Speaking of Heresy

My "new" car is fantastic. I am so happy with it. The only things wrong with it are that I have no (working) way to plug my ipod into the sound system, and . . . it has a tiny, well-nigh tasteful, American flag sticker in the lower left hand corner of the rear window.

That's the heretical part of course--that having an American flag sticker stuck on my car would be "wrong." I don't know. I guess I just spent too long in the down-and-out East End of London to be comfortable with iconography that identifies me with one specific ethnic group or nation. Ever since my uncle came out with the album and song "Citizen of Heaven" (what? you've never heard of it? yeah . . . it was kind of like my book: worth it, but obscure) and I realised that was an actual Bible verse, I have had a little trouble being patriotic. (Either that or it gave me an excuse not to be.) Yes, I am an American, and I appreciate the freedoms that I have, and I daresay I take many of them for granted. I just have a little trouble wanting that to be my identity--the thing I'm known for.

When I was a little kid, living in Honduras, I thought the USA was Heaven. After all, we had to fly to get there. Through clouds and everything! Plus, everyone spoke English (i.e., I could understand them) and we could drink water directly from the taps instead of having to boil it first. After we moved back here, however, my attitude started slowly but surely to shift. I guess that happens when you've been exposed to another culture at an early age--even if you spend that early age trying to resist it (stupidly, I refused to learn Spanish). You just realise that there are other people out there and other ways of doing things, and while you may still prefer your way, the lines dividing cultures and nationalities get to feeling really arbitrary and frustrating. At least they did to me.

I've been reading Jeremiah lately. That book is fascinating to me, in part because Jeremiah was so faithful to God, and God was so faithful to him, but he ended up feeling disappointed with how God was demonstrating His faithfulness a lot of the time. Sometimes he just wished God would leave him alone--that he didn't have these words burning a hole in his heart and his tongue that he just had to speak but which got him in heaps (or cisterns) of trouble every time he opened his mouth. I haven't hung out in a cistern lately, and hope not to . . . ever, but there are still some things about this guy that I resonate with, I guess.

The other thing I find fascinating, though, is his message. Here he is, going to the priests and prophets and leaders of a country whose claim to identity was having been hand-chosen by God. They are telling the people, "God's not going to abandon us. Look--His Temple's here. That's His house. He won't let anything happen to that--or to us, either. We are the people of God." And Jeremiah's saying back, "Um, guys? Stop hiding behind this Temple and these religious practices, okay? God knows you haven't really been worshiping Him in a while now--all these idols and stuff instead--and He's getting ready to send in the Babylonians to take you all away for a good long time."

("No He isn't"--"Yes He is"--"No He isn't" . . . )

"So here's what you have to do. You've got to cooperate with the foreign army. Let them in, abide by their laws, go where they tell you, and seek their good, and you'll be spared. If you resist? It's not going to turn out so great for you."

Somehow, the people didn't like this message all that much. And I think I understand why not. For one thing, it sounds heretical. Here they are, the people of God, being told to capitulate to a bunch of heathens. (Never mind that they've been worshiping idols in tandem with God for a long time now.) To make matters worse, the guy that's telling them this is saying that God is telling them to do this. It's another one of those, "God wouldn't say that," moments, like "Go marry a prostitute" (Hosea) and "I'm going to form a child in your womb so it looks like you got pregnant out of wedlock in a culture where that's not okay--okay?" (Mary). Sometimes God asks us to do stuff which is according to His plan, His wisdom, His goodness . . . but it doesn't sound Biblical, if you will.

This message of Jeremiah sounded treasonous--well it was treasonous--and the assumption was that treason against the nation was treason against God, but the fact was, it wasn't. The nation had run away from God a long time ago, and the only way to get any of them back was to send them away for a while and stoke up the fires of repentance and true faith and God-seeking and character-building that God wanted.

I got to thinking about this. I got to imagining modern-day equivalents. I thought about how there are plenty of people in this country who don't believe in God, or believe in different gods, or are open about not caring less whether there is a God or not. But there are also a lot of people in this country who do believe in God and for better or worse are convinced this country once was a Christian nation and that it needs to become so again. I started imagining what would happen if some Christian somewhere began telling everyone that, say, extremist Muslims were going to take over the USA, and that we should let them. It doesn't just sound like we're giving up our national freedoms (which some people seem to equate with, like, the fruits of the Spirit or something anyway). It sounds like we're capitulating to the spiritual enemy. It sounds like by that very action we'd be denying our faith in Christ. Doesn't it?

