Rabbit Hole! – Stop! Cease! Desist! Flee! Avoid at all costs! The old saying, “going down the rabbit hole” essentially means to follow negative thinking patterns until we are swallowed up in the quagmire of negative thinking. This depth of negative thinking produces negative feelings, then negative behavior and can ultimately take us down into the pit of depression. Just telling ourselves or others to stop it doesn’t get the job done. Saying “You shouldn’t feel that way” is an exercise in futility, and in some cases borders on cruelty. They already know it’s wrong and that they should stop it. Therein lies the challenge of stopping such thinking patterns.
As a Man Thinketh in His Heart…
On a positive note, if we can reverse the pattern and think positive thoughts, we can enjoy positive feelings and positive actions. Interestingly, we have often misused a passage of Scripture to demonstrate this positive pattern. While the positive thinking principle is accurate (the reverse of rabbit hole thinking), the passage used doesn’t mean quite what we think.
As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he and so will he become – a biblical truth based on Proverbs 23:7, or so we assume. Here it is in the classic wording of the King James Version: “For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he” (Proverbs 23:7). That is only half the verse, and the KJV is not the best translation to begin with. Here is the more accurate New American Standard Bible rendition of the whole verse: “For as he thinks within himself, so he is. He says to you, ‘Eat and drink!’ But his heart is not with you.” The verse thus describes a deceptive person who says the right things to your face but in his heart harbors malice. The context demonstrates this point very well. Read it. Philippians 4:8 is a far better verse to use in explaining the accurate principle, and we will examine this verse and its context in the next segment of this two-part article.
But back to avoiding the rabbit hole – how can it be done? We really need the answer, don’t we? If we are honest with ourselves, many of us are plagued by negative thought processes, especially about our own lives and those of our loved ones. We are raised in a society where negative thinking far surpasses positive thinking. Bad news sells, and that is what the media thrives on – to an alarming degree. Many of us grew up in families where negative thinking was the order of the day (most days).
What – Me Paranoid?
Having a negative thought is one thing; dwelling on it causes that thought to multiply into a whole host of other similar thoughts. If we catch ourselves quickly enough, we can stay out of the rabbit hole, but that’s much easier said than done. Once in a ministry staff meeting in a foreign country, I was describing the dangers of negative thought processes, and made the statement that we often play out bad scenes in our minds that are based on no more than our own fears and imaginations. One brother quickly said, “I don’t just play out scenes; I play the whole movie over and over in my mind!” My wife has often told me that I imagine worst case scenarios and then experience the same emotions that would accompany the real thing had it actually occurred. Sadly, I think she is right. I have frequently been a rabbit hole thinker for most of my life. I can say that such thinking patterns ran in my family, which is true, but that doesn’t make it less damaging.
Rabbit hole thinking is a form of paranoia, and several forms of paranoia are found in my family of origin on the maternal side. Among these forms would be hypochondria, and its accompanying twin, psychosomatic symptoms and ills. Anxiety attacks are often a part of this particular cycle. I learned early on to avoid reading about the symptoms of diseases, because I could develop them within minutes. Thankfully, I also learned how to handle this tendency reasonably well, which I won’t take the time to describe here.
And then you have the apocalyptic paranoia, in which conspiracy theories abound. The world is surely about to go up in smoke! I could say more, but I’ve already exposed enough of the weirdness of my family tree and of myself in the process! Rabbit hole thinking takes many forms and it leads to something other than reality. It is worry gone awry. In that regard, I once said to an elder’s wife decades ago that her pattern of worrying about everything didn’t make sense because the old adage says that 95% of what we worry about never comes true anyway. “Precisely the point,” said she, “just think how my worrying helps keep so much from happening!” Funny, but not really funny. Negative thinking does not come from God, and that leaves only one other choice as to its source. So, how can we stop it?
A Book That Might Help
The field of psychotherapy aimed at helping with such negative life patterns is called “cognitive therapy.” It is based on the concept that the way a person thinks and feels, then affects the way they behave. These effects of going down the rabbit hole are undisputedly accurate. How to stop the pattern is the real issue.
Years ago, a psychologist friend recommended a book written by a cognitive therapist. The book was “The Feeling Good Handbook” by David Burns. It was a long book and contained some very good insights into how humans think and process that thinking. Here are a few highlights from my reading of the book, including how we think and how to effect change in our thinking. You may find these highlights very helpful – if you are willing to spend the necessary time in seeking to first understand them and then putting his recommended exercise into practice consistently. It involves a two-part process described next.
Ten Forms of Twisted Thinking
- All-or-nothing thinking − If a situation falls short of perfect, you see it as a total failure.
- Overgeneralization − You see a single negative event as a never-ending pattern of defeat by using words such as “always” or “never” when you think about it.
- Mental filter − You pick out a single negative detail and dwell on it exclusively.
- Discounting the positive.
- Jumping to conclusions − You interpret things negatively when there are not facts to support your conclusion. There are two basic types of “jumping” —Mind reading − you assume the negatives that they may be thinking; and,Fortune-telling − you predict that things will turn out badly.
- Magnification − You exaggerate the importance of your problems and shortcomings, or you minimize the importance of your desirable qualities.
- Emotional reasoning − You assume that your negative emotions necessarily reflect the way things really are.
- “Should statements” − You tell yourself that things should be the way you hoped or expected them to be. “Should statements” that are directed against yourself lead to guilt and frustration. Should statements that are directed against other people or the world in general lead to anger and frustration.
- Labeling − Labeling is an extreme form of the all-or-nothing thinking. You may also label others, leaving you feeling hostile and hopeless about improving things.
- Personalization and blame − Personalization occurs when you hold yourself personally responsible for an event that isn’t entirely under your control. Some people do just the opposite, blaming other people or their circumstances and overlooking ways that they might be contributing to the problem.
Daily Mood Log
- Describe the upsetting event in your own words.
- Record your negative feelings about it.
- Write out your negative thoughts and estimate your belief in each one on a scale of 1-10.
- Identify the distortion in each automatic thought using the forms of twisted thinking.
- Substitute more realistic thoughts and estimate your belief in each one on a scale of 1-10.
- Final outcome – re-rate your belief in each automatic thought (1-10) and circle the phrase that best describes how you feel now:
- Not at all better
- Somewhat better
- Quite a bit better
- A lot better
While I found the book to be helpful in some cases, it didn’t seriously affect my long-term thinking patterns. I won’t blame that on the book but accept the possibility that my own failure to stick with the recommended Daily Mood Log process was the cause. I think that Burns’ approach could be helpful especially in cases where we are at a loss to figure out what is bothering us. I have written a journaling piece (just for me) with several iterations, entitled, “What in the World is Bugging Me Now?” Perhaps Burns’ approach would have helped me at least figure out the answer to the question posed in the title. I have found that prayer walks (speaking out loud to God) have been helpful in identifying the root causes of a confused psyche, and journaling has been even more helpful.
If you are a rabbit hole thinker, give the ideas I gleaned from Burns a try. They just might help you. I know that they ring true to me in principle as a way of helping identify wrong thinking. How much they help in making a permanent break with faulty thinking will likely vary from person to person. I do believe they are worth a try. However, about a year ago, I discovered another very practical approach that has helped me the most. This is described in Part 2, so keep reading!
Avoiding the Rabbit Hole — Part 2
In the first part of this series, we hopefully identified what “rabbit hole” thinking is and gave some practical solutions to consider applying, notably some ideas I gleaned years ago from David Burns’ book, the “Feeling Good Handbook.” This present article will focus on a practical technique I discovered in December of 2017 that has helped me far more than I expected at its beginning. In the first article, I was honest about my own inner struggles with negative thinking, a process that has significantly affected my emotions and my actions. But as promised, this second part will describe my discovery of what has proved to be a much more effective thinking path, for me at least.
