A snarky, humorous, sometimes bitter, look at the Bible and faith. Not the uptight judgmental religion you may have grown up with. A refreshingly real look at faith for a new generation.
If on your journey, you are stuck because you think you don't deserve anything from God, you are going to love the next story in Luke 7:1-10.The story starts off with Jesus entering Capernaum, a town in Galilee. The Jews in this area were not as strict as those around Jerusalem, because of geography and a lot of complicated history. A centurion, who had been stationed in this “more liberal” region to keep order, sent some elders of the Jews to ask Jesus to heal his servant. When these elders saw Jesus, they begged him to heal the servant. They said, “this man deserves to have you do this because he loves our nation and has built our synagogue”. (Luke 7:4-5 NIV)Let's take a minute to contemplate how crazy this scene was. Centurions were leaders of groups of a hundred or more soldiers. They got their position by proving themselves in battle. As experienced warriors, they led groups of soldiers and always took a position on the front line. These were tough dudes who had done some serious killing and torturing of people. They were respected and wealthy in the Roman world. This centurion used his power and wealth to show favor to the Jews. He even helped them build their synagogue. This was enough for the Jewish leaders to overlook the normal disdain for soldiers. They believed the centurion deserved help from Jesus.The centurion, on the other hand, saw things very differently. When Jesus was on the way to his house, the centurion sent word to Jesus,“Lord, don't trouble yourself, for I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. That is why I did not even consider myself worthy to come to you. But say the word, and my servant will be healed. For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, ‘Go,' and he goes; and that one, ‘Come,' and he comes. I say to my servant, ‘Do this,' and he does it.” (Luke 7:7-8 NIV)The centurion basically said, “I'm not worthy to have you in my home. I understand how authority works, you can just say the word and my servant will be healed”.Jesus responded to the centurion's request by telling the crowd that he had not found such great faith in all of Israel.Wait! What? How did the centurion show the greatest faith Jesus had seen in all of Israel?I mean, uhm Jesus? You know the disciples have been walking around soaking in your teaching for quite a while there. Remember, John the Baptist, he's in prison because of you. Tons of people have been coming to you for healing and a lot of these guys memorized the whole first five books of the Bible. Those Pharisees, they devoted their whole lives to just sitting around reading the scriptures and talking about them. This centurion dude, he's not even a Jew. How does he have greater faith than any you've seen?Ironically, as a kid I got in trouble for asking too many questions about this story. It honestly didn't seem like the centurion was any different than anyone else. I mean we barely know anything about him. How'd he show great faith? Several poor frustrated teachers told me I just needed to accept the story and “have faith”.I always wanted to scream, “I'm trying to have faith, but y'all can't tell me what it is.” Their frustration with my many questions led me to believe “having faith” meant “quit asking questions”. Which may work for some people, but I've never been able to shut down that part of my brain.Turns out, Jesus never told us to just “shut up and drink the Kool-Aid.” He's OK with ALL of our exhausting questions. Faith isn't about not thinking; it's about knowing the answers are good and worth finding.In the case of the centurion, the answer I found was exactly what Greg and I needed to know when we were struggling with feeling unworthy.Consider how the centurion's attitude directly contrasts what the Jewish elders said. They said, “He deserves to have you do this because he helped build our synagogue.” The centurion who was a wealthy, generous, powerful leader, said, “I'm not worthy to have you in my home. I understand how power works. If you choose to, you can heal my servant with just a command”.The attitudes of the religious leaders and the attitude of the centurion couldn't be more different. The leaders were proud and trying to impress. The powerful military commander humbly asked for mercy for a servant.Great faith is understanding Jesus' power, realizing we don't deserve anything from him, yet trusting enough to ask anyway. Jesus' definition of “great faith” as modeled by the centurion might be why survivors seem to have an insider's advantage when it comes to knowing God. When we have hit rock bottom, it's a lot easier to see we don't have anything to offer God. Following Jesus isn't a religion based on earning our way “in” by impressing him. It's a relationship built on knowing our need.In those moments, when we realize we don't deserve anything from Jesus, we are almost there. When we are facing the pain in our world, when someone close to us is suffering, we can find hope when we call out to Jesus like the centurion did. Great faith is saying, “Jesus, I don't deserve anything from you, but I know you have authority over this situation and you care more than I do.”When we humbly realize we don't deserve anything from Jesus, somehow our eyes are opened to God's great work in this world. When we know how much we don't deserve God's love and acceptance, we are suddenly freed to live in it. We no longer live in the trap of focusing on our own unworthiness. We are fully aware of our unworthiness and our acceptance anyway.I believe this awareness of our unworthiness and how much God adores us is at the heart of Jesus' message. My journey to fully embrace this message has felt like a lifelong wrestling match with fear, pride, shame, doubt, tradition, and stubbornness. As the following story from my religious past illustrates:I walked up to the pulpit nervously. “Was I really going to do this? I couldn't believe I was sharing my story in front of all these people. The small group of young people gathered that evening felt like a stadium to me because I was about to bare my soul to them. It was too much. I hated public speaking in the first place. I got nervous just responding to roll calls in class, how could I stand up and share my story? What if they rejected me?”I took a deep breath. I looked down at my notes. They just looked like blurs. I was about to hyperventilate. I was going to pass out. At least it would get me out of this. I looked around the room in sheer and utter terror. All these faces ready to reject me like I had been rejected so many times before. Passing out would be a relief.Then I looked beside me. There was Jesus. Smiling in approval. Reminding me how he had not only forgiven me but fully accepted me. Reminding me how loved I am. Telling me God the creator of all the universe was looking at me in this moment as a doting Father proud of his little girl who had just come home. Proud that I was going to tell everyone what a mess I had been but he loved me anyway.So, I did it! I like to believe it was an eloquent call to follow Jesus and know the Father's love, but it was probably a bumbling bunch of over-sharing. Still, I shared my story. I told this daunting group of church people not only about ways I'd been victimized but also, about ways I had hurt people. I told them how God freely forgave me and gave me new hope and joy. I was excited about my life, my ministry, my upcoming marriage, and my education career as I approached them all with Jesus by my side. I finished my speech took a deep breath and felt Jesus giving me an approving hug. We did it! I felt total joy in that moment.But it was just for a moment. Someone interrupted us. The youth pastor rushed to the podium and nudged me to the side. I looked away from Jesus and began to listen to this pastor as I crept off of the stage.I had been a fool. I had been suffering from a delusion. Jesus wasn't there. He didn't accept me. This pastor pointed out the fallacy of my crazy beliefs. God is clearly a God of justice and I clearly needed to be punished for my mistakes. I couldn't just commit all of those sins and have joy. How could that even be possible? The way to please God was through strict adherence to the moral code of the Bible. I was so sure that I had been with Jesus, but as I sat under this cloud of shame, I couldn't find him anywhere.The pastor looked at me and passed his final condemning judgement on me. “Cindy will never have the kind of marriage she could have had because of the mistakes she has made.”How could I have ever thought God accepted me? What was wrong with me? I didn't even deserve this pastor's acceptance. I was misleading all of these young people by flippantly sharing about my past as if it didn't even affect me anymore. I needed to be remorseful and sullen. I needed to constantly feel guilty for my mistakes. I didn't deserve joy.Of course, I didn't literally see Jesus visibly standing beside me or giving me a hug, but I felt his love and acceptance. Unfortunately, I also allowed judgmental church people to keep me from embracing his very real presence in my life.Accepting Jesus' love after so much shame has been a long journey for me. This morning, I thought about my journey as I read Luke 7: 11-16. This time, something jumped out at me. In six short verses, Luke recounts the story of Jesus raising a young man from the dead. It drives me crazy that Luke only wrote six verses. If I'd been there, I'd have written a book about the boy, his mom, how he died, what her life would have been like without him, what Jesus was wearing, everything he said and a million other details. Because Luke only included the bare bones of this story, we know each detail he included is significant.Then he went up and touched the bier they were carrying him on, and the bearers stood still. He said, “Young man, I say to you, get up!” The dead man sat up and began to talk, and Jesus gave him back to his mother. Luke 7:14-15 (NIV)One of these significant details is that Jesus touched the bier the young man was being carried on. It seems like such a trivial detail in our culture, but I imagine Luke's original audience immediately saw how scandalous touching the dead man's bier was. Jews didn't touch things associated with dead people. Nothing was more unclean to them than dead people. They had tons of rules about what to do and not to do when it came to dealing with a dead body. There were rituals and waiting periods to go through to cleanse yourself after becoming unclean from coming in contact with a dead person or even something that was touching a dead person. The rules were so extreme that people carrying the body carried it on a bier with poles attached so they wouldn't touch what the body was touching.When Jesus touched the bier of this dead man, it would have been shocking. Like doing tequila shots and dropping an F bomb in a Baptist church shocking! People were appalled. Southern Belles would have fainted. Youth Pastors would have jumped up to tell the youth “touching funeral biers is NOT allowed.”Only, there was this glaring problem with all of the judging about how unclean this made Jesus: Jesus raised the man from the dead!What do you do with that?I know most people dismiss this story as a fairytale or myth because people die and we've never seen any of them come back from the dead. Death is pretty final and that feels quite certain.The most amazing part isn't really that Jesus raised someone from the dead. If he's truly God, of course he could do that. It's amazing and all, but that guy isn't still walking around. He eventually died (again).What's amazing is how Jesus completely annihilated the basis of religious judgmentalism. How are you going to call him unclean for touching a mat with a dead man on it after he raised the dead man?Get this! What is even more amazing is what that means for you and me when it comes to all of those judgmental rules: They make no sense when Jesus completely changes the situation. How are you going to judge me by my past when I've been accepted by God Almighty, the Ruler and Creator of the Universe?Yes. All those religious judgments about me, actually made total sense. I was once a wreck. I messed up royally. I deserved to live the rest of my life drowning in constant guilty remorseful shame. My propensity for sin was so great that I could drag anyone who came in contact with me down. Association with me was enough to make anyone “unclean”. Only, God threw a paradigm changing, grenade of total acceptance at religion's rules for judging me: He gave me right standing with him while I was still a mess. His acceptance motivates and enables me to become better.He hugged me that day on the stage. Not literally, but he was there. He was with me. He walked through the religious crowd and did something utterly shocking to them. While I was being told about how unclean I still was, Jesus did the unthinkable: he accepted me and changed everything.I don't mean he loved me in some overarching, general, well wishing, sense. He actually accepted me and declared that I have right-standing with God the Father through him. He heard those stories that made religious leaders cringe and he said, “That's my baby girl right there. We got this.” He allowed himself to be associated with me and my “unclean” guilty story in a way that appalls religious people.It is incredible to reflect on how far I've come since speaking to the youth group that day. I've been married for twenty-eight years. I have a wonderful marriage. My husband and I laugh at the twisted way the “prophecy” the pastor spoke over me has come true. Through the years, we have counseled over a dozen couples who were living in misery because of religious sexual shame. The condemnation from that youth pastor left me so shamed, I spent years praying for God to take me out of the world. Instead, he empowered me to accept his forgiveness and freedom. Then I got to share the same freedom with people who had done a good job following the rules, but were caught up in the trap of thinking they deserved something from God.I'm still growing in my freedom from being a shame-filled judger. It is one reason I re-wrote this book. My first edition accurately portrayed my bitterness with how American church culture misrepresents Jesus. However, it offered little hope. Thankfully, the community of people following Jesus is still at work. Several faithful believers called me out. They helped me confront areas where I still need to grow. As I let go of (most of) my bitterness, I'm finding freedom to be even bolder as I stand against church abuse. My outrage is no longer tinged with questioning how God could let me be shamed. I love the lessons he continues to teach me. As I let go of my shame, I feel honored to get to help others do the same.I am learning to look past the problems with the institutions as I focus on the hope Jesus called his followers to. As we all put away our bitterness, and rise above all of our shame, we will bring hope to a hurting world. We will be gracious, forgiving, and generous, because we realize we don't deserve anything from God, but he forgives us anyway. His forgiveness gives us hope, for all the messes we see around us. I pray you can learn from my mistakes and not fight against the peace so freely available to you. I hope your journey is less like a wrestling match, than mine has been, and more like a hike with a friend. Either way, God adores you through it all.
“Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.” Luke 6:37-38 (NIV).My friend Kathy is an amazing Christian, who wants to share God's love with everyone she meets. A few years ago, she invited me to meet her at a local strip club, so we could tell her friends, who work there, how much God treasures them. Kathy told me, many of these dancers didn't want anything to do with Christianity because of things church people had done to them. Since I'm also bitter about church culture, she knew I'd fit right in. That night, I was amazed by the beautiful souls of the dancers I met. I was so inspired by these women that I continued to work in strip club ministries for a long time after that first night. Though the ladies who worked in the clubs had very different stories than mine, I loved the community I found with them. I never struggled to talk to them, to see their strength, or to sincerely desire the best possible life for each one of them.On the other hand, it was always a struggle for me to deal with how much I hated the men in the clubs. See, there are often abusive jerks in the clubs, who think having a little money means they can talk to women like they're garbage. I have seriously sat and prayed, “God help me not punch this guy in the throat.” I hated them. My rage towards these jerks extended to all the men in the clubs, and it blinded me to seeing them as anything else. It took a lot for God to change my heart in this area. Softening my heart took years. I struggled. Not just a little, I intensely struggled with emotionally unhealthy vengeful hate.In the last chapter, I mentioned praying for abusers. My most memorable experience of praying for abusers, took place as I drove to a strip club one night. I vented to God. I was bitter, self-righteous, and full of hatred. I despised the abuse I had seen, but I didn't want to see the whole picture. I wanted people to blame. I saw my friends only as strong survivors and their customers only as abusive jerks. The messes in this world are seldom so neatly divided. Obviously, I still had a long way to go on my journey towards fully living in the peace and hope Jesus provides.As I drove, I ranted to God about my whole, ugly, hate-filled mess. Finally, the truth about my attitude came out. I said, “OK God, why aren't you fixing this?” There it was. My real issue: I was still mad at God for the things I'd been through.Honestly, I didn't struggle so much with the abuse I endured. I was angry about the shame heaped on me by church people. Why didn't God break through and yell at them? Why didn't he make it clear how much he cared about me? As I was recovering, I needed to know he still loved me. Unfortunately, people who should have told me how much God still loved me, told me he didn't let bad things happen to people who love him. They told me I was “forgiven”, but I'd always have to pay for my mistakes. The way they misrepresented God, filled me with bitterness. It tainted everything I did. I desperately wanted to protect my friends, who are dancers, from ever feeling the shame I felt. Deep down, I also didn't want to deal with the anger I felt towards God. My anger towards God was too raw and painful to face, so I stuffed it. But stuffed emotions never stay stuffed, so mine came out as hatred towards the men.Somehow, when I finally voiced my real frustration, in my car that night, I had a sense of how incredibly beautiful God's way really is. I knew those church people were wrong. Now, so was I. I was reminded of a truth I didn't want to believe: “Hate doesn't change anyone”. Though I knew this was true, in that moment, hate felt better and I wasn't ready to let go of it. So, while driving, I angrily blurted out, “OK God, I see it, but if you want me to care about these guys you are going to have to do it through me. I can't do what you're asking.”I want you to know, this was not a nice eloquent prayer session. I was angry. I was yelling in my car like a crazy woman. I was real about all the pain I saw and how much I hated it. I was arrogant and bold. Little did I know, I was about to be humbled, yet profoundly honored. God was about to show me a glimpse of how he sees the men I hated.As I went into the club, I forgot all about my prayer and began joking around with my friends. I didn't associate my ranting prayer with anything that could happen that night. Simply because, I did not talk to the men, ever. I was merely going to avoid them, as usual, while hating them a little less. Turns out, God was preparing me to meet Greg, a man who was carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders, and needed to know how much God still loves him.Greg came up to talk to the dancer I was talking to. I tried to slip away unobtrusively, but my friend said, “This lady is a Christian, you should talk to her.” So, Greg turned to me, not for a conversation, but to tell me how much he hated religion.I listened to Greg's rant. Amazingly, God was honoring the challenge I had issued earlier: “If you want me to care, you are going to have to do it through me.”As Greg continued his story, I knew God was working on me. Despite my bitterness, I heard the deep hurt behind Greg's angry complaints about the religion forced on him as a child. He had experienced rejection and shame for not living up to their standards.After a while, Greg finished his beer. He turned to me with a sudden seriousness and said, “I don't want Jesus to forgive me because I don't deserve it.”The anger in his voice turned to despair as Greg told me the story of his sophomore year in college. He had pressured his roommate, who had just broken up with his girlfriend, to go to a party with him. His roommate never drank but gave in because he was feeling low. Greg remembered handing his roommate a drink with the promise, “this will fix you.”. He had no idea how depressed his roommate really was that night. After just a few drinks, his roommate jumped onto a motorcycle; sped up the curvy mountain roads; then drove off of the only overlook with a broken guardrail. Greg never forgot getting the news of his friend's suicide.As he sat there beside me in a strip club, recounting this trauma from over twenty years ago, I began to actually see Greg. I saw how he was weighed down by guilt. I saw how he blamed himself for all kinds of problems around him. I saw a desperate, hurting soul looking for solace in the company of these dancers. I saw a glimpse of how God sees him. I saw hope for him. I saw how he struggled with the same shame that Jesus had freed me from.When Greg said, “I don't deserve Jesus' forgiveness.”, I saw the glaring truth of my hypocrisy. I remembered that I too had said the same thing to God twenty years earlier. As a young overwhelmed mother, I had cried out to God. “I can't raise these children. I'm too messed up. I don't deserve them.” Like Greg, I felt I didn't deserve good things in my life because of what I'd done. My path was different from Greg's. I dealt with my shame by throwing myself into church work. But, no matter how good I got at following the rules in church, I couldn't shake my shame. I knew I could never measure up and never deserve God working in my life. Like Greg, I knew how much I didn't deserve forgiveness.When I finally got to the point of desperation where I cried out: “I can't do this. I don't deserve my children.” I came to the end of me. I got quiet and I listened. I felt the calming, peaceful presence of God reminding me of the story of the Apostle Paul. Paul was responsible for the deaths and imprisonment of many early Christians. God completely forgave him and empowered him to be one of the key leaders of the early Christian community. In comparison to Paul, it seemed ridiculous to think God couldn't work with my mistakes. I didn't deserve forgiveness. Thankfully, God gave it anyway, and he also empowered me to accept it.Yet, here I was, all these years later, condemning all these men for the sins I saw in them. Why was I so ready to see people like Greg as hopeless, when I knew God didn't see him that way?After a while, Greg didn't want to hear any more. He ended our conversation with, “Listen. I know all about your religion. I can't follow all of those rules. I just think Jesus wants me to care about people.”I told him he was absolutely right on both points and God still loves him. He shushed me and said, “He shouldn't”I didn't push anymore. I simply promised Greg I would be praying for him.This morning as I read Luke 6, I remembered exactly how judgmental I can be. I haven't seen Greg in years. But I still pray for him to know how much God longs to walk through this life with him, to give him the peace, healing and hope he has been seeking.It is crazy miraculous, (like healing the blind kind of stuff!) that I ever talked to Greg. It is proof of how much God wants to reach out to him. Literally, twenty minutes before I went into the club, I would have immediately judged him and refused to talk to him. Graciously, God broke through my judgmental pride to give me a glimpse of how he sees Greg.I thank God for being so patient with me. I thank him for being way more loving and accepting than I can ever comprehend. I thank God for not giving up on the Gregs in this world, who don't know how loved they are. I also thank God for being patient with the religious Cindys of this world, who get a little bit better, then think they can condemn the rest of the planet for not living up to our messed-up standards.Before you judge me too harshly, remember this not judging thing is hard. If you don't think so, then you aren't doing it right! Our society seems to thrive on judging other people. I mean let's all be honest and admit: deep down, wouldn't we all love to be Judge Judy and hand out sassy judgments to everyone we find annoying? Our desire to justify ourselves by condemning others is why Jesus' calling in Luke 6:37-38 is seriously hard stuff.In those verses, Jesus calls his follower to be gracious in how we see people, forgive freely and give generously. Thankfully, Jesus didn't simply throw out these commands then say, “Good luck with that. I'm watching.”In the rest of Luke 6, Jesus taught some pretty amazing points to free us from being shame-filled judgers.Consider carefully who you follow.Jesus continued by saying “Can the blind lead the blind? Will they not both fall into a pit? The student is not above the teacher, but everyone who is fully trained will be like their teacher.” Luke 6:39-40 (NIV).We aren't supposed to “judge” in a negative, hypocritical sense but we are supposed to make wise judgments about who we follow. Don't expect anyone to lead you somewhere they aren't going. If you want to be gracious in your assumptions of others (non-judgmental), forgiving, and generous, then you need to actively seek leaders who model these traits.Sounds like no-brainer advice until you think about how often we surround ourselves with people who make us feel better, instead of people who challenge us to be better. Real growth comes from finding people who will confront us in our shortcomings and model areas where we want to grow.Deal with the mess in your life so you can help others with theirs.“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me take the speck out of your eye,' when you yourself fail to see the plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.” Luke 6:41-43 (NIV).Jesus uses an exaggerated word picture to tell us two things: First, we all need to deal with our own mess. Secondly, there is actually very little we can accurately judge in other people's lives.Seeing our own mess accurately is no easy task. I often joke that denial is my favorite coping skill. One clear indicator that I'm denying my own mess: when I judge people harshly, it is because of something I'm not willing to deal with in myself. For example, in my opening story, I judged the men harshly because of “my plank” which was me being angry with God.When we refuse to deal with the messes in our lives, they don't go away. They pop up everywhere and influence everything we do. They have power over us. They become a nagging voice of shame, constantly telling us we are not good enough. We compensate by comparing ourselves to others. We look for problems in their lives so we can say, “See. I'm not so bad.” We live with the shame of trying to deny our messy plank, and we compensate by being judgmental.Jesus' advice frees us from the cycle of personal shame and doubts which cause us to judge others. He gives us the power to deal with all of our real issues, our deep hurts, and our shame. Healing all of these hurts can be a long process. Sometimes, we just aren't ready to admit our deepest hurts. Amazingly, even while we are in the process of simply admitting the hurts are there, Jesus provides freedom. When we admit we have a “plank”, it frees us to know we are going to deal with it. We no longer have to stuff our deepest pains and pretend we are “OK”. We get to admit, we aren't OK, but we will be! The peace we find from Jesus' acceptance of us and our “messy plank”, frees us from the need to build ourselves up through judging others.But what about the speck? Are we supposed to just deny other people have problems? Surely, we are supposed to help.Absolutely, we should help other people with their problems. We just need to realize; we only see the tip of the iceberg. We don't know all of their struggles. We only see a speck of their pain and the struggles in their lives. Of course, we should help people with problems we see. We just need to be sure we start with a humble attitude, which comes from being fully aware of our own mess, God's patient grace with us, and our very limited perspective. This humble attitude frees us from condemning others.Years of working with at-risk youth has given me unique insight into our “plank-eyed” tendencies to judge with condemning certainty, based on a “speck” of information. For example, I always think of Matt, one of my favorite students of all time. Matt was a young man with a huge heart and a tough home life. His mom worked two jobs just trying to make ends meet. His father was not in the picture and his older brother was a drug addict who, at seventeen years old, had already been arrested twice. Matt did everything he could to help his mom. He was consumed with not wanting to be another man who let his mom down. He worked his butt off trying to help her. His grades, appearance, and health suffered from the heavy load he was shouldering at such a young age. When I was assigned to be his tutor, I sat in on meetings where his teachers judged him as lazy and apathetic. The truth is, he worked harder than any of them; he was just ashamed to tell anyone. From their limited perspective, they saw his actions, then judged his motives. And they were dead wrong.Matt needing support at school was the “speck” his teachers could see. When they judged him, they no longer felt responsible for helping him with that speck. They hadn't dealt with the “planks” in them, which made them so ready to judge a thirteen-year-old boy.When we condemn from our limited perspective, it always points to our own plank. We miss the joy of helping people in the small areas where our lives intersect. “Holy speck helping” begins with “humble plank acknowledging”.Your focus determines your direction.I can't imagine anyone reading the previous two points and not wanting to apply them. We all want to follow wise leaders and to be non-judgmental, encouraging people. We all want to see the best in others and inspire those around us to greatness. I'm sure you've never thought: “What I really want out of life is to harshly judge everyone who makes me feel uncomfortable about anything I struggle with.”Despite our desire to be encouraging, judging people is a trap we have to constantly battle. How do we read these stories and Jesus' teaching about not being judgmental and really live differently?Jesus addressed the continual nature of our struggle in the next part of his lesson on not judging. He said:“No good tree bears bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit. Each tree is recognized by its own fruit. People do not pick figs from thorn bushes, or grapes from briers. A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of. Luke 6:43-45 (NIV).The “fruit” in our lives comes from all the things beneath the surface, deep in our souls. In order for our lives to produce good things, like not judging people, we have to store good things in our hearts and souls. In other words, if we want to accept people the way Jesus did, we have to continually focus on who he is and how he accepts people. It is a discipline we practice because of our desire to honor what Jesus has shown us. Our focus determines our direction. When we focus on ourselves, our hurt and our shame, we remain stuck in lives full of shame-filled judging. Thankfully, when we determine to focus on Jesus and his acceptance of us, we are freed from shame filled judging and we get to grow and accept others.Doing these things will help you build your life on a solid foundation that will not fail you when times are tough.“Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,' and do not do what I say? As for everyone who comes to me and hears my words and puts them into practice, I will show you what they are like. They are like a man building a house, who dug down deep and laid the foundation on rock. When a flood came, the torrent struck that house but could not shake it, because it was well built. But the one who hears my words and does not put them into practice is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. The moment the torrent struck that house, it collapsed and its destruction was complete.” Luke 6:46-49 (NIV).Jesus ended this sermon with a final challenge comparing and contrasting the two responses to his message. Everyone believes being gracious, forgiving, and generous are good things but few people focus on growing in these areas.The foolish man building his house on sand reminds me of so many teens I've talked to through the years. I've helped several young people whose parents neglected and abused them because of drug addictions. These teens were using drugs while telling me, they didn't want to be like their parents. They believed they could just quit when they had families because they'd care too much about their kids to use drugs. Unfortunately, that wasn't the case for any of them. None of them had learned any coping skills for the struggles in life. Instead of building their lives on different decisions, they escaped the hard emotions of their teen years by self-medicating with drugs. When they had families, they had no foundation for dealing with adult stresses. Sadly, they became the thing they hated most.In life, we don't get to suddenly have great character when we need it. Wanting to be good isn't enough. Character is built over time through frequent choices. We will all have hard times in our lives which will shake us and reveal our true character. If we follow the principles Jesus teaches in Luke, he will prepare us for these times. He helps us see ourselves accurately, then empowers us to change, grow, and become the good people we want to be. If we continually build our lives on the principles he taught, the hard times will not destroy us, they will reveal the strength of our character.So, whatever your shame struggles are, there is hope for you. You can quit judging yourself and others.Trust me. It's a journey.
My friend Karen is one of the happiest, craziest people I've ever met. I've never had a discussion with her where I didn't end up feeling better. She is the most free-spirited person I've ever known. If there is any person I'd describe as full of joy, it's her.The truly crazy part about Karen's story is what an amazing survivor she is. She has endured unspeakable abuse in her life. She was abandoned by her father and abused by her mother's boyfriends. She ended up marrying an older man, who she thought would protect her. Just a few months into the marriage, he began abusing her too. It started with him sharing their very private intimate videos with strangers online. This betrayal set her up for further exploitation as he transitioned into selling her online.Karen's escape from her abuser was straight out of a Madea movie. After a year and a half of being abused, she began praying for the power to get away from her husband. She remembers that the complete loneliness was one of the hardest parts and what drove her to pray. She had no family or friends to turn to, because her husband kept her completely isolated from the world.She smirked a little as she recounted her story to me, “I'm not sure if this was an answer to my prayers or just rage, but one day, when he was stoned out of his mind, he hit me. It felt like every ounce of anger I'd ever felt all came together in that moment. I grabbed the iron skillet I was cooking in and I knocked him out.” At this point in the story, she laughed. “I didn't think I could hit him that hard.”After knocking out her husband, Karen grabbed her social security card and driver's license then ran several blocks down the road to a payphone where she called a women's shelter. She remembers panicking because she thought she had killed her husband but also feeling like he was following her. Turns out, her knock-out punch sent him to the hospital long enough for the women in the shelter to relocate her to another state.It's been twenty-some years since Karen knocked out her husband that morning. It's hard to believe such a happy person has endured so much abuse. Her journey to becoming the positive woman she is now, hasn't been an easy one. She went through many trials and traumas along the way which shaped her into a strong, courageous and compassionate advocate for other survivors.Part of the reason she is so free is because of how she has forgiven her abusers, which was no easy task. It took years of counseling, prayer, tears, growth, and strength from God. As Karen grew in her walk with Jesus, she realized more and more how much she did not deserve his love. The closer she grew to him, the more her love for others grew. Eventually, she was even able to extend this love to the people who had hurt her the most.Karen is quick to point out that feelings and the kind of love Jesus taught don't always go hand in hand. She says, “Sometimes, you just gotta do what's kind and best even if you don't feel it.”Nothing tested her resolve in this, like her relationship with her mother.“It wasn't easy to forgive anyone, but it helped that I could see they were all messed up from drugs and dealing with their own messed up lives. But my mom, she was jealous of me. I was just a kid and she didn't protect me. How could she be jealous…”Determined not to focus on past hurts, Karen stopped. She knew she would never fully understand why her mother did what she did. Karen chose to focus on remembering that everyone needs to know God's love. Even the woman who hurt her most.Karen's journey to forgiving her mother began with sending Mother's Day cards and birthday cards to her. It took a lot for her to be willing to do even this. She would always pray, “Lord, you know I don't want to do this. I don't like my mom. She hurt me deeply and has shown not an ounce of remorse. But you love her. I would like to want to forgive her, but I'm not there yet. Please heal my heart…”Only, Karen admits, her original prayers weren't worded that nicely. She remembers them being raw, angry, and real. The version she shared with me all these years later was what she calls the PG-13 version. She always laughs about how the unedited original version had a lot more cussin' in it. She would then say, “It ain't like anything I was telling God was anything he didn't already know. He just wanted me to share it with him.”Through many years of doing this, Karen's heart softened. She realized all her mom was missing out on. She knew her mom was still a victim of constant abuse. Eventually, Karen found out her mom was in a nursing home. All the men her mom had given her body and soul to, through countless affairs, had left her penniless and alone now that she was aging and frail.When Karen visited her mom, she found out no one was helping her bathe. Karen would go in as often as possible and bathe her. At first, her mom wouldn't look at her. Karen wasn't sure her mother even recognized her. Then on one visit, her mother began to cry and just say, “I'm sorry baby, I'm sorry,” and “Thank you” over and over.Karen's mom died soon after that visit. They never had a deep discussion or the kind of reunion you see on a Hallmark movie, but Karen found peace. Karen no longer saw her mother as purely evil; she saw her as a woman who never knew she was worthy of love.Karen's story perfectly illustrates the completely different way of thinking Jesus called his followers to in Luke 6. Jesus' way is so completely hard to do that I'm convinced it's not possible without God's help.I have been working on “loving” my biggest enemy, who abused a family member. I'm currently at the point of: Usually, I don't want to retaliate. I kind of feel sorry for him. I pray he changes. I also sometimes pray he gets struck by lightning which God lets me say and helps me work through.So, if you think this next passage is easy to live out, Karen and I both want you to know we don't think you are reading it right!As Jesus continued his sermon about what it means to be blessed in God's kingdom, he said:“But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If someone slaps you on one cheek, turn to them the other also. If someone takes your coat, do not withhold your shirt from them. Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have them do to you.“If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners do that. And if you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, expecting to be repaid in full. But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. Luke 6:27-36 (NIV).The word for love in verse 27 is “agape,” which I've mentioned before is a word that isn't possible for us to fully live out. It is often translated as “love” but sometimes as charity or benevolence. In our humanity, we can't completely comprehend or live out “agape”. It refers to more than an emotion it is also an act of the will. It is choosing to practice love towards someone.In other words, it is much more than the natural feeling of intensely liking someone who clicks with our personality. Agape has to do with intensely valuing people and seeing their inherent worth. I can choose to imperfectly model “agape” love towards someone even if I don't feel emotionally attached to them, like in Karen's story when she wrote cards to her mom. Karen didn't feel like she loved her mom, but her actions reflected an understanding of God's “agape” love for her mom.At first, the idea of agape being separate from our feelings may seem like a relief (As in”thank goodness I don't have to like all the annoying people around me!). But the choice is to something more intense than superficial and transient human feelings. When you think of the person who you resent the most in this world, God doesn't call you to feel the same kind of love for them that you feel for the person closest to you. He does, however, expect you to see them as a human being with extreme inherent value. He wants you to know that despite all the things you see, God sees more and he still intensely “agapes” them.As a fellow flawed human being, you will never fully live out God's kind of “agape” love in this world. But the more you understand his intense love for people you don't like, the more you can grow in choosing to practice this kind of love. This means actively trying to do good things for some people in our lives as we wrestle with not liking them…and yes, hating some of them.Obviously, this takes wisdom too. I don't believe for a second that “agape” loving other people means you should put yourself back in a situation where you could be abused again. For example, with Karen's husband, the forgiveness story included praying he would go to prison and never get a chance to abuse another person. It also included praying for God to change him. Karen has forgiven him, but she is never going to reach out to him because she needs to protect herself.Jesus called us to actively seek the best for our enemies, for our sake and theirs. Sometimes, it's not possible or wise to actively show love to someone who could still abuse us. In those cases, I recommend praying for the person and leaving them in God's hands. I promise, it's OK. God can work in people's lives without our help.Loving our enemies, the way Jesus taught, is hard. It is also the reason people like Karen radiate freedom and joy. She loves openly because she has had to walk so closely with God in order to forgive the extreme abuse she's endured. God made something beautiful out of her struggles: he shaped her heart to look more like his. He freed her from bitterness and hatred. Now she frees others.In Luke 6:35, Jesus tells us we will be rewarded for loving our enemies. “your reward will be great and you will be a child of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked.” (NIV) Karen is an example of the reward we get from loving our enemies. She proves she is a child of the Most High because he has freed her to show kindness to people who don't deserve it. She doesn't need their praise. She is filled with joy because she's being like her heavenly Father.That's the joy in this for all of us. Karen's example is tough to follow. It's not natural to love our enemies. It's hard to forgive people who have hurt us. It's even harder to actively seek to help them. But when we let God help us, we are freed from the trap of hatred. So, yeah, loving our enemies ain't easy, but when we do, we get to be sons and daughters of God, who are in on his business of loving this often-unlovable world.
