I’m in dire need of a purging of my mind, so here it goes......
In the United States, the past few months have been full of controversy. Confederate flags, homosexual marriage, and church shootings have been at the top of the list for every news station across the nation. I can barely force myself to look at my Facebook feed because the controversy spills over onto social media until its saturated with hurtful, argumentative, angry words that offer no room for productive conversation. Generally speaking, it seems like the Christian community has been blindly throwing out Bible verses like hand grenades, seeking to level anything in their path and prove their point in 140 characters or less. (I said GENERALLY speaking - I have read some very thoughtful and sensitive Christian perspectives on these topics.) This - the grenade-throwing - provokes the eye-rolling of non-believers as well as those believers who’d prefer to see a conversation with a lot less mud-slinging and a lot more compassion.
Let me pause here to make it very clear that I am indeed a follower of Christ. My faith is the cornerstone of my life; everything is built around it. But no matter how central my relationship with Christ is in my life, that doesn’t make the circumstances of life as simple as some Christians would have me believe. I’ve had to fight tooth and nail for my faith, and that makes it all the more priceless to me. Even though I believe in the Bible, I also believe that life is excruciating, and sometimes it’s impossible for me to apply a chunk of Scripture to my dilemma at hand, click my heels 3 times, and have my joy magically restored. It’s not that simple.
I was raised in a church where things were black and white. There was no in-between, no gray, no sitting on the fence. No swearing, not even the occasional “piss” or “hell”. No drinking, not even a glass of wine on your anniversary. No skipping a church service, even if you were running a 105 degree fever and had boils covering your body. No listening to any genre of music other than Southern Gospel. If the band name included anything other than a surname, they were out of the running for song selection. You get the picture.... the rules were hard and fast. Even though I now understand that these rules were over-the-top legalistic, it made things simple. Why? Because it caused me to disengage my brain. If I stuck to God’s rules, abided by His code, then I would get into heaven free and clear, no questions asked. But in disengaging my brain, it was a huge detriment to my faith. I wasn’t “allowed” to doubt or question. (Yes, looking back, I realize that a lot - but not all - of these rules had at least minimal scriptural basis and were intended to keep me from harm.) In my youth, I offered up a few questions, and quickly realized that those questions, too, were against the rules. It lessened my view of who God was because I deduced Him down to an intolerant, ungracious, rule-slinging monarch. It seemed like those who I looked to for answers were afraid that God couldn't stand up to my adolescent skepticism. And it took me almost a full decade to “un-train” my brain, to realize that God is so much more than a score-keeping rule-maker, and that He isn't intimidated by my skeptical heart.
In my pride-filled immaturity, I made the horrific mistake of conveying this idea of God to those around me. I was a college freshman convinced that my community college was my new mission field, and that I was going to bring “truth” to my fellow classmates. A few listened to me while I told them why I didn’t swear, or why I chose to attend church services approximately 3.1 times a week, or why I would never, EVER drink an alcoholic beverage (again). I had close friends that confided in me the life-changing struggles that they were facing. Instead of acknowledging the reality, pain, and enormity of their struggles, I simplified them. I retrieved a few Bible verses from memory, quoted a rule to correlate with those Bible verses, then spewed words that reflected nothing but legalism, hatred, and a blatant lack of grace and love. There’s a long list of those I’ve wounded in my zealous ignorance. I’m in the process of forgiving myself for wounding so many others.
That list of people that I wounded has resurfaced over the past several months. This year has been the hardest year of my life. I experienced a wound more severe than I ever thought possible. I look back at the people that I've wounded, and it makes me nauseous to think that I could've caused them the level of pain that I'm experiencing right now. To steal the lyrics of an old hymn, “this has been the darkest night my soul has ever seen.” I’ve had some people tell me to “just forgive” or “it’s time for you to move on.” I appreciate the sentiment, but it’s not that easy. I know that I am commanded by Christ to forgive. But I refuse to do what I once did - disengage my brain - just to say that I was blindly obedient. Even though there's something honorable about blind faith, for me wrestling with truth and life causes me to put even more stock in the faith that I cling to so dearly. Forgiving is not that easy for me. So when I do forgive, it’s not a few cheap, heartless words that I toss out without a thought. When I forgive, it comes after hours and weeks and possibly months of struggle. When I forgive, it’s worth something to me, and hopefully to the one I’m forgiving. Forgiving, to me, isn’t that simple.
Just like forgiving isn't that simple for me, it's not simple for me to blast my lack of acceptance for homosexuality across social media when some of my openly gay and lesbian friends exhibit more authentic love, compassion, grace, and mercy toward others than some of my proclaiming Christian friends do. Yes, I know that I have to demonstrate the same grace to my Christian allies as I do to my homosexual friends. But still, it's not that simple.
I’m not as careless as I once was. Believe it or not, I hold my tongue more often than I let it loose. I watch people and try to understand them much more often than I attempt to judge and offer “advice.” And I’d like to think that I’ve learned a few things in this walk of life. Primarily, I’ve learned that things usually aren’t as simple as the church would like them to be. I still believe in right and wrong. I still believe in sin. I believe in Heaven and Hell and Satan and the Holy Spirit. And most importantly, I believe in the redemptive power of the blood of Christ. I stand by the Apostle's Creed.
I also believe that homosexuality is real, not just a choice or a character defect that can be explained away by a few traumatic childhood events and a wild college frat party. I believe that alcoholism is a disease that can grip even the strongest will. I believe that depression and mental illness can overwhelm a person to the point of despair, no matter how many times they recite verses or entire books of the Bible. I can understand how a single mom can feel so helpless that she makes the choice to abort her unborn baby. I can understand how a husband feels so unwanted by his wife that he turns to another to meet his needs. I can understand why the abused child struggles with forgiveness, even well into adulthood. Do I support these things? No. I haven’t experienced every one of these things firsthand. But I can try to empathize. I can have compassion and extend grace to my brothers and sisters. I’ve played the role of the judgment-casting hate-monger, and it’s ruined more relationships than I care to admit. I can say with certainty that my former lack of compassion didn't convince anyone that Jesus was the answer they were looking for.
Now, I just acknowledge that life isn’t simple. Wounds, struggles, addictions, sin... they’re not simple things that can be “fixed” in a 30-minute counseling session. Sometimes they require your sweat and blood and tears. And even after you’ve put in the work, you still have to wrestle with your identity, your relationships, and your faith. That’s not simple stuff. I recently read an article that echos my heart: "It is OK if we don't understand everything fully. The problem arises when we settle for easy answers rather than wrestle for real truths."
I've committed to wrestle for the real, hard truths. Because real life is worth so much more than settling for the simple way out. And real truth, real healing, real resolve, is worth so much more when we're willing to dive in deep to find it.
