Experiencing God -- Or Not

In the previous post I listed some things I have learned from (or about) atheists, agnostics and freethinkers.

Now I want to share why it will be impossible for me to ever honestly become an atheist or agnostic.  (I still do consider myself a freethinker.)

In my encounters with all kinds of thinkers I have noticed a common thread regarding how it is that people get to their various intellectual positions, and this is it:

Our beliefs seem to be a direct result of our experiences.

Most of the atheists and agnostics I have met have made a statement something like this: "God has never revealed himself to me."

-- From this statement atheists conclude that there exists no supreme being.  Along with it they are obliged to believe evolution.  Most are quite willing to do so, seeing nothing miraculous about the existence of the universe and everything in it.

-- From this same statement agnostics go to the possibility of a supreme being whose existence can be neither proven nor disproven.  They are at liberty to accept creation or evolution or a combination of the two; they may see the divine design in the universe but, since they have never personally experienced God, they will say he has withdrawn from any kind of interaction in human affairs.

Whether or not an individual has experienced the supernatural seems to be the operative function for becoming a nonbeliever (most atheists and agnostics I've met are former believers).  Here's what they have not experienced:

• Miracles or supernatural happenings
• Healings
• Answers to prayer
• Paranormal activity
• The miracles of nature

Really, there's probably no need to categorize this stuff; it all boils down to one thing:  The supernatural -- whether we experience it or not.

Excuse me a minute; I'm getting a message from God!

And this is why I will never be able to deny the existence of God or of His activity in the world.  Because I have personally experienced the supernatural -- thousands of times over.

• I have seen thousands of answers to prayer in my lifetime -- at times almost daily.
• I have personally experienced miracles -- occurrences that defy any other explanation. (I will describe one of these miracles in detail in my next post.)
• I have been physically healed many times and have seen the healing of others.
• I have had "visions" in which truth was revealed to me, truth that was always eventually proven, sometimes before the day was out, sometimes within months.
• I have not experienced the paranormal, but I believe the accounts of those who have.  My dad, a lifelong minister in the church, was the go-to guy for exorcisms, and he told me about a few of his first-hand experiences.  His exorcisms were always conducted in the name of Jesus and produced consistent results --"deliverances".  He was also called upon to "cleanse" houses from manifestations like doors that opened and closed on their own, lights going on and off, levitations of furniture, icy-cold zones in the house, etc.  He referred to these as poltergeist (playful ghost) activity, which always ceased when he invoked the name of Jesus -- and never returned.

Is an unseen power trying to communicate with us?  Is it just our imaginations?

I have lately puzzled over the reason for God's apparent selectivity about who gets to experience him and who does not.  I have had friends tell me that they searched diligently for some sort of revelation -- and never got any kind of sign that God was communicating with them in any way.

Do some people just lack the connectivity that it takes to hear from God?

Am I one of the lucky ones who is blessed with a sense of the supernatural?

Does God love some of us more than others?

When I talk with other believers about this, most of them assert that God will always be found by those who seek him with all their hearts.  I'm not so sure.  I know people who have prayed and prayed, and waited and waited, and got nothing.

I don't know.  Maybe some people are just supposed to trust the testimony of others.  If that's the case, I am here telling you now, that there is a God and he sometimes interacts with human beings.  In fact, in my life He is right in the middle of everything.

And that's why I could never not believe in God.  I would have to deny my own senses and my own experiences to dis-believe in Jesus.

It's been said that experience is the greatest teacher.  For my non-believing friends, it seems that the lack of experience is pretty powerful too.  It's how they get to a state of non-belief.

Believe me.

What I Am Learning from Atheists

I have made good on a pledge I made to myself the day I realized that I would not likely ever return to church.  I said that, having spent the first 60 years of my life enjoying the company and serving the needs of believers and religious insiders, I would spend the rest of my life hanging out with non-believers and outsiders.

So Kaye and I started attending meet-ups for freethinkers, agnostics, and atheists (actually, we were doing that before we left the church).  We have made some great friends, and we have met a few real jerks  -- It's just like at church.

Here are some things that believing and non-believing thinkers have in common:

• We are real people who live real lives.  We love, we hate, we are proud, we are humble, we laugh, we cry, and we all make mistakes -- and a few of us admit it.

• There are all personality types in both camps.  It's no different than any other cross-section or grouping of people.  Some people are fun to be with, others are not.

• There are closed-minded, dogmatic people in both camps.  You would think that folks who label themselves as freethinkers would be a bit more willing to entertain another's point of view, but it's not always so.  Atheists can have made-up minds that ignore the facts just as well as religious folks can.

• Both are people of faith.  That may sound like a contradiction in terms, but many of the non-believers I have met are full of faith.  One big unproven thing in which they have a lot of faith is evolution (though they are quite confident about it).  I mean, think about it, they must embrace the idea that we evolved from one-celled slime molds to the intelligent, high-functioning human race that we are today -- by pure chance.  Or rather, by an against-all-odds string of random chances that is nothing short of miraculous.  That is highly counterintuitive and takes more faith than most of us can muster.         On the other hand, many believers take literally every story in the Bible, including an account of a flood that covered the whole earth to wipe out all but eight people and the animals.  There are big logistical problems with that one, but hey, believers are big on miracles.  So both groups are obliged to embrace some really fantastic stuff.

