Do you ever have those moments – be they minutes, hours, days, or weeks – where your mind is filled with doubt and confusion, where everything that you know is for some reason up for questioning,
even though you know that you know that you know it? Those moments where you ask yourself, do I even know how to hear God speak to me? Am I really where he has asked me to be, or have I somehow mucked it all up and ruined his plan for my life? In our moments of clarity these questions are really
kind of ridiculous, but in our moments of doubt they are very real, penetrating to the depths of the mind and soul. You know what I’m talking about? These are the moments when, even though we absolutely know the devil is lying into our ears, for some reason we still give that voice credence, though momentary, and this challenges everything that we know.
This past week was like that for me. As I was expressing it to my wife the other day she looked at me astonished saying you actually think this? You actually believe this? No. Of course I don’t. I know what I believe, yet in that moment they became very real possibilities – even though in that moment I knew those possibilities to be false, charades drawn up by the enemy to confuse and destroy. Why do we give those thoughts place in our lives? I have no idea. Weakness maybe. Perhaps we are searching for a pat on the back, confirmation that we are where we knew we needed to be all along and therefore we question everything and create drama, just hoping that God steps in and says, in his gentle, incredible way, silly, you know this is where I want you, you know what is true, you know that other voice is simply a lie. You are truly silly my child! Yesterday was one of those moments. I know God has led us to The Bluffs, but still I asked, really? Are we sure? Maybe we messed this us (even as it is so overwhelmingly evident that God brought us here – isn’t it amazing how we do that?).
Michelle worked from 2-8pm yesterday, giving me some time to a house that is empty for the first time in two weeks (we had students living with us the past two weeks). You’d think I’d spend some time in solitude and silence (both needs in my life), but not yesterday. I’m pretty sure from the moment Michelle left to the moment I picked her up from work someone else was constantly with me. And I’m not talking about Someone Else, I’m talking about people. Four o’clock found me at our community pool feeling loved as just about all of the 25 kids in the pool were calling out Brian, watch me! Brian, watch this! Hi Brian! The innocence and joy of children overwhelms me sometimes. I ended up playing football at the pool with my j-high boys (Miles, Scott, Michael, Tristen, Deon, Cowboy, Daniel, and others) and playing at the pool somehow led to me bbq-ing hot dogs for all of us for dinner. Thank you South Everett Foursquare – we are still using the extra hotdogs from that bbq at our house at the beginning of the month!
Now, most of the kids know that I’m a pastor (though, with their Catholic background, many refer to me as a priest instead), and so, as I’m standing there grilling dogs on my patio, surrounded by 7th and 8th graders, one of them pipes up and asks me, how come you’re a church guy? I said, I don’t know if I’d call myself a church guy. I’m really a Jesus guy, and that’s why I go to church. So he continued, well, why are you a Jesus guy? Hmmmm. Well, now that you ask, let me drive my bus through that wide open doorway. It was so beautiful. I gave a brief answer of a God that absolutely loves us, wanting to be in relationship with us, and how I wanted that relationship because I couldn’t do life by myself, and so I needed Jesus. Then another kid goes, I have a friend who’s an atheist. He’s got a lot of questions. He asks his mom, but she can’t answer them. I invited him to ask them. They were questions about how God can exist (to which I asked, ”why do you think God doesn’t exist?”), about stealing, about how you know you get to go to heaven. I couldn’t believe this was happening. My church kids never sit with such seriousness or questions! My heart leapt with joy. This is what I live for – to share Jesus with those around me.
I spent about thirty minutes with the boys (the grilling was followed by a meal around our kitchen table, followed by snacks on our patio – again, thank you to all who have given to us to give to those around us!). In that thirty minute span I spoke about the story of God creating a people to be in relationship with him, of that people choosing to follow their own ways instead of God’s ways, and of the gap, the separation in relationship that came as a consequence. I spoke of God’s incredible love for his people, but his holiness and desire for perfection and the consequences and punishment for everything that we do that is not in the ways of God. I spoke about God coming back to judge everybody for what we’ve done, and how one bad thing is enough to keep us from entering God’s presence for eternity. The kids got a little freaked out, asking if that meant they were screwed. What a perfect question. So I spoke about that indeed, they were kinda screwed (they didn’t like that thought much), but there was a way out. So I told of God loving us so much that he had his son be born among us, live with us, experience all we experience, live in perfection, and when he died, I told of how Jesus offered to take the punishment that was due us for the consequences of what we’ve done. I spoke of a God that loves us so incredibly, who absolutely longs to be in relationship with us – not just to save us from the consequences of our action, but to actually live with us in this life.
How beautiful is that? How incredible?
Michael asked if stealing was wrong. What do you think? I asked. He said yeah , cause it was taking what didn’t belong to you (but does anything really belong to any of us?). But then he said, “What about if you really need it? Is stealing ok then?” So I spoke of a God of love who established some rules and guidelines – all in love – to help us live in love with one another. I explained that the problem with stealing is that it is not acting in love toward that person. I told him that is what community is for – so that those that have share with those that need. I explained that in God’s eyes, if I have and don’t share, I am just as bad as someone who needs and takes (1 Jn3:17)– because both act in selfishness instead of the love that God wants for us.
As I walked down the street to pick Michelle up from work, I marveled in the goodness of God. In a moment of my doubt, in a moment when I chose to give space to lies and confusion, God chose to encounter me with his beautiful people. God chose to encounter me, and remind me of how silly I am to doubt his goodness, his hand in our life. God’s love and gracious compassion overwhelm me. In the moment when I least deserved his goodness – when my faith was failing, he encountered me and spoke his love and joy to my spirit.
“…let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action.” – 1Jn3:18
I love this Brian. I was just asking those same doubtful questions on Saturday night and it’s great to read this and hear where God took you and how he spoke against those lies.