In C.S. Lewis’ classic Narnia book The Silver Chair, these words sprang from the lips of Prince Rilan, after a March-Wiggle named Puddlegum had released him from the spell of an evil witch: “For now that I am myself I can remember that enchanted life, though while I was enchanted I could not remember my true self.”

Where I’ve Been
Allow me to refresh your memory. On June 23 I wrote a piece called Why I Write Part I. Nearly a month later I wrote Part II and shortly there after I promised that Part III was coming soon. Two months and twelve days later I have scrapped the draft that has been on my computer for a month and here we are.

I should also tell you that for several months I have been quite depressed and the pinnacle of that depression has been the last six to eight weeks. I looked for a job all summer and found nothing. I applied for fifteen jobs in all and the only place that took me in is the same place I worked at for ten years. Now I am back in the same place doing basically the same thing except with no seniority and half the pay. It’s funny how things work. Last year when I quit Erin was sad because she still had to work there. This year shortly after I came back, she finally got out of there for a much, much better job. This should, I know, be reason for rejoicing with the person I love most in this world. However, I have spent half of my time swimming in waves of sadness and regret. I have been under the spell of my own misery, complaining and self loathing. But I am waking from my enchantment.

Who I am Instead
I know that this is supposed to be the promised part about self forgetting objectivity and here I am 323 words in and all I have talked about is my current job situation. You may (or may not at this point) remember that I started this experiment with several quotes, one of them being from Jurgen Moltman, who writes, “My own experiences with theological thinking have in Christian theology: the telling of God’s history with us, and the argument for God’s presence – biographical subjectivity and self forgetting objectivity” (Experiences in Theology xix). The point of this exploration in thought was to try to figure out a bit about what compels me to write about my experiences with the Christian faith. It is important to make the distinction: I am not writing about why I believe what I believe rather I am asking why I write about what I believe.

The answer? Because I forget who I am. I spend so much time thinking about where I am, my particular place in time and space: stuck in a job I don’t like, ready to be done with my undergraduate studies, wanting so desperately to move out of West Michigan, thinking about kids, buying a house or where to apply for seminary, constantly wondering what comes next. I am enchanted by the drama. I look for my identity in my accomplishments and my desires. I often forget that ultimately it’s our identity in relation to Christ that dictates who and what we are.

I wrote back in June that environment, authority, and personal experience will all play a role influencing what we perceive to be the truth. However, I said that I still believe when it is all said and done there is really only one truth – one way the story actually goes – though we may find a thousand different ways to read it. I still believe that today more than ever. I believe that we have potential to think clearly and accurately on matters of the faith and at the same time I believe more than ever that some of the beliefs I hold will be inevitably wrong. However I am spending less time bemoaning the fact that environment, authority, and personal experience influence what and how we believe and more time dwelling on the hope that in spite of the history of corruption of power in the world and in the Church and in spite of our varied and sometimes sordid stories or personalities, God can be trusted to work in history leading his people into love wisdom and truth.

The Environment
Our environment will always influence who we are to some degree. However, we do have some choice as to where we spend our time and to where we turn our thoughts. The Christian Church is the environment that has had and I pray will continue to have the greatest impact on my life. Each week the liturgy and hymns of faith remind me that I am part of something so much greater than myself, something so much deeper than my darkest worries, something that extends wider and farther than my highest hopes could ever reach. The sacraments remind me that some things in this life are sacred – a deep spiritual meaning embodied in bread and wine or the waters of baptism. And there is the community. This is the first time in my life that I have ever felt somewhat alienated from the Christian community. The reasons for this are mixed and varied and I am not even sure I know myself well enough right now to honestly say what those reasons are. However, I will continue to seek out Christian community. I know that this feeling of alienation is probably due at least in part to the way I feel about myself at this time, and at least partially due to the way we all struggle to open ourselves up to lasting and meaningful relationships. However, my renewed ambition to be a part of authentic Christian community is not because I have correctly assessed what’s wrong but because I do know how it can be when it’s right. It’s never perfect but it is so right when we carry each other’s burdens and go through this life together. In the hearts, homes, prayers, and arms of other believers is where we belong if we acknowledge that we belong to Christ.