• We make un-deserved and demeaning statements about each other.  Atheists belittle believers as lacking intelligence.  Yet atheists number less than 10% of the US population.  Are they all in the 90th percentile or above in IQ?   No.  So a basic glance at statistics indicates there are are far fewer intelligent people who are atheists than those who are believers.  Both camps are populated by great minds, and both camps are populated by imbeciles.        On the other hand, believers label atheists as evil, angry, unhappy folks who are just mad at God for some reason.  Well, not the ones I know.   My atheist friends are mostly nice, normal people who are out to make the world a better place.  It's probably just the odds, but I have known more angry Christians than angry atheists.

• Both groups come up with some really dumb ideas.  I've heard some really bazaar statements made in both groups.  I once heard an atheist say he couldn't believe in God because a few centuries ago the church castrated the young choir boys to keep their voices high as long as possible.  It must have been a sensitive spot for him.  Still, I think TV and camp meeting evangelists get the prize for the most outlandish zingers made  -- don't even get me started.        On the other hand, both groups are capable of coming up with some really good stuff.   I guess that kinda comes with all personality types being present.

• We look alike.  Believers and non-believers come from the same cross-sections of society (although there are more atheists in academic communities) and really aren't that much different than each other.  You can't tell by looking or listening, and many atheists don't willingly share their minority beliefs in casual settings for fear of unpleasant reprisals.  For believers, it's much like witnessing, but believers have a far greater chance of acceptance simply because they are in the majority.

I have really enjoyed my encounters with free-thinkers, atheists and agnostics, and I'm planning to continue.  Kaye and I have made some friends at these meetings who we hope will be life-long friends.  As an independent thinker, I have found the discussions much more fascinating than those at the church Bible study.  Maybe it's just that at church I've heard it all so many times, re-hashed and re-articulated, but always within the same parameters.  I like thinking outside the box, and have been fortunate to bump into some wonderful outsiders who are like me in that.

Would you like to try something different?  Maybe start with a visit to Meetup.com and do a search for Freethinker, Atheist, Agnostic and see what comes up in your neighborhood.

Disclaimer:  You should really think about whether you are ready for this before visiting such a group.  Are you willing to listen to beliefs and points of view that are radically different than your own?   Truth is a wonderful thing, but it can also be very disturbing if you're not ready for it, and of course, not everything you hear at one of these meetings will be the truth (again, very much like church).  You need to be able to sort things out for yourself -- or with like-minded friends.  What's your motivation for going?  I was looking for some interesting and refreshing conversation with people who didn't always fill in the blanks with religious cliches and pat answers.

Have a good time!   And if you don't have a good time, then try something else.  Maybe just let other people tell you what to believe all your life.  It's a lot easier.

Reviewing the Exile Part 5: Winning the Turf War

This is the conclusion of my thoughtful review of my spiritual journey at the 5-year anniversary of my dismissal from the church.  (Scroll down to read Parts 1 through 4.)

______________

In the winter of 2009 the local congregation split over philosophical issues and 150 people left.  It was a nasty split because the arguments turned into personal attacks.  Dissidents were labelled as rebels by the leadership and were put in their place - and quite disrespectfully.  (Okay, I haven't said anything surprising yet, right?')

The remaining 75 were left with our heads spinning, and Kaye and I were wondering if there was any hope that our life-long church home would rise out of the ashes and once again become a viable force in the spiritual world and the local community.

Six months later, in September of that year, an interim pastor hosted a series of meetings in which the faithful were to re-establish the mission of the church.  His first presentation was a summary of a concept called the Life Cycle of a Church, and we were supposed to plot our location on the bell curve of church progression and see if we could establish a Sigmoid Curve that would be a platform for renewal.  From the visual chart we could easily see what had divided our church (although I was quite aware that we were really two churches under one roof and had been for a long time).

Vibrant and growing churches put a high value on People and Relationships and assume that sound doctrine will follow.  People feel they are loved and cared about, their needs are met, and the church grows.
On the other hand, stable and dying churches put a high value on Structure.  When in competition, sound doctrine, programs, and property win priority over relationships and the needs of the people.  Consequently, people feel they are undervalued and they go elsewhere, and the church stagnates or declines.

Over the previous 20 years our church had slowly polarized between these two camps of people that I call the Progressives and the Traditionalists.

  The Progressives placed a high value on people.  They were visionaries and outreach types.  They wanted to reach the neighbors and maintain an active presence in the community.  They were all about the “Go” factor in the Great Commission and were interested in what happens outside the four walls of the church building.  On a hot summer day you might find them passing out popsicles at the county fair.  Their vision was simple:  " We just want to love people."
To their downfall, they didn’t care much about rules and regulations.

  The Traditionalists were all about what happens inside the four walls.  I have often labeled them as the Fortress types.  On the marquee out front, you will see the word "Come" but never "Go."  They protected the facilities by putting up signs on the walls:  “Please do not take food and drink outside the fellowship hall”,  “No one under 18 may sit in the balcony without supervising parent”,  “Your mother does not work here; please wash your own dishes” in the kitchen, and so on.  They had regulations for every detail of how the place could be used, all the time unaware of how threatening they had made their church environment.  Visitors were afraid to do anything for fear of a reprimand.  Their vision was equally simple:  "We just want to protect this place."

Along with that, preserving the denominational doctrinal distinctives was given high value.

It came time to select the next Senior Pastor, and the masses wanted to promote the incumbent Associate Pastor to the position.  He had been there for over 20 years and he was the young visionary, a people person who cared much more about loving people than he did about following rules.  This man was seen as a champion of the Progressive movement and he was very popular.  But his disregard for the status quo had made him the pariah of the Traditionalists.

The governing board of the church was under the control of the Traditionalists who represented at best a fourth of the constituency, mainly their own families.  They would not allow the congregation to vote on this man for their senior pastor though he was popular with most of the people.