7. Better Than #Blessed(Luke 6:17-26)When I lived in North Carolina, I taught English to migrant workers, and I had the privilege of meeting some of the most amazing Christians I've ever known. I would often come home from work and find presents left on my doorstep by grateful students. When I went to their church, I was greeted with sincere hospitality like I've never experienced anywhere else (and I'm a Southerner y'all!). These students deeply impacted me spiritually and opened my eyes to God's heart for people living in poverty.As I try to write about how much they meant to me, it is hard to pick a single story to share. I have never been so blessed as I was by these migrant workers who welcomed me into their lives. When they had parties, we celebrated with joy and infectious laughter for hours and hours. If you came to their birthday parties three hours late, they were just getting started. There might be four families living in a single wide trailer, but they always had an abundance of food which they shared generously.Daniel and Luciana were one couple I worked with. I met them when they were living over a shoe store in one room that was their kitchen, bathroom, and everything else. It had a single stove, a toilet and sink. They slept on the floor with no furniture. Both of them worked full time so they could send money back to Nicaragua to support their family. They were survivors of trauma, lonely, hardworking, and living in poverty, but somehow still full of joy.In my mind, I can still see and hear Luciana, telling me, “Teacher, I have much sadness in my heart but much joy as well. God is always with me.”As I got to know Luciana, she shared stories with me of being left in charge of her younger siblings while her parents went to work all day. She remembered the hopelessness of trying to care for her sister when she was struggling with an unknown illness. They had no money for doctors or even medicine. I felt a sense of holiness in the moment as Luci talked about her sister. There was deep pain and peace in her story. Luci remembered making her sister broth to sip on then lying beside her. Sometimes they would giggle and dream about the future. Decades later, Luci still felt the pain of her sister's death. She looked past me as if she were watching a memory. “teacher, I will always remember her laugh.”As a teenager, while Luci grieved the death of her sister, she was full of doubt, and fear. She worried about caring for her other brothers and sisters. What if she couldn't save them either? She was much too young to be taking on so much responsibility. I am sure this trauma is why she was willing to make the extreme sacrifices she made in coming to America. She left everything she knew to make sure her children didn't face the same hopelessness she had known.It was remarkable to me how anyone could have seen all of the things Luci had seen and still have such a positive, joyful spirit about her. In contrast, I'm bitter about so many petty things. I often look at what others have and think life is giving me a raw deal. I have to make lists to remind me to be grateful (which is really disgusting because I have so much stuff and so many blessings.) But Luciana, was grateful. She was one of the toughest survivors I have ever met. She had dealt with overwhelming abuse, neglect, hardships, and poverty.While I was teaching Luci, I was very bitter about how my students were treated. As I learned their stories, I wanted the world to know how wonderful and hard working so many of my students were. One day I shared a story with my class about how outraged I was with a local mechanic who took advantage of one of them. My husband had gotten in an argument with the mechanic who yelled at us for bringing him “foreign jobs”. I was determined to make sure this guy didn't get any jobs. But when I shared this story with my class, Luci and Daniel burst into laughter.“Oh, teacher. That is not unfair. People with guns taking your house is unfair.” The whole class had a huge belly laugh over my story. They saw a glimpse into what I thought was abusive and it highlighted the extreme differences in our worlds. They saw how spoiled and bitter I was (am) but still loved me. I taught them a little English and they taught me a lot about real joy.In Luke 6, Jesus was preaching a sermon to a large crowd. In this crowd was a group of disciples, not just the 12 but many others who wanted to follow Jesus along with a crowd of others.As Jesus was preaching to all of them, he looked at his followers, drawing their attention to the controversial point he was about to make:“Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.” Luke 6:20 (NIV).The Greek word that Luke used for poor meant more than just I-can't-afford-a-new i-Phone-poor. It was begging on the streets, going hungry, hopeless, unemployable poor. It was the poor of people like Luciana and Daniel.When Jesus said, “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God,” it was a completely radical statement. It was the literal opposite of what the religious leaders were teaching. The religious leaders were waiting for a day when Israel was collectively good enough to usher in God's kingdom with Israel at the center. They believed poor people were cursed and unclean because of sin, something they had done to break God's law. The priests taught that the poor continued to be cursed because they didn't have the means to follow the oppressive rules which religious leaders had added to the original law. The working poor were trying to survive. They didn't have time to obsess on tons and tons of rules and rituals about what was unclean and clean.In their culture, what Jesus said was shocking. “You religious folks think your life of ease is a sign of God's pleasure. You look down on the poor and think they are the problem. Guess what?! I'm giving them the kingdom you've been waiting for.”But Jesus didn't stop there. He continued (verses 21-26):“Blessed are you who hunger now, for you will be satisfied. Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh. Blessed are you when people hate you, when they exclude you and insult you and reject your name as evil, because of the Son of Man.“Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, because great is your reward in heaven. For that is how their ancestors treated the prophets.“But woe to you who are rich, for you have already received your comfort. Woe to you who are well fed now, for you will go hungry. Woe to you who laugh now, for you will mourn and weep.Woe to you when everyone speaks well of you, for that is how their ancestors treated the false prophets.” (NIV).Jesus said we are blessed when we are hungry, when we weep, and when people hate us for following him.Seriously?! All of those things suck! How can those awful, hard things be blessings? My spoiled American self wants this to be a mistranslation. I want to say, “Uhmm God, someone mixed up the words ‘blessed' and ‘woe to' in every English translation of this story.”However, when I reflect on what this passage really means, I can't contain how truly freaking awesome I think it is! Jesus challenged us to change how we see the struggles of people like Luciana and Daniel. I love that Jesus flat-out condemned the normal religious criteria for judging and condemning people. Turns out, having a life of ease, wealth, and fame are not signs of God's acceptance at all.On the contrary, people who struggle like my students did may have an insider's advantage when it comes to knowing God. Psalm 34:18: “God is near to the broken-hearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.” (NIV). Somehow, we see God most clearly in our struggles. When our hearts are breaking, God draws near to us.For some reason, suffering is part of this messed up world we live in. Though some have it easier than others, we all suffer in this world. No life is untouched by heartache, death, disappointment, illness, or betrayal. Being part of God's kingdom doesn't free us from suffering.Not being freed from suffering, actually feels like awful news at first. I'm not gonna lie, I'd like to be free from suffering. Sometimes, when I focus on those who have more than me, I still whine about God not being fair. However, I don't want any part of a religion that says I deserve a life of ease and Luci deserved to suffer. I love what Jesus taught. Luci is close to God's heart. God has walked with her in every trial. She knows him in a way I am jealous of because she has heard his whisper so many times.Jesus said there can be amazing blessings in unfairness and suffering. In those moments when you are overwhelmed with heartache, God teaches you vulnerability, compassion, empathy, and belief in something bigger than yourself. Somehow, our struggles connect us with the heart of God. It is in those moments we know most clearly that we were meant for more.Jesus' message frees us from the religious shackles which teach us to try to outperform others to earn God's favor. We don't have to hide our struggles from him. We don't have to pretend we are OK when we are beaten down by life. We are free to EXPERIENCE LIFE! Following Jesus isn't about denying our emotions and being freed from the human condition. Following Jesus means experiencing life to its fullest which strangely, frustratingly, and amazingly, includes being honest about our struggles.The deepest connections we can have with others come from sharing our struggles We all need other people. You bond with other people when you are brave enough to be broken, dependent, hungry, grieving, real, vulnerable, and poor.Being real about your struggles in this world is also how you learn to live in the freedom Jesus taught. It's how you develop a relationship with God. You don't impress God with how awesome you are at obeying his rules and how much you can buck up when times are hard. He asks you to be real with him. Faith doesn't mean guaranteed fixes or just being blissfully OK with things that suck. Jesus said you would be blessed when you weep, mourn, go hungry, are hated because of him, or have a problem where you are constantly dependent on others.I'm my life, faith has often looked like: yelling at God, arguing with him, and lying on my kitchen floor crying ‘til I couldn't move from exhaustion, telling God it hurt that bad. Then somehow His presence blessed me even as those parts of my life continued to suck.Faith also looks like what I learned from Daniel and Luciana's example of grieving deeply and still having joy. It looks like picking myself up off the kitchen floor carrying my hurt in a grateful heart which knows God didn't abandon me in my problems. He is with me and he is with you. He will give you courage to face whatever hurt life brings. You can be part of his kingdom and have your eyes opened to the hurt around you. You can be filled with hope as you see his tremendous heart for the poor, the hurting, and all of the survivors of this messed-up, beautiful world because you are one of them. You can walk through all the pain, fully see it, fully feel it, and still have crazy-awesome joy. You really can struggle your entire life while also knowing God's blessings! And that's WAY better than what most of us mean when we say #blessed!
6. IF It doesn't Feel Like Rest, It's Not(Luke 6:1-12)Anza was a young Mexican mom who came to my English classes. I invited her to church and she was thrilled to join me. Her first Sunday in the Hispanic church, she watched everything I did and copied me, which was funny ‘cause I'm the worst at fitting in at church! My mind wanders like a toddler at Chuck E Cheese, which inevitably leads to me to do something awkward. It was super cute that she was trying so hard to fit in and endearing that she thought I could teach her how!One day, after a few months, Anza just quit showing up. I went by her house and she hid from me. I assumed it was something I had done, because my wandering mind also blurts out lots of things which I perceive as clever, uplifting sarcasm and others perceive as hurtful, judgmental, old bittiness. So, I was determined to apologize. I went by Anza's work and caught her as she was leaving.She clearly didn't want to see me, but I had to blurt out an apology. As I was telling her I was so sorry I had insulted her, she interrupted.“Oh, teacher Cindy, it was not you. I couldn't pay my bills and I did bad things. I did not want to come to church until I got better.”It turned out my friend had come to the area of the country I was living in at the time to escape a life of abuse and being sold by her ex-husband to pay bills. She had changed her name and gotten a fake I.D. so no one from her old life could find her. Making enough money to support a child is hard for many single moms; it's extra hard when you don't speak English well. Anza got desperate.Anza no longer had an abuser pushing her to have sex with strange men to keep from being beaten. Instead, she was driven by shame and desperation. It took a month of me continuing to visit Anza and helping her before she trusted me enough to tell me what was going on.“Oh Anza, why didn't you let our church know how much you were struggling?” I asked.Anza looked at me like I had just suggested she invite immigration over for supper.As I continued to talk to her over the next few months, I realized she viewed going to church as a way to “give back to God.” She believed that the purpose of being in a church was to give extra money and time to support the “ministry of the church.” She also believed sermons were to “teach her what she was doing wrong.”So, when she found herself caught in a vicious cycle of desperation and shame, sadly, the last place she wanted to turn for help was the church.I wish I could say Anza was just being paranoid, but I knew she had good reasons for feeling the way she did. Even when I wasn't caught up in my own vicious cycle of messiness, I felt the pressure of “supporting the church.” I wrestled with it for many years. Truthfully, I still have to be on guard against being sucked in. No matter how much I gave, someone was always there telling me it wasn't enough.For example, when my kids were in middle school and high school, their youth minister confronted us for yet another way we weren't giving enough. At the time, my hubby and I were both serving in our church as leaders, teachers and generous givers. We served the church to a ridiculous amount that I don't recommend.How had we “failed”?By letting our kids play sports and occasionally missing church events. In the youth pastor's words, we were “choosing sports over God.” At the time, I let myself be bullied into feeling guilty. I was working, raising three kids, volunteering, and taxiing kids to practices. It was insane! My kids would go to church all sweaty and gross from practice, but we'd bust our butts to work it all in (and still get accused of putting sports before God). If that's the condemnation I got, what hope did Anza have?Turns out, Jesus wasn't about that kind of legalistic judgment. He wanted us to know God and to have support here on earth. He knew life would be tough and following him would be hard. His plan for church was for it to empower us to connect with God and each other.He wanted his followers to offer a place of refuge for people like Anza. A place for them to learn to live their lives with him. He wants to empower all of us to rise above every hardship of this wonderful, beautiful, yet evil and broken world. He wants to give us peace when we face the hardest things we can imagine and to empower us to be the very best version of ourselves.The word used for God's love for us in the Bible is AGAPE, and it means an unconditional love not based on being deserved or earned through service. Agape earnestly seeks the best for the recipient. This kind of love is actually impossible for us as human beings to completely understand. We cannot fully comprehend a love not based on what we get from it. How do you love someone who doesn't deserve your love? It's not natural. But somehow God does it for us.The fact that much of church culture revolves around burdensome service to their mission shows our complete inability to comprehend how much God actually loves and accepts us. God's kind of love is so beyond our comprehension that we have to constantly reconnect with him in order to live in it. Our drift is always back to religious rules and service.During the time of Luke's gospel, the religious leaders had also created a culture of burdensome service to the temple. The Jews around Galilee were not able to participate in temple worship as often because of geographical influences. They were also less strict because of their cultural heritage. The criticisms of them by the religious elite roughly parallels the tensions between fundamentalists and liberals in Christianity today. Both sides often miss the point as they argue over rules and strict or lose interpretations. I mean, do you ever hear people from different denominations saying, “What can you teach me about Jesus that I may not see from my vantage point?” They are too concerned with having correct theology to focus on knowing how Jesus is at work in all kinds of different ways in our world.Similarly, the religious leaders of Jesus' day went crazy over debating how to keep the Sabbath commands. “Sabbath” is the Hebrew word derived from their root word for rest. Sabbath days were given to God's followers in his most basic instructions: The Ten Commandments. “Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy.” God gave his followers some pretty simple instructions: Set aside a day of the week, rest from all your hard work and reconnect with him. It was meant to be gift.In Mark 2:27, Jesus says, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.” (NIV). Taking a break and reconnecting with God one day a week is a completely emotionally, mentally, and physically healthy thing to do. But it is hard for us to believe God gave us this rule (or any rules) for our freedom and benefit.It feels like because he is important and he is God, and we are little nobody peons we should totally do something to impress him. So, we try. We dress up and we put on really elaborate shows on Sunday. We endure all kinds of awkwardness created by humans, thinking somehow serving the big institution puts a gold star by our names on God's refrigerator chart.There are millions of ways modern Americans have made Sunday mornings an elaborate religious show for God. Very seldom does what happens on Sunday morning seem to be for people to recharge and connect with God. (This is perhaps why tons of modern Jesus followers are abandoning Amercanized church.)The ancient Jews went crazy with their rest day rules in a different way. They were hyper-strict about Sabbath rules. They had rules defining at exactly what point you were working and what was considered rest. Obviously, the rule debating religious elite were out of touch with the working-class people who were mostly farmers and manual laborers. I mean…uhhhm Hey religious dudes, we know when we aren't working. It's called sitting down! (Really, has anyone ever needed rules about how to rest?)Throughout the ages, all religions have been performance based. For some reason, human beings can't seem to accept God loving us and wanting us to rest to connect with him. We can't believe the connecting would be for our benefit because he already loves us.It can't be that simple…But when you consider this story from Luke 6, you see Jesus said it really is that simple.One Sabbath while Jesus was passing through fields of standing grain, it happened that His disciples were picking the heads of grain, rubbing them in their hands, and eating them. But some of the Pharisees said, “Why are you doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?” (Luke 6:1-2 NIV).The ancient Jewish laws were so strict about what you could do on the Sabbath that rubbing grain in your hands was considered “harvesting” which was totally work! The rule was “don't work,” so God must have been displeased with this seemingly insignificant act. (Again, imagine this rule through the eyes of an ancient laborer who had actually harvested wheat by hand. It's comically ridiculous.)Jesus replied to them, “Have you not even read [in the Scriptures] what David did when he was hungry, he and those who were with him— how he went into the house of God, and took and ate the consecrated bread, which is not lawful to eat except the priests alone, and gave it to the men who were with him?” Jesus was saying to them, “The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.” vs. 3-5 (NIV).Jesus reminded them King David had not only broken rules but also, he broke original rules straight from God. God told the Israelites to set aside food for the priests to eat. David went into the temple and took the forbidden holy bread, ate it, and then gave some to his soldiers. David's need while he was running from King Saul was more important than following the bread rule.Jesus was showing the Pharisees that in all of their effort to keep rules about rules to honor the Sabbath day, they were completely missing the point. In verses 6-11, Luke gives another example of people's needs mattering more than the rules.On another Sabbath, He went into the synagogue and taught, and a man was present whose right hand was withered. The scribes and the Pharisees were watching Him closely, to see if He would heal on the Sabbath, so that they might find a reason to accuse Him. But He was aware of their thoughts, and He said to the man with the withered hand, “Get up and come forward.” So, he got up and stood there. Then Jesus said to them, “I ask you directly: Is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath or to do evil, to save a life or to destroy it?” After looking around at them all, He said to the man, “Stretch out your hand!” And he did, and his hand was restored. But the scribes and Pharisees were filled with senseless rage, and discussed with one another what they might do to Jesus. (Luke 6:6-11 NIV).If you really imagine this whole scene, it's actually so ludicrous that it's also comical.How dare you miraculously heal a man's shriveled hand! I'm enraged and must destroy you!The religious leaders were so consumed with impressing God through rule following, that they were limiting when God could work. A miracle by definition is healing which can't be done by human ability (so God was doing it). Did they also think God was going, “Oops, my bad, I forgot it was the Sabbath day. Thanks, religious dudes for pointing out my error.”?Only the idiocy of believing you could somehow impress the God who created this entire universe could lead someone to that kind of messed-up thinking.The only thing crazier than believing you could impress an all-powerful creator God, is believing he already cares and just wants you to know him! Thankfully, everything Jesus did and taught demonstrated the crazy reality that God really does adore us.Consider how this story ends in verse 12:Now at this time Jesus went off to the mountain to pray, and He spent the whole night in prayer to God. (NIV).Wait! What?! Jesus was God, right? What is happening here?So, yeah, I'm not that great of a writer. I can't explain how Jesus was God but somehow limited himself to human form and then prayed to God. It kind of gives me a headache to think about…However, it is absolutely cool that Jesus took time out from his ministry to recharge. He clearly had a pretty important mission. Yet, he took time away from that mission to go off by himself and pray all night. He probably slept in the next day, too. I bet Peter told everyone to leave Jesus alone while he rested. Because it turns out, somehow while he was walking around in flesh as a human, Jesus realized he needed to rest and reconnect with God. He wanted you and me to have his examples and teaching so we would know we need these things, too.In our crazy modern world, I'm guessing you need recharging more than ever. You need to recognize legalistic rules which aren't helping you know Jesus. You need to free yourself from demanding religious systems which offer no hope for you when you face struggles like Anza did. You need to understand, in times where you feel you have nothing left to give, God is still with you. He isn't disappointed and waiting to push you to do more. He simply wants you to spend time with him so you can know him and yourself better.
