Signs That I Am Aging – #1

I started listening to talk radio.

By personal choice.

And I like it.

In fact, I almost prefer it.

Struggles

I am losing faith.

Not faith in God. Not faith in Christ. I have as much faith in the way of Jesus as I ever have. It’s probably safe to say that I have more faith in the way of Jesus than ever.

I am losing faith in church. I am losing faith in Christians.

I know, I know: Christians are imperfect people. They’re no better than anyone. But Jesus said that the way that the world knows who we are is by our love for one another.

And churches split. Christians kill. Christians advocate for war. Christians ignore poverty. Christians ignore the environmental crisis. Christians lead the way in hatred of homosexuals… You get the picture.

At the same time I know that this isn’t the whole picture. I know that there are wonderful people doing the work of God in the world.

So what are we to make of the church?

My experience with the church is a mixed bag.  On the one hand, I have developed life long relationships based on truth, forgiveness, love, and hope.  My wife and I have enriched our relationship through the church.  We have seen many examples of what it looks like to live in a loving, self-sacrificial kind of marriage.  Many people in the church have invested in my life – from my youth minister, to my high school buddies, to my college minister, to people who volunteered with me in the youth ministry at WHBC.

But then there’s that other hand.   One of the basic problems in my experience is that church is entirely focused on the sustainment of the institution.  From tithing to programs – everything rests on “growing” our particular “family of faith.”  There has been little to no focus on impacting the surrounding community.  Sure, we want people to come, only so long as they come to our church and “get saved” in our church so we can grow.  And I have met the meanest people in church.  There are people in the church who hate.  You know, the ones who never have anything good to say.  Everything is negative criticism.  Not to mention the deep political divides within the church.  The church is more divided in terms of right and left than the American political sphere – you have fundamentalists, mainline liberals, emergent, reformed, catholicism, etc., and virtually none of them work together.  Blah.

I could keep going, but you get the idea.

In all of this, I have been struggling over the past few months about what it looks like to actually be the people of God, to actually participate in the life of the Kingdom.  And I can’t get over the feeling that the Kingdom of God does not exist in the traditional, institutional church of America.  Maybe I’m wrong.  I hope that I am wrong.  It’s just a feeling that I have.  And I certainly don’t have any answers.  I just have questions (and sometimes I don’t even have questions, just illegible inward emotions that drive me crazy).

And in all of this, I have been struggling with my place in the church.  I used to think that I was going to be a youth minister for 10 years or so, and then possibly do something else in the ministry.  I can’t go back to that.  I can’t bring myself to work for a system that is so fundamentally flawed.  But I’m still called.  I know that God has called me to “ministry,” as cliche as that sounds.  So I have no idea where to go from here.

I have a feeling of disgust towards church.  I can’t put my finger on it.  I don’t have any answers.  I just know that I can no longer live in the status quo.

I’M DONE!!!

This semester is finally over!!!  God, it was hard, but now it’s done.

Whew.

Light at the end of the tunnel

Only 2 more days of class and 2 days of finals (of course, this is expanded into 2 weeks).  Until then I have to keep my priorities straight, so blogging is on the back burner.

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and a time to rest.  I sure did.  I didn’t even think about class, and I didn’t go to work.  It was very nice.  Weeks like that make me thank God for Sabbath because otherwise I would lose my mind!

I Suck at Serving

So sorry I haven’t posted this week – I’ve been ridiculously busy. But I’m finally done with training at Ninfa’s.

Last night was my first time to actually take on a few tables – and right now I suck at it.

One table asked me what kind of drinks I would recommend – I know nothing about alcohol. I had to get Cameron (my trainer) to take over from there. Oh, and I messed up their order, too. She wanted ground beef on her salad – I ordered fajita beef.

I spilled charro beans on an old guy with a suit. He wasn’t very happy.

One lady wanted nachos – and instead of the regular cheese, she wanted chili con queso and rice on them without beans. Even though this was kind of a strange order, I got it right, except I forgot to exclude the beans.

I forgot about one of my tables.

I almost forgot to I.D. a girl who asked for a Margarita.

I’m better at Greek and Hebrew.

Life is good, hard, hectic, beautiful, joyous, frustrating, exhuasting, energizing, fun, hilarious, blissful, tedious, incredible, etc.

I’m not sure what to think about life right now.

I’ve got a baby on the way. That’s exciting, to say the least. I love my wife. Every moment with her is just… peaceful. My favorite part of the day is when I get to just be with her.

I’ve got a new job. It’s pretty cool, I suppose. There are some fun people there. And I’ll make good money for what it is – a transitional, part-time job. But, dang, training is not easy. Passing the menu test is definitely doable, just incredibly taxing, stressful, and time consuming.

Class is great. I love Truett. Next to family it’s the best part of being alive. I’ve learned so much and met so many wonderful people. I have truly seen the love of God at this place. But, dang, the work is tedious at times. Dr. Ngan’s assignments make me not like the Bible – I didn’t think that could happen.

Leaving Western Heights has caused a flurry of conflicting emotions. I am sad about leaving my kids, to be sure. I will miss them greatly. I will miss teaching them, hanging out with them; I will miss trying to show them what Jesus is like. But I am surely excited about the opportunities that lie ahead and the newfound freedom on Sundays that I will have.

Life is strange and confusing, really, when you sit back and reflect.

Through it all, may each and every one of us pursue love, joy, peace, faith, and hope. And may God bless those pursuits.

New Job

I start my new job tomorrow at Ninfa’s as a server.   So when you want some good Mexican food in Waco come and see me (and give me a big tip) – just wait about 2 weeks so that I can finish my training.

