Weekend Favorites

• Grace doesn't avoid the appearance of evil, it runs straight into it. Awesome blog post for the religious peeps here: http://networkedblogs.com/m396a

• Lil Wayne -- How To Love:

Woman at the Well

Christians and "Salvation"

Rachel Held Evans posted on her blog a thought-provoking article by Caleb Wilde on the the Christian view of "salvation."


Read it here: What Do You Have to Know to Be Saved?

Women in Religion

"We live in a world in great need of healing. And there are people across the globe offering to dedicate their lives toward this healing; yet, they are denied simply because they are women." 


Read the article here: Female Jet Pilot? Sure. Preacher? No.

Break the Mirror

In the morning

After taking cold shower
—–what a mistake—–
I look at the mirror.

There, a funny guy,
Grey hair, white beard, wrinkled skin,
—–what a pity—–
Poor, dirty, old man!
He is not me, absolutely not.

Land and life
Fishing in the ocean
Sleeping in the desert with stars
Building a shelter in the mountains
Farming the ancient way
Singing with coyotes
Singing against nuclear war–
I’ll never be tired of life.
Now I’m seventeen years old,
Very charming young man.

I sit down quietly in lotus position,
Meditating, meditating for nothing.
Suddenly a voice comes to me:
“To stay young,
To save the world,
Break the mirror.”

By Nanao Sakaki

Useless, Yet Priceless.

This story by Jim Palmer, found in his book Divine Nobodies, changed my life. Read and enjoy. Also, get the book. It's good.

One day while browsing, I came across a large picture book of Ireland, each page a photograph of some aspect of a day in the life of this legendary land accompanied by an explanatory caption. Settling into my comfy chair, I set off to the ancient island. Somewhere around Dublin the corner of my eye caught something that hijacked my attention.

All decked out in a pretty pink dress with white lace was a sweet little girl in a wheelchair. Her angel face was radiantly pale, and her sandy blonde hair was pulled back in a ponytail sporting a big yellow bow.

Frilly white stockings disappeared into her sturdy white leather dress shoes, which were strapped down tight to the folding metal rests beneath her pigeon-toed feet. I could not turn away from this portrait of mangled beauty, despite knowing well enough that it isn’t polite to stare at handicapped kids.

Kneeling down close beside the little girl is Dad. With one arm gently wrapped around her, he reads from an oversized storybook propped up in her lap. Slumped over against his shoulder, she is turned toward him, with the top of her precious head resting against the side of his face. She can’t walk or sit up straight, and offers only an occasional groan. She’s just sitting there unresponsive, seemingly oblivious, as Dad dutifully reads her a story, altering his voice to impersonate the different characters.

My mind began wandering, imagining this father’s world. On bended knee is a man who must walk through life brokenhearted for his daughter, who will never sing silly songs, skate in the park, or dance at her prom. A dad who loves his little girl perhaps even more because of that but who will never hear “I love you, Daddy,”
whispered in his ear or receive a homemade Father’s Day card with sunshine and stick people. She will never do most of the things a ponytailed little girl wants to do for her daddy. A tidal wave of sorrow crashed over me as I pictured my Jessica strapped in and slumped over in that wheelchair.

The lens of my soul zoomed in on her facial expression as she sits wrapped in her father’s arms. Earnestly reading, she sits spellbound, gazing into his face with her mouth slightly open with a smile. He’s glued to the book; she’s glued to him.

What does she see? What does she feel? She seems so content and peaceful, at home really, resting her head against Daddy’s face, receiving his love. Then again, that’s all she can do. She’s not even capable of reciprocating her father’s love, and yet I can see she is his most precious treasure. Perhaps most look upon this scene in pity. How terrible to not be able to function in the most essential ways; perhaps in the eyes of the world she is useless. Not to her father. To him she is priceless.

