(Written 1/18/07) 

Stillness is uncomfortable. It’s scary to be vulnerable.

Tonight I was at church and I was the only one there. It was dark outside and even darker inside where the parking lot lights didn’t reach. For some reason my imagination went crazy and as I looked left into complete blackness, I imagined a demon running through the hallway, unseen but felt, toward me.

I picked up my crap and left.

That may seem dramatic, but hey, these things happen when you start realizing there’s more going in the world than we have control over. When was the last time you shut off your radio while you were driving home late at night, the only one on the highway? When is the last time you went outside and just looked around? When was the last time you allowed yourself to stand and wait before God? ooh…yes.

It’s scary to lose control. It’s scary to not have anything to claim an identity in, no group to link up with, no agenda to hide behind, no control of the situation.

I think we do this with the Bible. We talk about it a lot instead of letting it overwhelm us in silence. It’s not as scary when we talk about it.

This reminds me of Makenna, my almost 3-year old niece. We watched “Robots” more than once in my room, and there is a scary robot who looks like a monster, who happens to be the overwhelming, domineering mother of the main villain…and she has a man’s voice. Anyway, Makenna for some reason kept wanting me to rewind it to the “mean mommy” part… “Is this where the mean mommy is??”  “Is the mean mommy in this part??”  “Where is the mean mommy?”  “I want to see the mean mommy again.”

I could not figure it out until her dad, my brother, called her over and asked her why she wanted to see the mean mommy so badly. She just kind of shrugged her shoulders…looked away…and mumbled something about liking her. Maybe Makenna wanted to see what she feared over and over again so that she could conquer it, and have control over when it appeared and when it didn’t…and so that she could share the experience and talk about it with someone, therefore making it more abstract and not so overwhelmingingly scary.

I do this also, when I tell people about the massive spider sneaking around my room, or the horrible news that broke my heart, or when I look over to laugh with my friends when the movie makes me jump.

Do we do this with God and His word to tame them down and make them less invasive? It’s one thing to go somewhere and talk about the Bible while I munch on cookies (which is good, of course) and it’s another for me to sit in my room in the middle of the night and get extremely uncomfortable with the Spirit of God pushing a truth deep into my heart until it starts to burn and I feel sick with a reality check of sorrow and humility.

Eugene Peterson’s book, “Eat This Book,” has some provocative quotes:

We are fond of saying that the Bible has all the answers…But the Bible also has all the questions… The Bible is a most comforting book; it is also a most discomforting book. Eat this book; it will be sweet as honey in your mouth; but it will also be bitter to your stomach.

We are accustomed to thinking of the biblical world as smaller than the secular world. Tell-tale phrases give us away. We talk of “making the Bible relevant to the world,” as if the world is the fundamental reality and the Bible something that is going to help it or fix it. We talk of “fitting the Bible into our lives” or “making room in our day for the Bible,” as if the Bible is something that we can add on to or squeeze into our already full lives.

He also tells the story of a scholar questioning Jesus’ story of loving a neighbor:

There was nothing wrong with the scholar’s knowledge of Scripture. But there was something terribly wrong in the way he read it, the how
of his reading. This becomes evident when the scholar quibbles, “wanting to justify himself.” He asks, “And who is my neighbor?”

Why does the scholar ask for a definition? Clearly, because he needs to defend himself against responding to the text personally. Defining “neighbor” depersonalizes the neighbor, turns him or her into an object, a thing over which he can take control, do with whatever he wants. But it also depersonalizes the scriptural text. He wants to talk about the text, treat the text as a thing, dissect it, analyze it, discuss it – endlessly. But Jesus won’t play that game.

So instead of inviting the scholar to join him in a Bible study of Deuteronomy and Leviticus under the shade of a nearby oak tree, Jesus tells him a story, one of his most famous, the Good Samaritan story, concluding, as he had begun, with a question, “Which of these three, do you think, proved neighbor to the man…?” The scholar is impaled by the question: the words of Scripture can no longer be handled by means of definition, “who is my neighbor?” Jesus insists on participation. Jesus dismisses the scholar with a command, “Go and do…” Live what you read. We read the Bible in order to live the word of God.

It is by our actions that we know we are living in the truth, so we will be confident when we stand before the Lord, even if our hearts condemn us. For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.
1 John 3:19-20

If you are ever curious about what should define those who claim to follow the risen God, read the letter written by John. The repeated use of the word “love” is almost annoying. And it’s so easy for me to read it and just check that off, thinking that yes, I love people, got that done. CHECK!