We’ll see how it goes….

Mental Burnout

I recently went to a session at Truett on burnout sponsored by True Course Ministries. Burnout was described in this way at the session:

Burnout is a cluster of symptoms, including emotional and physical exhaustion, depersonalization or a tendency to withdraw from people, and decreased personal and professional performance.

In this session they talked about the common occurrence of burnout that happens among “helping professions.” This includes teachers, lawyers, doctors, law enforcement, clergy, social work, etc…. Here are a few of the statistics that struck me:

• 50% of American parents (about to be me) burnout
• 20% of clergy (me) burnout and never return to ministry (uh-oh)
• people most prone to burnout are idealists (me) and perfectionists (not me).

Then, to top off the fact that I, myself, am one of those unfortunates who are extremely prone to burnout, they added a list of symptoms of people who are experiencing burnout. They listed mental, physical, and spiritual symptoms. These are the mental symptoms that someone experiencing burnout undergoes…

• anger (as in a kind of inner anger, not necessarily a “throwing things across the room” kind of anger)
• cynicism
• negativism
• increased irritability
• sense of helplessness
• decreased self-esteem
• sense of hopelessness
• self doubt
• apathy
• difficulty concentrating or paying attention
• feelings of disenchantment
• disillusionment
• disorientation
• confusion

I read this list and thought, “That looks a lot like me! YAY!” Luckily, I’m not to the point where I’m experiencing any kind of physical symptoms, nor am I experiencing many of the spiritual symptoms that they listed, but undoubtedly, this is cause for concern. Now I’m not on track for depression or anything, nor are any of the ’symptoms’ that I have severe. But they’re there. I am undergoing burnout.

So, the question becomes, how do I combat burnout?

I don’t know the answer.

Do you have experience with burnout? How did/didn’t you handle it?

Sabbath

Sometimes the most spiritual and godly thing you can do is stop, lie down, and take a nap.  And so I did.

It was good.

Is This God?

I was sitting in Truett’s chapel exactly one week ago at the Parchman lectures as Dr. Ben Witherington III talked about the fact that Lazarus is most likely the beloved disciple in the gospel of John (yes, Lazarus, not John) when a thought, or an idea, or a prayer, or something like that came to mind.

It had nothing to do with John. Err… Lazarus.

Anywho, I’ve been struggling lately with exactly what I want to do with my life. I know I’m going to “be in ministry,” but that’s awefully vague, and frankly, I’m not even sure what that means (since, in fact, all Christians are called to be ministers of the gospel). And this is why I’m at Truett.

I’ve been thinking about youth ministry, and, I am somewhat sad to say that youth ministry is not my long term calling (sorry, Western Heights). God has surely taught me this much.

I’ve also thought about teaching in some capacity within the church, and this sounds pretty cool. And I’ve even thought about going and getting my PhD so that I could possibly teach on a university or seminary level.

But for some reason a thought entered my head at the Parchman lectures as Dr. Witherington did his thing. I had to write it down. I don’t know why it even entered my brain because I was actually quite focused on what Dr. Witherington was talking about, and this had nothing to do with what he was saying whatsoever. Nor have I thought about it at all in terms of my own life goals…

Social justice.

Christian ethics.

Peace making.

Suddenly, an excitement came over me. This is what I want to do! Immediately, I thought about the implications of this. How could I pursue social justice, Christian ethics, and the concept of peace making in terms of my life practice and in terms of applying my life practice to broader social issues? This works nicely with my previous aspirations of furthering my education, but now I have a focus. I’m now thinking that I want to pursue a ThM with a concentration in ethics either at Fuller or Princeton, and then pursue a PhD somewhere, somehow. But these degrees are not degrees simply so I can have degrees. I really want to serve God, to discover what it means for the church to be an agent of social justice and peace because, frankly, in its most popular forms, the church is not acting as an agent of peace or justice.

So now, a week later, I’m turning ideas over in my head, and all of these ideas are seeming to be confirmed by random events this week, and I don’t know if this is merely some kind of self-fulfilled prophecy.

For one, I talked with my wife, and, of course, she was supportive and even excited for me as she always is.

Then, I talked with my good friend Cruz about it, and he was really excited.

Then, I got this Relevant Magazine package that we receive for our youth ministry at the church, and it was filled with items that focus on the social action of the church. Most notably, it had Brian McLaren’s new book, Everything Must Change (of which I will speak of soon), which I read in two days on my trip to Jackson and which even further got me thinking about social justice and peace-making. Additionally, one of the magazines in the package features an outstanding article, “Belief to action: Taking your group beyond conversion to discipleship.” And finally, the Robbie Seay Band’s new CD was included in the package, and it explodes with a message of action.

Another weird thing: as I was at Union doing the whole recruiting thing, I had the privilege of speaking with a student who was concerned with ethics and social action. He told me about his desires for ministry, and I was floored because it resonated so well with what had come to my mind this week.

Finally, this weekend Baylor’s Center for Jewish Studies is hosting an international conference entitled: Interfaith Journeys on the Road to Liberation. The conference is focused on liberation theology, and it has brought speakers and theologians from around the world who have experienced and practiced liberation theology. Today, I went to a luncheon for this conference and was privileged to hear Dr. Allan Boesak speak. Dr. Boesak was/is a Christian leader in the liberation movement in South Africa, and his message today was absolutely amazing, again confirming what I have been thinking about all week long – the need for the church to stand up for justice and peace.

If God is in this, I suppose my excitement will continue, and I suppose that doors will open along the way. If this is indeed of God, and I think that it is, then I will certainly jump in head-first and never look back.

We’ll see, I guess.