Taking all this in, a torrent of troubling thoughts rose from somewhere deep within me. Would God still love me if I couldn’t do anything for him? What if I were useless and couldn’t do even the basic things I had learned a good Christian does? What if I couldn’t impact others in any significant way, lead someone to Christ, serve a person in need, teach others Scripture, be a leader? What if I couldn’t even go to church or have a quiet time? What if I couldn’t progress any further in my spiritual life? What if I were barely even capable of having an intelligent thought about God? What if . . .

Complicating the matter further, the handicapped girl with her doting dad festered the wound of my own father’s rejection. Even before he left, he was never really there. To this day I cannot remember ever having a meaningful conversation with my father or a time when he looked me square in the eye and said he was proud of me or loved me. We never went on camping trips or to sporting events or worked on cars together. I tried out for the football team one year, hoping my father would take interest in me, but he never attended one of my games.

Somewhere back there that curlyhaired kid with gaps in his teeth and glasses held together by masking tape came to the unconscious but firm conclusion that he was badly defective, ugly, stupid, and worthless. This was the only logical explanation to a little boy for why his dad was so thoroughly indifferent toward him and eventually left home altogether.

I’ll be honest, all that “inner child” stuff makes me a little squeamish, but I cannot deny that my childhood self-hatred has played out in my adulthood with this automatic and insatiable drive to prove to the world (mostly myself and God) that I am not the piece of dung something inside tells me I am. Despite my sound grasp of the doctrine of justification, for all practical purposes, if God is my “Father,” then I am still the useless bumbling son needing to supply sufficient reason for God to like me. My born-again legal standing before God was sufficient for warding off his wrath, but the idea that God was proud and satisfied with who Jim Palmer was seemed like a pipe dream.

Following me into the library that day was this phantom Christian I had created through years of being the kind of saintly person with whom I surmised God would be pleased. The whole drill seemed to be to strive hard to fulfill God’s expectations and play your 1 John 1:9 card when you failed, earning you the right to start over and try harder.

Sitting there, a heavy weariness set in and I wanted to cry. I’m so tired of trying to get God to like me. I’m terrified of being abandoned and left alone in life. It had already happened a few times with people it’s not supposed to. Having tasted of God’s love, I didn’t want to lose it. Making things work with God was my last great hope in life, and I couldn’t afford to mess it up. If I drove God away, who was left?

I knew when I died I would go to heaven, but something deep within needed and longed for God now. I worked hard to stay on my game (daily quiet times, attending church, leading groups, and teaching
classes) as I envisioned God in heaven perpetually asking, “What have you done for me lately?” I was desperate and willing to take whatever rest I could get, even if it was just an hour in a comfortable chair eating yogurt-covered pretzels and escaping to Ireland in photographs.

But then there was this out-of-order child in the wheelchair. . . useless yet priceless. She can’t even sit up straight, but someone has gone through all the trouble of doing her up in bows and frills. An occasional grunt is Dad’s only reward for giving his all in reading her the story. There’s nothing she can really do for him, but she doesn’t need to do anything; her father simply loves her. She’s just slumped over, gazing into his face, receiving his love.

I’ve never spoken in tongues, healed anyone, or reached the blissful state of nirvana, and I probably wouldn’t even know the yin from the yang if I ran right into it, but sitting in the public library thumbing through photographs of Irish foxhounds, farmers, and pubs, a picture of a girl and her father came down from heaven. Somehow, right before my very eyes, the Spirit transformed this sight into a snapshot of God and me, offering a completely new set of “What if . . .” questions.

What if I’m the girl slumped over in the wheelchair? What if there isn’t anything I can do “for” God? What if he just wants me to lean against his face and receive his love? What if this phantom Christian I’ve been chasing is just a big distraction from resting in what God wants to freely give? What if my value and worth to God are not contingent on what I do? Maybe this is why I’m so tired inside. My soul has only so much energy, and the bulk of mine is being drained through striving to earn God’s love and acceptance. What would it be like to truly know there isn’t one more thing I ever have to do for God in order for him to be pleased with me?

