Expectations

It’s a BCP and RCL mash-up kind of morning, because some days I just need both…

First, there’s Paul.  He’s writing to the Corinthians, and he’s frustrated.  He feels as if he has given them absolutely everything he has and everything he is, yet somehow mutual disappointment remains:

II Corinthians 12:15, 20, “So I will very gladly spend for you everything I have and expend myself as well. If I love you more, will you love me less… I am afraid that when I come I may not find you as I want you to be, and you may not find me as you want me to be” (NIV).

This passage is not expressly about God’s love and sacrifice for us, but I couldn’t help but think about how God doesn’t always measure up to what we want God to be.  Of course, humanity has a rough time coming close to our potential on most days, so I stopped to wonder if we are also mutually disappointed. 

When I was a kid, disappointment was the worst punishment.  If a parent or a teacher or a friend said, “I’m disappointed in you,” the level of shame was unbearable.  It was all the motivation I needed to “be good…” or at least to “not get caught.”  No time out, spanking, or loss of privilege could ever compare to the pain of not adding up… not meeting (and often exceeding) the expectations of other people… being a disappointment.  I like to think I’m not a people pleaser, as an adult, and I highly doubt most people would describe me as such, but the truth is: it still eats away at my soul if I let anyone down.  And I am, undoubtedly, my own worst critic.

How do we reconcile this?  How do we come to a point where we do find ourselves… and others… and God as we hope us all to be?      

I’m not interested in pat answers, but put simply: we have to change our expectation:

Psalm 37:3-7a, “Trust in the LORD, and do good; Dwell in the land, and feed on His faithfulness. Delight yourself also in the LORD, and He shall give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the LORD, Trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass. He shall bring forth your righteousness as the light, and your justice as the noonday. Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently for Him…” (NIV).

We can’t be Christian and selfish.  The two are mutually exclusive.  How did we miss this memo?  Life (and faith) works best when we align our desires with those for which we were created.

Now, please don’t misunderstand!  As human beings, created with free will—the ability to choose anything of which we are capable—we can do what we want.  But there is an old adage that goes something like this:

“Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should.”

Well… keepin’ it real, sometimes I hate that!  Of course, those are probably exactly the times when I need to realign my expectations… and my thoughts… and my feelings… and my attitude… and my actions…  Because this all really comes down to whether or not we are going to be the people we were created to be, and that requires the same kind of complete self-giving that puts the other first. 

Not easy, but what else would we expect?

L.

Forgiveness

Luke 17:1-4 “Jesus said to his disciples: ‘Things that cause people to stumble are bound to come, but woe to anyone through whom they come.  It would be better for them to be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around their neck than to cause one of these little ones to stumble.  So watch yourselves. If your brother or sister sins against you, rebuke them; and if they repent, forgive them.  Even if they sin against you seven times in a day and seven times come back to you saying ‘I repent,’ you must forgive them” (NIV).

At the expense of sounding arrogant, forgiveness has never been all that hard for me (at least in most circumstances).  I think it might be because I always believe people can change and be better.  Honestly, that's sort of weird, since I am decidedly not an optimist.

Now, forgetting?  That’s another thing altogether, but we should probably take great care in remembering that the notion of ‘forgive and forget’ is not actually found in Scripture.  Huge sigh of relief for detail oriented people who remember everything…

I think we need to make a distinction between forgiveness and healing (related to pain, suffering, mourning, grief, etc.).  Too often, I feel that we approach wounded people by insisting that they forgive those who have harmed them.  That is biblical after all, right?  But we also project these unreal expectations on forgiveness.  In so doing, we perpetuate cycles of abuse.

Let me tell you what forgiveness is not:

Forgiveness is not forgetting the offense and moving on without taking the necessary time to heal.

Forgiveness is not indiscriminately returning to how the relationship was before the offense.

Forgiveness is not allowing yourself to continue to be abused in any way or justifying abusive actions by another.

Forgiveness is not blaming yourself, as opposed to the offender, for what happened.

