And Jesus Said, "Go ye therefore into the bar...."

I am on a spiritual kick right now with my blogging.

In the past, I feared going into the bars mostly to protect my preacherly reputation. While in my heart, I wanted to be there and hang out with people. Now, as my regular readers know, I go in and sing and drink and fellowship.

This evening, as Teach99 was wrestling with students at the first shift of a school lock-in, I was hanging out with a co-worker over a Shiner, potato skins, and Buffalo wings! It was delicious. As we were socializing, we went over the weeks mishaps. We have many mishaps at our inner-city school. We shared about friends and family and without pretense, I could say hey, I started going back to church. He knew I used to be a preacher and actually did not know that I wasn't going.

We have been good friends for more than two years now. During my first year, we were neighbors and he was assigned to be my mentor. He is old enough to be my dad but acts younger than I do. We do duets together at Karaoke and counseling sessions at various bars. I would love everyone to see us jump on stage to "Takin' Care of Business." It is loads of fun.

I have seen him through good times and bad times and he the same with me. He is one of my "beer buddies" that I have acquired over the past year or two.

What is the point of all this? I noticed a situation that occured today at our after school incerveza (play on the word inservice). After we had our first round, I ordered water. I know he drinks a lot sometimes and after I ordered water, he had the opportunity to pause (because the bartender was flighty and ran off before my friend could respond) and think for a second and said, 'I will have water too.' That was awesome to me and made me think more of the isolationist view that people have at some of your more conservative evangelical churches...

The "us and them crap" that is propigated by most evangelical conservative preachers and serious church members is just crap and haughty arrogance that gives them an excuse to look down on others and feel better about themselves. It is all just "us." We are all in this mudhole together trying to find significance, meaning, and peace in life.

If my stepping out there and saying "water" instead of "beer" helped him to do the same and get home safely, then I am doing better ministry in darker places than any pastor of a mega church who may look down their noses at "those lost sinners who hang out in bars" and put on their big show on Sundays. What good are they doing for those in the darkest places. I doubt they will show a TV broadcast of the favorite preacher at a local pub.

What real good would I be doing if I were a preacher on a Sunday morning preaching against bar patrons and alcohol except to achieve job security for myself becuase I tow the line? The only way that the church can reach lost people is to be with lost people. This experience (as well as some others) has caused me to see the value of genuine relationships without the objectification of human beings for the purpose of propigating the gospel. When you have a good relationship, the gospel will happen naturally.

While I used to preach loudly and impatiently, I see how maybe just maybe I can lead silently instead and end up being a lot more productive.

Growing Up.

Growing up really is hard to do. We go through life, trying to sort out right and wrong and truth and fiction. Some of us do, if we aren't afraid. Sometimes these wrestlings can affect many things. They affect the way we relate to others. When we change, the system we lived in changes. This can be magnified and compounded when you leave for a while and come back. You can get the objective view you need when you leave for a while or at least I got the view I needed.

It was a while back when I was told that I came across as needy and childlike. I had to agree with that. I couldn't help it when it was the truth. Since then, I have become more purposeful about recognizing when I am still a child (being playful is okay) who is out looking for people to take care of me. More and more I have been growing toward thinking on my own and deciding for myself like an adult should. God gave me a brain and I can trust myself. I can also (honestly growing in this) be open to listening to others input. After weighing it out, if I agree with it I can follow the advice and spit it out if I disagree with it.

One of the things that came up around the same time was that I began wrestling with different faith issues. I went from dogmatic preacher man to acknowleging that what I was doing really met some underlying need of mine. The "light from the sky" calling experience became natural. I was heading toward preacherville for my own purposes whether I liked it or not. This was something I had to acknowledge. Something about the ministry clicked with something inside me. I needed acceptance and this was a way to get it. My heart was pure, but I did not realize what my real motivation was until many years after I was "called." A lot of good came out of that journey. But the root of it all was something natural.

This would explain a lot about why I was so depressed for a long time. I was after something that I was not getting. If anyone has ever known what it is like to be a minister at a typical church these days, you can be surrounded by some of the most critical people anyone has ever seen. Ministers are scarcastic about this phenomenon all the time..."My job is to put out fires" ... They tell young ministers... "Be careful, three strikes and you are out." ... "If you can do anything else, do it." Most recently, I heard a pastor honestly say that the typical tradiitional church is just looking for a chaplain or baby sitter. This does not sound like a place for someone who is intoxicated by the need for acceptance. No wonder I spent so many years depressed.

Realizing my motivations was a liberating experience. I realized that I was burned out and that my life calling should not be something that I view as drudgery. So, I quit and became a teacher (long story that I may have put in a previous blog). Being a teacher has helped me become an adult. It has helped me grow up, especially since I have to differenciate myself from a group of highschool kids... (even though I let myself get pulled into a joke contest the other day, I can tell that I have grown up during the past three years).

But, I am left with the question, "What about faith?" I can believe that there is a God who created everything around me. But, does God relate to me on a personal level? What is truthful about all the faith that I have carried with me all these years? Is Jesus the only way to heaven? More basically... Is there a heaven?

I can go from the heavenly to the personal.... "If there is a God, why did he ______? etc.

