Struggling with Struggling

Life is a struggle.. 

Anyone who has taken an intentional breath notices the resistance of their flesh to the desire to inflate one's lungs. It requires exertion, an effort, and more so if encumbered with tight clothing or artificial restraint. How easy the breath when we are asleep (by contrast). Or the breathing we do when we are distracted by some other activity, why are such breaths not seemingly laboured or difficult..? Why is an intentional breath so much harder work?

This entire blog has been about wrestling with some thought, idea, conviction, position, application, meaning, existence, intentionality and my place in it. I note that in the passage of some nearly 10 years, I have not progressed much in my comprehension or indeed compassion of the various states on which I have reflected. I find the world as confusing and contradictory now, riddled with paradox and incongruity as I ever have and intellectually at least I have strayed further away from what many would consider to be central convictions of faith, creed, theology and practice. It is as if skepticism has replaced any sense of certainty of belief (as I've tried to resolve the absolutes of being 'in Christ' with the observations of my hypocritical life) and my pursuit of wisdom and understanding has only led me further to the conclusion that I am stupid, naive and ignorant. Oddly there is some comfort in this.

I see long known friends wrestle with physical and mental illness, attempting to hold on to 'truths', denying the power of the chains that bind them and seeing their bondage as only temporary compared to the eternity of worshipful freedom that they anticipate. The 'now and not yet' of salvation that dominates much of our understanding to attempt to hold in tension the contradiction of our reality with the truth of the transformative work of Christ in the regenerated heart. Yet the reality is our regenerated heart is still sick. It is not whole. It is not pure. It can and does still sin, and even Paul testifies to the tension when he laments that the good he wants to do he cannot do and more the bad or evil he does not want to do, he does all the more.. . It would in scientific terms at least be regarded as anything other than regenerated. yet, the contradiction of conversion suggests that we wouldn't even feel that contention (and struggle) unless our heart was regenerated, inclining our will towards God/holiness.. It seems like a circular argument, verified only with itself - (simul justus et peccator, anyone?)

Some of my friends note that I distress myself with incessant thinking. They couldn't think like I do, "isn't it exhausting?" they cry! Yet I respond, the thinking is what I am driven to do. it is how a mind works and I am surprised you spend so little time actually doing it, being content to bumble along without care, burden, certainty, conviction, knowledge, understanding, reference, critical analysis, evidential rationalism or indeed any sense of reason for the actions they undertake,...  'how do you know what you're doing is helpful to you?'  Don't you need to be convinced you are not 'wasting your life?' Are you instead a follower of fatalism or simply being tossed about by every wind of tickling ear doctrine? (to mash metaphor) How can you 'test and approve' if you neither can articulate what you think you know let alone have no criteria for verifying it?  Indeed to gain wisdom or understanding, surely one has to think?   How does one even begin to live with this 'new life in Christ' without thinking about the applications of what would be different?

One doesn't achieve a goal or state by simply an act of the will alone..  instead one takes an aspiration, determines what achievement of that aspiration looks like, creates plans to achieve that success and undertakes a discipline to action the plan, else all that is left is an aspirational target with no ability to attain it. 

What at least I try to do, is think constructively.. have a purpose about it.  It is a struggle, but it is not simply 'over thinking' as if random thoughts pervade and have no purpose or ability to settle into the complex tension of previous thoughts in their logical or philosophical positions.. instead there is an intentionality about it, to find meaning or peace by settling a matter (or parts of a matter) sufficient to be (at least) somewhat 'certain'... If I am to have any hope at all, I need to find a reason for that hope and to be able to  'always have an answer... '  If I do not have an answer I cannot fall back on 'I just trust that is it so' (for to do so I must have implicit trust in the authority of the source of the idea, which requires me to know what the source is, and verify that it is indeed considered to be the authority on the matter - and empirically that cannot be that the source matter determines itself to be the authority on a subject, as that too would be a circular argument and indeed one of the detractors for me in determining that the God-man Jesus should be authoritative in confirming the Word-Flesh scripture. )

Indeed, so many abuses have occurred also by fallible humans in positions of authority or influence in our lives [we are all hypocrites] that it is easy to imagine that there is no-one person capable of being sufficiently authoritative to enable us to take 'at face value' anything they say without having at least a cursory ability to see for ourselves. And yet faith requires us to hope in what we do not yet see.  So maddening is this position, as it is similar to the twisting winds of post-modernism where little seems to mean what it did, all truth is subjective and if you're confused about what you know, yet unbelievably intolerant of anything you disagree with, you're probably doing it right! I have so much sympathy with Thomas, who at least was able to touch the wounds of Christ to verify for himself what he could scarcely believe with his eyes let alone his heart.