All of this is incredibly difficult to flesh out, because as followers of Jesus, we also frequently cite passages of Scripture about losing our lives and participating in the death of Christ, which often includes being persecuted in some way, but please hear me clearly… none of this means that you have to participate in unhealthy relationships that violate who you are as a human being, created Imago Dei. 

I think we have done a miserable job of helping victims to work through their pain, as we blanketly state that forgiveness will restore all things.  Maybe we can roll with this from an eschatological viewpoint, but let’s be real, friends… most hurting people are more concerned with how they might survive the next few minutes than the end of the world as we know it!  We have to stop making these things congruent, because they’re just not…

Webster’s definition of forgiveness is “the act of forgiving” (ahem… super helpful).

Webster’s definition of forgiving is “willing or able to forgive” (there’s something to work with there).

Webster’s definition of forgive is “to give up resentment of or claim to requital.”

Nowhere… in any of this… do I see forgiveness defined as offering yourself to someone who will hurt you over and over again, without boundaries or consequence.  Nowhere.  We have to stop telling people that forgiveness means sucking it up, putting yourself in danger, and moving on!

If I were to define forgiveness, I would say it is the moment at which you reach a point where you no longer hope the one who has harmed you will be run over by a truck or struck down by lightning.  Admittedly, even this can be a process, depending on the offense.  And that’s OK.  Interestingly, the biblical definition from Luke (above) also allows for rebuke and requires the offender to be repentant.  Do we even talk about that?  We don’t?  Right…

I think Jesus gives us an example of forgiveness that neither demands nor receives such repentance when, as he is dying, he says, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34, NIV).  So, I’m not necessarily saying we must hold out for an apology, and, in fact, I have certainly offered forgiveness to others, myself, who have hurt me deeply and never bothered to care.  But… we have to stop shaming victims into this kind of obligation, because even if it is freeing to stop praying for that thunderstorm to hit; there is so much more work to be done than this.  Forgiving someone who does not deserve it is not a magical band-aid that removes all pain… And it certainly doesn’t remove scars.

What I’m trying to say is that we should stop lying… and we should also stop discrediting and humiliating victims.  Forgiveness is important, but it comes with guidelines and often with really long timeframes.  Perhaps we could stand in the gap while our brothers and sisters are allowed the space they need for legitimate healing to occur.

 
L.

The Sarcastic, Fed-up, Parent God

Job 38:21, “Surely you know, for you were already born! You have lived so many years!”

If Job was glad God had appeared on the scene, I’m honestly not sure how long it lasted.  And I have serious mixed feelings about the sarcastic, fed-up, parent God who is portrayed here, so clearly.   Perhaps this is because, like so many times before, I know how to play both parts in this dialogue.

Although I am the mother of three pretty fabulous teenagers, I think I’ll keep this particular verse of Scripture in my back pocket… or maybe I’ll even plaster it on their bedroom walls!  Because, let me reiterate, they’re great!  But they’re also teenagers!  And there are moments when I know… for sure… that I have a corner on truth that they’ve just not come to yet. 

And still…  I have no desire to downplay Job’s complete and intense grief, because even if God has a corner on truth in this situation; it’s still a horrible, unimaginably painful state of affairs.

I have nothing comparable to share (thank goodness), but I should admit that I had one of those “the universe hates me” moments, just this morning.  It happened just after I finished snapping more pictures of the many things we are trying to sell at a garage sale.  If you could see my driveway, at present, I would be a little embarrassed.  It is filled with stuff that has been stored for almost four years.  The truth is, if you haven’t used something in that amount of time; you never should have moved it to begin with.  But this house was supposed to be a very temporary fix.  Seven people.  Three Bedrooms.  Less than 1,000 square feet of space.  We were supposed to make good on a three month lease, sell our out-of-state home, buy something new, and move on.    

Upon finally realizing that these many possessions could be useful to someone who has a large enough house for them, I sort of metaphorically threw up my hands and said, “Let’s just sell it all…” 

So, you can tell I was already in a pretty sarcastic mood…

Everything also feels like a time crunch, lately, but I had rallied.  Laptop and phone in hand, I grabbed a folding chair, sat down at a table I’d love to sell to somebody, and prepared to blog… and podcast… and garage sale…

But, wait.  Was that a raindrop on this day where the weather forecast has consistently promised sunny skies?