5. Problem kids, drunkards, traitors, and other people Jesus likes hanging out with.(Luke 5:12-39)Tears suddenly welled up in Celeste's eyes. I was shocked. Why was this confident, beautiful business woman crying? I had simply told her I thought she'd look just as beautiful if she let her hair go back to its natural color of red. My mind was racing. I'm the queen of accidentally insulting people, but I couldn't imagine how this insulted her.After a long awkward silence, Celeste smiled through tears which were now flowing freely. “I'm sorry. You must think I'm a nut!”“No. Honey, you cry if you need to. I'm sorry if I said something…”She wiped her tears and then said, “No. It's not you at all. It's just my past.”She went on to tell me about how much trouble her hair had caused her as a child. Her mother had died of a drug overdose when she was eight years old and her abusive dad had abandoned her. Her grandparents took her in for a few months, but her grandmother couldn't even be in the room with her without crying. While Celeste was grieving the loss of her mother, her grandmother very painfully pointed out how “that red hair is just like your father's. I can't even look at it. He stole my baby girl from me.”“What kind of shit is that to put on an 8-year-old girl?” Celeste questioned, the pain still raw and obvious in her voice.Celeste went on to say that her grandfather was a little better. He would smile and give her cookies. Her grandfather told her to keep to herself and maybe her grandmother would come around.But after just eight months, she found herself sitting in front of a social worker and being placed in foster care.“My new foster mom was OK. She tried I guess, but she didn't know what to do with me. I was so mean to her….and I had this thick mess of red hair that had become the reason I was unloved in this world.”Celeste laughed a little. “You wouldn't believe the hell I put that poor lady through over trying to get my hair brushed. Finally, I wore her down and she quit trying. So, insecure nine-year old, lily white, freckle-faced me went to school with a red afro that whole year... I didn't make a lot of friends.”Celeste went on to explain that throughout the rest of her childhood, her red hair was the cause of a lot of pain and insecurity for her. Worse than that, it was her excuse for not even trying to care about anything or anyone. She viewed herself as an ugly, unlovable redhead. She let people abuse her but she also abused plenty of people. People hurt her and she hurt people. It was how her world worked.She stared past me at her daughter playing in the lake. “She's the best thing that ever happened to me. I didn't want her and the only reason I didn't have an abortion was being pregnant felt like a way out of my effed up life.”When Celeste found out she was pregnant, she was 17 years old. Her foster parents had already told her they were going to kick her out when she turned 18. If she was “lucky,” her social worker might be able to work things out for her to stay with them an extra three months so she could graduate.Leaving her foster home early and going to a home for teen moms was when Celeste began to take care of herself for the first time.“It's funny…My roommate was studying to be a hairdresser. She just looked at me one night and said, ‘You know you don't have to be a redhead.' Something in me clicked. I didn't have to be any of the things I was. I desperately wanted to be different for my baby. I wanted to get off of drugs so my baby would not lose me the way I lost my mom.”And here we were, ten years later, sitting at a picnic table watching our kids splash each other in the lake. I'd been friends with her for a year and I had no idea how much pain she had been hiding.After she shared her story, I felt incredibly honored and she felt incredibly embarrassed.“Oh God!” she groaned. “I can't believe I shared all that with you. You must think I'm horrible.”Unfortunately, though Celeste was one of the strongest people I've ever met, she felt like she was too big of a mess for most religious people. She felt they'd shun her if they really knew what she was like. She recounted stories of being forced to go to Vacation Bible Schools as a child and her foster parents dropping her off at youth group meetings, hoping they'd “fix” her. She heard stories of Jesus and even believed in him, but she didn't like church.“In church, I still feel like the little girl with the red afro wondering why I don't fit in. People will be nice enough, but I know if they really saw me, they'd run from me.”The abuse and hurt in Celeste's life started from situations beyond her control. The rejection she felt from others early in her life shaped everything about her. Even as a great mom, wife, and successful business woman, she was desperately afraid of ever being all of the things that she had been called as a child.Unfortunately, Celeste was probably right about many of the people in my church (and I wish I had been louder about how wrong they were!), but Jesus could totally handle all of her hurt, her mistakes, heartache, fears, and current struggles. As she followed him, she began to find the healing she so desperately wanted. We lost touch with each other and I'm not sure if she ever learned to “fit in” with American church culture, but I know she is completely “in” God's kingdom.When Luke wrote his gospel, he was writing for ancient Roman Gentiles and others rejected by the strict religious elite. Remember, strict Jews shunned Gentiles so completely that they refused to enter their homes and they would literally walk to other side of the street to avoid contact with anyone they considered unclean.When you think about the extreme animosity between Jews and Gentiles, the fact that Luke, wrote this account of Jesus is crazy awesome. The fact that thousands and thousands of Gentiles followed Jesus is even crazier-awesomer. How in the world would a bunch of ancient Roman “Gentiles” lower their guard enough to follow a Jewish rabbi?Simple. Luke showed them what Jesus was like.If you've ever felt like Celeste, knowing you didn't fit in with the religious crowd, you should absolutely love, the stories of Luke 5:12-39. They are stories of outsiders and survivors who were completely shunned by the religious elite. Yet, completely accepted by Jesus. He shocked the religious elite by openly associating with the people they condemned. Jesus hung out with people on the outside of religion so much that he was constantly criticized for it. Matthew 11: 19 says Jesus was known as a “glutton, drunkard, and friend of sinners” I mean, how often do you think that shows up on a preacher's resume these days? Imagine: “I'm a pretty good preacher, but I'm mostly known for eating and drinking a lot plus I just love hanging out with sinners.” We can't even imagine it, because religion is all about not associating with the “out” crowd.The heart of religious attitudes remains the same today as it was back then. For many of the religious people of his day, the people Jesus associated with proved he wasn't from God. Religion said he wasn't worth following because of who he hung out with. I think who he hung out with is the very thing that makes him worth following.There weren't a lot of redheads like my friend Celeste, running around the ancient middle east. There was no foster care system. However, there were tons of people being shunned and abused because of suffering they had already endured.For example, people with skin diseases. The shunning people with skin diseases suffered was much more blatant than what Celeste experienced. But at the heart, the religious rejection of their worth was the same.The ancient Jewish rules for skin diseases encompassed anything from a long-lasting rash, to a severe infection, to leprosy. All of these skin conditions were lumped together and came with a pronouncement by a priest that the sufferer was “unclean.”The common belief that all suffering was the result of sin and therefore deserved was harsh for any survivor of that day, but it was especially harsh for people with skin diseases. They were shunned on every level. They were forced away from their families and had to live with other outcasts outside of their towns. When they walked around, they had to put their hand over their mouth and shout “unclean” so people would know to avoid them. “Clean” people wanted to avoid even breathing the same air as them. They were physically cut off from their community and considered separated from God because of their illness. They were told not even God cared about them.In our modern comfortable lives, it is hard to fully comprehend their world and what people with skin diseases went through. Most of the harsh rules were originally designed to protect the community from the spread of the disease.The problem was, when the rules about physical uncleanness were seen as condemnations of spiritual uncleanness. Rules meant to protect the community from spreading disease became rules used to shun and judge. Fear of skin diseases found an outlet in religious condemnation. “If I'm better than them, I won't suffer like them”. Blaming others for their suffering leads to all kinds of cruelty. Then and now, fear and blame strip away basic human compassion.Imagine the horror of going through suffering completely out of your control and being told it was your fault because of evil in you. Imagine being made to feel like your suffering was a sign of God rejecting you. That's how Celeste and people suffering with skin diseases were made to feel by religion.Jesus responded to our suffering differently. In Luke 5:12, “a man came along who was covered with leprosy.” (NIV). It is no surprise that the leper fell before Jesus with his face to the ground. This man approached Jesus with the same act of reverential recognition of Jesus' power that Peter had done earlier. He fell before Jesus and begged, “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.” vs.11 (NIV). It is interesting; he didn't simply say, “Please heal me.” He asked to be made clean. He saw himself as unclean. He accepted people's judgments of him.All of the hurt and rejection this man endured makes the following verse more beautiful:Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. ‘I am willing,' he said. ‘Be clean!' And immediately the leprosy left him.” vs. 12 (NIV).Let this scene soak in a minute. Jesus reached down and touched the unclean man. The law said this made Jesus unclean also. Even after the leper was cured, he was still considered unclean until a priest declared him clean. Jesus wasn't worried about the religious rules of who was clean and unclean. He cared about the man. He was walking around with all the power of God in him and he chose to stop and be identified with this man. Jesus never worried about unclean people making him unclean.Then Jesus ordered him, “Don't tell anyone, but go, show yourself to the priest and offer the sacrifices that Moses commanded for your cleansing, as a testimony to them.” Luke 5:14 (NIV).The priests believed there was no way to be cured from a pronouncement of an unclean skin disease except through a miracle. They had no power to help. All they could do was judge the uncleanness and make sure the judgment against them was carried out. Jesus told the man who had been healed not to tell anyone about his healing except the priests. Jesus had already made the man clean, but he wanted the priests to see. The priests would have to declare that someone had come along with a power greater than theirs because, religion can only judge as unclean and shun. Jesus accepts, heals, and makes people clean.As the story continues, it gets even more crazy-awesome! In Luke 5:17-26, a bunch of Pharisees and teachers of the law came from all over to hear Jesus teach. A crowd of people gathered outside the house where Jesus was teaching. They were all trying to get in to see Jesus. Many in the crowd were suffering from illnesses and disabilities. The religious leaders were crowded around Jesus, debating minutiae of the law and pontificating pontificatable things, while people were literally dying to get past them to meet Jesus!One particularly badass group of friends was determined to get their friend to Jesus. While Jesus was teaching and answering questions, this group of friends was carrying their paralyzed friend to meet Jesus. When they got to the house where Jesus was, they realized they couldn't get through the crowd. So, they climbed up on the roof, dug a hole in it, and lowered their friend through.Now, back in the day, roofs were thatched and made out of straw and wood and covered with tiles. So, it wasn't impossible to just tear a hole in it, but it wasn't a nice thing either. The homeowner wasn't going, “Yeah that's cool. Just dig a hole in my roof. I'll patch that right up.” These dudes defied social conventions and went all out to get their friend healed.The coolest part of this story is what happened when they lowered the friend in front of Jesus. This whole group of religious leaders who believed that all suffering was based on sin and thus believed that they were closer to God and above everyone else, sat there debating with Jesus. Suddenly, a paralyzed man was lowered into the center of the room where the discussion was happening.I'm guessing all eyes were on Jesus and the paralyzed man. I feel like Jesus probably laughed when he saw this, ‘cause he saw the opportunity this was creating! Luke says that Jesus looked at the paralyzed man and said, “Your sins are forgiven.” Luke 5:20The religious leaders were SHOCKED and OFFENDED. They had the ability to recognize sin and they were super good at judging people, but they did not have any ability to do anything about it. Jesus was telling them what he was all about and how he was different from what they expected of a Messiah. He told the man that his sins were forgiven, but he didn't heal him. The man was still lying there paralyzed while shock and offense spread through the room.I'm sure Jesus masterfully let the awkwardness of the moment hang in the air while reality sunk in. Jesus had just claimed to forgive a man of his sins, which meant he was declaring himself equal to God. At the same time, he was separating the man's sins from his current condition. His paralysis stayed even after Jesus declared him forgiven.Jesus knew what was in everyone's hearts. He knew the buzz he had just created, so he asked:“Why are you thinking these things in your hearts? Which is easier: to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,' or to say, ‘Get up and walk'? But I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.” So, he said to the paralyzed man, “I tell you, get up, take your mat and go home.'Immediately, he stood up in front of them, took what he had been lying on and went home praising God.” vs. 22-25 (NIV).This is another of Jesus' responses that seems a little Yoda-ish on first glance. “Which is easier to say, your sins are forgiven, or get up and walk?”I'd probably have been like. “Uhhmmm, I dunno, ‘Get up and walk' has less syllables?!”What was Jesus getting at?Jesus was demonstrating the best news for survivors: Our struggles do not mean God is far from us! My friend Celeste was judged because of a whole lot of circumstances beyond her control. She responded to how others shamed her by rejecting people before they could reject her. But God never rejected her!Religion says our struggles are deserved because of character flaws and mistakes which led to God's displeasure with us. Jesus' message is different. Jesus said that God wants to freely forgive. His message separated our struggles from God's acceptance of us. Jesus accepted the paralyzed man in front of everyone. He declared him “forgiven” and “clean,” yet he remained paralyzed.If you aren't a survivor and you've somehow managed to live in a safe bubble right up until you read this book, or (more likely) if you have cleaned up your act; your life got better; and you think you deserve your easy life, being forgiven but not healed probably doesn't feel like good news to you. It probably feels like sucky news. But those of us living in the harsh world of reality know that life is really, really hard. Religion judges people whose struggles are worse than most. Jesus' interaction with this paralyzed man showed us that God doesn't judge the way religious people do.If you are like me, you are probably thinking, “Yeah but that paralyzed dude probably hadn't done all of the messed-up stuff I have done...I'm still not convinced that this applies to me…” If that's you, then hang on! You'll LOVE the next story. (Which is the craziest-awesomest!)In Luke 5:27-32, Jesus was walking along and he saw a tax collector named Levi (also known as Matthew) sitting at this tax booth. When Jesus asked Levi to follow him, Levi seems to have jumped at the opportunity because he “left everything and followed Jesus.” (Luke 5:28 NIV).The totally cool part about this story is the fact that Levi was a tax collector. Remember, they were literally considered the enemies of God who were not only siding with the occupying enemy, they were raising money for them. No one was considered more unredeemable and unclean than tax collectors, who basically flipped off the religious elite and gave a big “F you” to the whole system. Yeah. Jesus chose one of those guys to be his disciple!That is so freaking awesome!!! But Jesus didn't stop there…Luke 5:29 tells us that Levi had a huge banquet for Jesus where he invited his tax collector friends and some other “sinners.” Good church people might like to clean up how this party went, but let me just throw this out there: Everyone at this party was automatically considered “unclean” just by being in Levi's home. I don't know about you, but when I've been around a group of people who flipped off the religious establishment and said, “We're going to do our own thing,” we didn't sit around and work jigsaw puzzles. Just saying, this wasn't a PG group of people Levi was hanging out with. So, when Jesus went to this banquet, he once again irritated the peejeebers out of the religious elite.In ancient Israel, the wealthy people like Levi ate lavish meals in huge open dining areas almost like being outside. People could walk by and listen in on conversations. Poor people would come beg for leftovers. Everybody in the community knew who you ate with, and they totally judged you by it!As Levi was having his banquet, religious leaders observed and criticized Jesus. Shocked by Jesus' audacious disregard for religious propriety, they asked Jesus' disciples why Jesus was eating and drinking with tax collectors and sinners. Jesus was accepting these people while they were still messed up. (I mean thank goodness…'cause I for one still wouldn't be in if he didn't!)When he was questioned about his outrageous behavior, Jesus answered them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” vs. 31, 32 (NIV).This conversation was happening out in the open. Jesus basically called everybody at the party a sick sinner. It seems they weren't offended though. They all knew they were not following God's rules. They knew they were far from fitting in with the religious crowd. More than anything though, I think they also knew how much Jesus accepted them in their “sickness.”The religious leaders were appalled by Jesus' behavior. They said Jesus wasn't worth following because of his association with sinners, but they couldn't deny his wisdom. So, they questioned Jesus further. They asked why John the Baptist's disciples fasted and prayed, but Jesus' disciples went around eating and drinking. Jesus told them that the time to fast and pray would come later. Then he told them a strange parable:“No one tears a piece out of a new garment to patch an old one. Otherwise, they will have torn the new garment, and the patch from the new will not match the old. And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the new wine will burst the skins; the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No, new wine must be poured into new wineskins. And no one after drinking old wine wants the new, for they say, ‘The old is better.'” Luke 5:36-39 (NIV).At the time, no one could have fully grasped the meaning of this. But looking back, we can see that the old religious way of doing things would not mix with the new way Jesus taught. Just the stories from this chapter of Luke demonstrate how the old way of judging people would not work in the new kingdom Jesus ushered in.The fact that Celeste felt so judged in churches claiming to follow Jesus demonstrates the problems religion still has with trying to mix the old covenant (or testament) with the New way Jesus taught. You can't love and accept like Jesus did and add legalistic religious conditions. The choices are: Jesus' way of love which accepts, redeems, and heals, or the old way which judges and condemns based on our life circumstances and our ability to follow the rules. These two approaches do not mix. If legalism is working for you, you aren't going to be loving and accepting the way Jesus was.However, when you understand that Jesus wants to hang out with you while you are still messed up, you are changed by his acceptance. You find peace and hope in your mess and you aren't afraid to hang out with other messy people. You want to reach out to the Celestes in your world. You want to show them how loved they are when they hate how they look, when they are abandoned, when they lash out, and when they spiral out of control. You know acceptance isn't based on what they've done, but on how much God loves them (even when they stay messy and still struggle!)