But to answer my friend's rhetorical pronouncement from the earlier paragraph, the other seemingly truthful answer is 'Yes, it is exhausting'. Struggling is tiring.  Work requires effort. Energy is expended.  Anything worthwhile generally is. Ironically, metaphysically and practically - the struggle is real.

Still, I am angry and disappointed, at myself and with others.  I am sad, upset and broken, but do not want to be fixed - and certainly not fixed to be 'just like the unthinkers' in their blissful acceptance and blatant ignorance. I am not placated with platitudes and homilies nor personal stories of confirmation-bias which attests to why your 'truth' is right especially where there is denial of my reality or indeed contra evidence in your own life that you fail to accept exists. I don't want to discredit your truth, but I neither wish to accept it nor have it override my own.  Reality is too precious a thing to simply wave it away to whimsy or paradoxical tension in a 'now and not yet' way.  And yet...

I am somewhat envious of those who delight in their blissful ignorance, or blind, faithful, trusting subscription to an ideology or education without any understanding of why they believe it is so.  - that many cannot construct any personal creed stating a source (authoritative or not) for their opinion and yet can be certain of their truth is as inspiring as it is baffling. The level of 'self-belief' required for contentment in 'not knowing' is surely worthy of merit if not respect from others and indeed myself.   And for all I think I think I know, for all that I apply myself to applying, for all I hopefully hope in, I am still stupid, naive and ignorant.  The struggle with struggling is unending until death, and even then what is attained is lost and what is achieved makes little difference when righteousness is imputed by faith, through grace..

So what of the comfort in the struggle...?  

1. I am not mad.   - Deluded, confused, mislead, baffled, contradictory and purposeless maybe.  but not mad.  To struggle at all seems to conclude that one recognises that there is a reason for struggle..   who has known the mind of God? 
2. I am probably in error.   - to recognise that we are understanding metaphorically things we cannot conjure for ourselves, with our thinking shaped by our education and relative understanding of our world and our corporeal nature.  To perhaps accept that whatever we believe we have come to know is still little of what there is to know.   At this juncture we are 2000+ years after Christ and we're still debating and working out what his words mean, let alone others who have contributed to the canon of our scriptures.  We may be governed by theistic absolutes such as 'eternally consistent nature of God' yet there are many a matter that creates a bit of sucking of teeth as we struggle to resolve it within the consistency we acknowledge.. perhaps then I can give myself a little break that better minds than mine have not resolved some things sufficiently?
3. It is ok that the struggles of others are different to my own. Indeed if all of our struggles were exactly the same, how can we ever offer any real comfort that the struggle is worth persisting? - none of us would be able to attest to being at peace about any such thing!   Moreso that within the body we are all different parts.. We are not aspiring to all be 'the same' in skills, gifts, works or honour - indeed, how easy it is for us to overlook v 24 in 1 Corinthians..?    instead for proper functioning of the body we need our members to struggle with different things
4. I am not well read even though I've read plenty.  Sometimes to unlock something, some one says or has written something that conceptualises the conundrum and expounds a solution in such a way that scales from our eyes seem to fall. but my quest for understanding is unmatched by my ability to read let alone identify to be read, let alone having the time to read many such volumes in search of answers.  There are many (let me suggest) professional theologians and thinkers who have devoted many hours to many subjects (or just one!) and have gifted successive generations with their insight.  I have but many questions, and few solidly researched answers. This returns to the question of authoritative sources, and I'll at least add weight to arguments provided by those who have dedicated themselves to reasoning beyond my meager contemplations. 
5. Eventually my struggle will be over.  We all die. Striving will cease - whether for wisdom or righteousness.. Rest will come.  my ignorance will neither enable or prevent whatever might come later, and while it might be preferable to leave this mortal coil with some certainty about what the 'not yet' is, ultimately my preponderance of evidence makes no difference to what actually 'is'. 

