Vintage: A Simple Man (November 2011)

I've been called a renaissance man. I'm pretty good at everything, I'll try my hand at anything. I, like my father, am driven. Constant in my mind is the long list of e-mails and messages to write, the projects I would like to complete, all the things I think I should be doing.

I complicate things.

I make up things for myself to do.

I am an intellectual. I believe in God, but there are plenty of things in the Bible I don't live and don't believe.

I'm a poet. I like things I can't completely understand. I like art that is ambivalent, art that's complex emotionally, formally, and ideologically.

I'm an individualist; I don't depend on others. (People leave, and the show must go on.) Lately, emotional and intellectual confusions have kept me from depending on God as well.

I pray to love God, but in the daily reality, I sing Manchester Orchestra's "I'm gonna leave you the first chance I get." Because the terror, the unknown, the pure emotional energy it takes to love a jealous God I can't see and who can change everything in an instant is enough to send me running away most days. Also, I sin, and that makes being around God uncomfortable. It's miserable, but it's true. So instead of finding myself in this God who others deride and don't believe in, instead of throwing myself on a God who, rather than being "understanding," of my faults and doubts, says "repent" and "I love you" (I love you? Who says that? What good is that to me?), I prefer a complex web of identity markers: I'm a poet, I'm a singer, I try to follow Jesus, I'm a volunteer, I'm an intellectual. This way, someone can't reject me on the basis of just one thing, and I can have a conversation about faith or poetry where I get ignored or insulted and still feel safe. Because only part of me is on the line. Nobody knows all of me. Heck, most people can't even keep track of what country I'm in. I'm safe; I'm complicated.

A couple weeks ago at youth group, we talked about Paul. Paul said "To live is Christ, to die is gain." Honestly, I'm not confident enough to say to live is Christ. I'm a full-time missionary! But for me, to live is to do my best until I have time for God, to do good things, to try to be worthy.(?) As for death, well, I hate how many Christians talk about tickets to heaven and all that and ignore the present commands of God, so I don't let what happens when I die enter my theology or my motivations. I pray for mercy, that as I live and die, God won't cease coming around, teaching me, pursuing me, using me, showing little bits of his glory.

Watching "Chariots of Fire" today, I was struck by Eric Liddell. I'm more like Abramson, out with something to prove, striving, straining, wanting to be the best, because if I'm not the best, I apparently am not trying hard enough. So I try to be everything to everybody, I try to be the best Christian, the best poet, the best musician, the best missionary, the best friend. Lately, about once a day, someone unfriends me on facebook. And I ask myself "what did I do wrong? Was I not interesting enough?"

"I try to be my best."

Jesus was a simple man. He did what he saw his father doing. Paul was a simple man: to live was Christ. Liddell was a simple man: Running on the Sabbath was out of the question.

I'm more like Solomon, thinking too much for his own good, or Samson, all for God until "oh hey look, a pretty girl," or David, who violently throws himself back and forth between repentance and failure.

I don't want to be like David. I don't want to have to look at my wife and go "Well, I f*cked that one up, but I'm a good man and I'll live with the consequences, and hey, she's sexy." I don't want to be like Solomon, who seems to me, depressed, and in the end, wasn't really loving and serving God at all. I don't want to be like Samson, who sure, God used him to fulfill his destiny, but didn't really get to enjoy the journey and knew God more as a judge than as a Father. I'm not saying God isn't big enough to redeem any mistake I make. I'm just saying, I want to be a person of joy, and a clean conscience, I want to know and experience God deeply.

God, I need you.

I understand obedience. I understand, that if I feel like God is calling me to Central Asia, I must go. I won't be happy otherwise. I understand that, like Paul, if I knew I was going to die going there, it wouldn't change anything. I must live by faith.

 But I don't want to be a good servant. I don't want to reach the end of my life and say, "Well, God, I lost you somewhere in the madness, but I made 150,000 converts, and helped 550 orphans." I want to be like Liliya, singing "won't you let me love you more?" to God as she goes through her day.

My true measure of success, is when I wake up or fall asleep, I pray, that I want to be with You. That when I have nothing to do, I spend my time with You, and when I am overwhelmed, I turn to You, and You are my rest in the storm.

God scares me. I heard Chris Kelly in a sermon say that the number one command in the bible is this: "Do not be afraid." I trust God has my best in mind, I'm just afraid of how much that will cost, of how hard things will get this time. I'm afraid that somewhere in there I'll give up or fail or have a major David-like blow-up. And God says "do not be afraid." "Don't worry." "Rest in me." "I love you." And I'm like, "sure, as long as I can keep my complications around to fall back on." And he's like "Chill out, what you yellin for? I am. I am enough. I love you."

15 The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.”

 Dad, make me a simple man, a man who can say "I love you too," with no ifs, ands, or buts. Erase me, as needed. "Make soft my heart, in thy strong flame, to take the imprint of thy name." Change me.

"I am in love with You, and there is no cost. I am in love with You, and there is no loss. I want to take your name. I want to cling to You, Jesus."