I'm not saying that's what's going to happen. I'm not Jeremiah. As far as I know, God did not wake me up this morning to tell my occasional blog-readers to get ready for a terrorist influx by giving into it. (And I should probably also say, for any Muslim friends of mine who might be reading this, I am not tarring all Muslims with the same brush, but I think we both know there are people of that faith who want to take over the world by shari'a law, and that such a law does not exactly grant equal treatment to people of other faiths. Certainly such impulses exist within aspects of "Christianity" and Buddhism and Hinduism, too, but extremist Muslims seem to me a little more global with theirs at the moment.)

What I think I am saying is, I think it's easy to mix up nationality and national rights and privileges with Christianity, and I don't think they're the same thing. And while fighting for universal rights and freedoms is likely a good thing, I don't think they, as political constructs and national benefits, are as important to God as they are to us or as we think they are to Him. And sometimes I wonder, if there were to come another Jeremiah, whether we'd think he wasn't the anti-Christ and throw him in a well or something.

Don't Hate Me Because I'm . . . Complicated

I used to go to a church where I was more liberal than most of the members. Now I go to one where I'm more conservative . . . at least on some issues. For the last two or so years I've had an on-again, off-again complex friendship with the Milk Guy, a man with whom I think I have a moderately deep connexion, but with whom I share very little in terms of background or faith. I had cancer for a while but (fortunately) nothing much came of it. And, though I am not a really great cook on any terms, I tend to cook better Indian food than American. These are just some of the ways that I suspect I don't live up to expectations . . . and I'm okay with that. (Today, anyway!)

This afternoon I shall be adding to my resume of weirdness by going on video record with my views on marijuana. One of the young men who grew up in the church I work for, but who currently . . . well . . . doesn't, is going to film school and is doing a documentary about pot. "I already have people to interview who are for it," he said. "I thought you might have another perspective." He is undoubtedly right, although my perspective may still not be exactly what he (or anybody else) anticipates. In any case, in a weird sort of way I feel kind of pleased and honoured to have been asked. If this documentary ends up on Youtube and I end up not looking too stupid and/or reactionary, I'll share the link so you can find out what I said. In the meantime, I did talk about pot once at A Wandering Line . . .

Beyond Settling

So really. How do you know when you're supposed to be content with something, seize the opportunity available instead of the one you might have wanted, and take things as they come, versus when you're supposed to hold out for something better? How do you know the difference between contentment, resignation, and settling? I've asked these kinds of questions before. Here's a new context for them.

You may have noticed that I keep obliquely mentioning I need to replace my car. Bela Corolla, serviceable as he has been, is rather ailing these days. Even though three years ago he got all new brakes, new tires, a new battery and a new starter, and even though last year he got his wheels re-applied (when they almost fell off) and a couple of other things, this year he's burning oil so that I have to put at least a quart in every week, I can't see how fast I'm going at night (due to all the interior lights having died), and the struts are shot. The car basically clunks along, no matter how smooth the road surface . . . and in Central Massachusetts the road surface is not always very smooth (regardless of ongoing attempts to fix this). There are also more minor cosmetic issues, like the fact that when a droplet of water hits a fabric surface in the car, it spreads to an unremovable stain 1000 times its size. And the fact that one of the lights on the passenger's side is taped on with packing tape.

Car-Shop-Dave, from my church, has been helping me in my quest for a replacement vehicle, and the other day when they were moving cars around at his dealership, he discovered a 2005 Nissan Altima with only 52,000 miles and an excellent Carfax, that he thought would be just what I was looking for. Even though they want to sell it to me for $1000 more than the maximum price I was willing to pay (since I am not entirely sure I have the money for this venture to begin with), yesterday I went in to look at the car.