I guess I have a pretty pathetic definition of love. I wish I could understand it more, but then again, that is a scary thought, asking the God of all creation to teach me about love. The entire Bible rips into this unending definition of love. What is it? If we’re supposed to be “known by our love” and the primary definition of God Himself is love, what the heck does that look like and mean?

I really don’t know.

All I can think of is maybe my definition of love needs to be punched in the face. It needs to get a little more dirty and a little more angry - or a lot more. Love has somehow become a passive word, an enabling word, a word I use to talk about diet pepsi (which actually might qualify as a deep and passionate love). I just finished reading “Wild at Heart” again, and I was so thankful for John Eldredge’s definition of love in the book. I’m not sure if he ever literally defined it, but I find it unlikely that you can walk away from the book without a defintion of love seeping through the pages. It’s a dangerous, pursuing love. The love of a man that isn’t afraid to face pain and humility and sacrifice in order to love his bride. A love that is willing to be gentle and vulnerable, and also incredibly tough, leading, and resilient. Can you imagine if all men began to love their brides this way? And what if the women were supporting them and responding in this love? What a revolution.

I also read that Godly women should be known for three things: being valiant, vulnerable and scandalous. I like it. I will do my best to embody that.

I don’t really know what the point of this post is. There’s a lot to say, but it’s more like internal dialogue that isn’t too revolutionary to society in general at this point. But hopefully someday.

I’m stumbling across this reality that perhaps God wants to redeem us. And, maybe in more ways than we realize.

I think I’ve always had this thought about redemption, that when we begin to engage in this crazy life-shaking transformation through God’s grace, our future is new, redeemed, and our past just kind of blanks out into black and white dead-ness. But, I’m starting to understand that God wants all of me. Not just the “new life” I was thinking. Why would He want that? Why wouldn’t He just toss the crap aside and whisk me off to newness? Does God really want me to go back and face my hurts and my wounds and my fears and my failures…and to redeem them unto Himself?

Why in the heck would he do that? And what does that look like? That just is too much for me to think about, it’s taking me weeks to comprehend this new thought. Is it possible that there are treasures in my past that I thought were broken pieces? If I let Him will He take me back to those in order to free me from them and to show me His glory? Is it possible for God to be glorified through broken pasts? Amen, yes.

Can He truly love us that much, that even when we were dead to Him, DEAD (do we even comprehend this??) He was working out our future glory in Him? How great is this love, can we even understand it? What would this do to my definition of love, and to my understanding that I have been crucified with Christ, and yet I live…He has made all things beautiful. Maybe I should weep more for my past of selfishness, pride and moralistic judgment in order to give it back to Him to be redeemed. Or do I still think that my past wasn’t that bad…

“Even if our hearts condemn us. For God is greater than our hearts, and He knows everything…”

I would like to blame the following for my not updating this website for awhile:

1. Coram Deo

2. Mosaic

3. “Wild at Heart”

4. Ivy Ashland

5. Tyler Cooper

6. Philip Yancey

7. Kate Crumb

8. Mitch Bernay

9. Jenny Collicott

Thank you.

I might as well just make this Timothy’s website. I just think he has some good and intriguing things to say during this intermission in my own personal ramblings. He makes some interesting points on Dave Matthews, Isaiah, and the end of the world. You have to be curious by now. Go have a gander.

So in my last post I said that I don’t really have much to say right now, and that my mind is just existing in a quiet peace. Well, I realized I have been singing a song in my head for the last day and a half, and that the lyrics express my soul well right now:

Creation yawns in front of me, oh Lord, I’ve never felt so small. And I don’t believe that I’ve believed in You as deeply as today. I reckon what I’m saying is there’s nothing more to say…

And the mountains sing your glory, hallelujah! The canyons echo sweet amazing grace. Grace, how sweet the sound! My spirit sails! The mighty gales are bellowing Your name, and I’ve got nothing to say…I’ve got nothing to say.

Just wanted to share that.

It also kind of reminds me of something in Isaiah 32:

Then the wilderness will become a fertile field, and the fertile field will become a lush and fertile forest. Justice will rule in the wilderness and righteousness in the fertile field. And this righteousness will bring peace. Quietness and confidence will fill the land forever. My people will live in safety, quietly at home. They will be at rest.