4. Freak-out-Worthy Acceptance(Luke 4:38- 5:11)I wish I could go back through time and hand-deliver this book to all of the survivors I've known through the years. I'd write a personal apology in the front of each book.It would say, “I'm sorry that I tried so hard to change you. I'm sorry I didn't accept you the way Jesus would have. I apologize for not seeing the beauty and awesomeness of your life. You forever impacted my life with your strength. I'm sorry I didn't value it more when we knew each other.”See, as much as I rag on religious people in this book, a lot of my disgust is aimed at myself. I'm really good at what I call “following Jesus from a distance.” I like working on all the stuff we see on the surface. I like helping people get better jobs, have better relationships, and better morals. While these are important things to work on, they aren't the ultimate things. Fixing outward behaviors and circumstances doesn't get at the heart of our deepest needs. Jesus sees past those surface behaviors; he cares about the pain and mess in our souls.For most of my adult life, I was great at following Jesus from a distance. I liked everything Jesus was saying. I thought I believed it all. I cleaned up my life and it looked really good on the outside. I was doing a lot of great things. God was at work in my life. But I was still carrying shame around. I was still trying to feel worthy of being loved. I still wanted religious people to respect me.What I didn't understand then, and I can barely grasp now, is how completely Jesus accepts us and how completely none of us deserve his acceptance. I was so busy trying to “clean” everyone else up, because it was a twisted way for me to also “clean” myself up. But Jesus never asked me to do that. He accepted me and all my unclean, messy messiness! Then he said, “Let's start sorting this out together.” There was no measure of how clean I had to be in order to gain his acceptance; I just had to accept his acceptance!So, I'm sorry if you are one of the people I hurt along the way. I truly didn't understand how much Jesus accepted both of us as we were! I was keenly aware of how much we didn't deserve it, but missed the mark on how freely Jesus accepted us anyway!The disciple, Simon Peter, also followed Jesus from a distance for a while. His story starts right after the religious people from Jesus' hometown tried to throw him off of a cliff. Jesus shrugged off the experience and went to another town and began preaching and healing people. (Which I think is pretty amazing considering how quickly I let an insult set me back). Jesus loved people more than I can comprehend, but he didn't need their approval. It's interesting how he wasn't ever stopped by their hate.In Luke 4: 31-37 we find that all the small towns around the area began talking about how awesome Jesus was. They were amazed at his teaching and all abuzz about the miracles he was doing (which I'm guessing was a real burr in the butt of the people in his hometown!) Verse 31, tells us they were amazed because his “words had authority. This was a big deal because teachers in Israel didn't just say stuff the way we do. They had to cite their sources. They quoted and referenced important people to give authority to their words. Jesus had no need to do this. He just taught. He was fully God in the flesh and didn't need validation from other people.In Luke 4:38, the incredible story of Simon Peter begins. As you read his story, try to step back from overly romanticized versions of Peter with a holy glow about him. Imagine a real working-class man with a lot of bravado living out this story. Luke tells us, after Jesus preached in the synagogue, he went to the home of a man named Simon, who later became known by the Greek name, Peter. (It was a confusing, complicated time for names. From now on, I will call him Peter.)Jesus healed Peter's mother-in-law, who was suffering from a high fever. She immediately got up and began waiting on all of their guests. (Which, kudos to her, ‘cause I would have still been milking the “I was just on my deathbed” thing. Probably instant healing from Jesus gives you a different perspective though.)Verse 40 tells us, that evening, crowds of people came to Peter's house. Jesus stayed up all night healing the sick among them and casting out demons. Peter must have thought it was extremely cool to have this happening in his home. Hospitality was everything to people back then. Who you ate with and who you stayed with were “your people”. They were the people you identified with. It was a huge honor for a Rabbi to be staying in the home of a working-class man. Religious leaders strove to associate themselves with the most important people they could find. Jesus chose to stay with regular people like Peter. We don't know how long he stayed or how often, but Peter's home was a base for Jesus while he continued to preach in the area.In Chapter 5, we learn that Peter was a fisherman. Fishing was really hard work back in the ancient day. Boats were harder to navigate and equipment was bulkier. There were no fish finders, GPS navigation systems, boat motors, or elaborate gear set-up thingys. Just nets, boats, and oars. They threw the nets out, let them sink, then pulled them up to see if they caught anything. It was grueling, repetitive work.One morning, Peter was cleaning his nets after fishing all night with nothing to show for his efforts. I'm sure he was in a rotten mood. All Peter wanted to do was go home and crash in his comfy bed and sleep until it was time to get up and do it again. As Peter was working and dreaming of rest, Jesus walked up with a crowd following him. He got into one of the boats and asked Peter to push out into the water so he could preach to the crowd. Peter showed his tremendous respect for Jesus by immediately doing what he asked.After Jesus finished preaching to the crowd, he told Peter to do something which was probably even harder for him to obey: Jesus said “put, out into deep water, and let down the nets for a catch.”Peter answered “Master, we've worked hard all night and haven't caught anything.” Then he said “But because, you say so, I will let down the nets.” Luke 5:5 (NIV)I love that Peter puts a qualifier in there, “because you say so.” Peter was acknowledging how crazy it was to go fishing again, during the day. He probably wanted everyone around to know it wasn't his idea to go back out again. This was Jesus. They'd seen him do some crazy stuff already. Still, Peter seemed to want everyone to know he thought it wouldn't work.So, Peter and some of his fellow weary fishermen rowed far out into the deep water. They threw their nets out where Jesus told them to. Then they caught such a large number of fish that their nets began to break. They had to call the other boats to come help them. All the boats were so full of fish that they struggled to row back to shore. For ancient fishermen without sophisticated equipment, this was like winning the fishing lottery. They were astonished.Peter's reaction to the huge catch of fish is really strange:… when Simon Peter saw this, he fell at Jesus' knees and said, “Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!” For he and all his companions were astonished at the catch of fish they had taken.Jesus said to Peter, “Don't be afraid; from now on you will fish for people.” Luke 5:8 and 11 (NIV).Wait! What? Why did Peter tell Jesus to go away?Think of all the things Peter had already seen from Jesus. He'd seen him heal tons of people, including his mother-in-law. He'd seen Jesus casting demons out of people, which, seems like it would be way more awe-inspiring than telling someone where to catch fish.Peter had already heard Jesus preach. He obviously thought Jesus was a great teacher and a powerful man. Why did he react to this miracle with fear and asking Jesus to go away from him?Because of what this miracle meant. This miracle was specifically for Peter. Sure, it had been cool to see Jesus helping people and listening to him preach. Getting to serve him seemed special. It had been an honor to have a teacher like Jesus in his home and on his boat. Peter was serving Jesus which made him feel special.But the miracle of the huge catch of fish? That was directly for Peter. That was Jesus serving Peter. Jesus looked into Peter's life and saw his need and cared about it. Before Jesus called Peter to be his disciple, he provided for Peter's family through a miraculous load of fish.God was showing Peter how much he cares about our needs. Peter dramatically fell in front of Jesus, the way a peasant would fall in front of a king, in fear and recognition of how he knew he didn't deserve to be fully seen and fully cared for. Peter said, “get away from me. I'm a sinful man” (vs 8). Any pride Peter had, was thrown aside in this moment, because there was no way for him to convince himself he deserved this miracle. This man who seems to have so much bravado, fell on the ground in front of Jesus when he realized how much he cares and saw a glimpse of his power.When we truly understand what Jesus has done for us, we should freak out the way Peter did. This truth of who Jesus is and how much he cares for us is the hardest thing in the world for humans to grasp. Somehow, our pride wants to make it more complicated. But in those moments when we see it, even just a little, we, like Peter, are filled with a sense of how undeserved God's love really is. It's a natural response to want to send Jesus away from our messy lives. Like Peter, I've often felt I didn't want Jesus anywhere near the mess I was making of my life. I knew I was a train wreck. I knew I deserved the junk in my life and I knew I didn't deserve his care. I wanted to follow Jesus. I wanted to be associated with him. I wanted to clean up my life so I could deserve good things. But Jesus saw past all of that and accepted me fully. He cared about my deepest needs even as I followed from a distance. Gradually, I began to accept his love.You know how you can tell who gets this? Which people understand how little they deserve to be accepted by God? You can tell when you meet them because they are gracious in how they love and accept other people. They don't need to go around “fixing” everyone's problems so those “cleaned up” people can come to Jesus. People who have fallen at Jesus' knees and said, “Get away from me! I don't deserve your love” know that nothing we ever do can make us good enough for such undeserved grace. We simply accept it and give it to as many other people as possible.I'm truly sorry for all the times I didn't show this because I couldn't accept it myself. I pray that for the rest of my days I will do a better job at representing Jesus!I pray for you also, that you see how freak-out-worthy Jesus' acceptance of you is. He sees beneath the surface of your life and wants to walk with you anyway. He doesn't want you following from a distance, he wants to care about what is happening in your life, right now. That thing you are thinking about that you wish you could hide from him. He knows about it. He cares. He wants to help you with it. If you don't find that scary, you aren't fully comprehending it! It is also the answer to your search for peace. You are accepted as you are, even with that thing you want to hide! You can find peace when you accept his acceptance of you, no matter what happens in your life, even if you get worse. And the crazier-awesomer, un-freaking-believable thing is that Jesus wants to give you hope to actually get better and one day be free from the deepest hurt you are hiding. You and I don't deserve this hope, but he freely gives it anyway!