Authority
The traditions of the Church – the Sacraments, the Liturgical year, creeds and confessions – are rooted in the biblical narrative: in the Hebrew and New Testament scriptures. They are thousands of years in the making. They have cradled countless Christians and affirmed their faith in the face of heresy, an antagonistic age of enlightenment and the pluralistic age of our present time. Sure some things are not perfect. Yes, sometimes we disagree about how confessions are worded or how many Sacraments there are. However, we must remember, many creeds were formulated because Christians throughout the ages have learned that it is terribly easy to get things terribly wrong – to deny the blessed Trinity for instance. The triune God is something we get a glimpse of in scripture but it is spelled out in much greater detail in the Nicene and Athanasian Creeds. I may not agree word for word with the warning at the beginning of the Athenasian Creed and its implicit damnation of all who fail to grasp the Trinity. However, I can affirm its heavy tone and the emphasis it places on the importance of sound doctrine and careful reflection regarding our triune God. And of course there is the favorite of so many (myself included) the creed of all Ecumenical Creeds: The Apostles’ Creed. Each week as I stand and affirm it, I am participating with countless other Christians across the world and throughout time. And I am reminded this is not about me.

My Personal Experience
So what possesses a person to sit all night in front of their keyboard and work on an end-cap to a series of blog post when the few people who were interested have probably forgotten about it?

Here I am awake. Here I can remember the enchantment I have been under and gain some perspective on it. But while I wander through my days asleep with my eyes open I cannot remember for the life of me who I am here. When I swim in the sea of my own despair or even if I blissfully stay afloat in the wading pool of my own accomplishments I lose a sense of true identity, a sense of who I am in Christ. But here I remember. I sit here not to convert, convince or proselytize any friends or strangers who may chance upon this (although I would love to connect with you in dialogue). I sit here tonight and write because I need to remember.

And just maybe, maybe in doing so I will remind you of something good, something beatiful, something true.

Shalom,
Wayne

So it’s taken me a lot longer than I thought to put together why I write part 2. It was fairly easy to say why I bother writing at all. But my promise to provide autobiographical, and I guess theological reasons for why I bother writing on matters of Christian spirituality has taken a lot more out of me.

Above is a picture of of a mead composition notebook:100 sheets of white and blue lines, wide rule (not the standard college rule), 9 3/4 x 7 1/2 in. There was a time when I was young, unfortunate and a bit naive, and I thought that this book was my only friend. Times have changed: adulthood, emotional maturity (a little bit anyway),true life-long friendships, true love and spiritual maturity (again, at least a little bit) have all set in since the days when I was a card carrying member of the teen angst club.

As a young adult in my early twenties, I didn’t have a blog. I had a band. More like a series of want-to-be bands that bickered about what record company they would be signed to some day and whether they were a “Christian band” (that terminology still makes me want to throw up) or if they were “just a band made up of members who were all Christians.” I always opted for the latter option but somewhere inside I think felt then as I do now, that the whole discussion was just asinine. But I digress.

If you would have asked me then why I wrote about my faith, my experience with Christian spirituality or the Christian religion I would have probably started with something like: “Well you see my father is an alcoholic my mother used to be kind of mean and crazy…” I would have proceeded to tell you of the family dysfunction and teenage heart breaks that filled my little black notebook. Then I would have told you about this amazing church and how my family was doing so much better, of how my father had quit drinking and how they went to church together nearly every Sunday. There was a relatively short period of time when that part would have been true. I would have told you regarding those teenage heartbreaks that when I wrote or prayed about it, that it all went away. That part would have been a lie (that shit followed me farther into adulthood than I suspect is normal let alone healthy). But these were the answers I would have given. These were the answers I had to give as to why I was a Christian. And writing about my Christian experience was ‘just a natural outpouring of who I am.’

