certainty-on-one-biblical-interpretation and instead wrestling with these hard realities of life together. to see God’s image in each other and have that be enough to keep us united even when we might see the scriptures or life or a whole host of things different from each other.
love’s the thread that binds us all together in perfect unity.
it’s stronger than we think.
* * * * *
ps: karl’s blog is called church dreamer. check out the about page & his first blog post, Jesus hates flatscreens. oh yeah, it’s going to be fun.
unless we’re all free, none of us are free.
“freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.“
- martin luther king, jr.
most of you know i’m a nut case for equality. you hear me talking a lot about gender equality but that’s just because it’s a critical starting place. when half of the population of the world is thought of as “less than”, we’re in serious trouble. in a church that is supposed to be the free-est, most liberating place in town, we’re in even deeper trouble. christians should be leading the way on equality in absolutely every area, yet we all know that on the whole, we are lagging behind, stuck in white privilege & imbalanced power & segregation and all kinds of things that are not reflective of the kingdom of God Jesus called us to create.
equality isn’t just about gender. it crosses into race, sexual orientation, socioeconomics, and any other ways we are divided that strip people’s dignity.
it’s not a side issue or a pet project equality is a core issue of an active faith and one that as Christ-followers we are called to participate in creating. here, now.
the fight for equal rights has never been a simple one. all over the world, there are wars & battles & movements calling for change. people are sacrificing all kinds of things on behalf of change, even their lives. i believe passionately that we re called to be dignity restorers and champions of equality in every way, shape and form. toni morrison says “the function of our freedom is to free someone else.”
i am supposed to use any freedom i have to help free my brothers & sisters who aren’t free yet.
yeah, unless we’re all free, none of us are free.
this week was a historic week in our country in the movement toward marriage equality. i always say it’s easy to be against equal rights when we have the ones we want. i love that our president stepped out in a big and bold way to advocate for change that’s been a long-time-coming in this country.
it was brave.
i hope it calls all of us to be brave, too.
the reason it’s so risky to stand on behalf of change in a public way is because we’re scared. we’re scared of what other people might think. we are scared we’ll lose our jobs. we are scared we’ll lose our ministries. we are scared we’ll lose others approval. we are scared we’ll be bullied alongside the outcast.
and the truth is that we might.
but it’s worth it.
because unless we’re all free, none of us are free.
galatians 5:13-15 says: “for you have been called to live in freedom, my brothers and sisters. but don’t use your freedom to satisfy your sinful nature. instead, use your freedom to serve one another in love. for the whole law can be summed up in this one command: “love your neighbor as yourself.” but if you are always biting and devouring one another, watch out! beware of destroying one another.”
i am so tired of all the destruction, all the ways christians have used the Bible & power & control to separate, divide, and strip others’ dignity.
but i firmly believe the solution is not in looking at how jacked up the system is and spending energy there. it’s fun to rant & rave about it, but the truth is that ranting and raving won’t change anything.
what will change things is when we begin to vote with our feet (and in ballot boxes) and refuse to be part of churches & systems & groups that oppress. period. they aren’t going to get our money or our time or absolutely-anything-anymore and i don’t care how good their music, teaching, or kids program is.
when we risk our reputations and speak out for equality and freedom.
when we actively participate in setting others free. that means creating little pockets of love & freedom where equality is practiced & dignity is restored.
our freedom is all tangled up together. our dignity is all tangled up together. our hope is all tangled up together.
Jesus shows us what love looks like–laying down our life for our friends. this means we will pay a cost on behalf of love. i am reminded of what cornell west says: “justice is what love looks like in public”
it’s time for change. so many are starting to rise up from below. there’s a holy stirring. a hunger and thirst for justice and righteousness. we are done sitting passively in our fear & complacency while our brothers & sisters are marginalized, oppressed, and stripped of their dignity.
the cost to us will be great.
we’ll lose our reputations, jobs, respect, friends, appearances of theological credibility, and a whole-bunch-of-other-things-that-are-worth-losing-on-behalf-of-doing-what’s-right.
so that’s why i’m writing this today. to say strongly and clearly that i stand on behalf of my brothers & sisters and their fight for freedom.
because unless we’re all free, none of us are.