“He’s not a good fit for this church”,  they said when announcing their decision to the congregation, and everybody knew what they meant:  “He is not traditional enough for us.” and furthermore, "We don’t like him (partly because we can't control him)."

And the people, by association, felt that the judgment was being made about them as well.  They did not “fit” at this church anymore and the message was clear:  They were not welcome anymore.   Reluctantly, 150 good people left.

Most of those visionaries joined or started house churches and five years later, only a few have returned to an institutional church.   They invited that popular pastor to be a sort of traveling elder for their house church network, and they support him financially.  Now everybody is happy. 

__________________

Well, back to that September membership meeting where we were learning about the life cycle of a church and that the sign of a dying church is that it puts a high value on Structure rather than People.  Kaye and I looked around the room and saw 40 people whose priority for their church was Structure.  They were intent on protecting their doctrine, their programs, their property, and their sanctuary for the saints.  They were all about the fortress and said so.  “We want this place to be the same familiar place for our kids and grandkids that it was for us.”

No mention of people and relationships; it was all about the institution.

Hope died for Kaye and me that day.  We could see the handwriting on the wall... and on the dry erase board.  We drove home in defeat.  Then we set up a meeting with the interim pastor letting him know that we were not going the direction that the church was apparently going.  As visionaries ourselves, Kaye and I had better ways to spend our remaining time on the planet than doing regular maintenance on a religious machine that was obsolete and no longer viable in the culture except as a safe haven for the saints.  We told him that we would probably only return for special occasions, family events, and such.

He suggested we not come at all.  Seriously.

Well, okay then.  He spoke the honest truth that we had guessed was the case: “You are no longer welcome here.”

So opposing philosophical camps fought over our church, and the Traditionalists won.

Thank God.  They are welcome to it.

I am not a Traditionalist.  I’m not a legalist.  I like to think for myself and ask questions, and I don’t like to be handed pat answers or cliches.  I don’t think God and Christianity can be reduced to pat answers and cliches and rigid doctrines that abruptly end every attempt at intelligent conversation.  And I don't believe that the mission of the church can be carried out by fortifying the traditions that are perpetuated within its four walls.

So, I really do not fit there.

Again, Thank God!

At the last board meeting that I attended subsequent to my resignation as an elder, I was pointing out the realities of the direction they had chosen for the church, when one of my counterparts interrupted me, “Bob, when are you going to give it up?  You guys lost!”

To which I replied, “We all lost; there are no winners here.”

But, five years later, I have made a turnabout and hold the exact opposite view and believe that we were all winners:

• The Traditionals who placed a high value on Structure won their church back and were able to control the direction she would go.  To them the struggle was all about protecting their fortress, and now they had their familiar buildings, property, programs, and doctrinal platform back under control.  And really, it was appropriate that they would be the ones to win that 10-acre corner property, because they were the ones who valued that kind of stuff.

• The Progressive exiles were also the winners, because they didn't put a high value on the buildings and property and traditions.  They were now free to pursue their vision of an incarnate Church that is truly the salt of the earth.  Meeting in their house churches, they do not own church buildings (and the responsibilities that come with that), they do not have a budget, they do not hire staff, they do not sign their names on any denominational statement of faith, and they are not subordinate to any designated leader who assumes authority over them.  Wow, they really do enjoy a lot of freedom!

• I was a Winner too, but not in the way I had hoped.  I had wanted to stay there and spend the rest of my life trying to change the institution from within, and that’s what I would have done if I could have.  That thought just scares the crap out of me now.  If I had not been banished, I probably would still be there.  And I would live out my days in never-ending frustration and disillusionment while fighting the traditional powers that be.  Forever and ever, amen.

I am so happy to be outside now.  I am not sure how I am viewed by those who are still inside, but I feel like an escapee.   As I exited, the door slammed shut behind me and smacked me in the virtual rear end.

It stung for awhile.

But not anymore.

After all, this September I am celebrating five years of liberation!

Footnote:  With a more objective viewpoint now - having been outside the institution for five years, I believe that the growing exodus from the church nationwide is to some extent a departure from exclusivism, and I think it is a healthy movement.  There needs to be a blurring of the lines between the 30,000-plus Christian denominations that have an unavoidable tendency to divide the Body of Christ.

Structure be damned, the church needs to get back to loving people...  at the expense of doctrinal distinctives which must take a back seat to compassion and good will.

When you hear people yearning for the good old days in their particular denomination, know that you are listening to someone who is part of an aging institution that will continue to become less and less relevant to the needy world outside their walls.

Read Reviewing the Exile Part 4 here.

Read Reviewing the Exile Part 3 here.

Read Reviewing the Exile Part 2 here.

Read Reviewing the Exile Part 1 here.

Thank you for reading!

Reviewing the Exile Part 4: Church War PTSD

This is Part 4 in my intentional review of my spiritual position on the 5-year anniversary of my expulsion from church.  (Read Parts 1, 2, and 3 by scrolling down at the bottom.)

I'm hurt.  And I may never be normal again.  The personal and relentless verbal attacks that were launched upon me at the time of my expulsion from the church have left me with latent psychological and emotional issues, a sort of church-fight Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.  These issues are not manifested all the time, only at random and unexpected moments.  More than one social worker has tagged this phenomenon as Post Traumatic Church Syndrome (PTCS), and professional counsellors recognize it as a very real and not uncommon condition.