Am I an Actor?
Like most of us, a lot of my faulty thinking is kept under lock and key, and although it definitely affects my feelings, it is observable by others fairly seldom (I think). Seen one way, I “fake it” and act better than I feel. (Don’t most of us?) Viewed a more positive way, I try to do what I believe God wants me to do in spite of how I feel. Obedience to him is never wrong. There is definitely some credence to the idea that it is easier to act yourself into a better way of feeling than it is to try and feel yourself into a better way of acting.
Of course, if we are always “acting” and not dealing with underlying negative thinking and feelings to the contrary, we could accurately be called a hypocrite, a play-actor. Folks who aren’t at least trying hard to change bad thinking and emotions can’t remain hidden forever. They don’t strike us as the “real deal.” We may not know what is wrong with them, but we do sense that something is amiss. I assume they sense the same in us when we allow ourselves to remain in a bad place for too long.
Hopefully we will love them enough to ask them the right questions and start trying to help them by essentially helping them to help themselves. Hopefully others will love us enough to ask us the right questions and start helping us to help ourselves. They, or we, may well be struggling with what we are calling rabbit hole thinking, and this thinking/feeling/acting process needs to be interrupted and solutions sought. Others can call our attention to the need for help and start the ball rolling, but gaining that help is ultimately between us and God.
A Very Helpful Passage
Of course, for years I have taught against negative thinking and in favor of positive thinking. Here is my favorite passage in that regard, one that I have preached on many times. It is chock-full of practical principles about the right kind of “mind control.”
Philippians 4:4-9
Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! 5 Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. 6 Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. 7 And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. 8 Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. 9 Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.
Here are a few quick reminders of the more obvious practical principles found in the passage:
- Verse 4 – Decide to rejoice in spite of the circumstances; it is a command and thus a decision that can be made.
- Verse 5 – Stay calm and trust that the Lord is nearby just waiting to help you rejoice.
- Verse 6 – Don’t be anxious about anything, but pray about everything. And don’t forget to give thanks for past blessings, for the past is the key to the present and future. If God has gotten you through your past challenges, why would he stop now?
- Verse 7 – God has a peace to give you that is better felt than told; you just need to claim it by following what he is saying here.
- Verse 8 – The specific type of thinking that keeps you out of rabbit holes and in the peace that God provides.
- Verse 9 – Hang around spiritual people and imitate them; God and peace will always be nearby when you follow these principles.
Much more could be gleaned from this passage, but I will leave that up to you. It is a grand passage on which to meditate – often! But again, for me the question was not in simply knowing what was right regarding my thinking patterns, but rather in how to consistently practice what I knew to be right. Based on verse 8 in the above passage, I have often encouraged the concept of quickly changing one’s mind when negative thinking first enters it. And I knew that such thinking had to be replaced with better thinking, for our minds cannot stop thinking about something. My oft-used illustration was that instead of thinking about a black cow (negatives), start thinking about a white horse (positives). But my failure to find a more complete and effective way to do this was due to not discovering a specific path to follow out of the maze.
The approach I discovered seemed at first to be too simplistic to actually work – but it did and has continued to work for the past year. I have described it to a number of individuals and a few days ago, one of them wrote to ask for the details again. He said that the approach had helped him initially, but now the details involved were getting a bit hazy in his memory. His request led me to write this article and the one that preceded it.
A Real Rabbit Hole
Last December a year ago, I was spending a few days by myself at what we call our “camp.” It is a little house across the street from a lake about a hundred miles from our main residence in the Dallas area. I found this place while renting a small guest house of a couple who are now our lake neighbors. Long ago in my writing career, I discovered that being alone in a solitary place with a good view of nature provided the most conducive writing situation possible. From time to time through the years when doing very concentrated writing, I have rented such places in remote hotels or similar locations. Finding our own such place at a surprisingly low price (it is remote!) has been a wonderful blessing. Most of my writing takes place here, and this article is no exception.
But back to the story. I was here alone doing some writing last December and in the midst of it, doing a lot of soul searching and praying. I recognized that I was not in a good spiritual place, in that negative thinking was proving almost impossible to escape, especially in a few specific areas. I’m not sure exactly what they were, but I suspect aging and death were on the list (they often are, especially at my age). I happened to walk around the back of our lake place and when glancing under a little porch, saw a sizable hole in the ground. I’m not sure what type animals are using it to crawl under our house, but for some reason, “rabbit hole” popped into my mind. It gave me a name for my recent thinking processes, and even provided a visual to use in my then newly discovered solution.
As I went on my early morning prayer walk, the pieces of this puzzle I am about to describe fell into place very quickly. Let me warn you that it may be challenging to take these pieces seriously, precisely because it all seems too simple. It is simple, but in the spiritual realm, simple rarely means easy. Here are the basics of my process.
Say It, Say It!
When negative thoughts start entering my mind, I actually say (out loud if I am alone, otherwise to myself): Rabbit Hole – Stop! Rabbit Hole – Stop! At this point, I immediately seek a diversion in my thinking. I make a quick choice as to whether I need to employ what I call “escape thinking” or “spiritual thinking” for that diversion. That choice depends on the type of subject matter entering my mind and the emotional impact it is having on me. It will also depend on my location at the time. For example, if I am out and about, diversions are readily available in what I simply look at and start thinking about. That would be the escape type thinking to simply divert me from black cow thinking and on to white horse thinking. On the other hand, if I am alone or awake in the middle of the night, I have to figure out the type of diversion needed and available, taking into consideration how much my emotions are being aroused. The more alone I am and the more emotional the subject entering my mind, the more spiritual the diversion will need to be. Here are some ideas for initiating white horse thinking in each of the two realms:
Simple Diversions (All used only after a quick reminder, “RABBIT HOLE – STOP!” and a brief prayer of surrender.)
- If out and about, just looking at other things and thinking about them can provide the needed diversion – people, houses, cars, trees, animals, clouds, etc.
- If alone and stationary, then playing games on my phone or on the computer always helps to some degree in breaking the downward spiral into dysfunctional thinking.
- I have pictured playing a familiar golf course from the past when I still played golf, but that could be done with imagined scenes from fishing or driving or walking or anything else that would help me think about something besides my problems.
- Trying to remember names of people or financial issues or a variety of other things works too, especially now with my short-term memory being more challenging. Almost any kind of thinking about details is good for aging brains!
- I’m sure with time, I will think of other ideas that I already in fact use but don’t now remember, or I will figure out new ways of diverting me from the rabbit hole thinking. You and I both can break our old, bad habits of negative thinking and replace it with something much better, even if only intended for a temporary diversion from negativity. Enough diversions enable better patterns to begin developing.
Spiritual Diversions
- Bible passages – either the content of some or quoting them directly (hence the value of memorizing the most appropriate verses for the things that normally get to me emotionally).
- Bible concepts – thinking of how certain principles apply or could apply to me, and how they might apply to others.
- The latter application leads into thinking of possible ideas for teaching or preaching, whether a sermon, article or a possible book.
- Another idea would be to think of Bible characters and the stories about them in the Scriptures.
- Spiritual songs – a wonderful soul-comforting builder of my faith and a readily available diversion most of the time. I keep a thumb drive in both of our cars filled with my favorite spiritual songs and my computer and headphones are always nearby when at home or at the camp.
- Obviously, simply praying can help at any time and sometimes, I must fall on my knees alone to pray more urgently and earnestly. But those latter times actually don’t come that often once our thinking patterns start to go in better directions. Waking up worried in the middle of the night may well be one of those latter times, by the way.