I am so afraid. I’m holding on to all these things I feel I must do to stay on God’s radar. Who will I be if I have nothing left to hold on to? Who will I be when I stand before God with empty hands? Maybe this
is what God is trying to tell me. He wants me to open my clenched fists and discover I am not what I do but what he wants to give me. And what he wants to give me is love and life, unconditional love and life.

God placed the little girl right before me and gave me the eyes to see the deeper meaning of her handicapped condition. Until I understand I literally cannot do anything for God to achieve worth and value in his eyes, I won’t stop trying. Maybe God wants me to stop trying.

Jesus once said, “Apart from me you can do nothing.” Wasn’t Jesus essentially saying there is nothing we can do of value for God on our own? Think about it—isn’t it a little silly to think there is anything God needs me to do for him? He’s God! However, God did create me for the purpose of knowing him and has placed his life inside me so I can know him.

God wants me to experience him as life, peace, freedom, wholeness, and joy; and as I trust and depend upon his presence within, I come to know him in these ways, and God is pleased. If you’re building a sandcastle on the beach a few feet from the ocean, what sense does it make to be hauling Dixie cups of water one by one from your hotel room across the street on the fifteenth floor? There’s an endless supply right before you for packing sand and filling moats. Maybe “accepting Christ” isn’t so much a one-time thing we do as a formula
for escaping hell in the afterlife, but rather a lifelong process of learning to depend on the sufficiency of Christ within for what we most deeply need and desire. His life fills our empty moats of worth, purpose, and love.

Though I had a seminary degree and could wax eloquent from the Pauline Epistles about “unmerited favor,” somehow God could see I needed a little help to truly understand. He arranged for that angel in a wheelchair to be right in place, knowing I needed to witness a dad loving his daughter who couldn’t do anything for him and didn’t need to. Watching her peacefully and contentedly resting against Daddy’s face, I could see she had found what my soul was yearning for. I needed to know a heavenly Father’s love that did not require my
striving to maintain it. Maybe you can’t get the “know he is God” part right until you get the “be still” part down.

Excerpt from:
          Palmer, Jim. "Death to the Phantom (Worthless Grace)."Divine nobodies: shedding religion to find God (and the unlikely people who help you). Nashville, TN: W Pub. Group, 2006. 47-54. Print. 

Pillars of the Earth

I just finished reading Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett. An excellent read. The following paragraph stood out to me the most:

"Archdeacon Peter's face was like a stone. He was the worst kind of Christian, Philip realized: he embraced all of the negatives, enforced every proscription, insisted on all forms of denial, and demanded strict punishment for every offense; yet he ignored all the compassion of Christianity, denied its mercy, flagrantly disobeyed its ethic of love, and openly flouted the gentle laws of Jesus. That's what the Pharisees were like, Philip thought; no wonder the Lord preferred to eat with publicans and sinners." 

Follett, Ken. Pillars of the earth . New York: Morrow, 1989. 926. Print.

Is It Really Either/Or?

Good question/response article from Brian McLaren's website on the fusion of religion and science:

Here's the Q:

i've just finished reading “The Story We Find Ourselves in” … it was captivating … the ideas r creative … 8)

Just one question: evolution states man evolved from primates but the Bible states God created man from dust – how to u reconcile them? Thks.

Here's the R: Thanks for your question. I'm so glad you enjoyed the book - people often ask me which of my books is my favorite, and I usually say, "My most recent book - and Story We Find Ourselves In."

On how to reconcile the Bible and the theory of evolution: I don't try to reconcile them for two reasons. First, you don't need to reconcile friends, and I don't see the Bible as an enemy of science or vice versa. And second, the Bible is a special kind of library (as I explain in New Kind of Christianity) ... but it is not a science textbook. So if I have a disease, I'll consult a medical library. If I am getting sued, I'll consult a legal library. If I'm having trouble in my garden, I'll consult a horticultural library. If I'm interested in the origin of species, I'll consult the literature on evolution. And if I'm on a spiritual journey, I'll consult the biblical library ... They aren't in competition at all - unless we erroneously try to turn them against each other.