3. Homeless and Full of Peace and Hope(Luke 3)Jeanette is one of my absolute favorite people on the planet. She is AH-MAZING. Every time I see her, she encourages me more than most anyone I have ever known. When I think of what it means to be a Christian who models a life of peace and hope, Jeanette is the first person who pops into my mind. She is compassionate, generous, full of joy, wise… and homeless.Yup, she's homeless. She's not the kind of homeless most people picture when they think of a homeless person. The people you see on the streets with signs are only part of the picture of homelessness in America. Many people are like Jeanette, caught in a cycle of poverty that is really hard to get out of.Jeanette stays with friends and in shelters. She works whenever she can find something to do. But she has trouble maintaining a job because years of drug abuse has left its toll on her memory and her body (and her work history). Honestly, she has no concept of saving any money for the future. When she gets money, it's for spending and giving away.Jeanette doesn't ask for handouts. If you give her something, she will find someone to share it with. Whenever I saw her at the shelter where I used to volunteer, she would always give me way more than I could ever give her. She was thrilled with being a Christian and how much Jesus changed her life. So, she spent most of her days praying for people and looking for ways to encourage them. As I was having meltdowns about leaving my teaching career, she was praying for me to find my way. She didn't always know where her next meals were coming from, but she'd tell me not to worry. She had more peace than me because she knew her peace wasn't based on something as unreliable as a job. The hope she has for the world is infectious. When she reads her Bible, she writes down Bible verses over and over on pieces of paper and walks around looking for people to share them with.How absolutely AH-MAZING is that?I couldn't help but think of her story as I read Luke 3 and the lessons John the Baptist preached. He was homeless too, or more accurately, his home was in the woods.It's so crazy to think about the story of John the Baptist. He was a bold man who had a huge following. Though he was following God faithfully, his life was pretty tough. He preached in the wilderness and ate wild locusts and honey. Many people believe he was used to living on his own because his parents died when he was very young. In Roman occupied Israel, most Jews were poor, so John's relatives couldn't provide for him. He knew how to survive in the wilderness so that is where he set up camp to preach.This arrangement worked out really well, since the Romans were extremely strict about gatherings which might lead to riots. The Jews were already known for not being cooperative with Roman leaders. So, it was safer for John to camp out in the woods away from civilization and yell at religious people about how they needed to change their heart and get right with God.It's hard for me to imagine this working. ‘Cause when I think of yelling preachers, I think of obnoxious religious people cramming their opinion down other people's throats. Turns out, John was yelling at those people!I love to think about Luke's Roman readers reacting to John's sermon. They had grown up around Jewish people. They were used to Jews thinking they were “unclean” and refusing to associate with them lest they become unclean also. Imagine how they felt when they read about John calling those people out:John said to the (Jewish) crowds coming out to be baptized by him, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.' For I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.” Luke 3:7-9 (NIV).So, what's up with calling people a brood of vipers?Well, that might not seem like a big insult to you. But it was a major insult back in the ancient day. It was like the Queen Mother of insults with an F-bomb attached. The Roman dudes reading this were like “Dammmmn!” and somebody yelled “Oh no he didn't!!!” (or whatever ancient Romans did when somebody “just got burned”).Vipers were considered the vilest creatures on earth to ancient people. They believed when vipers were born, they ate their mothers. (I don't know why they believed this...I'm guessing no one really wanted to get close enough to intensely study baby vipers…)The viper comment was a terrible insult, like saying you were the worst kind of double-crossing back-stabbing backstabber. It was also a fitting picture for what John's religious audience was doing. God had given them commandments to follow in order to have a relationship with him. He promised to protect them and provide for them if they would follow him. God would make them a great nation that would bless all other nations. Instead of being grateful and obedient, they tried to use God's laws to manipulate God and to hurt the people they were supposed to bless.The Jewish religious leaders thought they were special and blessed by God just because of their birth. This is what John the Baptist is referring to when he said, “Do not even begin to think that you can justify yourself by saying that you have Abraham as your father. He basically said, “Geesh people, this is God we are talking about. He could make descendants of Abraham out of these rocks if he wanted to. You can't possibly think all it takes for you to be in God's kingdom is to be born into the right family. You have to follow him!Then John used a word which has really been ruined by religious people: repent. When I hear someone talking about repentance, I immediately assume they are judgmental. It makes me think of this obnoxious preacher on my college campus who called me a whore for wearing a mini-skirt. Unfortunately, when religious people these days use the word repent, they are most often condemning other people because of a behavior they disagree with.However, the ancient Greek word which has been translated “repent” was about a much deeper change than just behaviors. The word they used, metanoia, is more like our modern word “mindshift.” It was actually used in contrast to only changing your behaviors or changing so you could get a better outcome. Metanoia was about a complete overhaul in how you think.So, when John said repent, he wasn't simply saying, “here's a list of bad behaviors you need to quit doing.” He was saying, “your abusive behaviors show that you need to change your whole way of thinking about God.”It's crazy, but John's bold approach worked. The people knew they were messed up, so they said, “What should we do?”John replied, “Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none, and anyone who has food should do the same” Luke 3:11(NIV).Which seems like a Yoda-ish answer. I mean, two shirts aren't a lot of shirts John. How are we supposed to live that out in America?John was issuing a call to extreme generosity. This isn't another formula to measure if we are “in” or not. It's a check for our heart. Are we willing to be so generous with others that we might even give if we aren't completely sure we will be able to make it without what we gave away?John's call to extreme generosity was a glaring contrast to what the religious leaders of the day were professing. They lived in luxury and favor with the Roman government. They believed their lives of ease proved they were blessed by God. Meanwhile, most of the working-class people were struggling. They had been conquered by Rome and lost much of their land. They also had to pay heavy taxes to maintain the Empire. In addition, they gave offerings to support the priests. The priests did not respect the common people for their sacrifices or hardship. Instead, they judged them harshly.I believe John was proclaiming that this life is not about how much stuff we can get, but about how much we can help others. Two shirts aren't a lot of shirts, especially back in the day when you had to make them by hand. Giving from your excess doesn't require much (and the priests weren't even doing that). Giving when you have very little reflects the heart of God for all humanity. It's a gracious, loving act which elevates the person with less.Because of John's preaching something crazy happened. Verse 12 says, “Even tax collectors came to be baptized.” (NIV).Did you catch that? Is your mind blown? Probably not. But it would be if you were living back in the ancient day and you heard about tax collectors being baptized by a Jewish prophet.See, the Jews believed they were God's chosen people and God was going to set up an earthly kingdom. This was true, but they were wrong about how God's kingdom was going to work. All they could imagine was a political kingdom with them at the top ruling over the rest of the world. So, when they were conquered by Rome, they decided Rome was the enemy of God and God's plan. Tax collectors were therefore seen as Jewish people who made money by collecting money for the enemy of God. Even worse, they took more than was required and kept the extra for themselves.Tax collectors were such hated traitors that when religious teachers of the day wanted to make a point about someone being really, really, obnoxiously bad, they just said, “he was as bad as a tax collector.”And you know who backed up tax collectors? Soldiers. Think of all you know about Roman soldiers. They were tough guys who did a lot of messed-up stuff. I mean, these dudes were BRUTAL. Plus, they were the muscle behind the Roman Empire, God's supposed enemy.Think about how people viewed tax collectors and soldiers, then consider the rest of this scene from Luke 3. Some tax collectors got baptized and asked John, “So what should we do...I mean besides just giving away our shirts and food?”“Don't collect any more than you are required to,” he told them.Then some soldiers asked him, “And what should we do?”He replied, “Don't extort money and don't accuse people falsely—be content with your pay.” Luke 3:13-14 (NIV).Wait?! What???? Don't you mean stop siding with the enemy and find a new job?Religious people in comfortable lives of ease don't like to admit this, but sometimes life sticks you in difficult situations with no way out. John didn't tell the soldiers to desert their posts (they'd have gotten killed). He told them to be as fair as possible in their duties. And tax collectors, they were like the mafia for Rome. They were hated more than soldiers, but John didn't tell them anything except: be fair in collecting money from people.Whatever you are struggling with in your life, whatever injustices you see around you, this little nugget of truth should calm your soul. God doesn't expect you to right all of the wrong systems in the world, even the ones in which you might currently be trapped. He expects you to follow him to the best of your ability as you navigate this broken world.And just to be crystal clear: Do not think for a second this means you have to stay in a situation where you are being abused!!! That is not what I'm saying at all! But when you don't know the way out, that doesn't mean God has abandoned you. Follow him as closely as you know how and he will honor your heart and show you the next steps. Psalms 34:18 declares that “God is near to the brokenhearted.” (NIV). He sees your struggles, dear one! They matter to him. This world is a broken, hurt-filled mess, but there is beauty in every day. There is hope. God knows you can't change all of your circumstances. He sees your heart. God longs to walk through this broken, messy world with you.My friend Jeanette showed me this. She will probably never look like the picture of Christianity put before us in popular media, but her handwritten Bible verses inspired me more than a thousand sermons. She gives to everyone she comes in contact with and she blesses everyone who knows her. She may be homeless still, but she is a strong warrior in God's kingdom. She is full of peace and she shares hope everywhere she goes.My DisclaimerThroughout this book, I completely rag on religion, which I'm sure is completely confusing since, “Uhmm aren't you religious, Cindy?”Yes. Yes, I am. Truthfully, I think we all are and it isn't always all bad. But when religion is bad, it is insidiously awful and damaging like nothing else. Religious shaming hurts people at the very core of who they are and religious hatred unites people to do some of the worst atrocities ever committed against humanity. And in my years of working with survivors, I've grown to absolutely hate how people use religion to shame the people who God wants us to embrace and encourage.For the sake of clarity, in this book, when I refer to religion, I mean “any system of beliefs, values, or practices which we believe somehow make us more worthy than other people.”I'm aware that this definition creates a HUGE mess for how we look at the world. It's easy to identify religions like Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. And it's easy to look at world history and identify where these religions have gotten ugly. It's hard to recognize the less defined, less traditional religions people are currently clinging to.We live in a time where people are largely rejecting traditional religions for a lot of good reasons. However, they aren't replacing traditional religions with anything better. Instead, they are just drawing different dividing lines and we are all hating each other as much, if not more, than ever.One of the main messages of the book of Luke is about how Jesus taught a different way. Each story shows how strict religious adherence does not give us what we are all seeking. Strict religious adherence all by itself does not produce good things in us. The only way religion can help us is if it points us to our need for God.My point is that all of us are religious to some degree. Christians like to say Christianity isn't a religion, it's a relationship. I would say, it's supposed to be a relationship. However, the American versions of Christianity are mostly religion. Often these religions can show us our need for a relationship with Jesus. Sometimes, these religions can get in the way of our relationship with Jesus.In my own life, I spent years and years trying to be “good enough” for God and trying to prove myself through serving him. I failed over and over. I wrestled with depression and anxiety all the time because I was living with constant shame over mistakes I had made.God was there the whole time, loving me and wanting to walk through all the hurt and struggles of this life with me. But my foolish pride wanted to do it on my own. My pride kept me from seeing God when he was right there, longing to help me.The following story in Luke presents a picture of how our religious practices and foolish pride can keep us from recognizing Jesus when he is right here with us.In Luke 4:14-44, after Jesus' temptation in the desert, he returned to a region called Galilee. He went around preaching in the local synagogues. He was teaching the people and they were all super-impressed with what he said. Jesus was wowing the crowds with his understanding of scripture and pointing out the hypocrisy of their current practices.Well, Jesus was wowing everyone except the people in his hometown. When he visited his hometown of Nazareth, he got a different reception. In Nazareth, Jesus went into the local synagogue on a Sabbath day and began to teach the people. In those days, different rabbis would stand up and read the scripture and then the leaders would talk about it. Following this tradition, Jesus stood up and read the following excerpt from the Old Testament:“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,because he has anointed meto proclaim good news to the poor.He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisonersand recovery of sight for the blind,to set the oppressed free,to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.”Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him. He began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” Luke 4:18-21 (NIV)In other words, Jesus read a prophecy they were all familiar with and said, “Guys this happening. I'm the one you've been waiting for.”Luke tells us that their reactions were mixed. “All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his lips.” Luke 4:22 (NIV). But at the same time, they were saying, “Isn't this Joseph's son?” Luke 4:22 (NIV).Jesus had grown up in their hometown. He did chores just like them. How could he be anything special? They all recognized what he said was amazing and gracious, but they also like “Hold up. How can you be the Messiah, you're just a regular dude?”Then, OH MY GOODNESS! I crack up every time I read Jesus' response to them as they questioned him. He knew their hearts. He knew that they didn't want to know him or God's plan, they only wanted him for what he could do for them.Jesus totally called them out. In Luke 4:23-27, he said:“Surely you will quote this proverb to me: ‘Physician, heal yourself!' And you will tell me, ‘Do here in your hometown what we have heard that you did in Capernaum.'”“Truly I tell you,” he continued, “no prophet is accepted in his hometown. I assure you that there were many widows in Israel in Elijah's time, when the sky was shut for three and a half years and there was a severe famine throughout the land. Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a widow in Zarephath in the region of Sidon. And there were many in Israel with leprosy in the time of Elisha the prophet, yet not one of them was cleansed—only Naaman the Syrian.” (NIV).Basically, Jesus said “All y'all are going to tell me I need to prove myself to you. But I have no need to. I don't do miracles to gain power in this world, I do miracles to bless people who call on me. Consider these stories that y'all are all familiar with: the famous prophet Elijah miraculously provided food for a widow during a severe famine. There were many widows in Israel who were not seeking God, so Elijah went to a woman who you would consider an unredeemable pagan.”Then Jesus continued: “And Elisha, another of your favorite prophets, remember him? Well, he also healed a foreigner, another person you would consider unredeemable. Religious people just like you wouldn't listen to Elisha. You honor Elisha as being from God but you are just like the religious people who wouldn't listen to him.”This was a total mic drop moment. Everyone there understood what he was implying. Today we would have been going, “Oh no he didn't!!!”He just called the whole crowd out for missing the point of God's plan. It was never supposed to be a religious system for just one race to rule over the world. And the crowd totally felt the burn from Jesus' insult. Luke says they were furious. Jesus had accused them of not knowing God at all! And in perhaps the most ironic thing ever to happen on planet earth, this crowd drove Jesus out of town and tried to throw him off of a cliff!It's kind of like they were saying, “We'll show this guy how much we love and follow God. Let's kill him!”The sad, (and, if you're twisted, comical) irony in this story is that Jesus was the Messiah they had been reading about their whole lives. What he told them about themselves and their ancestors was absolutely true. No one even tried to say it wasn't. They just wanted to get rid of him for saying it. They wanted the Messiah to give them power over others, not confront the problems of their hearts.It's interesting to note that when Jews spoke of peace, they were referring to living in harmony with God and his good plan for the world. They greeted each other and parted with the word “shalom” which we translate as peace, but it is much more. Shalom refers to seeking to live in harmony with God's good desires for this world. It was a constant reminder of the kingdom Jesus was bringing for the whole world. Though they said, “shalom” they wanted what we all want: lives of ease, power, comfort, control, and satisfaction with who we are.Their extreme response is a picture of how much we don't like seeing the ugliness in our own hearts. None of us like confronting how our religion may be blinding us to actually knowing God. None of us want to confront who we really are deep in our souls. None of us want to deal with the brokenness within us. The most amazing thing about Jesus is that he loves us way too much to not push us to deal with the conflicts deep in our soul. He wants us to have inner shalom peace with him.Therefore, he wasn't just confronting the people in his hometown to be a giant jerk and get a rise out of some religious people (I mean, not gonna lie, I'd still think he was cool if he did!) He wanted them to see that even though they were good at being religious, they were missing the point. They were missing walking in peace with God.Even after all of these years of seeing God work in my life, I still don't immediately like confronting the issues deep in my soul. I still don't like seeing my own hypocrisy and bitterness. I can totally relate to the wanting to throw someone off of a cliff thing. I mean, I like to believe it would be a child abuser and not Jesus, but I totally understand frustration over being confronted with what I'm really like.However, this is also the most amazing part about following Jesus. I am completely loved and adored by God. As I confront those parts of me, I wish would stay hidden, I get to change them. I get to continually grow and be better. I get to have a mindshift as I walk in shalom with Jesus. I get to share his peace with the world. I don't have to live in shame, hypocritically hiding behind religious rules which do nothing but separate me from others. I get to share this peace with the world the way my friend Jeanette does.Jesus will show you the truth about who you really are as he walks with you and helps you become better. And yeah, as you cling to whatever religious belief makes you feel safe and in control, seeing who you really are might make you kinda want to throw him off a cliff sometimes. Thankfully, he's been there before. He will love you anyway.How freaking awesome is that?