Not Stuffing Emotions
Neither of these diversion lists is intended to be exhaustive. I’m sure you can think of others that may be more helpful to you, but these provide some good suggestions with which to begin. I’ve been very surprised at how effective this approach has been in helping me break out of rabbit hole thinking in real time, and how effective it has been in helping my overall thought patterns change. Some might be wondering if I am advocating stuffing our feelings. It’s a question worth asking, but the answer is no. I don’t stuff my negative feelings, although some should just be diverted and forgotten. Others need more examination, and if they involve real problems, solutions should be sought. I can sense pretty quickly which problem areas are real and which are simply worldly anxieties. The former I mentally put in my “prayer box” and save them until later, usually for my morning prayer walks and journaling on my computer.
If those real problems involve only my personal thought processes, I surrender them to God and later pray and contemplate possible solutions when I open my prayer box. If those problems involve other people about whom I am concerned, I pray about them and when it seems appropriate (after seeking God’s guidance), I contact them or someone close to them to see what I can do to help beyond prayer. As you can see, I don’t avoid dealing with real problems – quite the contrary. But I don’t allow those problems to interrupt me and take on a life of their own by invading my thinking and setting up camp for the day (or days). I take charge of my thinking and thinking schedule, in other words.
When my thoughts start speeding up my heartbeat and raising my blood pressure, even a little, it’s time to say (loudly): Rabbit Hole – Stop! Rabbit Hole – Stop! And then after a quick prayer of surrender, I quickly decide what merits being mentally placed in my prayer box for later and then it’s on to a diversion that works at the time. This funny little approach has helped me put passages like Philippians 4 into practice like never before. It may seem a bit of an odd approach to you, but considering that it has helped me seriously change a lifetime habit of going down the rabbit hole for a year now, I suggest that you try it. Let me know if it works for you!
Avoiding the Rabbit Hole — Part 3
I wrote what I initially intended to be a two-part series. However, I had a hunch that something else might end up in the pipeline. Whenever you write an article giving advice and using yourself as a positive example, one thing is relatively certain: you are going to be tested, and tested soon. For decades, I have taught and written about the need to have a surrendered faith. The second book I wrote was “The Victory of Surrender,” with the first edition published back in 1995. However, I had taught many lessons about surrender prior to writing about it. A point I always made was that deciding to surrender and committing that decision to the Lord meant that a test was likely to come shortly thereafter. (Please don’t view that as a negative! It is of God for our good.) Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness for 40 days of fasting and temptation – right after his baptism.
That same principle works when we give spiritual advice with ourselves as the example of how it should work. Just before I posted the second article about avoiding the rabbit hole of going down the whirlpool of negative thinking, my tests came: three in one day. One only involved me and the remaining two involved other people with whom I have close relationships and concerns about. I caught myself starting to go down that rabbit hole a number of times, but then did what I wrote about. Rabbit hole – Stop! Rabbit hole – Stop! Then I used some of the diversions in thinking described in the second article. It worked, but it wasn’t easy. The things tempting me to go down the rabbit hole were emotional-laden things.
As I took these things out of my prayer box the next morning to address them with God, I decided to journal about a them. Writing is a very helpful process to use in both identifying and controlling troubling thoughts. My very spiritual wife, Theresa, has written her prayers down on paper for years, virtually every day. By her own admission, she is not as in touch with her emotions as I am and writing for her is a must in her mind. In earlier years, I thought (and said) that since I was in touch with my emotions, prayer walks in which I talked aloud to God would be sufficient. Most of the time they were. In spite of that, Theresa would occasionally remind me that she believed I was missing out by not writing my prayers down. I wasn’t a good listener.
Becoming a Journaler
Then around the time of our October birthdays, in 1998, we went to a Bed and Breakfast in Nantucket for two or three nights. It was designed to be a getaway to read a book about improving our marriage and work on making improvement a reality. Once checked in, we had a significant relationship “bump” within the first hour. As usual, it was mostly me and this one was bigger than the norm for us. It was surprisingly disturbing to me emotionally. To say it was an overreaction on my part would be a nice way to put it. We talked it through that same evening and were reasonably resolved, she more than me. The next morning, I went on a long prayer walk to figure out why I overreacted. It didn’t work; no solution was forthcoming. Nor did a couple more prayer walks the next day or two help identify or solve my confusion. I was not only perplexed; I was still disturbed emotionally.
Then came the ferry boat ride back to Cape Cod as the first segment of our return home. The date was October 29, because the large TV screen on the boat was showing John Glenn’s space shuttle blast-off with him as the oldest person ever to enter space at age 77. I did watch the launch, which was exciting, but for the next two hours I was typing earnestly on my laptop. I was doing what my wife had suggested for years, journaling with God. It was a wonderfully helpful endeavor. God used it to help me get my confused thinking and feelings sorted out. It was like a birthday of sorts, a beginning point for me becoming a regular journaler (my spell check resisted the term, but it is legitimate).
Inserting a Second Step
I have written previously about my almost daily gratitude journaling, something I started near the beginning of this year (2018) in imitation of something my good friend, Mark Mancini, said he was doing. But as I wrote after my recent testing time, my journaling was more like the one on that ferry boat 20 years ago. However, it was different, in that I wasn’t trying to sort out my thinking and feeling; I was trying to find better ways of looking at those three things that were disturbing me. Often just identifying my issues, followed by surrendering them in prayer, does the trick. I sensed that I needed to do something different and perhaps learn something new that could help me, and even help others. Ultimately, I suppose it still involves surrender, but as a third step and not a second one.
I began thinking about questions that I could ask myself that might help me look at the troubling situations more spiritually. Here are some questions that came to mind (and cautions with them):
- What are the facts here – not possibilities, assumptions, or feelings – but concrete facts?
- How might I look at these facts in a different way than normal, looking at possibilities that they are not as bad as they seem due to faulty interpretation of them on my part?
- What are the other possibilities other than the one you are quick to assume (which may well be a worst-case scenario)?
- Do I have all of the related information about these facts that might make them less serious than I might otherwise assume?
- Even if the facts are as bad as they seem to be, how might God be planning to use them for my good and for the good of others involved in the scenarios? With him, short-term pain is almost always a part of the long-term gain that he provides.
- Regarding the two issues that involve the problems of others who are close to me relationally, should I just recognize that everyone has to make their own choices and decide on their own responses, and that such is beyond my control? And, those choices and the consequences that follow are their responsibility, not mine. (I think that is about how God deals with us humans, isn’t it?)
- All in all, just how likely is it that I am weighing these situations more heavily than the facts I know right now warrant?
I’m sure you can think of additional questions, but we need to start questioning our questions a lot more than we do and doubting our doubts more than we do. If we proceed a step at a time based on what we do actually know to be factual, we can avoid coming to conclusions that are simply assumptions based on fears. Looking for the positive possibilities is a good exercise. I thought of an illustration I read years ago, written by the old commentator of yesteryear, Matthew Henry. Upon being robbed, he sought to do what I’m trying to describe here.
Here is his quote: ““Let me be thankful, first, because he never robbed me before; second, because although he took my purse, he did not take my life; third, because although he took all I possessed, it was not much; and fourth, because it was I who was robbed, not I who robbed.” Almost all things we view as bad could have been worse, and if looked at in a positive light, they might well be good.
An Enjoyable Process!
The day those three challenges came, my diversions worked in keeping me from going down the rabbit hole. Journaling the following morning about those concerns that I had locked in my prayer box overnight then helped me gain a more realistic perspective about them, and then led to their surrender. Perhaps this is somewhat repetitive of what I wrote in the first two segments about avoiding the rabbit hole. Even if true, it is yet another way of looking at the principles that work to keep us out of that dreaded chasm of negative thinking gone to seed. I’ve enjoyed the process and enjoyed describing it for your consideration. Negative thinking can be diverted and dealt with successfully, and more importantly, negative thinking patterns can be replaced with much better ones. Let’s stay on God’s paths in our thinking and doing. They never lead to rabbit holes!