As soon as I sat in it, I uttered an involuntary sigh, and thought to myself, "I had no idea my car was so uncomfortable!" Car-Shop-Dave and his car shop let me take it home for the night so I could have my mechanics check it out this morning, and naturally, the more I drove it, the more I loved it. But . . . it is still $1000 more than I was willing to pay for it. And . . . I discovered that Bela's trade-in value is only $1000. Not only are all those things wrong that I mentioned before, but I'm sure my Corolla's Carfax tells all and sundry that one particularly rough year, I crashed him. Twice.

There are people who would say God doesn't care about my car needs, mundane as they are, and I'm not one who subscribes to "prosperity gospel." (I find it kind of horrifying, honestly.) However, I do believe He cares about the details of our lives, and I also believe He is able to do, as the Bible says a few times "more than we ask or imagine." I have a pretty good imagination, so that's saying something.

So let's say I had this pipe dream of an expressly environmentally-friendly, safe car which I could somehow get for under $10,000, at payments of only $200 a month. Unlikely, but God can do anything, right? So . . . do I hold out for this? Or, when the opportunity arises to get a car with an excellent reputation and history, which is more comfortable and more spacious than I could have hoped for, but which costs slightly more than I had wanted, and when my car's trade-in value is less than I'd hoped for (though honestly probably better than I should've expected), and they tell me I can make payments of $202 per month, do I take it? Does $202 count as "more than $200 a month"? Or is this some kind of divine dig-in-the-ribs, where God's saying, "Oh no, darling--you don't get out of making an actual decision that easily." (Interestingly, today I saw a car with a license plate saying "UDCIDE." It felt a little more personal than the last one. Who are these people?) Another factor is that the dealership's interest rate isn't that good for financing, but my bank that could give me a better one apparently doesn't deal with them. On the other hand, the car's so good that if I don't decide to buy it by tomorrow at 2 p.m., the dealership owner wants it.

So really. What am I supposed to do? I'm asking. This car's pretty great. I want it. I do. But it's kind of none of the things I asked or imagined. Does this mean I'm settling, or that it's more than I asked or imagined? It doesn't feel like more. It just feels like different.

I have less than 24 hours to figure this out.

Echos of Last Year

In response to my last post, Jeff commented, "A common thread in these dreams is the idea that you've got a medical issue that part of you knows needs to be checked out but some how you ended up not doing it. I wonder if you've got anxiety, perhaps related to the cancer, that you're not having as much medical care as you should."

"Oh," I thought, dismissively. "That's a pretty good theory, but actually I've had a lot of check-ups recently and they've all been in the clear." If anything, that would have been last year, when I had a lump I could feel but which didn't show up in initial testing and which no one really thought was anything to worry about. It did occur to me that the check-ups themselves were maybe triggering the dreams--maybe they were dredging up memories of last year. Anyway, whatever the case, I feel that I am in good hands and that I'm being well-monitored.

But . . . today I got the official report back from a medical exam I had last week. It says, "Your recent imaging exam . . . showed an area that we believe to be benign (not a concern). However, you should have a follow-up to confirm that this area does not change."

What? Not again. At least it (whatever "it" is) showed up this time. And the follow up appointment was scheduled for me and isn't until mid-January. So I guess they really aren't all that worried. But they weren't before. They thought it was benign before. I kind of don't care if it is benign. I just don't want anymore "areas of concern." I want to be able to get away with not having chemo, and I want the cancer never to come back, and . . . well, yeah. That's pretty much it.

Discipline

I have some thoughts about Oscar that I will save for A Wandering Line, but for now, as an update, let me just say that we are having housetraining issues. This is more galling than ever now that I know that Oscar's kennel-mate in his past life is, according to the new owner "100% housetrained." Ugh! How is that fair?!

Last night I got some tips from the "behavioural guru" at PAWS, and we're trying them out. They involve me keeping Oscar on a leash (and therefore in my sight-line) at all times, and when that is not possible, putting him in his crate. I'm not sure which of us likes this less. At home he kept looking at me like, "Aren't you going to take this leash off me yet?" Here at work (yep! I'm blogging at work!) I have to keep putting him in his crate if I go out of the room to get a cup of tea or make photocopies. I also have to bring his crate, which is a bit unweildy, and since I have to bring my own laptop to work, too, is just one extra thing to cart around on a daily basis.