  After our violent exile from church, the first time that Kaye and I approached the front doors of a neighboring church that we were obliged to attend (because of a family event), we were both suddenly afflicted with upset stomachs and a sense of dread.  Several of our fellow exiles have reported similar symptoms that are brought on by any encounter with the former church setting. These symptoms do not evidence themselves exclusively in association with thoughts or memories of the people who viciously expelled us, they carry over into every aspect of our subconscious beings that may or may not be related to the former church life in any way.  Here are a few that I've seen:

• Anger toward the people who hurt us - and disgust for everything they represent.
• Anxiety issues related to proximity with all things church.  We may get nervous near religious people and institutions.  Church potlucks can even seem threatening now.
• Fear of recurrence.  Avoidance of former church friends.  We spot them in the store and quickly dart to a different department to avoid them and the unpleasantries that might come with a chance conversation with them.
• Antipathy toward worship music.  Listening to Smile FM is repugnant and results in a quick twist of the tuning knob to any other genre of music - even Country!
• Aversion to the Bible.  Some former pastor friends of ours have barely picked it up since their expulsion.  It is associated with the pain they have experienced.
• Resentment toward the entire church world.  Just driving past any church can bring up feelings of angst.  A former pastor friend's daughter gives a wave every time she passes the church that ousted her dad; it's a wave that features the middle finger.
• Reversals of political position.  If the church is for it, I am now against it.
• Avoidance of confrontation.  We take extreme measures to not place ourselves in situations where any kind of reprimand may take place.  At work, at family reunions, in public locations, even on Facebook, we avoid any setting that might result in condemnation.
• Disgust for dogma.  We have been known to de-friend Facebook friends who post radical political or religious rhetoric.
• Contempt for religious cliches, slogans and pat answers.  That stuff just seems sappy now.  Denominational orthodoxies seem hollow and superfluous.

  And finally...

• Disdain for God.  Many victims of church abuse throw the baby out with the bathwater and walk away from God.  Many of the atheists and agnostics that we know personally, were once church members and were deeply injured in some way by their closest friends, and all in the name of some dogmatic religious point of view.

  

  In the past, I did not understand or empathize with people who left the church after being hurt in some conflict.  I remember saying that they should just get over it, that they should make every effort to reconcile with their adversaries, that the church was more important than the feelings of any of its individual constituents.  But I was wrong.

  I have changed my mind.  And, though I have forgiven and gotten past the anger with the folks who abused me, I have discovered that the underlying psychological feelings are not so easily fixed.  Time and space are great healers and my hurts are not an overbearing force anymore, but I will probably have recurring symptoms for the rest of my life.  And I do not blame any of my fellow exiles who demonstrate similar symptoms.

 They can't help it, any more than a traumatized soldier can easily get over the effects of the trauma that he has experienced on the battlefield.

  Nor will they readily return to that dangerous environment.

  The church will never again be a place of pleasant worship or sanctuary for me and my wife and our friends and thousands like us.  Understand this.  And if you are still in that environment, try not to be the next dogmatic bully that calls forth the next fight that results in another battlefield strewn with church fight casualties.

  Put a higher value on the individual than the man-made institution.  Put your relationships ahead of your religious orthodoxies.  Or you may be the one responsible for the next mass exodus and accompanying spiritual and psychological casualties.

And now the good side...

  Those who know me often hear me say, "There's good and bad in everything," and the same is true here, so now I'm going to come back to what's good about church fights and the resulting emotional upheaval. 

  My expulsion from the institution has caused me to examine what's real about my faith.  I have jettisoned the harmful traditions that I grew up with, and I have rejected the oppressive doctrines that give rise to the dogma which encourages the abusive behavior.  (In the church, behavior is often dictated by belief, so a belief in bad doctrine results in bad behavior.)

  The very essence of an exodus is that it leads to freedom.  Though I had to struggle through hell and high water to get here, I would not trade my liberty for anything.  The emotional wounds are reminders of a former life to which I will never return, and I am really happy about that.

  I may have battle scars, but I am free!  So, as my dad used to say, "It's shoutin' time!"

  

Reviewing the Exile, Part 3: A Viable Bible

Since I have left the institutional church, I am able to read and believe the Bible in a way that is honest and viable.  I was not fully allowed to do that when I was an elder in the local parish; before I could register my points of view I had to anticipate how my views would be accepted by the local pastor or other authorities in the church.

Most of my leaders and peers would insist on a literal interpretation of scripture, though none of them really applied it across the board.  There were many inconsistencies and exceptions to their rule; I could list dozens of them off the top of my head, but I'm not going to get started here, although I have cited some of them in earlier posts.

Basically, I concluded a long time ago, that absolute literalists were hypocrites to the extent that they did not apply a literal interpretation to all scripture and lifestyle.

So, I have not held an across-the-board literal interpretation of the Bible for much of my life. Years ago, my dad, a life-long minister in the same denomination, gave me permission to approach the scriptures through a more liberal filter, starting with Genesis chapter one and a creation account that allows for an old universe.

The problem with the liberal approach, of course, is that when you question the application of one passage of scripture, you open all of it to new scrutiny.  Hence, the slippery slope of which conservatives are so fearful.

Over the years I have proved to myself that I do not need to view every verse through the same lens.  In fact, I can be more honest about all of it if I recognize the varying and unique purposes of contrasting passages.  Some of it I see literally, some of it I see symbolically.  Really, the literalists do the same thing - they just don't admit it.

I suppose the danger is real, but that's why God has given us the Holy Spirit "who will lead us into all truth."  God's Old Testament people who wondered how to live right would go to the Law for answers.  God's New Testament people who wonder how to live right go to the Holy Spirit.  This method has worked for me for a lifetime.  Honestly.