I recently read an article online which mourned over the fact that millions of people claiming to be Christian voted for the democratic party again. How could they? The article assumed that this was an outrage and went on to blame this atrocity on the lack of biblical preaching from the pulpit. It rightly asserted that a vote is not just tying yourself to what you are against but also everything that you are for. The author goes on to lay out all the reasons, primarily the issue of abortion, that makes it impossible in his mind for a Christian to identify with and even vote for a Democratic politician.
Is he correct?
For me growing up in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s, politics seemed simple. I didn’t care that much about them until perhaps my high school and college years, but what I did know was straightforward and uncomplicated. If you cared about obeying God’s word at all, you were a Republican. There could be little debate about that in the parts of the world that I inhabited. It seemed so obvious that I never really questioned that.
As I grew older in years and in my discipleship to Christ, I began to question where that assumption came from, especially since it didn’t seem to be such a no-brainer anymore.
Evangelicals and Politics
If you’ll allow me to speak in broad generalizations at this point, it would seem that this began in earnest in the 1970’s. Evangelical Christians (particularly White Evangelicals) had largely retreated from the public square and the marketplace of ideas in the 1920’s and ‘30’s and resigned Christianity to something of a personal and private faith that need not interact with the world at large. This led to what most evangelicals saw as a sharp decline in public morals that by the 1960’s had reached alarming lows.
Although there was some movement in political parties in the 1960’s for various reasons that are beyond the scope of this article, this began to change drastically in the late 1970’s as far as the evangelical movement in America was concerned. The Republican party began to speak out more and more about the problems that they saw in America that needed to be fixed. America’s real problem, they argued, was a moral one. The nation that was “under God” had drifted sharply from its moral moorings and needed restoration. Many who were associated with the Conservative Republican party began to call out America’s problems and as a collective, evangelicals got excited because what they were saying sounded an awful lot like naming sin. They spoke out against things like abortion, immorality, divorce, crime, and the decline of the family. The Bible has much to say about these issues and the sentiment developed that it was about time that some politicians cared.
Finally! Someone in power was speaking the language of the devout and they were calling “sin” as “sin.” In droves, those that identified as Christian made their way into the Republican camp. That became so normal that if you were Christian growing up in my world, it was assumed you were Republican. The term “Democrat” almost became synonymous with “pagan.”
What never made it on to the radar for most was the fact that the Republican party held to many other positions that were not biblically rooted and even went in the opposite direction. But that didn’t seem to register. They were correctly identifying the problem, in the eyes of these Christ followers, and so this was their political home, their team. And they became active and powerful in the blink of an eye as a voting bloc.
What also escaped their attention was that the solutions to these problems that were being offered were decidedly not Kingdom focused or biblically derived. They may have identified some of the very real problems in society, but their answers were often not Christ-centric but trusted in the power of the state. The point of this article is not to wade into specific positions or solutions of parties that are unbiblical but to look at general trends. For now, I will leave it to the reader to do their own research to fill in those specifics.
Before long, most evangelical Christians had been drawn in by the siren’s song of identifying the problems and they had yoked themselves together with a political movement. This was now their identity and their passionate cause. And if I’m honest, as I look back on that time, it starts to feel a bit like the Israelites going to Samuel to demand a king.
History Repeating Itself
If we fast forward to the last ten years, I see a similar phenomenon happening. This time, though, it is the liberal Democrat party that has started to call out the problems in society, and to the ears of a growing number of Christians, it sounds like the real sins that plague us. They denounce racial and gender injustice, intolerance for others, mistreatment of immigrants and the economically disadvantaged, and a host of other similar justice-related issues. The ears of many have perked up. The Bible has much to say about these issues and it’s about time some politicians care.
Finally! Someone in power is speaking the language of devoted Christ followers that love their fellow man and are calling “sin” as “sin.” History is repeating itself, as droves of Christians are now making their way into the Democrat camps and identifying with the issues that they advocate for the loudest. (If I’m being honest, I believe there are also many that will claim to be independent but, in their heart, they have clearly placed their loyalties on one political side or the other).
And while they have now emotionally and politically yoked themselves together with this philosophy and party, they have failed to notice or care that there are many other things that this party (just like its counterpart) stands for that are opposed to the word of God.
They too have been drawn in by the siren’s call as they heard a party denounce the sins that they hate the most and want to see done away with. But just as a generation before, they have failed in many respects to discern that most of the solutions are not rooted in biblical thinking or coming from a Kingdom perspective. And like previous generation, there is a real danger of intertwining passions and identity with a political party that is not rooted in the ethics and solutions of God’s Kingdom. There is a danger in trusting the power of the state to fix the problems in society rather than the Kingdom of God being the only true solution to the real problems of humanity. Even if a political party could suppress certain sins from society, if they do so through non-Kingdom means, then what has been gained?
The Threat of Division
At the end of the day, the two sides have made the same mistake and neither one has recognized it. To make matters worse it has created a sharp division in the body of Christ and even in many local congregations. A generation ago, most evangelicals (although there were certainly some exceptions) identified as conservative Republicans, so there wasn’t much controversy. That didn’t make it right, but it was at least peaceful (not that this is always a good thing). It’s still probably true that most evangelicals are on the conservative side of the aisle (although I am not certain of that), but a growing number have walked over to the other side and that has created a massive amount of tension in the local church.
“How can they call themselves a Christian and support the Democrat party?”
“How can they call themselves a Christian and support the Republican party?”
And in unison: “Well if you think that way politically, you can just go ahead and unfriend me on Facebook.”
Do you see the problems? It’s not just the tension and division. What if they’re both right? What if the Kingdom-focused disciple of Jesus can find no true home in the world of a two-party political system? And how can we preach the gospel of reconciliation and unity if we are divided ourselves over the things of the world?
The author of the article I mentioned at the beginning makes some good points. It is difficult to see how a kingdom-minded Christian could yoke themselves together with some of the things espoused by the left side of the aisle. What he missed is that the same is equally true for those that would yoke themselves to the right side of the aisle. God does care about abortion, but he also cares deeply about issues of biblical justice.
It presents a real conundrum for disciples. If both sides champion some of the biblical causes but also both embrace many things that are opposed to the principles of God’s kingdom and solutions that are quite often rooted in worldly power and not remotely kingdom solutions, then which party should I attach my loyalty to?
Good question.
When Christians begin to yoke together with one side of the political spectrum or the other, we lose the ground of being prophetic to the culture. We become just another player in the partisan games. And it becomes easy to dismiss the gospel because there is no obvious distinction between the Kingdom of God and whatever political side we have tethered ourselves to. I believe we lose the ability to have the kind of influence on specific issues that we might have had if we had not invested our identity and passion into political partisanship.
The Kingdom of God has its own agenda in the world and utilizes weapons that are not of this world (2 Corinthians 10:3-4). Sometimes the Kingdom agenda will overlap with the rhetoric or concerns of one party and sometimes it will intersect with the rhetoric and concerns of the other party. Often, it will cut against both, and almost always the solutions of the Kingdom will vary greatly with the solutions of the world. Whichever party we consider, they are rarely rooted in the other-worldly approach that Christ callas us to as his followers. We can impact political issues without playing with the weapons of the world such as power over others. Wouldn’t it be just like God to impact the world through his people but to do so in a way that the world would never imagine could work?