The thing about this is that it's discipline--both for me and for him. The goal is to get him to stop urinating indoors, but in order to get him to make that discipline a lifestyle, I also have to discipline myself, though sometimes I'd rather just get lazy and let him run around and deal with it later. But I don't really want to deal with it later, of course. I just want him to be perfect already. I fear I do that with people, too--including myself.

Look at the Birds of the Air

A few evenings ago I had supper with Mentor-Liz. Then we had ice cream. (Note: "cherry-vanilla" ice cream is nothing like the black cherry ice creams I like, such as Ben and Jerry's "Cherry Garcia.") Then we went for a walk. It was a short walk, but it was long enough for us to see a bluebird.

By which I mean, a real live, in-the-wild bluebird. It was sitting at the top of a chain link fence, and it stayed there for quite some time, undoubtedly so we could admire its beautiful blue plumage and red breast.

Back when I was really really little (like, probably too young for anyone to believe I could remember any of it) I thought I saw a bluebird once, but when I talked about it to anyone as a slightly older child, everyone told me that was impossible because they were extinct. They told me I imagined it. I very well may have, but the fact is that bluebirds are not, after all, extinct, even though people thought so for a while, and the other fact is that I really did see one, finally in real life and not just in pictures, and all of three nights ago.

Birds have always kind of seemed to me like messages from God. Not messengers, but messages. The messages are never verbal (Obviously. They're ornithological), so it's always kind of hard to explain what I feel God is saying through them. Maybe sometimes He's not saying anything. Maybe He's just showing me something He made that He thinks I will enjoy. I think He does that sometimes. It's just that the showing always comes with a little extra sense of His presence. This has happened to me with cardinals, chickadees, swans and parrots (yes--parrots living in the wild in Connecticut--I'm not kidding, or making it up). This time it happened with a bluebird.

I didn't think about this until I started writing this post, but sometimes there are things that you know exist, that you know can happen, that you're even pretty sure you've seen before . . . but maybe you've just read about them in books. And everyone says, "You've seen that happen? That doesn't happen anymore. You've just imagined it."

But maybe you haven't. Maybe that thing is just waiting in hiding, like a legend or a myth or an extinction, waiting to come out at sit on a chain link fence where you can finally see it and admire it's plumage and say, "Ah! I knew you were real!"

Sesame Street Has Been Brought To You Today . . .

. . . by the nouns "miracle" and "intercession" and by the interjection, "huh?!"

Two weeks ago a bunch of people who don't know each other all decided to tell me across the span of a week the same (or mostly the same) thing about an aspect of my life. When that happens, I usually think it's worth listening, just in case, you know, it was actually God trying to get through to me or something. One of these people has just started an praying ministry on Facebook and I guessed I should especially listen to him, maybe?

I didn't really want it to be God, because I didn't really want to re-examine that area of my life (having already done so numerous times over the course of the year). But I didn't get the same "answer" I had been getting all those other times of hashing it over. I didn't feel like I got an answer at all. So I wasn't sure, even if it was God talking, what exactly He was telling me to do about it.

I'm still not, entirely, but I'm getting at least a little bit of a clue how to think about it. First of all, I should tell you I wrote at A Wandering Line a companion piece to the last post here. Two days after I wrote that, I visited a church with New Church's confirmation class, where they read Ephesians 1. Which, you know, is basically about God accomplishing the Impossible Reconciliation through Jesus Christ. Then yesterday I got a whole bunch of "messages" at least as insistent as the ones of two weeks ago, and this is how they went:

I went to see my counselor, who I meet with in a church. I was early so I made a pit-stop detour and on the wall on my way was a big sign saying, "Expect a miracle." Ha. I thought. That's ironic. Since, you know, I've been talking about those lately and also praying for one or two more than lately. I wanted to take it as a confirmation of . . . something, but I don't believe in fortune cookies. This was a little large for a fortune cookie, however. I have, on occasion (including last week), wished aloud that God would give me a literal sign. You know--one with writing. So . . . if I get one, should I dismiss it?

Then I went into the bathroom. I had forgotten that on the stall walls in this particular church, they have pasted Bible verses--a different one in each stall. I had evidently never been in this stall before, because I was startled when I read, "Blessed is she who has believed that what the Lord has said to her will be accomplished!" (Luke 1.45, NIV). Curiouser and curiouser . . .