Last week I happened upon this beautiful and insightful post from Brian McLaren on Patheos.com that I found very helpful in pinpointing my own position from which I read the Bible.  I copied and pasted his text along with the accompanying chart for the benefit of my readers.  I am a visual thinker, so this was like discovering gold for me.

Here's Brian:

"Earlier this year, I blogged my hunch that this would be the year of the Bible.  I felt we were reaching a tipping point after which the cat would be out of the bag, by which I meant that important conversations about the Bible would escape from the seminary classroom to the local congregation.  With important releases by Adam Hamilton, Peter Enns, Steve Chalke, and many others (including, I hope, my newest book), that hunch seems to be coming true.

Many people, of course, think there are only two ways to read the Bible: their way and the wrong way.  But there are actually multiple options, as this matrix shows.







Within these four general categories there are countless locations or points of view, and many of us move back and forth from one quadrant to another, depending on our mood or context.

There's one other feature to the diagram that's relevant to ways the Bible is being re-thought.  While some people read the Bible as an academic or intellectual exercise only, many of us - as indicated by the shaded circular space that overlaps all four quadrants - read it with some sense of personal need, maybe even desperation.  In this circle, we are seeking guidance and wisdom for how to live our lives because we are aware that as individuals, families, communities, nations, and civilizations, we are always on the verge of tipping over into self-destruction.

In other words, those of us in the gray circle aren't primarily seeking information from the Bible.  Rather, we're seeking meaning, hope, guidance, perhaps even salvation from something that threatens to destroy us.  And -- dare we say it? -- we may even be seeking revelation, some encounter that gets our minds into realities too big to be contained within our minds.  We feel ourselves to be in trouble, in a predicament, on a quest, and we're ever vigilant for news that might help us cope with the mysteries and challenges in which we find ourselves.  So the shaded circle represents a personal or predicamental approach, as opposed to merely an academic, doctrinal, analytic, political, or informational approach.  It can bring people from all four quadrants together.

As a boy, I was introduced to the Bible from the lower left quadrant.  When I got older, I moved to the lower right quadrant and gained new insights.  I was never attracted to the upper left quadrant, but I read many  authors who wrote from that quadrant.  From them I gained the freedom to apply critical thinking to this text that I had come to love.  Finally, I found myself at home in the upper right quadrant, where I can enter the Bible as a library, a literary collection containing poetry, fiction, nonfiction, and other genres, and where I have complete freedom to ask questions about the Bible's sources, development, internal tensions, biases, accuracy, cultural context, and genre.  In my movement from quadrant to quadrant, I have remained in that shaded circle of reading personally, because I still feel myself deep in the mysteries, dangers, and wonders of the human predicament."
(End McLaren's text)

My Position on the Matrix

Now I am going to tell you that, for the most part, I think my own location on this chart is the lower right: Innocent/Literary.  Though I have thought about it many times and am not afraid to ask questions, I don't really care about the reliability of the source or cultural context of the scriptures, because I have a personal relationship with the Lord through the Holy Spirit that bears witness to the validity (I didn't say "inerrancy") of the Bible.  The proof is in the pudding, if you will (I'm inside the gray inner circle of experience on the chart).  I have personally experienced miracles and countless answers to prayer.  As with almost all people, my experience influences my beliefs.  Hence, my position on the chart is Innocent.

Further, I have never really interpreted all of the scripture in a literal manner, so my position is also Literary because I allow that much of scripture may be poetic or allegorical and not meant to be taken at face value.

The big picture is important to me.  I believe in the Redemption Story of the Bible.  I have experienced it in my life a thousand times over.  This is reality for me, so I am not troubled by the many inconsistencies of the scriptures; I filter them through the cross and the redemption of Christ -- and my own experience.

Since leaving the church I no longer feel the pressure to conform to the platform of my literalist friends.  I never did conform, really, being the independent thinker that I am, but there was always a pressure for unanimity (called "unity") in the church that came from the pulpit and from my fellow constituents, and that is not present where I am now in the post-church wilderness (although it sometimes rears its ugly head in Facebook posts).

So, where do you find yourself on the chart?  Do you actually "move back and forth from one quadrant to another, depending on... mood or context" as McLaren says?  Have you  migrated from one place on the matrix to another during your lifetime?

This is good stuff, man!

Here's the link to McLaren's original post.

Reviewing the Exile Part 2: Exposing the Pyramid Scheme

When I left the institutional church I was overtaken by an unexpected feeling of freedom and well-being.  Puzzled at first, I finally decided that it could have risen from the fact that I was no longer under the authority of some self-appointed hierarchy of religious pretenders.  I recognized their fake world of ordinations, appointments, and degrees for what it was, a fabricated framework of in-authentic pontifications contrived from a few unholy and exegetic extrapolations.  It was an un-sanctified pyramid scheme built from the top down on anti-humility and anti-servanthood, by anti-Christ-like power lords, a sort of decree issued from ivory towers by self-inflated scholars, bishops, chancellors and presidents.

Why do we not get the picture? Jesus clearly banned religious hierarchy the night that he washed the disciples' feet.   "You know that the rulers in this world lord it over their people.  But among you it will be different.  Whoever wants to be a leader among you must be your servant.... "(Matt 20:25-26)

This is ridiculous!

When one exits the system, he removes himself from the pseudo-authority that parades itself with some sort of self-proclaimed "God-ordained" but imaginary anointing.