Citizens of Heaven — Our Priority
The Kingdom of God will always be political from a certain angle. We are called to loyalty to Jesus as Lord. For the first Christians, that statement by itself was a strong political statement. It meant that Caesar was not Lord and that Jesus was the King of Kings. He held the highest authority. For the first three hundred years of Christianity they consistently and intentionally avoided yoking themselves together with politics. And even though they were roundly criticized for that position, they knew that it was their job to offer the world a true alternative to politics, not just one side of the political spectrum that agreed with them on some things. That is no true alternative at all. They knew that they were to stand up against injustice but not use the weapons, power, or politics of the world to fight that injustice. They grasped the reality that the Kingdom of God was the solution and they called people to come join them as they lived as an alternate society, guided by the values and standards of the Kingdom. They knew that the Kingdom of God, not political power, changed lives and communities.
I am aware that this raises many other questions such as how should Christians vote? Should we be Independents? Should we vote for the lesser evil or is that an entirely flawed way of thinking? How can a Christian fight for justice in this world? For now, I will leave those questions waiting with the hopes of considering a Kingdom approach to such important issues in my book-in-progress, “
Crossing the Line: Politics, Nationalism and Kingdom.” The primary focus of this article is whether Christians should give their loyalties to any political party and trust in the solutions of that party. This is not about voting or not. It is bigger than that. It is about allegiance.
What would it look like if we understood our true identity to be citizens of the Kingdom and operated as a collective force, utilizing the resources and solutions of the Kingdom rather than tying ourselves to the two-party political fray and its weapons of choice? What if we were a true alternative to anything the world has to offer?
The early Christians resisted the temptations of latching themselves to a political philosophy for solutions. They stood up and spoke prophetically against any solutions or identification of problems that were not rooted in the new and otherworldly reality of the Kingdom. At the same time, they were working to bring the light of the new world of the Kingdom into every dark corner. Some might counter that our early brothers and sisters didn’t have the opportunity to take sides or engage in politics in the Roman Empire but that’s simply not accurate. They did and consistently chose not to for hundreds of years.
And they radically changed their world. The question is, will we change ours?
*Michael Burns is the author of
Crossing the Line: Culture, Race, and Kingdom, and
Crossing the Line: Politics, Nationalism, and Kingdom, which is scheduled for a 2019 release.
As a person who grew up in the evangelical world, I remember vividly one of the things that specifically inspired me about the ICOC. Men and women read the scriptures, internalized them, and allowed God’s truth to blossom into big dreams and goals! It was the commitment to bold spiritual dreams that inspired me almost 23 years ago to quit my lucrative job as an architect and become a ministry intern, which was anything at the time but lucrative!
Dreaming big is a beautiful part of our heritage together. We have planted churches all over the world and raised up leaders who have been able to make an impact very quickly. I know we have a lot of work yet to do, but I look at the cohesiveness of our missions societies, and the way we can work together for common goals, and it speaks loudly of that same collective desire to make sure we don’t waste our short time here, but stay devoted to not just having an impact, but having a BIG impact. I am proud of the men and women in our movement who have labored and sacrificed for the mission. Their big dreams and goals have allowed God to move in amazing ways.
Times change, culture shifts and paradigms evolve – but there is one thing inside all of us, no matter the generation, that is timeless and transcendent: we are spiritual dreamers (Psalm 126). As people made in the image of our Creator, it’s embedded in our DNA. God still holds the record for having the largest, craziest dream of all: enact a grand plan (that the majority of the world still scoffs at), rooted in selflessness, suffering, and ultimately the sacrifice of his Son, all with a goal of reconciling people back to an eternal relationship with Him. Wow!
When dreams subside, we’re not being true to who we are created to be. I’m sure you feel the same way I do – when I stop dreaming and pushing myself out of my comfort zone, I struggle, and inspiration wanes. However, I find that my dreams may not be the ones to pave the way for another 30-40 years of big impact in the ICOC. Don’t get me wrong, I can still think big, but in some ways I’m a less important stakeholder in the future than I was 20 years ago. For our church to not only endure, but to thrive, the dreams have to belong to the generation behind us. They have to own them as theirs, and we have to let them have ownership.
A Necessary Part of the Process – Mistakes!
This idea brings up a tension I can feel as someone in senior leadership. The big goals and dreams that allowed us to be who we are today also came with some mistakes. It’s okay though, for it’s a part of growing and maturing. For instance, even though there were mistakes made, I will never lament the commitment to being a church that practices discipleship. Even though we may have planted some churches in haste, I will never regret acting on the desire to aggressively reach a lost world. The work for the next generation is to make sure they follow in our footsteps as spiritual dreamers and be willing to sacrifice all their worldly pursuits and potential for the sake of God’s dreams – yet too many of them are not. However, the work for me, and many of those in my generation, is to allow their dreams to exceed what I am currently comfortable with. For sure, I don’t want them to have to make some of the same mistakes we did, but I need to not be overly concerned about that, or too cautious in allowing them to lead boldly. It’s a tricky thing to navigate.
This hit home for me recently in Seattle, as I was sitting in on a class taught by two zealous, visionary young leaders. The first one talked about having big dreams and pushing yourself to think bigger and bigger about what God can do. I was inspired, but at the same time, I thought quietly to myself things like: “Just be sure to get your degree first young man, you need a backup plan; make sure that zeal is accompanied by balance and careful thought; just be sure to get a lot of advice before running off and doing something rash!” The next young man got up and spoke about imitation – picking someone in the fellowship who inspires you, then learning all you can from them, soaking it in and doing what they do! Again I was REALLY inspired, but also thought (quietly): “Be careful with that imitation thing, you can get hurt by being naïve; imitation seems cut and dry, but it’s loaded with nuance and layers; and again – just be careful with that.”
Look, all of these are good, necessary nuggets of wisdom, and I hope the next generation does avoid some of the mistakes we made. But what if they don’t? What if they repeat a lot of them? Is that really the worst thing that could happen? If we’re not careful, we can overly advise them, based on our own experiences, which can block them from having the faith God inherently put inside of them. Besides, you can make a good case that making dumb mistakes is a natural part of the maturation process anyway. I have two boys, and as much as I’ve advised them about not doing stupid things that might break a lot of bones, I also realize it’s a rite of passage that I can’t insist they skip.
Another Necessary Part – Scary Risks!
On a recent trip to the Grand Canyon, I begged my 18-year old son to stop standing so close to the edge of the 3,000+ foot drop-off! He scoffed and kept telling me to relax. I was terrified, but also remembered that I took the same risks at his age! I wouldn’t take that risk now, but I did when I was 18. Asking our kids to “skip” the stage where mistakes are made won’t allow them to mature in a natural way, and asking them to avoid, at all costs, the mistakes we made when we were full of ridiculous spiritual dreams is not only unfair but can get us in trouble with God.
There is a famous Old Testament example of this in Numbers 13-14: Caleb, Joshua and the 10 spies. Don’t worry, I’m not going to make the application that young people are faithful, while older people are lame. But there are some things to consider from this passage that will help us here. In it, God has his chosen people situated in the wilderness, and he’s ready for them to take the next step, into the promised land.
We know the context. God miraculously rescued his people from bondage and displayed his power and glory in ways designed to make them say, “Wow, God can literally do anything!” So Moses is instructed to send 12 leaders, one from each ancestral tribe, into the land of Canaan to scout it out. What is there? Who lives there? What is the land like? And by the way, do your best to bring back some of the fruit of the land. They obey the Lord and diligently scout out the land. They return together full of information, with two of them carrying a big cluster of grapes, a pomegranate and some figs on a pole.
Their report? Yes, the land is fruitful and fertile, but the people are big, powerful and scary, and they live in powerful fortified towns. Let’s stay here and not mess with them, because we’ll lose! Just then, Caleb stepped forward and “silenced” them. He saw the same thing they did, but believed that through God victory could happen. Of the 12 spies, only Caleb and Joshua highlighted the potential, not the problems. They saw fruit; the other men saw difficulty.
Potential Problems – Not the Focus!
