It’s okay to wrestle with questions. I do it almost everyday. I believe that sometimes simplified answers to questions trivialize them. You don’t have to have everything completely sorted out before you enter into this journey with God.
Which is what I want to talk about tonight…the journey with God. What is this journey with God? How do we enter the story? What does it look like? …
In my 11 years of being a pastor, I’ve done a lot of pre-marital counseling. When I sit down with a couple, one of the first questions I ask is, “how did you two come to know each other? How did you fall in love?” Not because I need to know, but because I’m nosy.
I get the most amazing answers. Sometimes she pursued him. But most of the time, he pursues her. Sometimes it was real gradual. Others times, it is like Cupid “pop” just did a number. Some of them are long distance relationships, others are glued to the hip from day one onward. Some our very stoic and matter-of-fact about their love for one another. Others are so mushy it’s disgusting (get a room). But, without exception, each couple has a different story. They came to fall in love in very different ways.
The process of becoming a Christian can be very similar…experiences vary.
For me it was dramatic and emotional. I had grown up in a Christian home and had always gone to church. In others words, I had grown up with the language and culture of Christianity: I had known what it meant to be a Christian, but never felt any urgency or even desire to make it my own.
Then, one night while I was talking to a friend, it was like it just all came together. He wasn’t coercing me or pushing me, it just seems like the lights had come on and I knew what I needed to do. And after I prayed, it was like ‘something’ had happened. People could see the change in me immediately.
For others it is not so dramatic. Some people sit down, look at the facts, and say, “this is true, this is what I need to do.” For others it is like a struggle, and in the end they say “okay God, I give up, you win”.
Some pray to become Christians when they were small children. They didn’t understand all the deep implications -- they just wanted to be with God in heaven.
Still others cannot precisely pin-point the moment or have no recollection of a sudden awakening. Like my wife: she just can’t remember not believing, and as years went by her experience was an ever deepening relationship with Christ.
Becoming a Christian has been described a train crossing from one country to another in the middle of the night. Some people are awake and very aware when they hit the boarder. Others are sound asleep only to wake up and find themselves in a new place.
So when it comes to the ‘faith journey’, don’t worry about where you’ve been, or how you got here…because everybody’s story is different. If it’s too threatening at this point to ask it, then don’t, but at some point ask yourself,
“Where am I with this?”
If the Christian journey is a journey into a restored relationship with God and others…if God has taken steps towards me – if he is pursuing me – have I responded?
Some truths have to be experienced to be truly known. I talked about the Kiss. A kiss can be examined and deconstructed. But to truly be understood, it needs to be experienced.
What I would like to add to that tonight is this: we like to examine things – even experience them – without ever really committing to them.
We live in a culture in which everything is interesting but nothing is important.
Some things require even more than experience, they require commitment. And I really believe that relationships are one of those things.
I met my wife Marcy when I was 19. You may not believe this, but -- back then -- I was a kind of a geeky guy. Yet -- for some reason -- pity I think, Marcy began to return my affection. It wasn’t long before we decided to commit to get married.
Today, 16 years later, we are still in a marriage relationship. It is not dependent on my feelings any particular day, or even on the circumstances. She can be in the next room, we can be continents apart. We are in relationship.
When I ask people if they are Christians – I get all kinds of responses… “Sort of”
Now, I sympathetic to all these answers, but what would happen if you were to apply the same statements to other relationships. What if people asked me if I was married and my response was: “Sort of”
At some point, we have to say, “As flawed as I am, I want to follow you Jesus. I want to enter and commit to that mysterious dance of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. I can’t do it on my own, I can’t even meet you half-way, but I guess that is what the cross is all about…you going all the way for me.”
I believe at that very moment the cosmos erupts into applause. The lost son comes home. The lost sheep is found. You enter into The Grand Story and A New Life.
What is this life that Jesus offers? How does it saturate our days, hours and minutes?
Christ has called us to be disciples. Not converts. Not churchgoers. Not decent people, but disciples. What is a disciple ????
In our world of assembly lines, and impersonal learning, it’s really a lost word…
A disciple, simply put, is a follower in a growing - learning relationship with a mentor.
VIOLIN EXAMPLE* – They had confidence in the master craftsman. They followed him around through and watched his daily ongoing example. Watched very closely. Then repeated what they did.
When we are talking about following Jesus, we are not talking about ascribing to some dead guys ideas. Even though we can’t see or touch him, we believe that Jesus is in some way with us. He has a living presence and – as Simon will share later – a mission.
So tonight, we are going to look at three “disciplines of the disciple”.
Kinda like a three-legged stool. Solitude to community to engagement. You need all three to keep balance. Another way DIAGRAM.
The first is solitude. Being alone with God. Jesus said…
I am the true vine and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he trims clean so that it will be even more fruitful.
I have to confess, when I buy fruit at the store, I pass right by the organic section and go straight for the mass produced stuff.* It’s cheaper. It looks polished. Organic fruit doesn’t look perfect but it’s made with conviction.
We need to think of God as an organic gardener, carefully surveying each branch of our life. Sometimes letting us grow, sometimes pruning us back.
Every year a garden goes through the seasons of change. Which are very predicable. Then there’s the weather. Which is very unpredictable.
Life brings both predictable and unpredictable things. The predicable things being growing older and hopefully wiser. The unpredictable things are a little harder to define, but life does throw us curve balls every once in a while.
There is only one way to get through it. Christ repeats it again and again in the passage. Remain in me.
Simply put, the life of discipleship demands a daily relationship with Jesus.
But we have to pray, listen, meditate, and read. We need to let simple truths descend from mind to heart. This is a lifelong process, but it is from here that Jesus meets and speaks w/ us.
But we have also been called into community.
Jesus never wrote a book. He never founded a school or a meditation center. He formed a community. And that’s really what the church is. We talked a lot about this last week. So we are not going to spend a lot of time on it tonight.
Community is a way of living. It is a way of learning. And a way of growing. A long time ago – after watching “It’s a wonderful life”…*
Christians have a communal identity. When they get together, they are saying, “We’ve embraced is gospel. This forgiveness. The healing. We belong to God” It really should be a party of sorts … which is frequently not the case in churches.
When we started our talk on the church on week two, both Simon and I shared our early negative memories. But I’ve tasted this beautiful side too.
So Christians have a communal identity. They also have a communal mission. To bring this message of reconciliation to the world. To be ambassadors of mercy, justice and humility...
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