So...chapter two. We've been together for a few pages; it's time for me to make things really awkward. Let's talk about sex and religion! I promise, no matter what you have going on in your sex life, there really is hope for you in the story of Mary. (Seriously! I'm not kidding!!!)If you grew up in church culture, you are probably geeking right now about how inappropriate it is for me to talk about the VIRGIN Mary alongside our modern sex struggles in our sex-crazed culture. If you're geeking, I imagine it's because most of American church culture has tried to control sexual behaviors through fear. Fear leads to shame and I believe shame has led us to the mess we are currently in.How have we gotten to the place where a gay teenager's biggest fear is the rejection he will face from church culture? How have we gotten to a place where some churches rally around an abusive pastor while his victims are pushed aside? How have we gotten to the place where Christians still support institutions which repeatedly cover up sexual abuse? I'm no expert, but I know we didn't get here by doing a great job loving people the way Jesus did!One time, I did a talk about shame and sexuality for a women's ministry. In my talk, I ranted about victims of child molestation being shamed more than the perpetrators. Afterwards, several people told me they had been molested and were always afraid of people finding out their secret because of how they would be judged! I was shocked by the response. There were less than a hundred people there, and my speech was mostly a venting rant, but it resonated with people.This is absolutely crazy! It makes me literally want to vomit to think about how many people are living with this kind of shame for decades. It's even more horrendously sickening when the shame is coming from the people who claim to be following Jesus and should be sharing hope for survivors of abuse.Let me just tell you right now, struggles with sexual issues can be more damaging than many other struggles because they are so close, personal and private. Sex gives us powerful ties to people and when those people are evil and abusive, it warps our sense of who we are.But listen closely: what these struggles don't do is lessen how much God loves and accepts us. God desires the best for you. In his perfect plan, I believe that sex was supposed to help us bond with our spouses (because relationships are tough and he wanted to give us something super awesome and fun to emotionally link us together). But we mess up his ideal all the time. I believe it grieves his heart because he wants better for us. I believe it hurts our ability to know him because shame competes with his voice of hope for us. But, guess what? He loves us anyway!So, crazy as I am, I'm sharing all of this because the second story in the book of Luke is the story of the Virgin Mary.Now, if you are like any other sane, rational person, then right now you are thinking something along the lines of “What the heck does the story of the virgin Mary have to do with shame and struggles surrounding sex?”Well, there are two glaring points from the story of Mary which will fill you with peace and hope when you begin to grasp them.First, the hyper-focus on Mary's virginity is quite insulting to the incredibly strong woman she was. Her story was meant to be a story to inspire us all. Her story is the story of a young peasant who stood strong through many trials because of the extreme gritty hope she had.The second point we should get from the story of Mary is that, the God who created this entire universe did not use his power or the importance of his plan to redeem humanity as an excuse to use anyone. As you will see when we look at her story, God sent messengers to ask Mary to be part of his plan and he uplifted her. He didn't use her. He honored her.How can American churches claim to represent him while using people? I do not believe for one second that the sexual abuse and the way it has been mishandled in church culture by the previous two generations is remotely representative of what the Bible teaches us about following God. No religious figure or institution is more important than the dignity of a human being.Mary's story is amazing, powerful, inspiring and real. It needs to be heard. The sanitized version of the perfect, pale, timid, woman walking around in a bubble of holiness that many churches tell presents little hope for us in our modern world. She is held up as the ideal none of us can ever attain to. This ideal led to a whole tradition of bad teaching about sex and purity. The ideal has been used to shame people into submitting to a controlling church culture which is sickeningly tragic. The worship of Mary's purity forgets about the prostitutes and “not sexually pure” survivors in Jesus' family heritage. Worst of all, the sanitized version misses the point of Mary's story. The virgin birth was never meant to be the emphasis of the birth story of Jesus. It's just one sign that Jesus was the Messiah, but certainly not the most powerful one. Because let's be real, there's no way to prove it. (Thankfully, Jesus fulfilled around 300 other prophecies!)Also, just to be clear, (and more awkward!) ancient religions were filled with stories of gods lusting after women, having sex with them and tossing them to the side. Luke was writing to an ancient Roman audience. His readers grew up believing in Zeus. Remember him? The super lusty god who created half the problems in the universe by sleeping with humans and angering his goddess wife Hera? The Roman Emperors claimed to be “sons of gods” who had sex with whoever they wanted to. So, as uncomfortable as it is for Christians to talk about, God having a son with a woman would not have been shocking to Luke's original audience.What would have been absolutely 100%, mind-blowingly, core-rockingly shocking to Luke's ancient Roman audience was the way that God had a son through Mary. First, Mary was a peasant woman. Women had few rights in that day. Women in poverty were disposable playthings for men in power, especially the Roman men Luke was writing to. In striking contrast to the way they used women, God sent a messenger to Mary to get her permission. Just mull that over in your mind for a little while. I don't think we can ever fully wrap our limited minds around this detail of the story. Many ancient Romans probably responded to Luke's story by laughing at the idea of a god so highly honoring a peasant woman.We see how much God honored Mary in Luke 1:28, when the angel greeted Mary and called her “highly honored.” The angel revealed God's plan to bring his son into the world through her. Mary was understandably scared, so the angel reassured her as he explained God's plan. Mary agreed to the plan and even though she was scared, she said “may all of this be fulfilled” Luke 1:38 (NIV), demonstrating that she wanted to be part of this plan.And then there is the act of conception... I think Luke knew this would bother his ancient audience as much as it bothers us today. As awkward as it must have been, the gospel writers questioned Mary about how it happened. In Luke's description, he used a Greek word: episkiazo. This word meant “to surround with brilliant light”. Many Bible translations use the word “overshadow” because the idea is hard to translate. The idea was that something was creating such bright light that it caused everything around it to seem shadowy. It's the word New Testament writers frequently used to describe God's presence. It referred to an uplifting, holy, empowering, beautiful, experience which edified the person. It was not in any way a creepy instance of God using people the way humans use each other. God elevates people who choose to follow him. He elevated Mary. She was not an object to be used by a petty god. She was a young woman who was being empowered to be a fierce survivor in a harsh world.I need to camp out with this part of the story for another minute. As I write, I feel like I can sense little old judgmental ladies cringing. But I have to write this. This isn't the closed world my parents grew up in. You and I can't maintain the delusion that church people used to present. We have seen how cruel and awful this world can be, especially when it comes to sex. As I've already mentioned, we all know tons of stories of religious people sexually abusing those they have power over. It's sadly common. No good person should want to have anything to do with a god who even hints at promoting such things. Sorry. Not sorry if this offends your religious sensibilities, but my religious sensibilities are offended by people covering up abuse and shaming people over sex issues.I absolutely believe that Luke gave us these details about the story of Mary to provide a startling contrast to the gods and the culture of the ancient Roman (and modern American) world. The Creator of the Universe had a plan to save all of humanity and he did not find it more important than the dignity of a peasant woman. He did not use her for his pleasure. He empowered her to be part of his plan. Therefore, if anyone covers up abuse because they think their mission, agenda, or institution is more important than an individual, they are not representing the God of the New Testament! God's extreme value of people is the point of the virgin birth!Consider all the ways, God valued and empowered Mary. Mary needed to be empowered because her path was not an easy one! She had unbelievable struggles, gut-wrenching fears, doubts, and eventually “had a sword pierce her own soul.” But when it was all over and she was asked to tell her story, she was able to look back on everything she had been through and say, “My soul glorifies the Lord, and my heart rejoices in God my Savior.” Luke 1:46 (NIV)Our struggles and traumas are obviously very different from Mary's. And if you are like me, your mind is screaming at you about how much more your struggles are caused by your own bad decisions and not the more honorable trials of a hard path. I get that. I wrestle with that a lot, too. My mind instantly rejects finding inspiration from Mary because I'm far from living the kind of life that causes people to put up statues of me and worship my purity. But God doesn't make that distinction. That's a distinction from which Jesus came to free us. It's a judgment religious people make, but not God. He loves all of us: virgins AND those of us whose sex lives could inspire an MTV series with ten seasons worth of escapades.When we choose to follow him, he enables us to be bold in our struggles. Even when those struggles are X-rated in their origins, God will help us when we turn those struggles over to him. He wants to empower us to follow him, even when we are the cause of our struggles. He wants to give us power to stand strong when life is beating us down. He will give us hope in the worst situations and give us purpose even when things don't change. We just have to learn to hear his voice and understand his incredible acceptance of us.I pray you see this as you consider how hard and powerful Mary's story really was:First, let's just take a minute to consider the extreme emphasis on virginity in the culture in which Mary lived. Ancient Jewish people took virginity so seriously that a woman who was found not to be a virgin on her marriage night could be stoned to death. During Mary's lifetime, Israel was under Roman rule, so they were not allowed to execute women for such offenses, but the judgment was still there. Consider that Mary was pregnant and unmarried in this society. It's challenging for women even today; it was devastating in Mary's day. Unfortunately, she didn't get to walk around with a halo shining on her, declaring that she was following God. She was judged and shunned just like any other woman in her society would have been. (Except that God graciously sent an angel to convince Joseph it was OK to marry her.)And that was just the beginning of the struggles this amazing survivor faced.Most of us know Luke's story in chapter 2:1-7, where Mary and Joseph traveled to Bethlehem before baby Jesus was born and struggled to find a place to stay. Every Christmas nativity set shows how Mary ended up giving birth to Jesus, the Son of God, in a stable. It is one of the most beautiful pictures of God's heart for humanity. He chose to come be one of us and enter the world as a helpless baby in a place where animals ate and did their business. It wasn't the stuff moms dream of when they plan their babies' birth stories; it was dirty, hard, lonely and amazing.In verses 8-20, the story gets even crazier and more awesome. Most of us know about the shepherds showing up soon after the birth of Jesus. It's depicted in most every nativity scene: cute little shepherd boys with adorable little lambs to add to the quaint picturesque scene of Jesus' birth.Only shepherds were dirty, stinky outcasts. They did one of the worst jobs in their society. They slept outdoors and hung out with a bunch of other outcasts. People generally viewed them as dangerous or at least suspicious. They were about as far as you could get from being accepted by the religious leaders of their day. It's a glaring statement of how God feels about religion. The religious scholars were poring over Scripture, memorizing prophecies about the coming Messiah, and God sent angels to the religious outcasts and told them where to find Jesus.This is one of the most crazy-awesome things in the world to imagine. Can you picture Mary, camping out in a stable just after giving birth to Jesus? Then a bunch of thugs showed up to worship Jesus. It must have been mind-blowing for her. This isn't how kings are supposed to be born, and those certainly weren't the people you'd expect to be his messengers. (And the shepherds certainly weren't going to help her reputation!)I LOVE picturing the next part of the story! The shepherds went around telling people about Jesus, glorifying and praising God. Considering their status, I imagine it being like a gang running around the streets telling people about this little baby being born and how God was doing something new and amazing. I tend to picture a homeless person with a shopping cart chasing down a snooty lady, cornering her, scaring her out of her mind, then telling her about Jesus with a handful of swears in there. That's not exactly how it went, but pretty close.The story then takes a leap forward a few weeks. In verse 22, Mary and Joseph took Jesus to the temple for a purification ritual and dedication. While they were there, a priest named Simeon came up to them and took baby Jesus in his arms and praised God. Simeon had faithfully served God his whole life and was filled with joy just in seeing Jesus and knowing God was going to do a great work through him. Simeon spoke highly of Jesus and then spoke to Mary.Simeon said, “This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your own soul too” Luke 2:34-35 (NIV).Let's think about what Simeon said from Mary's perspective. Think about all the things a new mom feels when she holds her infant in her arms. As you look at a precious child so unable to care for themselves, somehow, everything in you wants to protect them. I still feel that way about my kids even though they are grown. The mama bear side of me will still go off on anyone who tries to hurt them in any way. To me, nothing in the world is worse than imagining my kids suffering.Now, imagine mama bear Mary standing with her infant in her arms. Simeon looks at her and says, “This child is going to cause powerful people to fall and lowly people to rise. People are going to speak out against him and it will show where their hearts are. And as he goes through all of this, you are going to experience such devastation that it will feel like a sword has pierced your soul.” (Luke 2:34-35 CFV*)If Mary didn't have miraculous peace at this moment, I don't believe she would have continued. At this point, I feel like I'd be saying, “Uhmmm, excuse me Simeon. That's not a very good blessing. This is the Messiah. How about you try again….”But God's message to his followers is never that our path will be easy. He tells us we will have meaning and He will be with us. The Americanized version of following God, which focuses so much on physical comfort and praise from people, would not have helped Mary much in the ordeals she would endure as she raised Jesus.For example, we know from Matthew's (and other non-biblical scholars) account of the early life of Jesus that within a few years of his birth, King Herod tried to have him killed. Mary and Joseph had been warned and escaped to Egypt where they lived as refugees for several years until Herod died. After Herod's death, Joseph and Mary brought Jesus back to Israel but were afraid to return to the region of Bethlehem because Herod's son had taken his place, and he also believed Jesus was a threat.That's a traumatic first few years of motherhood for Mary!In the last story of Luke chapter two, Luke's annoyingly, sparsely detailed ancient writing skips forward all the way to when Jesus was 12 years-old. Here we read the story of Mary and Joseph taking Jesus to Jerusalem for the Festival of the Passover. This was the most important religious festival for the Jews. Everyone went to Jerusalem to observe Passover. Because of the crowds, people traveled together with everyone from their town. As Mary and Joseph were returning home, they naturally assumed Jesus was with the crowd from their hometown. However, when they began to set up camp for the night, they began asking where Jesus was and no one knew.We don't know how frantic Mary was at this point. Luke doesn't share this detail. All she had already seen had to have entered her mind. Herod had killed all the baby boys in a town because of Jesus. Surely, she wrestled with some fear at this moment. Did she remember that prophecy; was this the moment when a sword would pierce her soul?Mary and Joseph returned to Jerusalem and searched for Jesus. They didn't find him until the third day.When Mary and Joseph found Jesus, they were astonished to see him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers. Jesus was wowing these religious leaders with his insights. This wasn't something Mary and Joseph could have trained Jesus for. In their strict culture of religious elitism, sitting among the teachers this way, wasn't something any twelve-year-old of their time should have been comfortable doing. Though Mary was amazed at what Jesus was teaching and surely intimidated by the powerful religious leaders, frustration seems to have been her strongest emotion as she interrupted their conversation to tell Jesus she and Joseph had been frantically searching for him.Jesus' replied to her:Why were you searching for me?” he asked. “Didn't you know I had to be in my Father's house?” But they did not understand what he was saying to them. (Luke 2:49-50 NIV)Jesus' response seems quite odd at first. At the time, Mary didn't understand what he was saying. But looking back, his reply is incredibly beautiful. I imagine God orchestrated this event for Mary. We don't know what happened to Joseph, but there are no reports of him being around when Jesus was crucified. Most likely, Joseph had died by then. As Mary went through the extreme trauma of seeing her son being unjustly accused, beaten, and then crucified, I wonder if Jesus' words echoed in her ears. I wonder if she remembered all God had already brought her through. I bet she still hoped something good was going to come from this. Even though her eyes and everything in her was telling her it was over, I bet she remembered all the times she had feared it being over before. I bet she remembered her frantic three-day search and wondered if Jesus was still somehow doing the work God sent him for.We don't know much more of Mary's story. But it's important to know she wasn't journaling about all of these events as she went along. What we know of her story is what she shared with writers who interviewed her after Jesus had been crucified and resurrected. Understanding all she had endured makes her reflections on her story more beautiful. In Luke 1:46-55, Luke records the reflections of this amazing survivor this way:“My soul glorifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,for he has been mindful of the humble state of his servant.From now on all generations will call me blessed,for the Mighty One has done great things for me—holy is his name.His mercy extends to those who fear him,from generation to generation. He has performed mighty deeds with his arm;he has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts.He has brought down rulers from their thronesbut has lifted up the humble.He has filled the hungry with good thingsbut has sent the rich away empty.He has helped his servant Israel,remembering to be mercifulto Abraham and his descendants forever,just as he promised our ancestors.” Luke 1:46-55 (NIV).Read this reflection and think about all that Mary had been through. She had seen her son be wrongly accused, betrayed by those closest to him, beaten and crucified. She had lived a tough life and was a widow. Yet she started out her reflection with “My soul declares how great God is.” She had an amazing peace with all that had happened to her. She had fully looked at the horror and evil of this world, but she also saw something more. I believe the resurrection and constant presence of God in her life gave her hope and peace as she reflected on a lifetime of experiencing how hard and cruel this world can be.Her hope is the same hope we are all called to no matter how hard our lives are or how many mistakes we've made. God values us. Me and YOU. He values every aspect of our lives. He wants to empower us in this harsh world. He wants us to know him. He wants to give meaning to all of our struggle as we find hope for more. He cares about our value more than we can fathom. As you follow him, your life may still be very hard. But one day, you will be able to reflect on all you have overcome with the same grateful victorious attitude Mary had because you know Jesus and the power and purpose of his resurrection: to show us how much God values us.
