ANOTHER BIT OF QUACKERY

If anyone's interested in more quackery, then I've come up with another "diagnostic tool." Caveat Emptor !

I think I can whittle the 28 Question Exam down to three.

The first would borrow a memorable phrase from Walter Brueggemann. I’d ask, “Are you striving to be a poet in a prose-flattened world.” Then I’d follow up with, “Is all of your poetry cruciform?” And that would be that.

What?

Where’s the third question?

Well, it’s not a question, really. It would be the circumstance of asking the previous two, just like I wrote them, without any further explanation. Then we’d watch to see how the examinee responded- with frustration or awakened curiosity.

That ought to tell us everything we need to know about the pith of their soul. Maybe not, but it sure ought to tell you something about my view of a pithy soul.

SPIRITUAL CHECKUPS

A good friend asked me a good question. He wanted my opinion: What sorts of inquiries might be helpful in determining how an individual is doing spiritually?

There are short exams out there that claim to do just that, but I've not been impressed. My deep seated idolatry would likely make it past the diagnostic filter of those things. That's a problem.

Of course, I'm no expert, but I think the questionnaires that are typically circulated in our churches reveal a very serious compromise with the spirit of this age. Their sensors are searching for the wrong contagion. They focus on efficiency and quantifiable progress. They assume the superiority of busyness and business.

It seems to me that instead of enquiring about the number of tracts a person has handed out or how many small groups they've attended, the truly helpful exam would question how consciously we are attempting to be formed in and by the gospel, and how aggressively we are struggling to resist the counterclaims of those powers who would usurp Christ's throne. Incidentally, I'm not talking about those manifestations of idolatry that "others" are exposed to, but the ones we Americans constantly swim in- radical individualism, reductionistic rationalism, traitorous nationalism, a gnostic disregard for the body, sensual obsession with the body, the commodification (and consequent dismissal) of all things human, mysterious and awful, and ...summarizing it all- chasing after the American dream of rabid consumerism.

My check up might look something like this:

1. Do you regularly eat with God and his people?

2. Do you immerse yourself in the four Gospels?

3. Do you find ways to plant the flag of the gospel in your own "small yard?"

4. Do you regularly ask yourself what those flags might look like?

5. Do you resist the salvific claims of Mammon, Mars and Aphrodite, which are present in the American Dream?

6. How?

7. Is your identity clearly rooted in your Baptism or your American Heritage?

8. Do you draw on the rich cultural distinctives of the church to enact and strengthen your identity?

9. Do you forgive your enemies?

10. Do you gossip?

11. Do you hold grudges?

12. Do you strive to see Christ in everyone that you meet?

13. Do you strive to be Christ to everyone that you meet?

14. Do you keep a Sabbath?

15. Do you strive to rid yourself of a deistic two-storied world?

16. Do you try to cultivate an attitude of astonishment and wonder?

17. Do you resist the need to explain everything, tightly?

18. Is The Faith confusing and challenging?

19. Do you prepare yourself to notice when “God makes a pass at you?”

20. Do you worship God with your body, as well as your heart and mind?

21. Do you Fast?

22. Do you Feast?

23. Can you tell the stories of God’s people?

24. Does the doctrine of the Trinity appear to be immeasurably practical?

25. Are you struggling in all these things?

26. Do you make regular confession?

27. Have any of these points gotten you in trouble?

28. Lately?

STRUGGLE IS GOOD

I’ve been a failure lately. More so than usual, I mean.

I’ve been thinking about what it all means. The exceptional run of spiritual compromise over the last few days reminds me that deep down…I’m a really sorry bastard.

Emotionally it’s meant discouragement and disgust. That’s fair. Those are the appropriate and default responses to sin, but Fr Joseph Huneycutt reminds me that I should also find hope in the ugliness.

The realization that I struggle with X- whatever it is- is good news. It’s the best possible sign given my situation.

We don’t like struggles or conflict. We tend to view them as negative aspects of life- or at least I do. The tempting response, as Fr Joseph explains it, is either to try to dull out the experience with food, shopping, sex etc or to get out of the situation that gave rise to the conflict in the first place. We leave churches, marriages, and other relationships in order to find peace- at least peace for ourselves. We leave behind a lot of hurting and confused people. Sometimes the leaving is necessary, but often these options are simply selfish.

Commitment to the good demands that we are, well…committed to it. Often situations, especially those beyond our control, make that commitment something that must be worked for- something we must struggle to attain.

Struggle is precisely what faithfulness looks like in the lives of compromised and finite people who are committed to the good.

I say “compromised and finite” because every struggle involves the possibility- the inevitability, really- of failing somewhere along the way.

Our Father understands that.

One familiar response, which knowing God as Father should certainly rule out, is the fear of being cast away. We begin with his love. We begin with his forgiveness. He knows us and loves us anyway. Not because we deserve it, not because we no longer struggle and can guarantee our failure will never happen again. But simply because he’s our Father.

Neither Love nor Forgiveness is a goal we journey to attain; they’re the ground the journey takes place on.

My failures speak of me. Maybe, the fear of rejection that sometimes comes after sinning is because I don’t really believe that I’m all that sinful- not really. You know what I mean: the moment before the deed I was loveable, but now I’m not worthy of God’s attention.

Hmmm. The truth is I was never worthy.

Michael Yaconelli has called authentic Christian experience Messy Spirituality. That seems right to me. We’ve fallen to certain temptations in the past because we have a particular weakness for them. Satan’s not going to take them out of the rotation. He’s much too good a manager for that. They get the job done. So, it’s likely that we’ll be facing that same fast ball in the near future. There’s nothing to do but try to smack the thing.

Like every father cheering on his little league player, our God certainly hopes for a base hit, but the only thing he finds totally unacceptable is for us to refuse to leave the dugout.

I may hear the sickening smack of the ball in the catcher’s glove behind me. It certainly got by. Probably took my eye off the ball...again. Coach has warned me about that.

Fair enough.

But the smack isn’t all there is to hear. I need to be listening for the encouraging and enthusiastic “Good swing!” coming from the stands. I’ll be a better player for it.