Again, those are the answers I would have given, if you had asked me why I write, at about age 21. And what I had was a real, and developing, yet shallow faith. You see, I no longer write to inform you that having Jesus and the Christian community in your life will make everything okay. However, it will provide a hope, a refuge, a shelter from the storm when things are not okay. Sometimes mean and crazy mother’s are not so mean and crazy after all and just when you are really starting to see growth in your relationship with them, they die. Sometimes fathers who are recovering alcoholics regress to a child like drunken state when their wives die and they blame God. Sometimes life and pain, and sin and temptation just seem to make life far too hard to go on. And when that happens Jesus is still there. He still offers redemption. He still trades beauty for ashes. He still calls us to be part of a transformed community. He still calls us to cut through through all the ‘piss and shit and lies that kill other people’ to see the beauty of the world that he created and is still transforming and then to show that beauty to those ‘other people.’

God, I hope that is what I am doing here: I hope I am writing about the kind of faith that “sticks;” I hope that ultimately I write, and am writing right now to point to Jesus and not just myself or a series of fortunate or unfortunate events in my life (which admittedly is a huge temptation). You see, I don’t need and you don’t need a Jesus that is only there when you are healthy and wealthy. We don’t need a Jesus who is only of use when we are low either. We need the real Jesus who created all things, said they were good and stepped in (and still steps in) to redeem them when they are not so good. And if we profess this Jesus, then we need other people who do (the Christian Church). And sharing in some way about the hope we have in such a God will still be a natural outpouring of who we are. I say “some way” because not every Christian is called to be a pastor, teacher, or even evangelist – I am still trying to figure out my “role” in all of this – not everyone will blog 4 God but Christians are called to live for him and participate in Christian community and in some way do their part to hold out Christ for the world to see.

I am getting ahead of myself; perhaps that sort of belongs to part 3: the things (doctrines, practices and what-have-you) that I understand to be essentials of this Christian faith, the things that are not subject to our individual stories. What Moltmann calls the self forgetting objectivity. As for what he calls biographical subjectivity or God’s history with us, here is not so much a comprehensive summery (that would be long and tedious). But as promised it is a bit more about me than my about me page offers and hopefully a bit more than a one-sided family bio without the vantage point time and perspective:

1977. I was, as I said, born into a home with an alcoholic father. Both of my parents had conversion experiences before I was born. The depth or commitment of my father’s I have yet to see. He remains a mystery to me. From about age 5 up my mom made sure my brother Jim, my sister Brenda and I were in Church every Sunday (my dad would always be on and off). We attended a Baptist, Pentecostal, Wesleyan and finally a non-denominational “seeker sensitive Church.” I prayed to accept Jesus around age 6 and again at age 13. Throughout my teen years I was active in church. I was ridden with guilt about listening to rap and heavy metal music and constantly ‘rededicated myself.’ I fell for a certain girl and a certain type of girl that was not right for me and chased both well into my mid twenties. In my late teens I became more involved with student leadership in my church. In my early twenties I got a job as director of youth ministries at a neighboring church. I worked there for three years. After that I gave up chasing “the one who got away” and married Erin, the love of my life. Literally a week after we returned from our honeymoon I finally started classes in preparation for ministry (something I had talked about since I was 13). It was almost another year before I was finally baptized. I fought with my mother about this because I was to be sprinkled and not fully submersed in water. Also, because she always said it was something I should have done at age 13 after had publicly committed to the faith and I said she should have had me baptized as a child since she was attending church at the time. In a way we were both right – one of us should have done one of those things. But she came and it was one of the greatest and proudest days of my life. Less than a year later she passed away of a rare and terrible neurological disease. I just hope that when they put me in the ground that someone will be able to honestly say that in the dash between 1977 – and whenever, that I loved the Lord God with my heart soul and mind and sought to love my neighbor as myself. As I could honestly say about my mother.

