This is an article I wrote for my work’s monthly newsletter. I thought I’d share it.

Messiness.

Yes…messiness. People and community are messy things. Life doesn’t fit into neat little boxes with lids that I close tightly around them when I need some peace. Sometimes I really wish it did. I don’t like it when I leave a room or a person with tension, or when I have no clue what I’m doing, or when things just don’t make sense.

But, alas, it seems that God delights in bringing me into messy situations…because this is where real life is happening. This is where I realize my true need for a Redeemer. People are broken, people are messed up, life is chaotic, and so am I. The depravity of sin has reached its grappling fingers into every part of my being and into every part of my dreams and desires.

Just when I think I have things all figured out and life is starting to make sense, and to fit into those boxes, God faithfully slaps me in the face by His grace and mercy, and again I see that life isn’t clean cut, and that I am more of a mess than I even realized. And praise God for doing so! Praise Him for crashing down the walls of pride and isolation that I so easily build up in my mind and heart. Praise Him for rescuing me from myself.

I’ve heard it said that when you are living missionally, you will have no clue what you are doing. I must be doing a good job, because daily I must reshuffle my head in order to realize that restoring life to others, myself, and our community is not an easily traceable or manageable series of events. But I must rely on my Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, to move through the Holy Spirit to restore and renew and bring life again to His creation.

And He is moving! I’ve had and listened to conversations with several people in this last week about how God is “doing something” to get His people out of the church buildings. He is awakening us to remember that indeed, we are the church, and we are in need of the Gospel as much as any man that has ever lived! And when we truly begin to grasp this truth, we experience such joy and soul-wrenching love for Jesus that we cannot help but become part of the revolution of redemption that He is designing!

So embrace the messiness. It reminds me of something my friend Will Walker said: “But here is the deal man, what we consider our greatest failures, often will be a great catalyst for transformation. So just sit back and enjoy the crash.”