This is a natural human phenomenon. My guess is the other 10 spies had some good reason for being a bit hesitant about boldly crossing over. The problem is, instead of being a part of the conversation, they let it be the main message. Their lack of faith infected the whole group of Israelites, causing panic and fear to set in. People talked about it, wept over it, and basically freaked out so badly that they contemplated overthrowing Moses and finding a new leader to take them back into Egypt, the place God had just delivered them from! Here’s the thing, I don’t want to judge those people. They reacted the way a lot of us would, especially after having gone through so much. These were the chosen people of God, they just had trouble seeing God’s power as being bigger than the fears associated with following His bold plans.
Not all of these fears were founded, but I’m guessing some were based on experience. No matter where they came from, we have to be careful not to miss the main message – why was God ticked off enough at them to decide they wouldn’t enter the promised land? They didn’t believe God could continue to do the miraculous things he’d done before (14:11). That’s it. In fact, a failure to continue to see God’s power through any difficulty, or despite any of our experiences, is seen by God as treating him with “contempt” (14:23). Not good. The only two allowed to cross over were the ones that simply saw the fruit and trusted the power of God, Caleb and Joshua. Young and naïve? Yes, but boldly faithful.
Here is what I’m hoping we think about. Our movement is wonderful and was advanced by some young dreamers with crazy ideas. Really, some of those ideas worked, but they were crazy! As much as we’ve seen God accomplish, there is still so much more work he wants to do through us. My hope is that the younger generations use us for our wisdom, wealth of experiences, guidance, and lessons learned. I also hope and pray that senior leaders like myself can work through our own disappointments or process any negative fruit of “bold dreams” in a healthy way, working hard to not let them overly influence the faith and idealism of those dreaming behind us.
I’ll be attending a meeting of Northwest leaders next weekend, and one of the topics to discuss is a new church planting in a Central Washington college town. We’ve scouted it out, talked about it, and need to come up with a plan. I see so much potential, along with some really good things I’d consider potential “risks” for planting a church there next year. However, I think what I’ll do is get the young dreamers in the room, and start with asking the question: “What do YOU think can happen?” And then listen, and let them dream!
An Introduction by Gordon
The ICOC family of churches is facing a crisis of which too many are unaware. It is an age crisis in leadership. It is an issue all movements inevitably must figure out, and their ability to do so defines their ongoing impact. Early in this century we went through a serious upheaval, during which we all but lost a generation of young leaders. Many were taken off the ministry staff simply because our contributions dropped, producing a financial crisis. We couldn’t afford to keep everyone on staff, and as expected it was “last on, first off.” More sadly, many chose to get out of the ministry because of being seriously criticized for things we older leaders had done but most of them had not. It was a confusing time for everyone, and although much clearer now in retrospect, the damage was done to our pool of younger leaders.
Since then, in my opinion, we have not made the concentrated efforts needed to raise up younger leaders. Some good efforts have been made, but too many have not been made wisely or intentionally, failing to take into account what our younger members in general are thinking about how we do church. We tend to be far more traditional than we think and can be far too comfortable with the current status quo. While many of our older members have become satisfied with a less radical, more comfortable version of Christianity, our younger members have not. Just doing church is not what they are looking for – they are looking for ways to change the messed-up world of which they are a part. They want their lives to make a difference in their world and in eternity – a big difference!
In discussing these concerns recently with my good friend, Daren Overstreet, the congregational evangelist of our Seattle church, he shared some thoughts with me that I think deserve a wider audience. Thus, I asked him to write an article to post on my teaching ministry website (gordonferguson.org), which he has now done. He has at least two more articles in mind on the subject that he would like to write also, which I highly encourage. Most of the articles on my website are my own, but when someone else writes on a topic that I see as critically needed, I am anxious to publish it. Daren’s article is one of those. Please read it carefully and prayerfully.
Daren Overstreet’s Article
We just returned from the Delegates meeting and the International Leadership Conference in Panama. It was a productive week, full of conversations about how we as a fellowship organize ourselves, stay connected to each other, and most importantly, how we collectively keep a hurting world on our hearts. Ultimately, the most significant thing we are doing together as church builders is helping lost souls find their place in God’s amazing story. An enormous part of that task is intentionally passing the torch on to the next generation. Our movement is nearly 40 years old, and I know we talk a lot about empowering those behind us, but are we intentionally doing it? Further, are we sure we’re teaching and modeling the things they feel are important? I’m talking to my fellow leaders and ministers who have been around awhile. We are building a church that can be a beacon of light right now, but unless we are intentional about thinking through what the next generation needs from us in order to lead into the future, our hard work now will be sadly short-sighted and struggle to endure.
The Seattle church belongs to the Northwest family of churches, and like all other regional families, we have strengths, weaknesses, and areas/opportunities for growth. A topic we’ve been talking about for the last couple of years is getting younger! And not just getting younger, but purposely raising up the young leaders required for us to see our churches not only thrive now but endure long after we’ve moved on. At a meeting a few years ago, we were all shocked when we looked around and saw mostly older, seasoned veterans in the room! The room contained quite a bit of wisdom, but not even close to enough engagement with the next generation. We have committed to making this different and have all been working hard to invest in young leaders, which includes having a much more inspiring vision for church planting and growth. We simply must have places to send them and their evangelistic dreams. Having said that, I was surprised and inspired to hear what THEY think is important as they watch us do ministry and hope for their chance. Let me explain…
This last July we had a Northwest leaders meeting in Spokane, Washington. During one session, I split the group up into 2 rooms: the younger people in one, the older leaders in another. We asked each group a series of questions. One question we asked the younger group was this: What do you want to see MORE OF in us as we pass the torch on to you? Of course they talked about more and better opportunities for training and leading, but a few of their answers jumped out at me, especially as one of the veteran leaders in the group. These answers spoke to the quality of the relationships and spirituality they see in us. There are three specifically I hope we all think about:
Be More Unified
In other words, they would like us to show them a much more inspiring picture of unity. Ouch. I just returned from the Delegates meeting, and I think we would all agree, the older generation has strong opinions about how things should be! The younger generation also has strong opinions, but here’s the thing – we happen to be in charge and do most of the talking, so we are the ceiling, and the model for how to cooperate. That’s an incredible responsibility and an opportunity I hope we don’t miss. They are asking us to show them how to maintain biblical unity even when the room is loaded with strong, differing opinions.
In the Northwest, I happen to know what some of them are referring to. We’ve had some meetings where strong opinions were shared in the group. In some of these conversations, unity was modeled well, in others not so much. I knew we had a problem when after one of these meetings, a younger leader asked me this: “Hey, do you think that at the next meeting the young folks could get their own room? We’d love to talk about some stuff on our own.” Yikes. I may not know everything, but I DO know that if younger generation is asking for their own room, there is a problem. Do you know how your young people feel you and your fellow leaders are doing here? You may want to ask…
Humility About Weaknesses
We all know humility is the main ingredient for ministry longevity. Without humility, the next generation won’t last in ministry. But again, do they see it in us? Are we modeling biblical humility by, in Scott Green’s words, “putting our worst foot forward?” Do they see us older ministers being open to change? Do they see us being able to move off our opinions and yield to each other out of love? By the way, isn’t that what the bulk of the New Testament was all about? Do they see us working at getting better, even if we’ve been in the ministry for a long time? Believe it or not, they get inspired by that, it motivates them. In Seattle this last summer, we invited Steve Staten in to do an “appreciative inquiry” (turns out, that’s a fancy name for a survey!). We wanted to find out what we were doing well, and what we needed to grow in. It’s really helpful to regularly invite an outside perspective to take a look at your work, it really is.
