Tag: community

Returning from the dead

crookedroadfaith

backfromthedeadIt’s October and with Halloween just around the corner, it feels like an appropriate time to bring my blog back from the dead. Thank you to those who have come back to read even in the absence of new posts.

So many things that have happened in the last several months. Many of the things that have been staples in my life are now gone. After losing my beloved dog, Lexy, a year ago, my dad followed just a few months later and the community with whom I would typically look for consolation and support is now also gone as I have found it necessary to look for a new church home.

I don’t know about you, but looking for a church is one of my least favorite things to do. I would almost (almost being the key phrase here) rather go to the dentist for major dental work than have to map out new churches to try. I have yet to find the recipe for finding a group of people with whom you feel a sense of community while simultaneously feel spiritually fed and challenged.

binocularsPart of the problem, at least for me, is that places of worship tend to be very “cliquey”. Now, I certainly understand the phenomenon of like-minded people finding one another. After all, that’s what a congregation is, isn’t it? A group of people who gather together to proclaim their belief in the same deity/dieties and who enjoy expressing these beliefs in the same way? This is how I see it, at least, and I don’t find any wrong with this in general. As a person who is an “extroverted introvert”, I absolutely want to find a community of people that make me feel as comfortable as possible when I walk in the door because, dang it, it’s hard to walk in the door all alone!

But the interesting thing about using a sense of comfort as the divining rod of church choice is that we simultaneously make the decision that those in the other groups or churches are “doing it wrong” – or at least not as “right” as we are. The group of people we worship with helps to mold the perspective we on faith as a whole – who God is, what God does, and what we as individuals are called to do under the umbrella of faith. Is that how we are supposed to choose our faith community? What do miss when we do this? It seems to me that by selecting our faith family this way, we quietly draw lines in the sand and define faith based on personal preferences, not theological truth.

Though I cannot guarantee this is the case with everyone, I would venture that many of us define God and faith through the eyes of legalism. We end up feeling good about ourselves and what we are doing “in Faith” because our community is doing everything the same way so we must be doing it right. We feel better about ourselves and the way we behave when compared to what those “other people” do and slowly but surely we become like some people in the Bible that we really don’t want to be associated with…

…the Pharisees.

10-23-cc-home_-moderndayphariseeI know. That’s a really inflammatory – if not heretical – statement, but hear me out.

When I reflect on the traits that I consider to be the defining characteristics of the Pharisees, I think of things such as self-righteousness and judgmentalism (no, it’s not be a word, but I like it so I’m going with it).

Mostly, I think of individuals who primarily seek to find only the wrong in others’ lives as opposed to accepting those around them as individual masterpieces God created. To me, the Pharisees’ primary goals were to ensure all around them knew they were the most learned, most perfect, and most chosen of all.

And as I look around at my own actions and those I encounter both in the houses of worship I have visited and just around me in general, I see those same traits oozing out of all of us. No, we aren’t literally crucifying people for committing what we consider to be heinous crimes, but I would suggest that we do crucify one another symbolically by choosing actions, behaviors, personality types and even careers that we feel are contrary to the narrow view of God and faith that we currently identify with. We do this by cherry-picking Bible passages that support what we want God to be saying and then using those passages as weapons, condemning others actions and, when possible, destroying the life they had that we find so atrocious. We are deciding for ourselves that one action is more deplorable to God than another because we find it personally offensive or contrary to the way we personally interpret the motivation behind the behavior and then use varied interpretations of His Word as the weapon to prove our point.

Now before you all start frantically typing angry messages to me, let me say this. Yes, I do believe that the Bible is God’s Word. I believe that He gave His Word to us via chosen messengers and that through those Words, He has provided us a clear example of how to live a life that is loving and grace-filled. What gets in the way is our desire to be “right”; to be the one that uniquely understands God better, worships Him more fully, forgives more freely. We all want to be God’s chosen and we will often do whatever it takes for us to feel as though we are accomplishing that goal.

biblerulesLet me be clear. I don’t think that wanting to be God’s chosen is a bad thing. My heart aches to hear God say to me, “Well done, good and faithful servant” (Matthew 25:23).  I long to know that when I depart this world, those who knew me will be able to say that I loved well and lived as God would have wanted me to despite my multitudes of failures. But one of the things that I think is crucial is that we all must find a way to understand that our desires are really no different than those of the Pharisees. They were learned men of the Torah who desired to ensure that all people within their area of influence were living as they had been taught and therefore believed the laws indicated they should be so that God would be pleased with them. In their fanaticism to accomplish their goals, they went to the extreme and while we can point and condemn, we are just as likely to do this as they were and in many cases, we already are.

In the end, I think it comes down to this.

Nothing about God is as simple as the black and white definitions we want to create. There is no right or wrong when it comes to a denomination or a church, congregation or stand-alone group. All there is an instruction from God to love one another. If we can do this, we can break down the cliques that exist and open our hearts and minds to see the world more like God sees it and in so doing, create a community that truly honors Him.

In the meantime, I guess l’ll continue to look for a community that looks more like me.

Advanced Directive Panic

crookedroadfaith

AloneBlocksforWebThere is nothing like sitting through an explanation of Advanced Directives and then staring at the document itself in an attempt to complete it with the name or names of those who should be contacted should my life be suddenly and irrevocably put at risk to drive home the realities of both my own fragile mortality and my current single-hood and parental status.