I have a good friend, Liz, who grew up going to a Catholic church. She tells me not to talk to her about religion. She says she generally hates Christians, but I'm “OK” with her because in her words, I'm not “weird about my religion.” Usually, this is followed by a laugh, and a comment like, “I mean you are sooooo weird, but not about religious stuff.” Most of her hatred towards religion comes from how her family was treated when her mother committed suicide. And truthfully, I am right there with her hating that about religion.See, when her mother committed suicide, Liz, her father, and brother were disowned by the rest of her family. She remembers leaders from the church coming to her house to discuss whether or not they could have her mother's funeral at the church. Liz wasn't in the room; she just remembers it only took a few minutes for her father to start swearing at them and throw them out. In her words,“He pretty much said ‘eff em' after that and we never went back.”Afterwards, Liz's dad began drinking a lot more and Liz was left with most of the responsibility of raising herself and her brother. Considering all she went through, (and there is a whole lot more to her story!) it is amazing Liz is the strong confident woman I now know.When I talked to Liz about what Jesus is actually like, she said, “That sounds good, but I don't think it's possible to really know the truth about Jesus. Honestly, I wish it were true. I gave up on church, but I never did quit praying.”Liz thinks Jesus sounds awesome, but she HATES religion, especially the condemning judgments from uptight people. She'd like to believe God really, actually loves us, but a lot of what she has seen from his followers is hate. Like Liz, many of us like the idea of Jesus but we have doubts because of things we have seen in religion and the world.The crazy-awesome hope for us is: you, me, and Liz aren't alone in wrestling with this kind of doubt. Turns out, the entire New Testament book of Luke was written for this very purpose! In his introduction, (found in Luke 1:1-4) Luke explains that he has put together a well-researched account of the life of Jesus so his friend and patron, Theophilus, could know “the certainty of the things he had been taught.” (about Jesus). Luke 1:4 (NIV)In other words, Luke wrote for an audience who had heard the stories of Jesus, but still had doubts.Just to be clear, the gospel of Luke wasn't meant to be an Americanized, theological defense with scientific proofs for believing Jesus did miracles. Luke wrote a well-researched account of what witnesses said. His proof is, look how different and incredible what Jesus taught really was. Luke simply said, “Here's what happened guys.” No push, no “if you died tonight, what would happen to your eternal soul?” emotional plea. Just, “here's what happened”, because what happened stands on its own as worth following.Here's the freaking awesome thing: There are tons of books out there about logical proof for believing in Jesus. This isn't one of them. This is a book about looking fully at the condition of the world alongside the book of Luke and finding peace in our messy world and hope with enough grit to stay with us in the tough times. This book is about knowing that what Jesus taught is worth following.The next crazy-awesome thing is Luke's audience. Theophilus would have helped distribute Luke's book throughout Rome. Luke was likely a non-Jew (Gentile) though he may have been a Hellenistic Jew, meaning a Jew who was also immersed in Greco-Roman culture. Either way, he was not one of the Jewish religious elite. So, take a minute to reflect on how crazy it is that he wrote a defense of the teachings of a Jewish Rabbi for a non-Jew who helped him share it with a whole lot of their very un-Jewish Roman peers.To begin to wrap your mind around just how crazy this is, think back on studying ancient Rome in middle-school. Remember those stories about ancient Greek and Roman gods who were petty and caused half of the problems with humanity because of their soap opera worthy drama? That's the culture Luke grew up in. Those are the people he was writing to. Only the culture was way more scandalous than your middle-school teachers told you. The Roman army was incredibly brutal and their religion was not PG-13. For example, some temples included orgies as part of their worship. Even worse, Roman citizens were allowed to discard servants and children who they no longer found useful. The ancient world was all about power and had no place for valuing people without it.So, if you are like Liz and have felt the brunt of a religious system which was also all about its own power and didn't value you in your weakness, it should excite you to know that Luke's audience saw the same kinds of things. It should excite all of us to realize how incredibly radical what Luke was telling them was. As you read Luke, think about how completely different the message of Jesus was from the Roman religion and culture. Of course, Luke's audience wrestled with doubt!Why was the message of Jesus worth working through all of that doubt? What did Jesus teach that offered Luke's audience so much peace and hope? As you read this book, think about how every story presents a radical contrast to the culture Luke was writing to. Imagine an ancient Roman walking past a temple where discarded servants were dying on the steps while remembering the stories of God in the flesh empowering those same kinds of people.Finally, think about the religious separation between Luke's ancient Roman audience and some of the Jews. Luke and his audience were super familiar with religious judgment and legalism, only more extreme than anything we've ever known. In ancient Rome, strict religious leaders around Jerusalem separated themselves so much from Gentiles that they would not even enter their homes. Contact with a Gentile sent strict Jews running for some water to do some serious ritual cleansing. Priests and religious leaders would cross to the other side of the street to keep from even the slightest contact with a Gentile (which was seriously messed up)! Of course, in an ancient society full of farmers and manual laborers, strict observance of these rules was not possible for many Jews. For example, the Galilean Jews who were mostly fishermen and traders, were considered more liberal (and unclean) mostly because of their occupations and the region they lived in. I mean, it's kind of hard to avoid contact with Gentiles when you are selling them the fish you caught. For them and many other Jews, the life they were born into made it impossible to strictly observe all of the rules.This messed up religious separation is one of the things that makes the story about Jesus so freaking AH-Mazing and gives it validity. Jesus started a movement to value all people in the most unlikely of places, a religious society that refused to accept anyone not born with the ability to keep all of their rules. Jesus confronted the whole idea of religion being about rules for judging who is in and who is out. Nothing says this more powerfully than the book of Luke.Luke was saying, “Hey guys. You know how the Jews can't even eat with us or come into our houses ‘cause they think we are so far from God that they can't associate with us without hurting their own relationship with God? Well, crazy thing: The Messiah their Scriptures prophesied about for hundreds of years came and fulfilled those prophecies, only for all of us, not just them. We all get to be in, y'all!”I just gotta say: Wow!!! I love this so much! What a kick in the pants to religious elitism!So, as we look at Luke's defense alongside stories of survivors I've met through the years, think about your doubts. Ask yourself, how did this story help people overcome their doubts? How is what Jesus taught different from the religious cultures of ancient Rome, ancient Israel, and much of modern America?In Rum and Cola for the Soul, I share stories of modern survivors of abuse and trauma along with Luke's stories of Jesus. As we look at what Jesus taught and the way he empowered the marginalized people of his time, you will see a beautiful picture of peace and hope for this world. Peace which can look fully at the pain in this world and see the beauty of the people caught in its grasp. Hope which knows what you see isn't all there is. There is purpose, meaning, and power to make things better for every person wrestling with the pain of this world.Nothing in this book is going to turn off all of your doubts and questions (cause that would be a cult). What I hope this book will do, is show you how the message of Jesus is a truth worth pursuing. I hope you will see the freedom from legalistic religion his message offers. Following Jesus isn't a simple truth to agree or disagree with. It's a whole new way of seeing the world. A way which puts us on a better path to finding peace and hope. The longer you walk on this path, the more you will see that ultimately there are good answers for all of your questions. Ultimately, you'll probably have more questions the more you follow Jesus. That's OK. Relationships are built on growing in our understanding.As a matter of fact, this whole book is about my story of growing in my understanding of who Jesus really was and what he taught. The stories I share are reflections of me sorting through my bitter baggage as I reflect on all I've seen in twenty years of working with survivors like Liz while wrestling with American church culture.So, if you are like me, Liz, and Theophilus, and you are also wondering how the message of Jesus applies to your world, you are going to love going through the book of Luke.The Voice of Hope in Our Struggles(Luke 1:5-25)The first thing you are going to love about the book of Luke is what it says about our struggles. In my 20 years of getting to work with some really amazing survivors, I have learned to recognize a common voice that is always there. In the middle of trauma, abuse, pain, suffering, injustice, heartache, whatever the problem people are wrestling with, there is always a voice present, telling them they matter. Once you recognize God's voice and his message of extreme gritty hope for all of us, you will hear that same message and see its beautiful influence for all people who are struggling.The kid in foster care who had been in over a dozen foster homes said, “If there is a God, he couldn't possibly love me. Nobody loves the stuff I do.” But at the same time, somehow, he still knew there was hope for him. He still fought to prove to the world that their judgement of him was wrong.The homeless man who looked at me with tears in his eyes and said, “Jesus don't want nothing to do with the likes of me.” Though he had given in to the world's judgement of him, there was still an echo of hope for him. I saw it when a car drove by. A passenger threw a can at him and said, “Get a job, you bum.”He defiantly challenged their judgement as he yelled, “Fuck you, asshole,” while flipping them off.The voice of hope was there with the addict as she visited rehab for the fifth time, hoping this time she could stay the course.The pregnant teen who ran from abusive parents only to find herself selling her body for a more abusive boyfriend. She heard the voice of hope as she tore off a phone number from a flyer in a bathroom stall, thinking just maybe she might escape one day.The little girl whose abusive father constantly told her she was not good enough. She heard the voice of hope as she delighted in hiding her father's things when he wasn't around. She couldn't avoid his angry tirades, but in her own childish way, she fought back against his condemnation of her.There is a battle going on. People in this world have treated these survivors like they are worthless. Life has been harder for them than for most people. Often, they are made to feel as if their struggles are somehow their fault. As if they somehow cosmically deserve to be treated as less worthy than others. However, at the same time, there is another message, something which seems to come from deep within, telling them, “You are incredibly valuable. Your present struggles do not define your value and worth.”Every time I see hints of that voice of hope winning out, I want to stand up and cheer. “Yes! Yes! Yes! My friend! You are more valuable than you know! Your struggles shape you but they should not define you. They are not who you are. You are more than that. You are treasured by God and he longs to fight your battles with you.”I believe that little bit of sass, that defiance, that hope which spurs us on in our darkest moments, they come from the Spirit of God reaching out with his voice of hope, to his beloved children, telling us our circumstances do not define the way he sees us.Sadly, it feels like God's steady, defiant voice is often drowned out by the world shouting a different message to us: “You mess up all the time. You caused this. You deserve to have these problems. We don't love you. How can you possibly believe God loves you? You're crazy. God loves perfect people.”If you're like me, my shame, doubts and fears echo and even magnify the world's judgmental message to me. When I listen to their message, I think, “Not only are they right in their judgments, I'm worse than they know”.All too often, people who claim to know God simply add to the noise. They keep people from hearing God's message when they make religion all about trying to be good to impress or manipulate God. We all fall for this when we think the good in our lives somehow makes us better than other people.If you aren't struggling with any big issues in your life, it might be a comfortable for you to believe you deserve the life you have, I suppose. However, basing your value on your achievements or life of ease, is missing the message of God for his hurting children. Everything Jesus did shouted God's message of love for all of humanity. It was never limited to those whose lives were easy.The very first story in the book of Luke, found in Chapter 1:5-25, gives us our first peek at God's message of hope for people while they were struggling. In this story, Elizabeth and Zechariah faithfully served God and Luke points out, God was pleased with them. Despite God's approval of them, they still dealt with an extremely hard struggle for most of their lives.From an ancient perspective, this story was actually shocking. People in ancient times weren't all that different from us today, except they perhaps had more to fear than us. They didn't live in the modern age of science, so their religions were openly based on gods who they controlled through rituals, sacrifices, dances, prayers, and morals which pleased whichever god they were trying to win favor from. Today, I think we use more intellectual language to try to cover up the same basic ways of seeking control. Still, at the heart of it, most modern religion isn't really that different than the ancient ones; we all want a way to avoid suffering.Ancient Jews were supposed to be different. They believed in only one God and they were to be his chosen people who would lead the world into a relationship with him. But deep down, their religious leaders still wanted a system they could control. Through hundreds of years, the Jewish religious leaders developed elaborate systems of rules about rules about the rules so you would know at exactly what point you were “in” or “out” with God.By the time Jesus came onto the scene, there were so many rules in Judaism that it was virtually impossible for a working-class person to follow them all. The religious leaders considered people in poverty, people with diseases, people with handicaps, and people who weren't following the Law to be “out.” Many of the ancient Jewish religious leaders were so strict that they believed all struggles in life were the result of sin. So much so that some believed babies born with diseases or handicaps must have sinned in the womb! (CRAZY right?!) As hard as it is for us to wrap our minds around anyone believing a baby actually did something so wrong in the womb that they deserved to suffer in this life for it, that's the kind of messed up thinking seeking to avoid suffering through religion leads to.As Luke begins his book, written to convince people to follow Jesus, he starts with a very unlikely story. A story which stands in contrast to the control most people are seeking through religion. Deep down, we all want control over what is uncertain and uncontrollable. We all want to avoid the pain and hurt in this world. We want it to not touch us. But, when your own life gets hard, when you face deep loss, trauma, or your own failures, your heart longs to know there is something more. You long for God's message reminding you of your value in the middle of your pain.The story of Zechariah and Elizabeth is an example of God's acceptance of people even as they struggled.In the time of Herod, king of Judea, there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah; his wife Elizabeth was also a descendant of Aaron. Both of them were righteous in the sight of God, observing all the Lord's commands and decrees blamelessly. But they were childless because Elizabeth was not able to conceive, and they were both very old. Luke 1:5-7 (NIV).Think with me for a minute about how emotionally traumatic it is today for women to not be able to have children when they want to. In ancient times, it was even more devastating. Women were only valued because of their ability to have children. A woman who couldn't have children was considered cursed by God. So much so, that even though divorce was supposed to be illegal for Jews, they made an exception for women who couldn't have children.In this culture, even though Zechariah and Elizabeth followed God and were accepted by him, religious people around them did not see them that way. Zechariah and Elizabeth lived with being viewed as a flawed, cursed couple, rejected by God most of their adult lives. We know they struggled with this because, Elizabeth described her situation as “disgraced among the people” vs. 25 (NIV).Luke tells us they were very old. They had given up. They had no hope of ever having a child. Yet, they remained faithful. They still followed God and tried to keep all they knew of his rules for how to live. They were accepted by God. Yet, even though they had this beautiful, empowering relationship with him, for most of their adult lives they lived in disgrace and didn't get the one thing all ancient people wanted: a child.Hold up! Think about this! This story doesn't fit the formula. They did everything right. They were supposed to be rewarded.Luke goes on to tell us the rest of the story:Zechariah was chosen by chance to go into one of the most holy parts of the temple and burn incense. It was a special honor. While Zechariah was there, an angel came to him and said God had heard his prayers and he and Elizabeth would have a son. Zechariah and Elizabeth's son was John the Baptist, the prophet sent to prepare Israel for their Messiah, the one the Jewish people had been hoping to see for hundreds of years. Being the parents of a prophet was a huge honor, so people often believe this is the point of the story. They see it as: Zechariah and Elizabeth followed God faithfully all of their lives and at the end, they got a super-sized reward by being the parents of a prophet. People who still want to cling to the old formula of “doing good stuff = controlling God” see this story fitting the formula because Zechariah and Elizabeth were the parents of a superhero of the faith.But catch this!The beauty of the story is: Zechariah wasn't expecting things to work out that way. We see this when the angel spoke to Zechariah and told him he would have a child. Zechariah did not believe it was possible. It is super important to realize Zechariah was not expecting God to give him a child. He didn't jump at the angel's message and go, “I knew it. I knew God was going to come through for me.” No. He basically argued with the angel and explained to the angel how it was impossible for him to have a child because they were old. He wasn't remaining faithful because he expected a reward. He knew his relationship with God was reward enough.How freaking awesome is that?Zechariah and Elizabeth were both faithfully following God without expecting to be physically blessed in this life. Following God was their reward. They had a relationship with the Creator of the Universe! They were choosing to follow his path, and this decision gave meaning and purpose to their lives. Because they understood this, they were the kind of people God chose to be the parents of a great prophet. They were the kind of people who get to be in on the great work God wants to do in this world. They were survivors who understood that no matter what happens in this life, choosing to follow God gives meaning to our struggles.I love thinking about Zechariah and Elizabeth in relation to some of the faithful survivors I know. These faithful survivors are AH-MAZING examples of what it looks like to follow Jesus. They inspire me every time I think of them. And you know what? Their lives are still hard. They still struggle with stuff. They still fall and have doubts. But their lights shine the brightest of all because they are surrounded by darkness. They have peace in their struggles because they listen to the message of God telling them how treasured they are. They walk around full of hope because they learn to drown out those other voices a little more every day.Whatever you are struggling with, I hope you quiet yourself and listen for the voice of defiant hope telling you that there is so much more to you than your current circumstances. I hope you hear the voice of God telling you how treasured you are no matter what struggles you may be dealing with.
It is no secret that I am wrestling with frustration over problems in American church culture. I see a lot of hurt in the world and a lot of broken systems that are supposed to be addressing those hurts but are instead causing hurt. What do I do with all that I know? How do I rise above it? This is my journey as I study the book of John.
In this interview, my friend Elaina openly shares some of the hurt and shame that was heaped on her in church culture after getting a divorce. She also shares how she learned to rise above it, in a powerful example and lesson for us all about honoring people.
I once tried to "imitate the mind of Christ" in my own strength. It was a comical and painful trap. If I had read the entire letter where this challenge is found, I would have been freed and empowered.
In this episode, I talk about my struggle with trying to live up to religious ideals that I was never good at, especially all of those conferences on the Proverbs 31 woman, ugh! When I studied the culture of the stories of Jesus, I found a much more freeing picture of grace in the middle of real life struggles.
Most of the ugly parts of religion are caused by seeking to control what is uncontrollable. This leads to fear which promotes all kinds of evil. Jesus showed us how to live in faith and free ourselves from religion. When we read his stories to grow in our faith, if frees us from the negatives of religion.
A devoted listener wrote this spoof ad for my podcast and blog perhaps inspired by some actual rum and cola. We had a lot of fun producing it. I love that she thought of me!
A look at the hurt American church culture has caused and how I believe that Jesus taught us a better way.
Charity began her recovery process at His Mansion Ministries and continues to grow through Celebrate Recovery Intro and outro music by Claudius Cooper
In this interview, I talk to a survivor of sexual abuse and her journey as a Christian to find complete freedom from shame and regret.Intro music is by Claudius Cooper
In this episode, I mention the Blue Letter Bible app which is a helpful free app available for free. There is also a Kindle download of the Bible from the same makers. They keep it free by promoting a lot of religious products, but the app is great. My really cool intro and outro features the music of a Reggae group I just found, Goymamba, the song is titled “Reggae Life” and it is available on Free Music Archive.com
In this episode, Nathan and Amanda talk about how their struggles impacted their relationship with each other, God, and other people. They talk about hurtful things in church culture for people who are struggling. Specifically, quick fixes, and the misconception that men are responsible for “fixing” the mental health of their wives. They also discuss how we can build better Christian communities through vulnerability.
Nathan and Amanda Felkel have been married for five years. In this time, they have been through a lot of struggles, including mental illness and Amanda being diagnosed with a seizure disorder (which was a misdiagnosis and she thankfully has been taken off of the medicine and has returned to school!) Their daughter still has hypoglycemia. Doctor's only know that it is caused by her being so small but they do not know why she is so small.Nathan and Amanda recommend the books For Men Only and For Women Only for young married couples. (You know it's a good book if I'm giving space to it instead of my own book!)https://tinyurl.com/y7ooblbphttps://tinyurl.com/y9xmwlw7Please reach out and share your story with me through my Facebook Page or website (www.rumandcolaforthesoul.com) or email me at Cindy@rumandcolaforthesoul.com
Some fundamentalists take exception to the common belief that John did not write the story of the woman caught in adultery. However, the fact that the early church clung to this story shows how important it was to them which means it demonstrates what Jesus was all about. In the story we find a beautiful example of rising above shame and being freed to live without condemnation because God himself accepts us.
Reading the Bible the way that your high school English teacher taught you to read literature reveals a whole different Jesus than the one most of American church culture is following. We like to say that Christianity is a relationship not a religion, but we have all the trappings of every other religion when we seek control and we feel like we are better than other people. Religion seeks to control our world. Our relationship with Jesus should free us from the need for control and the desire to feel better than other people.We need community to help us live this out better.
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