Bold-emphasis mine. Article quoted from Brian McLaren's website: http://brianmclaren.net/archives/blog/q-r-primates-or-dust.html

"I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ." Ghandi

Fascinating article by Michael Rowe from the Huffington Post on best-selling author Anne Rice and why she quit Christianity.

Why Anne Rice Has Never Been More of a Christian

Ironically, author Anne Rice may have been more of a Christian yesterday than she ever was, when she announced, on Facebook, that she was quitting Christianity and renouncing any claim to the title "Christian."

"For those who care,"

she wrote,

"and I understand if you don't: Today I quit being a Christian. I'm out. I remain committed to Christ as always but not to being 'Christian' or to being part of Christianity. It's simply impossible for me to 'belong' to this quarrelsome, hostile, disputatious, and deservedly infamous group. For ten years, I've tried. I've failed. I'm an outsider. My conscience will allow nothing else." 

Earlier this week on her public Facebook page, Rice had expressed her horror and revulsion at two different news stories that shared similar themes. 

The first was the co-opting of the "Christian" imprimatur by the GOP-linked "Christian punk rock" band You Can Run But You Cannot Hide, supported by Michele Bachmann, who believe that gays should be executed, and who deride America for not being "moral enough" to make homosexuality a capital crime like it is in Iran. The second story was an exposé of a seven-year old boy who had been indoctrinated into Fred Phelps' Westboro Baptist Church, whose sole great commission is virulent hatred. 

For a woman who has written extensively about her journey from childhood Catholicism to atheism and back again, her very public announcement came as a surprise to both her Christian and secular fans. At the same time, the raw honesty she exhibited by doing it in the way she did seemed, somehow, entirely Anne Rice. 

Rice's own personal trials have been Jobean in scope: the loss of her young daughter, Michelle, to leukemia in 1972; the death of her beloved Dutton editor, William Whitehead; the AIDS-related death of her best friend, gay writer John Preston. And, in 2002, came the cruelest blow of all, the cancer death of her husband of 41 years, poet Stan Rice. Any of us would be forgiven for collapsing -- mentally, emotionally, or spiritually -- in the face of any of these individual tragedies. Rice took them all on her shoulders and bore them courageously over the course of one of the most public and prolific literary careers of the modern age. 

In 1998, Rice returned to her faith after years of describing herself as an atheist, and opened her heart to God. If some fans of her vampire, witchcraft, and erotic fiction rolled their eyes at her announcement that she would consecrate her writing talents to the glory of God in future, others did not, and there was still a grudging admiration for her questing determination, as well as an intuitive sense that Rice was on a journey and they could either remain with her or step aside. In 2008, she laid out that journey in a searing, beautifully written memoir, Called Out Of Darkness: A Spiritual Confession. 

Rice's decision to leave Christianity carries weight not only as a believer, but a mother. Her son, bestselling author Christopher Rice, is an outspoken and articulate gay rights activist and crusader. 

What must it have been like for Anne Rice to watch and listen as her community of believers spent tens of millions of dollars in California making sure that her son remained a second-class citizen, denouncing LGBT Americans in the vilest, cruelest, ugliest terms, bookended with hearty "Amens?" How could she have listened to the hours and hours of gratuitous cruelty and hatred from the various churches and the politicians they've purchased for forty pieces of silver in adjusted dollars and not wondered who these so-called Christians were, and how it was -- given their bigotry and rage -- that she shared a title with them? 

At the same time, how many Christian mothers have turned their backs on their LGBT children and cast them out like tragic mistakes, or, worse, embraced them with a toxic, bloody, pitying, non-affirming love that made it clear to their children that they believed they were damned? 

"Love" is a quantifiable commodity, much as "faith" is. Neither, if they're true to their nature, can tolerate darkness. Both will eventually surge, gasping, towards the light. 

Still, it is possible to murder faith. 