How is that for a run on paragraph? The one constant in all of this has been Jesus, revealed to me by the Christian faith which has been passed down to me by the Church. I have been Pentecostal/Charismatic, Wesleyan/Methodist and currently Reformed. I have been to many different churches but I have never been without the Church: the mother who prayed for me, the pastors and youth workers who I looked up to, a few life long friends who encourage me and wrestle with me through matters of the faith and the community of believers at various places with which I have met and worshiped with most of my life. And in the midst of the Church there has always been Jesus, the author of the grand story as well as each individual story. I hope to live and share my story well, through writing or otherwise.

Shalom,

Wayne

For the past several weeks we’ve all been bombarded with constant news coverage of what has been going on in Durham N.C. This has also led to a lot of talk about racial and class tension in Durham and around the country.

I spent this afternoon reading Jurgen Moltmann’s “Black Theology for Whites” from Experiences in Theology. In that particular chapter, Moltmann shares a story from his time as a visiting professor at Duke (1967/68) that seems most appropriate for us all to recall today. Moltmann writes,

At that time Duke University was somewhat withdrawn from what went on in the world. But that changed abruptly on 4 April 1968. We were sitting with theologians from all over the country in one of the university halls at a ‘Theology of Hope Conference.’ I was just arguing with Van Harvey about the distinction between Geschichte and Historie when Harvey Cox burst into the room crying ‘Martin King has been shot.’ We immediately broke off the conference, and participants hurried home, for by the same evening shops and businesses in the American cities were going up in flames. The black population rose with a cry of rage, while the whites tried to protect themselves. Then the unbelievable happened: 400 students sat down in the quadrangle of Duke University and mourned for Martin Luther King for six days and six nights, in rain and heat. At the end of that week of shame and mourning, black students from a college nearby came and danced through the rows of white students and we all sang together: ‘We shall overcome.’ From that day, the blacks in Durham became more self confident and the conscience of the whites woke up.

Some of the African-American students who joined in that day were from the nearby North Carolina Central University where the 27 year old purported victim in the current rape case is a student.

While the case continues to get sorted out in the courts it would do us all good to remember a day like April 11, 1968; and what took place on the campus of Duke University, when many of God’s children did join in singing an old spiritual, one called ‘We Shall Overcome.’ Unfortunately we are still not ready in this country to sing “Free at Last.”

Shalom,
Wayne

The Hospitality of Abraham by fifteenth century iconographer Andrei Rublev of the Russian Orthodox Church draws upon Abraham’s visit with three angels in Genesis chapter 16. The icon provides believers with a visual stimulus to meditate upon the perichoresis – the mutual inter penetration or divine dance – of the three persons of the Blessed Trinity.

Here are some very important words for further meditation on the subject:

Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. (Genesis 1:2)

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. (John 1:1-3)

Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. (Matthew 28: 18,19)

The catholic [Christian] Faith is this, that we worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity. Neither confounding the Persons, nor dividing the Substance. For there is one Person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Ghost. (Athanasian Creed).

God’s history with the world is a trinitarian history. All three persons of the Trinity are always involved, Whether the Father creates the world through the Son in the energies of the Holy Spirit, and preserves it for the coming of his kingdom, Whether the Son is sent into the world by the Father through the Holy Spirit, then in his turn sending the Holy Spirit from the Father into the world, or whether the Holy Spirit glorifies the Son and the Father and leads … into the eternal life of the Trinity (Jürgen Moltmann – Experiences in Theology p.310).

Holy, holy, holy! Lord God Almighty!
All Thy works shall praise Thy Name, in earth, and sky, and sea;
Holy, holy, holy; merciful and mighty!
God in three Persons, blessed Trinity!

Question

Now, I readily admit that my church experience is limited (though it does span several different churches and denominations). However, it seems to me that too often each ecclesial community tends to focus most of it’s attention on one person of the Trinity – whether it be the Father, Son or Holy Spirit – while giving considerably less attention to the other persons of the Godhead. Is this your experience as well? If so why do you think that is? When you pray: are you conscious of the Trinity? Do you think the notion of a triune God has has practical implications for the way we should pray? Worship? Live? Let me know what you think.
May our triune God bless and keep you!

Shalom,
Wayne