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i used to….but now i….
i loved all those responses to yesterday’s soul care & spiritual practices during deconstruction! so many healing practices; thank you for sharing and feel free to still add yours.
the other day when i was driving in my car thinking about this series, an old post that i wrote 3 years ago came to mind. it’s called “i-used-to-but-now-i”. i thought it actually might be a helpful exercise as part of our conversation on rebuilding after deconstructing because it’s centered on respecting where we were and where we are now.
it’s about recognizing & giving language to some of the new. it’s honoring shifts and helps us say “here’s what’s changed.”
it’s funny, my list from 2009 is so long, but as i looked through it many things still resonated, although maybe not as important to me today as they were then. as part of this practice, i decided to make a new list, some are from 3 years ago and there are definitely some new ones, too. i thought maybe some of you might want to give it a try, too.
my 2012 i used to…but now i’s…:
i used to have a fear-centered faith. now i have a love-centered one.
i used to think the christian life was one of ascent & i kept feeling like a loser because i couldn’t get there. now i think it looks more like descent & it takes away the pressure.
i used to think church was about getting what i wanted–inspiration & wow. now i think it’s about getting what i actually need–a place to practice loving & being loved.
i used to feel the need for things to be black and white and make perfect sense. now i really appreciate the gray & the mystery of the “i don’t knows.”
i used to think people could pull themselves up by their bootstraps & change their lives with enough prayer and hard work. now i see how truly complicated poverty, mental illness, and a host of other problems really are.
i used to think that if i talked about God enough & my kids could regurgitate enough scripture verses i’d be a good parent. now i see our actions are far more important than words.
i used to be two people, one on the outside & one on the inside. now there’s just one of me, with all my strengths & all my weaknesses.
i used to read the Bible for knowledge. now i read it for beauty & challenge.
i used to never even notice the lack of women and underrepresented groups in church leadership. now i can see and smell it from a mile away.
i used to hold on to everything and so tightly. now i’m trying to practice a looser grip.
i used to think the kingdom of God was really really narrow. now i think it’s bigger than i ever imagined.
i used to spend a lot of energy shaking my fists. now i am most interested in planting new trees.
what are some of your “i used to…but now i’s…?”
i’d love to hear!
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helpful & oh-so-not-helpful things people do and say along the way.
i have a a theory about people and pain. when we see others in it, we don’t quite know what to do. the anxiety and discomfort of what other people are going through causes us to do and say a lot of really stupid things.
almost every hurting person i know has a least a couple of stories of things people-said-and-did to them along the way that really was not helpful. in fact, it often hurt–sometimes deeply. simple fixes, trite spiritual phrases, and direct messages about getting-better-quick left many of us feeling more shame, anger, and loneliness.
at the same time, often there are people along the way who offer healing balm for our wounds, who stayed with us in the darkness, who provided love & hope & encouragement in such beautiful tangible ways. their gifts of peace sustained us.
in my own journey through healing from personal pain and physical pain also through my faith shifts, i have experienced both. i know who and what was good for my soul and i know who and what did more harm. who i willingly drew closer to and who i avoided with a 10-foot-pole.
i think we’re all pretty clear by now that the deconstructing-rebuilding process is a messy, painful journey, not only for us but sometimes for those around us, too. and we all have stories of things that people said-and-did along the way that helped us and may have also hurt us.
the purpose of this series was to provide some hope & a loose framework for fellow sojourners. my hope was also to create a space to say out loud some things that needed to be said so that we could learn how to navigate through this process ourselves–and with others–better.
as an appendix to the last 2 weeks of posts together centered on rebuilding after deconstructing, i’d love to create two lists that we can share with the world:
1. a list of things people said and did during the bloody messy deconstruction process that helped, soothed, encouraged, and strengthened us.
2. and a list of ones that were oh-so-not helpful. it can become the top 10 please-don’t-ever-say-this-to-people-in-the-deconstruction-process.
i’m going to compile all of the responses into something cohesive as part of this series so i really hope you’ll take a few minutes and participate. this is a time to honor what worked and be painfully honest about what didn’t. a time to celebrate the good & let it rip on the bad.
here are mine, the helpful & the oh-not-so-helpful things people said to me during deconstruction:
helpful:
#1, without a doubt – when people just listened & didn’t offer any advice.
“it’s really hard”
“i’m with you no matter what”
“oh, i know that feeling”
“i care about you, not just your beliefs”
oh-not-so-helpful:
“when are you going to stop being so bitter?”
“i’m scared for you”
“i have a sermon that you really need to listen to.”
“the church is made up of imperfect people–what do you expect?”
“my church is so awesome! you’d really like it”
“you’ve got to be careful of the slippery slope.”
i know some of you have much more painful ones than these. please, share them freely. others need to know how nuts it can be.
what about you? what helped? what hurt? thanks for sharing.
my hope is that we can all keep learning how to be safer for others along the way.
