final exam.

Currently my mind is one muddled mess. ISF is somewhat like a summer camp on high. Christian camps often score high on their ability to conjure up feelings of need, desperation, fear of Hell the beginning part of the week only to have gospel night mid-week which finally offers the kids some hope in life. Speakers have the entire week planned out to tear down the kid, only to offer them hope at the most opportune time. ISF has been that for me in many ways. I feel like it’s dismantling certain ideas and concepts to a point where I feel like I have nothing left. It’s a muddled mess. But, then at the most opportune times when you feel like you are one neurotic mess, light shines forth and things come into focus. In my life I feel like the light is attempting to penetrate now, and while things are somewhat coming into focus it’s still muddled. It’s almost as if what is coming into focus is the realization that there is not really a clear image and this is a life long process.
Within the community at ISF I have this overwhelming feeling to be completely and brutely honest. I once was fearful to share my doubts of God and his love for me. Once I conjured up enough courage to share with others in my life I was told to reread certain passages and believe them. I felt if I only prayed harder, or believed more then I wouldn’t have these doubts anymore and I would feel loved. But, within the ISF community if I explain that I don’t think God loves me I am not told to just believe more., or read the scriptures more intently; but to enter into that feeling and open up to God in that feeling. ISF people just smile and nod, not freak out like other people might tend to do. Perhaps others in my life were attempting to tell me to open up to God in this before and I just was misunderstanding them. But, this semester the idea of opening to God and being honest with him has really begun to make sense. During one of my retreats I finally voiced to God in prayer that I don’t think he loves me and it’s difficult for me to trust him. I left it at this point and determinedly didn’t engage in ‘self-talk’ out of that. I experienced much freedom as I was finally completely honest with what God already knew of my life. When individuals come to me now with some questions or hurt instead of handing them scripture verses to memorize my desire is to help them enter into that hurt at a deeper level. To think of what God desires to show them within that pain and how to ask questions to get at the heart of the matter. It’s been great to just have a place where I feel like I can say anything and be completely accepted. This makes it daunting to think of emerging from this safe place of ISF into the ‘real world.’
At times all of the teaching within ISF leads me to paralysis as I feel like I have nothing to say to a person who approaches me. I don’t want to just say some trite thing. I don’t want to perpetuate the individuals deep belief they need to be good and not bad. But, how do I respond so as to not perpetuate this thinking? How can I effectively communicate this to others when their response is: ‘But, being good is a good thing, right?’ I encountered conversations like these over the Thanksgiving Holiday. It’s just incredible to think that we all believe we can be good. But, apart from Christ we can do nothing good! It’s only through Christ that our actions are considered good. This is a life-changing thought. This will change the way you see others around you. Even if an individual seems decent, they are not! They are sinning against the living God. We are so easily deceived into thinking that the world is okay. That people are good. I think this hinders our desire to share Christ with others.
The Horney material has been some of the most interesting to me. Perhaps this is because of my interest in psychology. It was intriguing when Coe began to discuss the three basic drives within a human and how these can perpetuate the false self and then ultimately what these could look like in ministry. I was able to understand and see why I behave in the ways I do. I began to wonder who I really am. I wonder if I can ever truly know because my personality has just been structured around the ways which I found I could survive. There are three basic drives one experiences in life: toward, away and against. Toward describes the tendency to move towards other people and engage in relationships. The away is the ability to draw boundaries in ones relationship, and the against is the ability to say no to certain things. However, when these drives begin to serve as the answer to basic anxiety they can begin to become neurotic ways in which to deal with the problem. The toward person becomes compliant, while the away person becomes aloof and the against person becomes rebellious. In class Coe discussed how these could look in ministry. The aloof person described me in many ways and it made me see the grossness of the sin of this. I realized how I perceive myself as this person, and thus it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. People think of me as this, and therefore I am. But, am I? I tend to withdraw from others. I like to watch people from a distance. I am fairly perceptive because I can watch body language and catch bits of conversations that happen. Therefore people think I am discerning. Perhaps I have a bit of this gifting, but I also have just learned to be a good listener because that’s how I survive. This is how I gain acceptance. I don’t necessarily do these things out of love for others. Even what I thought I was good at, alas, it is sin! I feel like throughout this semester I have become a bit more harsh and mean towards others in my life. I am not sure if others have noticed or not. I have begun to notice in my heart when I am doing things to merely be accepted by others and I attempt to stop. I want to do things out of love for others. I want to be motivated by Christ within me and not my own neurotic needs and beliefs. I have also begun to notice within others their neurotic claims upon me. I still have not figured out how to encounter these well, but it’s at least helpful to be able to recognize them. Ultimately I am realizing that peace comes from finding my identity in Christ alone. I will never be able to meet everyones expectations of me. I simply must rest and abide in Christ and be who I am. This sounds quite esoteric, but I am unsure of how else to phrase it.