After Steve presented his work to the church, I got up and responded. Among other things, I told the church that my desire for us is to be a “learning church,” which simply means I want us to be in the habit of learning what we can do better. To my surprise, of all the things I said during that service, it was that one comment that was highlighted. Why? Humility resonates with people who are trying their best to grow, and I’m telling you, seeing humility in their experienced leaders inspires the young people to want to grow more. Are we modeling what the apostle Paul felt deeply in 1 Timothy 1:15-16?
“Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst. 16 But for that very reason I was shown mercy so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display his immense patience as an example for those who would believe in him and receive eternal life.”
I have no doubt that Paul putting his “worst foot” forward provided motivation and inspiration to the young leaders he was training. How are we doing in that area?
How to Receive Criticism and Feedback
If you lead any group over about five people, I know you receive a lot of feedback, and plenty of constructive criticism. How are you doing implementing the things people have asked you to consider changing? Young people today are flattened by criticism! In a world determined to make everyone feel great, a lot of young people simply do not know what to do with the knowledge that they may have some things to grow in. I remember a sermon recently preached by one of our ministry interns in Seattle. He’s 25 years old, and a very good preacher. Here is what he said about millennials: “We are the most educated group to ever live, the most socially connected, the most benevolent, the most empowered, the most environmentally conscious, the most ambitious, AND the most sensitive. We hate hearing criticism. We know we need it, we just need to learn how to process it correctly.”
Where do they learn that? From us. So the question is, how are we at hearing things about ourselves? When is the last time you invited input into your life? When is the last time you assembled your trusted leaders and asked them what they see in you that could make you better? When is the last time you asked your leadership group or staff, “what is it like to work with me?”
By the way, it’s not just our young leaders that need to see us working through the things that hold us back, it’s also important for our members. Admit it, as your congregation ages, which means they are increasingly confronted with how often they don’t measure up to righteousness, the sermons that resonate with them are NOT the ones filled with challenging goals and high idealism. Those are needed, but they find us truly inspiring when we’re sharing the various ways God is taking our flaws and refining us. “Perfect” preachers aren’t that inspiring, flawed ones that are using God’s word to grow more Christ-like are.
In my opinion, that is precisely what made Paul the most effective trainer of men in the New Testament. He was more competent than we’ll ever be, but deeply in touch with where his power came from, which allowed him to offer us scriptures like Philippians 3:12-15:
“Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. 13 Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, 14 I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. All of us, then, who are mature should take such a view of things.”
Here is what concerns me in this area. The younger generation are getting jobs for companies that have realized the power of feedback and objective criticism. They have entire systems and departments in place for receiving and implementing it. The secular world simply cannot be better at modeling this for the next generation than we are as Christian leaders. None of us have arrived, and all of us have plenty to work on as we press heavenward. Let’s show the leaders coming behind us how to find glory in the growth process.
Do any of these things surprise you? When you think of passing the torch to the next generation, are these areas you would think to spend time and energy. A common complaint from the younger generation is this: “You older folks are answering questions we’re not asking!” Let’s make sure we’re asking them what matters to them. A lot is at stake.
More to come…
Can You Come Out and Play? — Spiritual Friendships
When I was in the 6th grade my best friends were Mike McFadden and Mike Doherty. We were all patrol boys at our elementary school; I was the Captain, Mike M. was the Lieutenant, and Mike D. was the Sargent at Arms. Together we would get to school early, raise the flag, and then Mike M. and I would get on our banana-seat bikes and visit all the crossing sites near the school. At the end of the school day, we would visit all the crossing sites again, and then lower and fold the flag. Not only were we hot shots, we were friends.
During the summer before 6th grade (in 1970), the three of us were hanging buddies, though usually one on one. On any given day, after finishing chores at home (which we all had) one of us would get on our bike, ride the 5-10 minutes to our friend’s house, and knock on the front door. A parent usually answered the door, and then came the question: “Can Mike come out and play?”.
We were friends. We wanted to spend time together. When our work was done, we wanted to do things together. We never called ahead. We did not plan the day before. We would connect and then begin an adventure that usually involved our bikes, sports, playing war, or pushing the boundaries of our parents’ guidelines around where we could go.
We knew all about each other, we liked each other, and we wanted to spend time together. We were friends.
This background, repeated in later years of my youth, has framed my mental model of what it means to have a spiritual friendship, or a discipling relationship. Fortunately, much of my experience over the last 40 years as a disciple has confirmed this. I had prayer partners in college with whom I learned to read and study my Bible, pray, and share my faith. As a single man, young married, and young father, I had discipleship partners who were committed to helping me grow. Additionally, as a father of older children, teens, and young adults, I have had spiritual friends who have helped me to navigate the vast unknown territories of life. I have been quite fortunate and am grateful.
Currently, however, I feel and observe a gap. Something is not quite right, and I am therefore writing about it.
- Friendship
“Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything I learned from my Father I have made know to you”.” – John 15:13-15
This passage is rich, and I am not going to do it justice. Suffice it to say, that after three years of spending a lot of time together, Jesus relationship with his disciples matured from a teacher-student or master-servant relationship to a friendship. Because of time spent, they knew each other and had lots of shared experiences. They were friends. Jesus had just washed the feet of his friends, and he was about to make the ultimate sacrifice, showing his love for them.
I love the paradigm of friendship.
James, while describing Abraham’s faith and closeness to God, states that Abraham was God’s friend:
“And the scripture was fulfilled that says, ‘Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,’ and he was called God’s friend.” – James 2:23.
Abraham knew God, trusted him, loved him, and wanted to spend time with him.
During some shared years in the southern part of Boston, I enjoyed a friendship with John McGuirk. John is especially good at being a friend – so I was drawn to him. He would often talk about spiritual friendships when describing discipling or evangelism, and John has proven to be quite gifted at both. John’s premise is that the ability to influence, teach, persuade, love, serve, or resolve conflict with another disciple or disciple-in-the-making is rooted in friendship.
I think that the strength or weakness of our discipling relationships is often rooted in the strength or weakness of our spiritual friendships. Just being friends is not enough, and just being spiritual is not enough. Put them together, however, and something magical happens: we feel loved, encouraged, inspired, and emboldened. God’s holy spirit flows between us and through us. Look out world!
- Time
“Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people” – Acts 2:46-47
Wow. We have become good at explaining this away. They lived close together, walked everywhere, etc.; translation: it was easy for them to meet daily.
Was it?
Life was hard. The basics of life required six days of hard work – just to eat, drink, and have clothing and shelter. Some of life’s chores that take us an hour may have taken them a day or more.
I get that we have busy lives. But are we busy doing the right things? Are our priorities God’s priorities? Do we make the time to have spiritual friendships, not just with each other, but with new friends who have not yet fallen in love with our God?
I believe that the pattern of spiritual friendships, or discipling, is set by those who have the most influence. If the pattern for a leader’s discipling relationship is to meet once a month for a couple of hours then that will be normative for the church, and most people will be lucky to get together nine or ten times a year – for a grand total of 20 hours.
20 hours in a year? Think about how much of life happens in a year: how much sin to confess, encouragement to be given and received, life difficulties to discuss, opportunities to grow and mature. This pattern is a pattern of appointments, not friendship. We can have some relationships like this, but this simply does not work for a primary discipling relationship. A meaningful and impactful spiritual friendship requires time and commitment. Lacking that, disciples will weaken in their faith, and evangelism will be anemic.
- Love
“By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” – John 13:35
“Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for each other, love one another deeply, from the heart.” – 1 Peter 1:22
Not only is it important that we love each other deeply, but that we feel loved. When we feel loved, it will come out our pores: how we talk, our body language, our facial expressions. And if people will know of our faith and discipleship by our love for one another, they will need to be able to hear it and see it!