To the outsider, we are all priests - to one another and to the Lord; all the parts of the Body are answerable directly to the Head which is Christ. (Eph 4:15)  No believer has authority over another.  We are all stones being built up into a spiritual house. (I Pet 2:5)

The foundation of real spiritual authority forever continues to be humble servanthood like that of Christ, and it is bestowed first upon God's favorite humans, the poor, the weak, and the least of these.  It is demonstrated by random acts of love and kindness and mercy every day, and it starts as a grassroots thing, originating in the ditches of everyday humanity and growing upward from there.  Hear me: real spiritual authority never starts at the top and works its way down by means of some corporate chain-of-command.  That would be exactly what Jesus said should not happen. (Matt 20:25-26)  Again, the church has turned Jesus on his head, becoming everything that he decried in the pharisees who paraded around in fancy attire so others could bow to them.

I am loving the living in a world of outsiders, unpowerful folks who do not tell others what to do or how to live.  None of us is infallible, none perfect, none lording it over others.  It's the world that Jesus was hoping for.  It's redemptive, it's pure, it's counter-religious.  Jesus would love it here; it's the kingdom of God on earth that he prayed for. (Matt 6:10)

It is authentic, and it is right, and I love it here.

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Now a reminder to pastors and leaders who are still in the institution:

 Your spiritual authority is not bestowed upon you by some council or bishop who presides from the next level above you, and it never flows from your submission to the powers-that-be in your denomination or church.  It springs from the bottom up as you submit yourself to the Lord and serve the people in humility, never lording it over another human being from a position of man-made power.  Your church authorities are appointed or elected by other human beings and their power is not God-ordained at all.  Don't confuse spiritual authority with institutional authority.  It is a mistake to assume that you are suddenly and automatically endowed with spiritual authority when you are appointed to a position in the church.  That is just unholy crap!
Mind you, an organization needs to be organized, and a top-down, pyramidal system is fine for that.  It works well in the world of the corporation, the military, the schools, and even in religious institutions, but it is not sacred, holy, or ordained by God.  To spiritualized it, building a submission-to-authority doctrine out of it by proof-texting scripture is heresy and is anti-Christ.  Let me say it again:
  The doctrine of a scriptural, God-ordained, top-down, pyramid-shaped hierarchy in the church is heresy and should be de-bunked. 

The clergy-laity split is one more divisive boundary that needs to be erased (see my previous post: Erasing the Boundaries).

The first shall be last, and the last shall be first. (Matt 19:30)  Keep that in mind for a great career in service to the masses.  And have fun!

(This is part 2 of my 5-year review of my life since being exiled from the church in 2009.  To read part 1, scroll down to the next post or click here.)

Reviewing the Exile, Part 1: Erasing the Boundaries

This is part of a 5-year review of my unexpected spiritual journey into the post-church wilderness.  It was five years ago that my local church blew up and I found myself  - along with 150 of my church friends - on the outside.  What I am sharing here is part of an intentional re-evaluation of my spiritual direction since my exile from the evangelical world.  What began as a 6-month sabbatical has stretched into a 5-year absence... and counting.

There are some things I have learned while on this journey....

Part One:  Erasing the Boundaries.

"He drew a circle that shut me out,

Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout,

But love and I had the wit to win,

We drew a circle and took him in."

                        -- Edwin Markham, Outwitted.

My dad quoted this poem several times in his sermons that I heard over the first 18 years of my life.  He was preaching about Godly love, about forgiveness and acceptance, about love for the unlovable.  It was a lifestyle that he lived himself.  Gene Sims was known as a magnanimous fellow, the kind that took notice of needy individuals from every strata of society, without regard for social status or wealth or intellect.  He taught his kids this respect for everybody.  He drew a large circle that took everybody in.  It was probably what made it possible for him to continue to embrace his own son - when my brother came out of the closet in his mid-thirties.  Dad just drew his circle a bit bigger - and took Ron in, along with his many gay friends and partners.  Amazing.

Actually, Dad may have moved beyond the theme of his favorite poem...

Like Jesus, he erased the circles entirely.

In his sermons, Jesus made it clear that only God was to judge people, that humans were never to judge each other.  "Do not judge, and you will not be judged.  Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned.  Forgive, and you will be forgiven." (Luke 6:37)  Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?" (Matt 7:3)

If Jesus drew a circle, it was a very large one.  He was called the "friend of sinners" because he hung out with outsiders (probably because they throw better parties).  Like Jesus, I am planning to spend the rest of my life making no differentiation between insiders and outsiders.  The wheat (believers) and the tares (nonbelievers) look exactly alike, after all.(Matt 13:24-30)  Well, to be honest, since I spent my first 60 years almost entirely with insiders, I would really like to spend much of the rest with outsiders.  There's just less expectation going on, less tension, less pressure to measure up, more acceptance.

There is a mathematical concept called the Bounded Set which has a circle with points located both inside and outside the circle.  This is rather like the evangelical world today.  The whole environment - from the church service, Bible study, Christian summer camp sermon, prayer meeting, discussion group, TV and radio broadcast, song and book - yes, thousands of books - is all about who is in and who is out.  "Are you saved? (are you inside the fold?)"  "Are you faithful about daily devotions?"  "Are you tithing?"  "Did you vote Republican?"  Boundaries everywhere.

Yet, only God judges who is in and who is out.

There is another concept called the Centered Set.  This set has no divisive circle, only a bold point at the very center, then smaller points located on a field all around the center, some close, some farther away.  This is more the way I think about my earthly journey now.  I can be living in such a way that, not only am I moving closer to the center (God) but I can be helping others move closer to the center as well.  But nobody gets to declare when another is inside or outside based on their closeness or their distance from the center.  There may be a circle that God alone has established, but none of us sees the circle or knows where it is, because none of us has the right to judge another.  We must live in total mystery regarding any invisible boundary that God has established.  That frees us to "be merciful, just as your Father is merciful" (Luke 6:36)  "Because He is kind to the ungrateful and wicked." (Luke 6:35)  

God is kind to the ungrateful and wicked!  Let the same be said of me!