At the end of my session, my counselor prayed for me, as she does, and prayed that I would see God do the impossible. I don't remember ever talking to her about that in those terms before. Or maybe she prayed something else similar . . . I don't exactly remember, but it was something along the lines I had been thinking of, about miracles and the irresistibility of God.

Then I went to work at New Church. The phone rang. It was the line the Milk Guy usually rings in on, and we had just been talking, so I thought maybe he had thought of one more thing to say, so I picked it up. It was definitely not the Milk Guy--it was a Wrong Number. This Wrong Number wanted to talk, though, apparently, because when I said the word church his ears perked up.

Evidently he is a Ghanaian intercessor praying for the City. We talked about church and about what we hoped to see God do in this City and about some of the problems we face here. I had that weird brain-prickle that sometimes occurs when I think that God might have orchestrated a mistake on purpose and so I couldn't really argue when Wrong Number said, "This is from the Lord--God wants to do things here, because look--I was trying to call my work, and I called a church instead and am talking to you. The Holy Spirit did this." I've been learning a lot about the Holy Spirit lately--maybe even more than I did when I worshiped in a charismatic church. I thought he was probably right. Then Wrong Number said, "Don't ever forget. God is a God of the impossible. He wants to bring people to Himself and He wants to do miracles. We need to pray. We need to pray for Him to do the impossible."

There's a certain vein of theology that says things like that in a way with which I am not comfortable. I don't, for example, think that the Christian life becomes trouble-free if you pray and believe hard enough. Quite the opposite, in fact. But I don't know. Do you think all that was coincidence?

Expectations

I used to have this friend who expected a lot of me but would completely freak out whenever she felt I was expecting anything of her. I don't know if I thought at the time that I could deliver, thus feeling the burden of expectations less, but anyway, it took me a few more fraught experiences and friendships to realise that superimposing expectations over personhood is pretty tough to deal with when you're the person being superimposed upon.

All of a sudden in the last week a whole lot of things have come up independently of each other regarding expectations I have of others and of myself. And of Jesus. Then today I discovered that Jeff's been blogging about worshipping expectations instead of Jesus. I feel like I do that a lot. I also feel like it's impossible not to have expectations and that I don't know what to do with them.

I think the short, and theoretically easy, answer is: just worship Jesus. Relinquish expectations. Just fuggedaboudit.

Or something like that.

I would counter, however, that a relationship is about trust, and a relationship with Jesus is especially about trust, and it's hard to actively trust if you're not expecting something. I guess what I'm supposed to trust is that Jesus loves me and will take care of me and no one will snatch me out of His hand. Which I feel He is graciously enabling me to do more and more these days. But I don't know, on a practical level, how to trust Him with specific situations.

Say there's something I'm praying about. I've been praying about it for a long time. I feel I've been obedient within the situation as best I know how. I know that on a realistic level, the thing I'm praying about can't change much. I also know that Jesus does miracles. Seriously. He does miracles, people! And I'm talking to Him. And He's pretty good with upsetting the status quo. So . . . do I expect Him to do the miracle? Or do I expect Him to get me through the situation without the miracle?

Well, I'll tell you what I'm temperamentally more likely to expect. (I mean, I won't tell you, but I'm pretty sure you can guess.) Is it more trusting, more Jesus-glorifying, more obedient, more worshipful to expect and hope for the totally unlikely miracle? Or is it more all-those-things to be more of a realist, to expect no miracle and to watch and see what happens without it?

Hoping and expecting a miracle seems braver and scarier and a lot more like putting myself out there to get hurt and shamed and at the very least disappointed. But it seems like that's what all the people who get a mention in the Bible did anyway--expected a miracle. At least eventually. (And they did often get hurt and shamed and disappointed, but they still got their miracles, too.) Not expecting a miracle seems safer but also more responsible and less of an imposition of my will on God's.

I don't want to burden God with selfish expectations the way my friend and I burdened each other all those years ago. If there's a free Being anywhere, it's God, and He doesn't deserve (nor do I believe will He tolerate) to be boxed in to my own little personal will. But without faith it's impossible to please God, and all those people in Hebrews 11 trusted in God, but also in specific things that God had promised for them. I don't know how to tell the difference between my wishes and God's promises, and I just don't know what to expect . . .