Waiting is always the hardest part

In what is now my 18th unfinished blog post, I am wondering if this one will actually find its way to the WWW, I guess if you’re reading this I have!

As I approach my 40th birthday, I find my life in a state of flux. My youngest is 4 years away from adult hood, my wife has refreshed her employment skills and is now looking for work, and it seems that everyone is looking to transition to a new phase in their life.

As for me, I seem a little stuck. – not the stuck that most ‘nearly 40 something's’ feel as they approach the mid-life crisis years, – I think I did that a couple of years ago! – but the distinct feeling I took a wrong turn somewhere and ended up in a back alley.   I won’t bore you with the details of those things, because actually that’s not the reason for writing.. Instead I’ve been pondering the question of why it is that I find waiting so difficult…

Here’s how it works for me.

• I send an email, I expect a response in a reasonable period of time. Reasonable is a fluid period, but I suspect a response should be received within a couple of days.
• If I send a text message, I expect a response within the same day – After all, all sorts of things could have happened that might prevent the intended recipient to reply, such as not having their phone with them that day, or being in a place with no reception or has the phone switched off, but one would imagine that at some point during that day, the recipient would find time to reply.
• If I send an instant message to a person who is online, I expect a response rather quickly.. – I mean barring leaving IM on (which does happen a lot, actually) if I’m engaging in a conversation I expect a response no longer than a pee break.
• If I’m in a conversation with a person, face to face, I expect a response pretty much immediately. (again pee breaks accepted)

Perhaps your expectation isn’t too far away from this in respect of communications using various media. Such is my personality, that the longer the gap after the expected response period, the more paranoid I become that I’ve said something which was received poorly and my emotional hamster starts running wildly trying to work out what I could have said better, and whether my relationship with the recipient is damaged etc. It drives me nuts. Most often, something quite rational happened and they carry on oblivious to my angst, and the delay was nothing to do with me at all.

Now it’s not just in conversations that my emotional hamster gets all worked up.  If I’ve promoted an idea, asked someone for a decision on something, made an alteration to something then my anxiousness is the same. What will they think? Will they agree?  And if the result of their musing will mean a change for me, then my uncomfortability rises exponentially, because I really hate living in the end of a season space, where something is finishing and something else is starting..  Innovation always energises me, and having to finish something or having to wait to begin something is like just winding and winding an elastic band on a balsa wood plane propeller (actually much more like twisting a sachet of sauce in  Wetherspoon’s before it explodes).

And so it is with God too.. I generally don’t find God silent. Most of the time it seems easy to determine his will by reading, praying, thinking, strategizing and just making a decision to act and seeing how the spirit feels about that! – God loves a good decision maker and unless he has other ideas (which he seems to make known pretty quickly) He seems pretty intent on my life heading towards His destination by choosing whatever path seems right to me at the time. [ For instance, you want to live in a different place? Put your house on the market! If it sells and you find a place to move to you like, then it would seem good to you and the spirit, so move.  If you put your house on the market, and it doesn’t sell, then that seems a pretty good indication that this might not be the right time to be moving.. and therefore get on with your life.]

But there are other things that are not so easy to wait for.. life changing events, that make ‘getting on with your life’ quite difficult…  That period between putting your house on the market and waiting a period of time to see if it sells, for instance is a horrible place to be. [and how sweet the relief once the house sells or a decision made to come off the market] Or maybe it’s a change of job role, and you’re finishing off your old responsibilities and trying to get up to speed on new ones. Man that can be a difficult place. Pregnancy too, is a big one isn’t it.. the pensive state between not yet being with a new life, and yet, there it is, trapped in a woman’s belly!