For me, it takes a commitment of time and friendship of another person for me to feel loved. Beyond the scope of this article, but useful, is the construct of Gary Chapman’s “The Five Love Languages”. We are all different, but my love languages are quality time and words of affirmation. If you spend quality time with me and are encouraging, I feel loved, and think of you as my friend.
I propose that when we feel loved our faith will grow. When we feel loved, we will then love.
“We love because he first loved us.” – 1 John 4:19
When we understand God’s love for us, we will love him with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. When we feel loved by a spiritual friend, we will not only reciprocate in that love, but we will have a greater capacity to love our neighbor as ourselves: to love our brothers and sisters, to love those who are poor and needy, to love those who are harassed by sin and are helpless.
If you add together spiritual friendship with time spent and a deep love you have powerful, life-changing relationships. We help each other be God’s friends and to know and share his love. We help each other to show the world Jesus by the way we love each other. And we are more effective sharing the good news with others when they know not just what we know but how much we care.
It takes friendship. It takes time. It takes love.
How will we then live to have spiritual friendships or discipling relationship that honor our God and enable us to fulfill his purposes for our lives? What do we need to change? What will we change?
Can you come out and play?
As noted in my recent post on Facebook and in the introduction to my new article regarding male and female role relationships in the church, the article grew out of a midweek outline for a lesson I taught. One sister who heard the lesson, Demerris Johnson, wrote me an email the next day that made my day! She has since read the much longer article now on my teaching website. Her heart-felt comments produced some special heart-felt emotions in me. She wrote about the racism and sexism she has experienced, of both overt and systemic types. More impressive was her description of how she has handled it all while fighting to maintain spirituality. She is an excellent writer and the contents of what she has written deserve a broader audience. I am posting it as a follow-up article on both this website and as a blog article on my blogsite (blacktaxandwhitebenefits.com). God’s blessings as you read!
Hi, Gordon,
You may not know me by name, though you may know me by face. Your lesson, along with a few I’ve heard since returning to Dallas after 8 short years, really stirred my heart. I’ve been a disciple of our Lord for 18 years now, and I’ve had countless struggles and an equal number of victories. I’ve endured extreme harshness and wrestled with my own value. I’ve dished out my own share of harshness and probably caused others to wrestle with their value. I lived in fear of “man” (or people) for many years, most likely due to my own upbringing and times of victimization, so there was a part of me who believed that this was the norm and just how I was treated. I thought I just needed to toughen up, but I just couldn’t be that tough. I was bound by the rules of our tradition. Sometimes, I even “needed” them. They helped me not to sin. But obedience out of fear, is that godly? Or should my obedience be prompted by love? Obedience to God out of the fear of God is one thing, but obedience to God out of fear of man? I think that’s obedience to man, not to God, though my obedience may produce an outward appearance of godliness.
I have sought, for many, many years, to find my voice. I’ve been singing since nearly birth. I sometimes say that when the doctor spanked me after delivery, I sang rather than cried! I hid behind my singing voice for years. I didn’t ever think my words had any value. I mean, what would I say? And during a period of a few years, every time I was in a Bible study it was, “you didn’t say this, or you didn’t say that.” I wondered at what point the Spirit would intervene? Perhaps he was waiting for us to “need” Him—that is, to see our need for Him, but I digress. I wondered if I would ever share my testimony—tell what the cross has meant for me—but I knew that one day, God would give me a voice.
He has always surrounded me with people who love me, and in spite of the internal battle I was experiencing for all of those years, I always had someone to turn to. Why am I saying all of this? There are two things I really want to address in this email:
One, I am a black woman who has often felt inferior or has been made to feel so in a white male dominated society, and at times felt unloved and unappreciated by my black brothers and hated by my black sisters, culturally speaking. Though I don’t directly experience much of this anymore, I know that it’s something my culture suffers, and from time to time, generations of oppression slip through the creases of today’s fabric and it all comes flooding back as if I had been living in the 60’s or sooner when racial tensions were high.
When I got back to Maryland, in May, after having been away in Madrid for 16 months, I was in a movie theater with my brother in Christ and his son, who is like my little nephew. We got into the theater just as the movie was coming on, and the dad had gone for snacks. I knew nothing about the film, so trying to be discreet, I whipped out my phone to quickly find the name of the main character. As soon as the light hit the air, a man behind me rebuked me and told me to put it away, that this was a public theater and that he would get the manager if I didn’t. He was a middle-aged white man, and I wrestled in my heart with soooo many thoughts. Why did he think he could speak to me in that way? I wanted to yell at him, I wanted to tell him that he couldn’t talk to me that way, that I was a woman of God, worthy of respect. But more than that, I wanted to respond in godly way, and I resented my own anger. I hated that he would put me in a position to feel that way. But I resolved that if he were to ever see Christ in a woman like me, that the best reply was a quiet one. And I simply put the phone away, and prayed in my heart, because I was sad that our cultures are still divided.
Two, I’m also a woman who has fought for her relationship with God, and I’ve sought understanding of some biblical concepts like the roles of men and women. Recently, I learned prior to your lesson on relationships and roles that the same word for helper in Genesis 2:18 was used to describe the Holy Spirit, and I was floored. Hearing you teach it just doubled the impact! I was soooo encouraged because I knew that God is just so much bigger than we are, and we can’t begin to comprehend his heart and mind. See, God has slowly been moving inside of my heart, allowing me to grow through difficult times. He has been healing my heart; I’ve found my voice, and I’ve won over many people, disciples and non-Christians alike. I’ve gained the respect and trust of many men and women in God’s kingdom (and apart from it), and I’ve been honored in many ways by no doing of my own. He has placed me in roles where I’ve been teaching men and women, but I don’t deem that to be exercising authority over them. I’ve wrestled in my heart with this concept and tried to wrap my mind around it.
I’ve always been very cautious about this, and I’ve wondered, “God, is this okay?” But if God is opening up these doors, and I’m not seeking this role but it’s being given to me, could it not be God doing it? I’m still trying to navigate these waters, but I see how God has strategically placed me in situations, towns and countries, which has helped me find my voice and my place as a woman of God, a black woman, a single woman, a mentor, a worship leader and a performer. I’ve begun to have my own convictions based on the Bible, not on tradition, and I’ve begun to taste the freedom in Christ which doesn’t leave me bound by guilt and fear. But I use it with wisdom.
Your lesson brought these two parts of my heart healing, and it wasn’t just the words you shared – it’s you. Your heart and convictions and humility shone through. Your heart to continually follow the Bible over tradition, your honesty about how chauvinism comes through from time to time. I mean we have to be honest about all being prejudiced toward something or someone whether we realize it or not. There are things we will fight till we die, but we must see it, and we must fight to master it. Your truth is my truth. You are my brother, and I’m so grateful that we have men like you in our movement to help us grow. You are a man just like any other, but that doesn’t change the fact that God used you to help heal my heart regarding the man in the movie theater. He used you to help me feel okay about the role I believe God is giving me in leadership. I’m not being extreme with this, but think about it, in our movement sometimes the smallest notion of a woman leading in any form could be viewed as extreme. I’m not referring to studying out sin with a young man but something as simple as teaching the choir or sharing some biblical thoughts on worship and why we do it or whatever else falls in my lap to share.
I hope you get my point. I’ve sought healing and wholeness for a long time, and God has used you for many years to help with that in my life. Every time I’ve heard you speak, I’ve just felt the love of God. Your heart for God is wonderful, and the fact that you’re an “old white man” (giggling profusely) makes it all the better. I’m so blessed that in God’s kingdom, I can look into your eyes and feel the love of a father. It makes me well up in tears right now as I write this. I love you very much and don’t even know you. But thank you for your heart and for sharing your gifts with us.
Love your sister in Christ,
DeMerris
P.S. I would love to meet Theresa. She sounds like a PAW, a pretty awesome woman (I literally just made that up, so corny. lol).