You murder faith same way you murder love: one bruise at a time, with small, daily cuts, with grinding contempt, with neglect. You murder faith by exposing it to bullets inscribed with Bible verses that kill Afghan and Iraqi children. You murder it by separating an elderly lesbian couple in a hospital because their union is considered "unnatural." You murder it by linking it to greed, to the "God wants you to be rich" movement which marinates in loathing for the poor and needy, in defiance of Christ's commission to care for them, then call it "good for America." You murder it by exposing it to any number of atrocities wrapped up in an inviolate nationalism that claims divine authority as its basis, with no room for dissent, and no mercy for dissenters. You murder it with self-righteous, violent militarism, with intolerance, with lack of compassion, with lack of humility and, most importantly, with lack of humanity. 

It dies a little bit more every time a gay or lesbian teenager commits suicide because they've been taught to hate themselves because God "loves" them but hates what they are. 

While Rice says her faith in God remains intact, her repudiation of Christianity is a threefold clarion call, one that should not be written off as a publicity stunt by a bestselling author, or condescendingly dismissed by the Evangelical establishment. 

One one hand, her announcement is a profoundly courageous personal declaration of spiritual intent. On another hand, it's a wakeup call to believers who sit by while unimaginable evils occur in the name of Jesus and say nothing other besides defensively whining that "all Christians aren't like that," or that the person reacting in grief and outrage is simply "persecuting Christians" because he's a "nonbeliever" (whether he's a nonbeliever or not.) 

On yet another hand, it's a rallying cry for any of us who have held onto our faith by bloody tendons, only to feel the agony when it finally snaps and breaks on the rack that contemporary, virulently politicized Christianity has become. 

Like Rice, our belief in the purity of Christ's teachings has chained us to a body of believers who no longer represent anything of what we believe, and indeed represent the very opposite of what Christ's teachings are. There seems precious little Christ in Christianity as it's understood in America today. 

Long accustomed to making excuses, to ourselves and to others, for the actions of our nominal co-religionists, we come to realize that there is no possibility of identifying ourselves as Christians any longer, not because of what we've become, but because of what Christianity itself has become. When the word "Christian" has been so thoroughly co-opted that it means something entirely different than what we believed it meant, from how we had always self-identified, it becomes a moral, ethical, and yes, spiritual, choice whether to continue to cling to "Christian" as a title, or leave it. 

At the risk of speaking for her -- and without knowing someone else's heart, one shouldn't -- it seems reasonable to say that, in leaving Christianity and rejecting its contemporary manifestation as codified ignorance, bigotry, and intolerance, Rice has paradoxically moved herself closer to the essence of Christ's teachings than perhaps at any other time in her life. 

As she has said, she rejects Christianity in Christ's name, and will follow Christ instead. In the words of John 13:35, "By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." 

The title "Christian," in short, is meaningless in and of itself, especially without love. 

Whatever backlash Anne Rice might eventually receive from her Christian readers, or from the Evangelical establishment itself, the undeniable fact is that the decision of this sensitive, passionate, and devout woman to leave Christianity is one that Christ himself would likely understand, even applaud, even as He would likely weep at the holocaust of hatred, bigotry, and collateral carnage that has devolved from the grimy, shopworn religion to which His glorious name has been affixed. 

Here is the link to the original article: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-rowe/why-anne-rice-has-never-b_b_664576.html.

Real Men Don't Buy Girls!

Be sure to check out the Demi and Ashton DNA Foundation on Facebook!

Right is Not Always Right

Excerpt from the article, "A Voice from the Christian Left" by Marilyn McEntyre, Professor of English at Westmont College, Santa Barbara, California.