Of course.

It was at this point that I literally threw my hands up. 

And so here I sit… snugly tucked away in my fifteen passenger van that may or may not start today… watching for any garage sale people who might brave the weather… reading the daily office and typing this post and wondering if God thinks I throw temper tantrums.

I guess if we’re going to dish sarcasm, we have to be able to take it, too.

Please, oh please, let tomorrow’s passage offer something more hopeful than this.

Also…  I swallowed a bug.

 
L.

Well… That was Unexpected

On Monday morning, the daily office led me to Romans 8:18-24…  On Tuesday, Romans 8:26-27.  I have to admit there was a certain sense of anticipation building, as I questioned what I hope for… and what ought to be… knowing full well that the next words are some of the most oft quoted to inspire expectation. 

Wait for it…

Romans 8:28… 

Actually not part of the daily office, today. 

Seriously?

Instead of God working in all things “for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose” (NIV), instead of some special recognition for the uniquely chosen and called, we are left with this weird narrative that doesn’t initially seem to fit (well, if you were looking for exclusivity):

Numbers 11:24-30, “So Moses went out and told the people what the Lord had said. He brought together seventy of their elders and had them stand around the tent. Then the Lord came down in the cloud and spoke with him, and he took some of the power of the Spirit that was on him and put it on the seventy elders. When the Spirit rested on them, they prophesied—but did not do so again. However, two men, whose names were Eldad and Medad, had remained in the camp. They were listed among the elders, but did not go out to the tent. Yet the Spirit also rested on them, and they prophesied in the camp. A young man ran and told Moses, ‘Eldad and Medad are prophesying in the camp.’ Joshua son of Nun, who had been Moses’ aide since youth, spoke up and said, ‘Moses, my lord, stop them!’ But Moses replied, ‘Are you jealous for my sake? I wish that all the Lord’s people were prophets and that the Lord would put his Spirit on them!’ Then Moses and the elders of Israel returned to the camp” (NIV).

Oh, Eldad and Medad.  I think I kinda ‘get it.’  I wish your story didn’t resonate, but it does.  I’m not even listed among ‘the elders’…  not yet… but I know what it is to speak truth from where I am, to have the Spirit rest on me, even when I’m not part of any particular chosen group.  I know what it is to have others implore leaders to make me shut up.  But…  you know… some of us have to speak in the community.  We can’t all stand around the tent.

Interestingly, though, I have also been the “young man…”  and Joshua…  Well, use some creative license here…  I wish their stories didn’t resonate, either, but there are, unfortunately, power structures that incite panic when it seems that someone unexpected may take the lead… get the job… win the prize…  As if there’s not enough work for all of us!  Goodness, have you even seen the Church?  Have you paid any attention to the world around us?  We don’t have time to worry about who has the nicest office… or the biggest paycheck… or the most highly renowned name.  Jealousy is both inefficient and careless. 

Thankfully, Moses has some words of wisdom to impart.  I’ve read them several times, and I think they may be spoken with a hint of exasperation. 

Moses says, “Are you jealous for my sake? I wish that all the Lord’s people were prophets and that the Lord would put his Spirit on them!”

I probably would have said, “Are you kidding me?  I can’t do this all by myself!  We can’t afford to pick and choose who God may use.” 

And so we’ve come full circle, at least in a certain sense… to that Scripture that wasn’t part of the daily office, after all… to that place where we must recognize that God works for the good of [all] those who love him…  and it would be best if the Spirit would rest on us all and if we would then speak truth and impart mercy… and justice… and all those other qualities that come from being a part of the people of God.

The people…

It’s plural…

More than one…

More than seventy…

More than we think…

There’s this quote I love, and, admittedly, I have overused it lately.  I do that sometimes:

“I’m not interested in competing with anyone.  I hope we all make it.”

-Erica Cook

How about especially in the Church?  Especially in ministry?  May these ordinary days be exactly that—not a race to the top but an expression of the common, everyday kind of love that should permeate each of our lives, regardless of status or consequence.  Now, that’s good…

L.