Let me back up a bit and provide a little explanation of this little form for those of you who may not be familiar.

An Advanced Directive is a document that provides health care facilities guidance about whether you would wish to be provided life-sustaining procedures or artificial nutrition and hydration should you be faced with a terminal condition or “persistent vegetative state”.

Yep, it’s a cheery little topic, isn’t it? Well, we spent several days holding in person training and discussions about this form over the past week or so in my office. I am part of the administrative team that puts these things together for my office so I get to participate many times (aren’t I lucky?). It is a very important document and being that I work with a healthcare facility, it is something that our employees deal with every day. We are all too well aware of the importance of having an Advanced Directive in place when things for a patient are truly about as bad as they can be.

So why do I bring up such a delightful topic of conversation on what is otherwise most likely a beautiful Colorado summer day?

Well, here’s the thing. While I understand the need for this type of documentation, as a single person, it does a number on my heart and mind. When faced with this form as well as the idea of a will, I am suddenly keenly aware that it is just me. No kids, no spouse. Just me. Oh, sure, if I had things that were worth giving away in a will, I could find friends and relatives to give them to, but when it comes to life and death, to whom do I turn to make decisions that honor both who I am and where my faith is? It is a decision that is certainly not something to be taken lightly and one which has made me look closely at my life’s decisions.04-lonliness-passionate.jpg

As I’ve said a number of times before, I am, for the most part, a happy single person. I have done the marriage thing – twice – and failed miserably both times so this has been a clear choice for me for that past 10 years and I am glad of that choice.

Single-hood has many pluses. For example, as a single person, I am able to control a good deal of the stress that is in my life which is important for my mental, spiritual and physical health. I don’t have to worry about when I come and go, what I have for dinner, or worry about someone thinking it’s odd that I want to make my dog the center of my social world (ok, maybe this is a little odd, but I’m allowed an oddity or two, aren’t I?).

But as I sat in the Advanced Directive course, I suddenly realized just how alone that choice for single-hood has made me.

If I were to have a severe accident, who in my life would be able to make that life or death decision on my behalf? Sure, the Advanced Directive is supposed to alleviate the “in the moment” crisis, but someone has to sign as my medical power of attorney. Who knows me well enough to know what I would want or need? Now, I know that the immediate response is my family, right? I mean, my dad is still alive as is my stepmother, my sister and my brother. But the reality is that though they are a part of my life, they don’t really know me all that well. My parents have moved out-of-state as has my sister and even though we call and email occasionally, we all live – and always have lived – very different lives. My brother doesn’t live far from me but the relationship with him is very much the same. I don’t begrudge any of them the state of our relationships – they are what they are for reasons far too complex to try to delve into here – but it certainly gave me pause staring at that legal document. And all of this was driven that much further home for me during a recent sermon on Matthew 10:34-39.

You see, much of what is different between my family members and I is faith. While my parents and siblings would likely profess to being Christian, the idea of being involved in church, studying the Word, prayer, and other acts of faith are not only not on their radar, but have been causes for minor mockery to large arguments.

In a very real sense, I am the man whose foes are of his own household. In fact, as I was growing up, the stronger my faith, the worse my relationship with members of my family. Now I realize that I am not living in Biblical times. I do not rely on my family to provide a home, monetary stability and the ability to participate in social and civic events. I am not shunned for my single, childless state, but it is at times like this that the difference between those with a family and those without becomes a much starker contrast.

Here I am at 50 with no children of my own, no spouse, no close family members. This is difficult enough when it comes to financial matters but somewhat paralyzing when it comes to life and death matters.

The reality is nobody wants to die alone or know that the fate of their lives may be in the hands of someone who has not real connection to them. We want that Hollywood emergency room scene where the family comes running in to spend even a moment with a loved one who may not make it. But if you’re me, who is it that will come running?

I don’t doubt that God will be with me every step of the way and He will provide His angels for me, but the knowledge of His presence doesn’t ease the sense of loneliness when I struggle with a health condition or a waning bank account.

I don’t say these things to invoke pity or sympathy, but to remind both myself and all of you that these are the things that many in our congregation face. Many of us are spouseless, childless or have strained or nonexistent relationships with family. We are, for all intents and purposes, the widows and orphans Jesus speaks of and it is for us that churches are supposed to exist.

In church, widows and orphans are given a sense of community; we are able to find people who are caring, loving, and willing to take on burdens far beyond those that others would. But as a congregation we cannot do that if we do not make ourselves available. Standing in the common area before or after church doesn’t create that community. What does create community is trying to understand what burdens being single may cause or what trials strife amongst family members can create. Community is seeing the individual for who they are and where they are.

Feel Lonely Wallpaper That feeling i

Perhaps there are others around you that have chosen to be single or are isolated from their families. Reach out. Pray with them or for them. Offer to have that elderly gentleman seated all alone in the restaurant a seat at your family table. Sit with the one who found out that life has changed forever in the blink of an eye. Most of all, remember to be the arms of Christ to others. In the grand scheme of things, this is all we are really called to do – to love one another by showing one another God’s love.

Now….who wants to sign my advanced directive??? 😉