There is no single reason I found myself in this situation. It came from all directions. As I continued this journey, I began to realize (after hanging out at a few Al Anon meetings) that maybe it was not God that was messed up or absent, but my view of God that I had somehow acquired. Even though I was preparing for ministry academically, my relationship with God was sporadic and restless at best. It was bi-polar and unstable. While, in the mean time I was looking to the fallible and human church to accept me and meet my needyness and I didn't even realize it.

So, what about faith? The past 2.5 years that I have been going to some of my favorite churches (i.e. Bedside Baptist, Couch Cathedral, or the Table Tabernacle, I serve a good breakfast at the last church). My faith became more and more bi polar. One day I was a diest and the next I was a believer. This has been going on for a while.

I know that I have had friends and family praying for me. I have had several conversations with many of them over and over. I even met with a former seminary professor who was in my shoes and really gave me more comfort than answers. He is presently a chaplain at a nearby hospital.

When it gets down to it, none of my questions can be answered on a quantitative level and cannot be proven scientifically, much to my chagrin. It takes a leap of faith to believe. And, I must be able to live with the questions that I have while beleiving at the same time... I remember a man in the gospels who said "I believe... Help my unbelief." ... Something like that. It is the dichotomy of faith wrapped in the realization that even our faith (man's believing in something unseen) is not perfect. But, maybe even if I have questions, I can still move forward anyway.

Like I said before, I have had friends who are willing to listen to me and really wrestle with me and the issues. Jim, Dave, Maury, Mary Alice, and especially my wife and others that are too many to mention. Maybe coincedence, maybe not, Chad enters the scene. He and I showed up on the same blog and after some searching I was able to contact him. He is a lawyer. I always thought I would find him on a record shelf somewhere, someday. He knew me back when.... He lovingly admonished me to get back to church at a time when I was open to hearing it.

A few weeks before, Roy enters the scene. Roy is a neighbor who pastors a church nearby. After looking at his website, I went to go offer him some of my books that I thought would be helpful. We began to talk and share our life experiences. Talking to him gave me some hope for what a church can be; an authentic community with authentic relationships. To make a long story short, it seems that he has come to the realization that maybe Jesus intended the church to be more like a crockpot than a microwave. Slow, warm, simmering, longer lasting... not fast, quick, and easy. The result is the willingness to go to the darkest of places and relate with people who are not at all turned on by the mass marketing of the mega church (yes, go have a beer with someone if you feel led to). Another result is a deeper sweeter knowledge of Christ and his people (at the local church) rather than just time to fill on Sunday morning. One word.... Deep. I am inspired by the idea and it goes along with some of the stuff I know about reaching today's generation. The more I get to know Roy, I appreciate that he is willing to wrestle with faith, himself, and allow others to go on the journey of questioning without any sense of condemnation from him.

A while later, when Chad tells me to go to church, I realize that it is time and I decide to darken Roy's doorstep. It has been a challenge. Even though I know the truth and love what he is doing, it is taking an entire paradigm shift. How do I relate? Even though I hated the "Butt Kissing" session in the middle of the service and realized that it was fake when people who you have been sitting by silently for the last 20 minutes become your best friend for five seconds, this church does not have one and what do I do? I have had to wrestle off my old lenses and sit back and enjoy the ride. (By the way, before and after the service, we have found an opportunity to meet many warm and caring people.) Another phenomenon for me to wrestle with is a bit of social anxiety. When you go to a big church, you can hide for a while and escape as soon as possible. This is not so with a smaller church. That is really a good thing.

So, I have gone to the church for three weeks now. I have had the opportunity to get beaten by Roy at Monopoly and even Boggle dang it! Even though the three weeks were good, I must admit I was tempted to play hookie this past Sunday. After all, I did not want to get back into legalism. But, nevertheless I went. I was in the chair participating and listening, my mind whizzing out of control like it usually does. My head was tight and full of anxiety, which I realized was something I do to escape and run away while still being present. As Roy preached about the Lord's Prayer, and gave me some new insight, I slowly let go and the momentum of my spinning thoughts, came to a pleasant meandering pace as I allowed myself to deal with myself and what God was teaching me during that moment. As they closed with a time of reverence and open communion (people walked forward at their own pace), I sat in my seat and cried unbearably over some of the things that I had done. One thing is using God's name for my own purposes. I went from running away, which can only be done for so long, to saying "I'm sorry Jesus."

Since that day, did I become Mr. Gunghobackfromcamp? No. I want to keep it real this time. I want to put the new wine in new wine skins. I feel like a load has been lifted off my shoulders. I don't want to approach my new faith (best term I could think of) in the old ways that burned me out. I did not set lofty spiritual goals to quantify my faith. I did not read the Bible. I still don't know for certain all the answers to my questions. Even if I believe that Jesus is the only way to Heaven, I would hate to be so dogmatic about it that I would be pissed off if I found others there someday (I got this from the former seminary professor/chaplain and I agree with it). For the first time in a long time, I am open. I think I am really open. I have some peace. God will take care of the rest. Thats okay, I need to lighten up... I can't do it on my own.


Next time.... It is okay to love yourself!