The entire concept of consolation and desolation is fairly reassuring. I feel like most people reach a certain stage in the Christian life and think that ‘this is it.’ I feel like ISF has excited me to the possibility that in this life it will never reach ‘it.’ We will always be growing and changing and learning. This is exciting to me! (on some days exciting and others fairly daunting). It’s encouraging to know that periods of desolation (felt absence of God) are times when we are being invited to journey deeper into our souls to ultimately experience more of Christ in our lives. I think often within Christian communities if this time of desolation is described the response is to look for hidden sin in ones life. Or, these periods of desolation are ignored and the Christian becomes compliant with their life. Stagnant. Never growing or changing. Not experiencing the real transforming power of Christ in their life. It saddens me and I desire to get into peoples lives and make them discontent with the life they are experiencing. But, I want to figure out how to experience this power of transformation in my life as well!
Coe has discussed parenting a lot. Shame parenting as one where the child felt loved, but not known while the guilt parenting is a bit more harsh and causes the child to go into hiding because they don’t want to be found out. In each of these parenting styles the child holes up and carves out deep spaces within the hidden heart. My parents fell into the category of shame parenting. I felt completely loved, but really unknown. Throughout this semester in discussions with roommates and classmates I remembered different circumstances in my childhood where I kept things from my parents. I didn’t share with my parents because I knew I would disappoint them. I have begun to realize how this has created within me this habituation to not share with others things that are going on in my life. The entire concept of sin structures and habituated sin in ones life is quite true. I have realized I cannot fight this on my own. I cannot simply will myself to change (and sometimes I don’t even want to change because life is easier to me this way). I need Christ’s power to break this sin structure and help me reorder it. I have to open up this part of my life and allow transformation to take place. I feel like all we learn just drives us back to the necessity of Christ and the cross in our lives. This goes back to the exciting part that I was discussing before concerning living in dependency upon Christ every day of our lives. We never arrive, but are able to experience God more and more in all areas of our life.
Sometimes all of this is completely overwhelming. I look at my life and begin to see how desperately messed up I am and how desperately messed up others are around me. I wonder how any of us can ever have any sort of healthy relationship. I wonder where I should even begin. But, then I stop and realize that I just wondered where I should start. It’s completely engrained in me that I need to do things. That I need to change myself. If there is a problem I did something wrong. Throughout this semester I have become more aware of this huge tendency in my life to rely upon my own abilities to change myself. While this can change my behavior, my heart will not be changed. And without heart transformation nothing of worth or eternal significance will be changed. It’s like cleaning the outside of the cup when the inside is what’s dirty. I need to be able to sit amidst my crap and not attempt to remove it myself. In class Coe brought up the example of sitting amongst the weeds with the Gardner. This has been a beautiful illustration in my mind of how I need to just learn to sit with the Gardner and trust that the Gardner will know what to address first (if anything). So, while the weeds can seem completely overwhelming, the Gardner has a vision for the future of the garden. He knows what needs to be addressed first. I just need to sit and trust. I desire to be ‘willing’ and open to God in my life. I often tend to be ‘willfull’ and attempt to control the future. I have noted this tendency in my life. If I know a certain situation will be uncomfortable I avoid it. But, this doesn’t mean I have grown in this area. It just means I have effectively removed myself from circumstances where this could happen. While it is sometimes important and necessary to implement this type of behavior change (removing self from the situation) this shouldn’t be confused with true transformation. I also can just completely give up and fall into the ‘will-less’ category. Sort of despairing of any true change in life. I want to reside in the ‘willing’ category. Open to God and what he desires in life. It’s a life of peace and full trust. There is much anxiety in my life now and this anxiety leads me to be aware of lack of trust of God in my life. If I completely trusted God I would have no need to be anxious.
Throughout this semester one of the greatest things which has penetrated my heart and changed my concept of Christianity has been the emphasis upon the relational aspect of original sin. I suppose I have been taught this before, but it hasn’t impacted me as much as this past semester. The idea that God designed us for relation with him, and this is the fundamental pathology for sin in our lives. We are born into spiritual death because of the lack of relationship to God. We have this deep relational need that we attempt to fill with other things. The entire problem of original sin is relational. It’s not some legal pardoning that was offered to us; but it was relational reconciliation. The relational hole makes sense of why a person, Jesus Christ, was needed to pay the cost. Everything has a relational component. It’s amazing! We were created to be known and loved and we seek that from so many things but God. How different our lives would be if we could understand this love fully!? It has moved me to be thankful for the cross and for God’s intended purpose for our lives. Instead of seeing God as a being requiring our service, I can see him as a loving Father offering a profound relationship.
This semester has been a complete muddle of feeling like a neurotic piece of crap, but also deep feelings of gratitude and excitement for the life God offers in Christ. It’s a balance between these two and one which we don’t have to figure out on our own.