But the biggest for me, is in breakthrough.  When God is seemly quite and weak. Where it seems that a decision is obvious but the timing isn’t right, or when it seems that you don’t know where to go or what to do. When you’re struggling through something and waiting for the end. When you’re struggling to get to somewhere and you’re helpless to bring about the change you need. When you simply don’t know what to choose between two seemingly attractive or catastrophic outcomes, and you’re just not sure which one to choose because it HAS to be A or B not both A and B. (like should we move to Australia say, and stay in England.. you can’t physically do both)  These are the most difficult places to be.. and perhaps where our emotional hamsters do the most roiling.  The what if’s come crashing like waves.. it’s difficult to plan, after all you don’t know what’s coming next, and there’s no comfort whatsoever in the  ‘take each day as it comes’ mantra that you whisper to your tortured soul.  It’s an intensely restless period, where peace and joy seems far from your lips and life, even the simple things (like managing freezer food) becomes a nightmare, life becomes painful, itchy and fragmented, relationships become tense or stupendously intimate as you both hold on and let go at the same time, and family tensions boil over into arguments, eggshell treading and lots of tears.

I hate these periods, and I’m thankful they don’t come often. Most of our life actually is quite controllable, and we can enjoy the benefits of planning and executing those plans, and dealing with any variations or course corrections as we go.  Minor alterations from a trajectory are easy to manage because you have momentum, and pretty much everyone is on the bus with you.

• So where you have seemingly difficult choices, but where they are in your power to make changes let me urge you.. just make a decision.  You’ll feel better once you have made a choice. It may be the right one, it may be the wrong one. – Maybe you just won’t know, but the paralysis of not making a choice, sitting on the fence forever or worse, trying to straddle both positions as they diverge will bring endless [avoidable] pain to your life.  Just decide and move on.  If God is seemingly quiet on the issue, perhaps he doesn’t actually mind which one you choose?  And won’t he bring ALL THINGS together for the good of those who love him? Romans 8 v 28
• Get on with your life. How often have you heard someone pray or prophesy using Jeremiah 29 v 11?  I wonder why they do that…  I think it’s a very unhelpful verse in the way it’s often applied, because it PREVENTS a person from making a decision, and REQUIRES someone else to tell them prophetically what to do. But the context in Jeremiah 29 isn’t wait on God till he tells you what to do AT ALL… in fact quite the opposite, take a look yourself… note the verses 4-9 a clear instruction to settle down, raise rugrats, eat and pray for your city to prosper.  then the kicker… v 10 WHEN you’ve been doing that for 70 years, THEN I’ll come to you and fulfill my promise BECAUSE [v11] I have plans to prosper you …  So God has a plan to prosper you, but work it out as you live your life.. don’t be paralysed waiting for God to speak, just decide what you want to do..  he’ll make it pretty clear if you’re stepping off plan.

And so with some certainty I feel I must pronounce that indecision is simply procrastination. It is a fear that we will choose wrong, which puts us in the same back alley that making a poor decision would put us in.. So you see, whether you make a bad decision, or no decision, this negative outcome is waiting for you…. The only way to attempt to avoid it is to actually make a decision… 

But if like me, you’ve made a couple of decisions and you’re now in the back alley you feared, there are still two choices!

1. live in the back alley, give up and wait for death, or
2. turn around and do something different. 

It is exceedingly rare that God will open up a secret compartment at the end of the alleyway, taking you into an as yet undiscovered life, of extraordinary wonder and fulfilment, instead we have to take responsibility for any poor decision we made that brought us here, stop blaming others (or God) for ‘leading us here’ and TURN AROUND and get out of the hole we’re in.   

The reason friends, that waiting is so unbearably difficult, is that we’re on a journey [aren’t we?] and waiting isn’t much part of getting to your destination. If we’re waiting we’re wasting time.  Waiting should be an active temporary thing (like going to a bus stop, waiting for the bus to arrive) not a passive thing (waiting at home hoping a bus would stop outside your house). Passive is procrastination again.  So if you’re not seeing breakthrough with something, chances are you haven’t made the decision (or followed through with the consequences of that decision (which is the same thing as not having made the decision at all)). 