When Paul spoke to the Athenians about the "unknown god", he included them all inside God's circle.  He was speaking to gentiles and non-believers when he said, "God is not far from each one of us... For in him we live and move and have our being." (Acts 17:28)

This sounds like the centered set.  Everybody is present, at varying distances from the center, and nobody knows where the boundary is between in and out.

Now, here's the thing:  God apparently operates with a centered set and is the only one who knows when someone is in or out.

And here's the other thing:  The evangelical church operates mostly with the bounded set, drawing circles, making judgements every Sunday morning, and invitations to sinners to cross the next line and become an insider.  For the most part, it is oppressive  and keeps a lot of folks feeling guilty and worried and insecure.  It's a dangerous environment to be part of, even if you like to think for yourself like I do.

Now back to me:  One of the most wonderful things that has happened to me since leaving the institutional church has been the erasure of those circles.  I see everybody as the same: fallible, imperfect human beings deeply loved by God.  My job as a believer is simple:  Love.  And leave the hard judgements up to the Lord.

When Jesus said his yoke was easy and his burden was light, he really meant it.  I can testify to it.  I feel free and unburdened, because, despite the evangelical message, "there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." (Romans 8:1)  There is nothing I need to do for God but love people - people of all kinds.  Paul said the entire Law was summed up in a single command:  Love your neighbor. (Gal 5:14)

Join me.  Erase the circles, like Jesus did.  Assume that every human being is on the playing field somewhere, and go from there.

Love without judgement and without boundaries.  Just love.

Erasing the exclusive circles does not come easily for the evangelical community, but there are many, like my dad, who have set the pace.  "There's a wideness in God's mercy!" Let there be a wideness in our lives as well.

*For an excellent explanation of churches with Bounded and Centered Sets see Jeremy Myers here.

Dreamwalker, the Book I Couldn't Put Down

  It took me 11 hours to read my late brother's novel straight through, all 423 pages of suspenseful fantasy.  I was spellbound by the vivid descriptions, intricate plot, and the adventurous flow of the story.  And I was awe-struck by the vocabulary of the author.

  If you read my previous post, you may recall my suspicion that Jerry was dumbing-down his working vocabulary for the benefit of the rest of us, his listeners and readers.  Now I'm sure of it.  This book removes all doubt that he was a verbal genius.  When you read it you may want to have a dictionary within reach (but it will fail you when you get to the words he conjured up).  What a word extravaganza this book is!  Don't get me wrong; it's not a difficult read, just a long one.  And well worth the effort.

  The book is a fantasy that features some dreamwalking apprentices who are called upon to explore the king's dreams when a threat to the kingdom is suspected.  There are castles, monsters, sorcery, and dirty-double-crossers that will be appreciated by fans of The Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter epics.

  I have never been one who reads fantasy.  I am a bit too practical to be spending my time on made-up stories.  But this one changed my mind.

  I only wish that there was a chance for a sequel. Unfortunately, Jerry passed away 3 days after the release of his novel.  He actually never got to hold a copy in his hand, a 20-year project that was realized too late for his satisfaction.  

  But it is not too late for the rest of us.  I highly recommend this book to anybody who is a fan of mystery, magic, and adventure.  And I also suggest that reluctant readers of fiction, like me, give it a try.  I don't think you'll be disappointed.  In fact, you may want to have snacks within reach in case you get so engrossed in the story that you forget to stop for meals.  It's that good!

Buy the book on Amazon here, or the Kindle version here.

A Tribute to my Brother, Jerry Sims

My brother, Rev. Gerald Sims, passed away on February 11, 2014, after a long struggle with cancer.  This is some stuff I want to say about him.

First of all,  Jerry was smart.  I was not particularly aware of this until we were teenagers.  Jerry was a year-and-a-half younger than me, and I remember when it first dawned on me that he was unusually intelligent.  We were riding in the back seat of the family station wagon along the freeways of Detroit’s downriver area where Dad was a pastor, probably on the way to a Bible quiz meet where Jerry was a star quizzer,  and on the way,  Jerry was figuring out the square roots of the license numbers of the cars we were passing.  Pocket calculators weren’t the thing yet then, and he didn’t need paper and pencil;  Jerry was doing all the calculations in his head.  I knew what a square root was, but I certainly didn’t consider it fun or entertaining to figure them out as a pastime while riding in the car.   I was still playing the ABC game.

Jerry loved words too.

Maybe this is why it struck me as especially diabolical that the cancer that eventually attacked his brain was first discovered in the mathematical center and then in the areas that controlled language and vocabulary.  That just wasn’t fair.

Early in his brain cancer journey, I recall asking Jerry if the tumor gave him a headache.  He paused a minute, searching for the right word, and then smiled.  “Why couldn’t I think of the word aspirin,” he said, “all that would come to me was ‘analgesic’”.  It occurred to me then, that he had probably been condescending to the rest of us all his life verbally, not wanting to sound like a geek by using the sophisticated vocabulary of which he was capable.  His condition had compromised his ability to dumb down his speech for the rest of the world.

Secondly, if respect is one possible manifestation of love, Jerry was a loving man.  He was not an emotional person or a sentimental softie like me, but many of you know that he was infallibly courteous and respectful.  I think that any time emotional love is inappropriate in the Body of Christ and in the world, respect is the most appropriate substitute, and Jerry was good at it.  I rarely ever heard him speak a critical word about anybody.