* * * * *
ps: i just got back from chicago and a lovely weekend in conversation centered around sacred friendship. i met so many wonderful people & it brings me so much hope, these conversations about men and women learning how to love & live & learn & lead alongside one another as equals, as friends. alise wright blogged a recap each day, and you can read them here and here. if you are new to this blog and haven’t read anything yet about friendship here, i have a list of posts on the bottom of the past series page.
next here: soul care & spiritual practices that sustained us during deconstruction
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alongside
the refuge turns 6 years old this month! it’s so hard to believe. some days it seems like yesterday and other days it feels like decades ago. there are many things to celebrate about the past 6 years. i continue to learn more than i ever bargained for about God, life, love, friendship, and leadership. some days i still want to run for the hills, but i’m learning something here that i’m not sure i’d ever learn somewhere else.
for me, one of the most important and beautiful parts of life together here has been what it looks like for men & women to live, learn, love, and lead alongside each other as equals, as brothers and sisters and friends. often, i am in situations where i realize how rare this really is.
i respect that there are definitely places for only women’s groups & only men’s groups. but there is so much we can’t learn when we are always segregated, relegated only to being above or below one another, or full of fear.
i wish more men and women would bravely dive into the deep end of learning how to live alongside each other as leaders, brothers & sisters, and friends.
there aren’t a lot of great models of people sharing power, learning to be friends, and deepening connection across sexes “in church.” one of the greatest gifts i received in the life of the refuge has been meeting other people who are practicing “alongside” in their lives, their ministries. they are diffusing power, developing cross-gender friendships, and cultivating intentional community where men & women are really equals. they are few but growing in number. their example inspires and challenges me to push against all of the voices that say “it’s not possible” and continue to live out the dream despite the obstacles.
here’s what i keep learning about men and women “alongside “ each other:
“alongside” heals shame. shame has tried to ruin me, and so many other people i know. inequality perpetuates shame for those “underneath” others. having to step up and live equally as a leader forces me to reckon with my shame. the first few years of the refuge i felt so bad about leading–and wanting to lead–because i had been taught i wasn’t supposed to. also, “alongside” has helped shame from my past. being honest with safe women friends was a huge start, but even more healing came when my male friends knew my real story, too, and help me release it. to heal, i need not only mothers & sisters but fathers & brothers, too.
“alongside” is a reflection of the kingdom. Jesus said that the kingdom of God was possible now. that we didn’t have to wait until heaven to experience God’s reality. Jesus blasts hierarchical divides and cuts through the things that separate and divide. equality is freeing. as we step into side by side relationships, the kingdom is reflected in both sexes and we participate in Christ’s healing of the brokenness that Genesis 3 brought into the world.
“alongside” teaches us courage. i always say “courage is doing hard things scared.” alongside as equals requires courage. when my husband and i moved from a complementarian-ish relationship to an egalitarian one, it freaked both of us out. we were scared because we knew how to do the way we had been doing it. when my friend karl called me to co-lead pastor with him instead of be an associate, it freaked me out. i knew in my heart it was the right thing but i was terrified to not have the fallback of him being in charge of me somehow, the only model i knew as an evangelical woman. the first time my friend shared with me the reality of his sexual addiction, it freaked me out, that level of sharing. but i knew that moment was a holy one. i needed to be brave, to stay in, to listen, to learn.
“alongside” requires faith. i’m constantly reminded how much of my christian life has not been about faith (even though it sounded like it) but rather about control (as a way for managing fear). segregation between sexes is a way of staying in control. integration and learning how to be more whole alongside each other requires walking out in faith, traveling a path without clear instructions. i recently heard someone say, “you’ll never stub your toe standing still.” we only stub our toe when we’re moving somewhere, practicing, trying, walking. oh, how many times i’ve stubbed my toe over the past few years! but each and every time i have learned something about God, myself, others. faith is never strengthened staying still.
so that’s what i’m learning these days in the deep end of the pool. diving in was one of the best things i’ve ever done.
God, give us courage to live alongside each other equally as men & women, brothers & sisters, lovers, and friends. we want to be a reflection of you.
* * * * *
ps: it’s not too late to register for a challenging & inspiring gathering centered on cross-gender friendships called when jesus met mary: a sacred friendship gathering. it’s friday and saturday, april 27th & 28th in chicago. i am really looking forward to being part of this and meeting some of you in real life there, too!
pps: i’m on a bit of a blog-roll these days, writing more than i have in a while. i’ve learned in these moments the best thing is to go for it and stay current, otherwise the moment’s often gone. tomorrow i’m finally sharing a post i’ve been meaning to with a bunch of good stuff to check out. on monday i am really looking forward to a new post-easter series called “reconstruction after deconstruction”, 8 posts centered on the brutal but beautiful process of restoring faith after loss & shifts.
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