So where does that leave me?  For the things I can decide, things that are within my power to change, things that ultimate affect my journey/trajectory or ultimately my destination, I can make [and follow through] a decision or two and end my discomfort. I may make the wrong decision, but a decision at least will have been made and I’ll have to rely on God (at the end of my three core years and ten) to bring about those plans and purposes he has for me to come good. For the things I’m waiting for others to decide, hopefully they’ll not drag out the difficulty for too long, noting that it is destabilising for them also to have these things hanging about undecided.   I’m not sure what a reasonable period of time is to wait for that… but I can’t imagine being in the dead zone for more than a month will produce a happy bunny, so I guess that’s the yardstick by which I’ll get very twitchy.. Finally, I can be hopeful that whatever I decided and whatever is decided for me, there is a future hope that all things will work together for good, so I needn’t worry about how many wrong decisions I make, or how blunderous my steps, I just need to worry about how I am leading myself and my family, in Christ.  And if waiting isn’t a passive thing, then I’ll wait for my end of days, by living my life for the glory of his name while there is breath in my body. In the end, isn’t that what we’re all called to do?

Predestination and Salvation's call

The biggest issue I have with predestination is that I may not be, or people I'm connected to may not be part of the elect.  Though I can be comfortable with God's sovereignty in many areas, that he may distinctly not chose a family member or indeed me makes me very uncomfortable (and unable to know how to adequately respond).

I'm comforted with the passages that also promise whosoever will may come to God, but  isn't that a bit like lining up to play football and being the last to be picked? You're not really wanted there, but since there's no-one else you can play the game?  Perhaps I have the wrong view of election and predestination, perhaps its for similar reasons I struggle to believe that God has to regenerate a person's heart before they can respond to God, when clearly those who might respond to God already understand that their efforts to reach him on their own merit aren't enough and they need 'saving'.  The unregenerated heart still feels the disappointment of success in worldy terms and still reaches for more longing for wholeness and belonging that nothing other than God can bring. This seems to me to  be 'built in' to the dna of a person.  It would be a very odd person who would wish that should God be convincingly demonstrated to exist they still wouldn't care a fig what He thinks of them.

In the end, though for God to be God doesn't he have to set the rules of play?  Isn't it really up to God who he saves and who he doesn't?  Why should he be subject to my preference?  Yet he is loving, gracious, holy and just.    but for totally selfish reasons the challenge for me is to know who God has chosen and who he hasn't.  I want to know if I can ever say to anyone again with certainty that 'God loves you', or is there some way that I can see a permanent banishment from God as somehow loving?    I want to be able to resolve satisfactorily in my head and heart that Jesus' sacrificial gift was perfectly executed, and includes everyone irrespective of whether everyone responds and without what appears to be heretical universalism.   I want to know what the point of evangelism is, if salvation is simply a spirit enabled, sovereign act of God, and HOW to evangelise without misrepresenting the truth and preaching a gospel other than one that saves.

Maybe the truth is that  there is a synergy in the saving grace from God. Maybe it is not we reach for God or he reaches to us, but perhaps it is that both reach for each other from the beginning of time? perhaps looking for a linear logic to understand the cause and effect is too limiting for an action of a God who is so sacrificial in his Love for us? perhaps the paradoxical approach is the only one that fully combines the scriptures which extol the grace of God and our need to respond to the yearning for God that is within every human heart?

But what of comfort?  What of the certainty of where we go when we're finished with our mortal body as we await our resurrection and face the final judgement? "God knows" seems poor comfort when a person has lost the physical comfort of some loved one's presence.  Do we need to be able to determine whether those who have lived with us are included in Christ?   and do we need certainty of salvation to attempt to live right? Isn't the law, still the law?

All I can say for sure right now is that with everything in me that can, I want to love God.  I'm convinced that to the fullest of my ability to respond, I'm organising my thoughts, actions and hopes heavenward, mindful that there are some areas of my life that are yet to be subject fully to his law - even after all these years of trying to follow Him.   If my sins are able to be counted paid in Christ, then I am grateful his sacrifice, grace and love is sufficient for me.  Even if I am not counted as covered by his blood, it does not remove the need to comply with his law which is still a better [perfect] way to live with each other even if there is no eternal reward.  Whether I am or not chosen, elect or disqualified from his saving grace, I hope I can graciously live to bring little shame to his name while I am alive in my body.  God is still God, He is still creator and author of life, I still owe him everything whether he wants me with him forever or just for now.  He is important, I am just a flicker in the flame of life... a gust in the wind... a moment in history.