Many on the Christian Right are fond of posing the question WWJD?-- What would Jesus do? I'd like to remind them what Jesus DID do: He cared for the poor. He did not condemn the woman caught in adultery. He prayed alone. He commanded us to love our enemies. He preached peace. He ate, drank, and lived with "tax collectors and sinners" -- the lowlifes and outcasts of his day, while reserving his condemnation for the religious leaders who from a place of privilege imposed their legalism and literalism on the people they were responsible for leading. He told his disciples not to oppose the healing work of those outside the ranks of his followers. And again and again he reminded us to care for the poor. (That moral issue gets more air time than any other in the gospels: 1 verse in 9.) If Christians concerned about how to respond to the grave global issues facing us all were to reread the Gospels for guidance, I think we'd find some pretty clear indications there about what Jesus would do. And what he wouldn't. (One of the few bumper stickers I've been tempted to affix to my still undecorated car in recent months reads "Who would Jesus bomb?") 

Whatever Jesus would do, given what he did do, and has promised he will do, I don't think it looks much like what the insulated, self-congratulatory Fox News fans on the "Christian Right" are doing.

You can read the entire article here: http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0716-29.htm

Starting Things Off

I envision this blog as a spot where I can share random, various things that I find interesting, fun, and thought-provoking--articles, quotes, or whatever--in hopes that you'll find them interesting too. So, enjoy and welcome to my blog.

To start things off, here's a religous article from Internet Monk on a quote by Martin Luther. I find Luther's quote and the subsequent article spot-on regarding the issue of freedom in God, specifically regarding alcoholic beverages. Many people chose to--and should--avoid them for a variety of good reasons, while some Christians merely abstain because they think alcohol is a sinful, unwise choice for all followers of Jesus. If you find yourself in the last category, this article is for you and for all of us who are still learning what it means to live the life of freedom Jesus intended. Enjoy! You can access the article here: http://www.internetmonk.com/archive/a-luther-quote-to-wake-up-the-sleepers

A Luther Quote To Wake Up The Sleepers

Whenever the devil harasses you, seek the company of men or drink more, or joke and talk nonsense, or do some other merry thing. Sometimes we must drink more, sport, recreate ourselves, and even sin a little to spite the devil, so that we leave him no place for troubling our consciences with trifles. We are conquered if we try too conscientiously not to sin at all. So when the devil says to you: do not drink, answer him: I will drink, and right freely, just because you tell me not to. -Martin Luther

Martin Luther is certainly my favorite person in church history. Time and again his grasp of the Gospel and unabashed honest humanity have come to my rescue. Luther has an ability to make the Gospel as outrageous as possible, and to chase the rats of legalism out of the attic before they make a nest.

The above quote is a good example. Luther recommending sin? Well…he doesn’t mean adultery or stealing. What Luther is talking about here is something C.S. Lewis talks about in Chapter 14 of The Screwtape Letters: the particular temptations that come to the person who is aware of his/her own righteousness. Even if it is an awareness of love, forgiveness or humility– all bring the possibility of self-centeredness and pride. But Lewis (and Luther) were especially aware of the spiritual dangers of trying to not sin. Yes…trying to not sin. 

Since encouraging people to try and not sin is a major occupation of confused evangelicalism, Luther sounds strange. But it’s clear what he means: we can’t get caught in the trap of trying to generate our own righteousness, even in the name of obedience. Luther’s encouragement to sin just to spite the devil is his provocative way of suggesting a Christian TRUST CHRIST and have confidence in justification by faith. So much so, that instead of living in a state of perpetual self-examination, we live with the freedom to be less than perfect. 

Isn’t sinning intentionally a really bad thing? A Christian’s attitude toward sin must be based on a thorough acceptance of the fact that our depravity isn’t going to be erased by efforts. Even our righteousness and obedience are thoroughly tainted with sin. Luther says we need to take the sting out of the devil’s condemnation with a willingness to be human, and rejoice that God loves us and Christ died for us. 

Let Luther bother you a bit. Particularly if you are starting to get miserable in this Christian life, and wonder where the laughter and honesty are among Christians. We can find it again, but it comes with embracing justification by faith existentially, and not just as a doctrine.

"The Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, 'Look at him! A glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!'" Luke 7:34 (ESV)