Pastors usually have one or two nemeses in their constituency whose spiritual calling is to get in the way of progress and do it as nastily as possible.  Even when Jerry was being assailed by an attacker who was viciously attempting to destroy his reputation and his career, he refused to utter a critical word about that person, even in his own defense.  I was amazed.

That was a demonstration of godly respect,  of sacrificial love.

Thirdly, if the word “liberal” means generous, Jerry was a liberal man. He was neither a legalist nor a judge of anybody.  And he was an advocate for the underdog.  That’s a family trait, by the way.

Those of you who attended my Dad’s funeral six years ago may remember Jerry telling the story of the superintendent who told Dad early in his ministry that he was a pastor who was 20 years ahead of his time.  Jerry then pointed out that all Dad’s kids were cursed with the same trait.  Later I offered an alternate perspective: Dad was not a man ahead of his time, just a minister who had enlisted in an evangelical denomination that was running 20 years or more behind the times.  As evidence for my theory I pointed out that, after Bible College, before he showed up at his first church, a circuit at Bliss and Pellston, Dad had been told that his wife would have to remove her wedding ring - jewelry was considered worldly, you know.  Well, she did, but eight years later, when they moved down to the city, Mom put her wedding ring back on... and nobody confronted her about it, and it ceased to be an issue in the Missionary Church after that.

Dad and Mom set the pace for the Sims family in being liberal.  Non-judgmental folks who respected everybody, regardless of status, gender, or orientation.  And Jerry took it even further.

I recall a few years ago when Jerry and I sat in lawn chairs at my campsite at Brown City Camp talking about what it would take to get the last restrictions on women in ministry removed from the constitution of the Missionary Church.  He said it could start with a resolution from a local church board.  I knew that there was no way that the conservative rural church board and pastor I was serving with at the time would support such a motion, but Jerry said the folks at New Hope would.  And he was right.  The resolution passed unanimously there and worked it’s way through the denominational system... and failed, of course, but that didn’t matter; at least he had tried, and church leaders had had to discuss and question their traditions again.  Yes, Jerry was a second generation liberal in a conservative denomination.

The liberal folks at New Hope will verify my observation here that Jerry was respectful, generous, and loving, a pastor who would affirm the gifts at work within men and women equally and without restriction.

Next, Jerry was a writer and author.  He wrote mostly novels, of which his first and foremost was a fantasy fiction mystery called Dreamwalker which was just released to the public a few days ago on February 8th.  You can find it on Amazon in a paperback for $16.99 or Kindle $7.99 if you like stories of adventure and intrigue.

His latest and unfinished work is a book called The Cannibal Church, which is centered around that common phenomena in our post-Christian culture:  the one new church in every town that is growing - at the expense of the other older churches in town.  Though Jerry will never complete it, probably any small town pastor living and working in the shadow of a mega church will be familiar enough with the topic to contribute to the content of that work.  Of course, that one will be non-fiction.

Finally - and this is on the lighter side - Jerry was a prankster.  I remember his practical jokes starting during the college years when he became the scourge of the pop can pyramid.  Pop can pyramids went through a popular phase while Jerry was at Bethel College, and the guys in the next room had one that he attacked several times, usually when the weather was mild and the windows were open.  One time he climbed out his window to the fire ledge when they were at class, inched his way along the outside of the building and threaded a string through the pop cans which were neatly stacked on the window sill almost to the ceiling.  He looped the string around the bottom can and then returned to his room holding the string.  Listening as the guys next door returned to their room and settled in at their desks for some studying, he pulled on the string...  and heard the delightful crash of 100 pop cans to the floor.  I think an earth tremor - in Indiana - was blamed for the incident.

For his grand finale, only last year, Jerry planned and executed an elaborate plan to fake a car wreck with sound effects while talking on the cell phone with an unsuspecting friend.  He called from the church parking lot which he had outfitted with props for breaking glass and smashing metal, and he had enlisted several of the youth who were on hand to assist with the effects.

And then he left before anybody could even the score.

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So these are a few of the essential traits that my brother possessed that bear witness to a life well lived.  As I mentioned earlier, it is a good thing for those who knew him to come together as we are today to give tribute to a wonderful man.

But there is an even greater tribute that we can offer, and that is to assimilate into our lives the characteristics that we admired in him.  It is an appropriate tribute to point out that he was a generous liberal.  A better tribute would be to become more generous ourselves.  If it was good for Jerry, it will be good for us - and will make the world a better place.

It would be fine to remember him as a courteous and respectful person, but even finer to become more loving ourselves.

It would be right to notice that he was an advocate for the underdog and the underprivileged.  It would be even more right to carry on that advocacy ourselves.

As far as being intelligent.  Uh, I’m not sure we can help ourselves on that one.  If you don’t want to factor the square roots of license plate numbers, in your head, well... maybe at least learn to play chess or work a crossword puzzle if it seems good to you.

And, uh,  I’m not suggesting anyone should aspire to become a practical joker - unless your friendships are very durable.

If you are a pastor,  like Jerry you will do well to aspire to lead a small humble congregation and give personal attention and build life-long relationships, rather than to cast a vision for the super church - which is all too often just a vision of grandeur.

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Jerry spent his entire adult life after college in ministry.  He invested every day of his life living out the Great Commandment: to love God and love people.  He demonstrated his love for the Lord, by serving people.  I say it again:  that was a life well-lived.

My brother, Gerald Sims, was a great man in a humble skin, a kind and gentle man.  And I love him and miss him already.

Thank you.