I'm at a funeral today. I hope that it gives me opportunity to talk about death, life and God. I hope that my own struggles don't get in the way of pointing to Christ. I hope that in pointing to Christ I don't lead people to disappointment, but to life. I pray that to whatever measure possible in my regenerated or unregenerated heart I can be influenced by the Spirit of God to be wise, humble and loving.  I pray that theology doesn't just affect thinking, but action, and that action comes from the heart and the head.  If the power of the resurrection is available to me, I trust that i will use it well to proclaim Christ, and him crucified so that those who can respond to the Gospel of Christ [by whatever method is valid] can do so and there may be a party in heaven for those that are welcomed in.

Being quiet

I’m quite a loudperson.  I don’t usually need a microphone to be heard in a room, I’m confident to speak to several or few (though I struggle to mingle in a crowd), and I usually have thought through (or can think through quickly) common subjects and discussion topics.  I like to think, enjoy a good debate (political, social or theological), engage with opinionated people who are iron to my iron regardless of view and I ask lots of questions and appreciate the answers.

I find being quiet really hard.  Listening for the still small voice is easier in the quiet than in the noise of an active mind. For me, to be quiet takes extraordinary amounts of effort and patience, and usually people who know me ask ‘what’s wrong’ because their perception is that it’s abnormal (for me).

All followers of Christ are charged with communicating the gospel of Christ, and living a life which displays his radiant glory (words & actions) yet also require humble service and quiet obedience. This dynamic is interesting to present when humble, quiet, obedient, service is by definition almost unnoticed and is certainly obfuscated by verbal communication and demonstrable conviction. I wonder about where blogging fits into the mix.  In many ways it’s a loud activity, communicating to any who stumble upon my musings, and perhaps it gives a glimpse into my heart or head for those with an eye to delve behind the words to the motivation for them.  But is the still small voice evident in the words? is it actually helpful to any cause? Is it quiet, humble, obedience too?

And what of the struggles with my marriage? Surely a man must first lead his household well? – Yet, even when that leading isn’t going to primary plan, does that mean for that season we’re totally useless to God, lest we become hypocrites, believing one thing and doing another?   If I can lose the way here where I have spent most effort, and invested so heavily, isn’t it all the more possible to lose the way in other areas? Shouldn’t that cause me to be silent for now?  - but if a gift is given surely it is to be used – not left unexercised?  It seems to me that if God is the same, yesterday today forever, and if his primary calling to us remains unchanged, and if we’re to be honest with each other as we do life together, then struggles alone do not disqualify us, and disqualifying ourselves only places ground into enemy hands.  We needed saving because we were sinful and we still need his spirit because we are weak. His strength is made perfect in weakness so perhaps I need to be all the more vocal of my own weakness so that He may be glorified in me?  Or have I misunderstood what Paul was talking about?

I need to find the quiet voice that leads the way. There are times I’ll need to be quiet to do that. But perhaps I also need to continue to be noisy in declaring who God is, the extent of his grace, the provision of the cross and the call to his kingdom?  I cannot fear man, what can they do to me? if they kill me, do I not still gain the prize? So death holds no barrier to action..  only my own stubbornness or embarrassment does?

What is death?

I find some scriptures really confusing.

The bible uses the word death or dying in a number of places and it is not always clear whether it’s talking about physical death, spiritual death, eternal separation, decay, what happens to our old man when we accept Christ.

I’m not a studier of Greek or Hebrew, so I have no idea what word is being used and in what context other than from the translation provided by hopefully learned folk who have attempted to translate the text faithfully into a language I sort of understand.

This morning then I was reading in John 8. There is a discussion between Jesus and the Jews which culminates in Jesus explaining that not only does he know Abraham (despite being less than 50 years old) he has spoken with him. [Presumably eluding to eternal life and to recognisable states of existence in the after earthly life]

So far so good…

But the bit that confuses is what is to be understood by John 8:52

⁵²The Jews said to him, "Now we know that you have a demon! Abraham died, as did the prophets, yet you say, 'If anyone keeps my word, he will never taste death.'

• Are they talking about the same death?
• Is Jesus suggesting that people who hold to His teaching never cease to breath the air of this blue/green sphere?
• Is the death we won’t taste that Jesus is suggesting the same as the one in Matthew 16:28?
• Or what about Hebrews 2:9? What death did Jesus suffer for all of us so that we don’t all have to ‘taste death’?