Category: Wildman Journey (Page 6 of 85)

Matthew 7:1-3 reads, ” Do not judge, or you too will be judged.  For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and  with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”  The Message translation makes clear a critical spirit is the result of judging other people. “Don’t pick on people, jump on their failures, criticize their faults – unless, of course, you want the same treatment.  That critical spirit has a way of boomeranging.”   

The Message goes on to translate verses 2-5 as follows.  “It’s easy to see a smudge on your neighbor’s face and be oblivious to the ugly sneer on your own.  Do you have the nerve to say, ‘Let me wash your face for you.’ when your face is distorted by contempt? It’s this whole road-show mentality all over again, playing a holier-than-thou part instead of just living your part.  Wipe that ugly sneer off your own face, and you might be fit to offer a washcloth to your neighbor.” “A holier-than-thou” attitude is convicting to me as I encounter the decadence of our day. 

I must confess that I am convicted of having a “critical spirit.”  In today’s cultural environment, which is intensely polluted with anger, , and vindictive attitudes, I have to be vigilant to not pick up a “critical spirit.”  Rather I desire to be loving, forgiving and putting the best construction on another person’s belief, behavior, and especially attitude.     

Years ago I was influenced by the healing ministry of John and  Paula Sandford.  I learned that a critical or judging spirit, will set in motion the principle of sowing and reaping.  They taught, “The fundamental laws of God are written into the universe and affect our lives as surely as gravity.”  When we transgress these laws, we set in motion forces that will be reaped by a simple, impersonal law. “In our sinful responses to wounding, we begin early to develop patterns of behavior that cause us to reap in adulthood the very things we hate.” 

We will sow and reap in kind.  We judge and do more of the same.  “The pain we reap often seems out of proportion to the harm we have done.  But Matthew 7 is clear.   “A critical spirit has a way of boomeranging.”  We are reminded in Gal 6:7, “Don’t be mislead.  Remember that you can’t ignore God and get away with it.  You will always reap what you sow.”  “This means we cannot ever lose our reward, but neither can we escape our fleshly deeds.  Those who think they have gotten away with something fleshly will nevertheless reap harm.  In fact, the longer a sin goes unrepented, the greater the reaping will be. ‘They sow the wind, and they reap the whirlwind’ ” (Hosea 8:7)

Here are three principles I have to continue to practice, so as not to develop a “critical spirit.”  First, I need to practice a lifestyle of unilateral  forgiveness.  There will be sharp disagreements  with others, I will have a different lifestyle and I will not agree with the behavior and attitudes of others.  But I owe them the love and acceptance of the Lord.  “What is important is faith expressing itself in love” (Gal 5:6). 

Secondly, I don’t want to be someone who  complains and argues about our negative culture.  “In everything you do, stay away from complaining and arguing, so that no one can speak a word of blame against you” (Phil 2:14).

Thirdly, in the midst of so much bad news, I want to be an instrument of “Good News.” “The Kingdom of God is near! Turn from your sins and believe this Good News” (Mark 1:15). Focusing on the kingdom is “Good News.”

In an article entitled “Men only want one thing” in Comment magazine, men are referred to as being like “timber.”  “Will they be shaped into good, sturdy beams and joists that will shelter, support, and protect?  Or will they shape themselves in their own wild ways, producing knotty. weak, and crooked lengths that don’t do anyone any good?”  May we be “good timber.” The author, Nathan Beacom, suggests “there’s something about America today that doesn’t jibe with the male psyche.”  The author believes monasticism offers keen psychological insights into the psychic and moral wounds of men.  

Beacom offers a spectrum of manhood.  One the one end is “the tough man.”  “For many men this tough guy leaves festering wounds of inadequacy and insecurity that can lead to all kinds of pathological behaviors.”  On the other end of the spectrum is “the sophisticated ally.”  “The ally tends to talk down his own sex in an effort to set him apart from the negative strands of masculinity.” Then there is the “full man,” having the moral ideal of a man expressed in gentleness and goodness.  “Failing this, strength, size, speed, aggression, and active sexual desire remain – but untutored and undisciplined.”

The author favors a “gentle man,” who is an integrated man, “both iron and disciplined on the one hand and gentle and patient on the other…….[which ] finds a harmonic resonance with the Christian monastic tradition.”  The Rule of Saint Benedict, “contains sharp and enduring psychological insights into the process of taking the raw material of masculinity and shaping it into good manhood.”  The Rule identifies “three key developmental strands that are lacking in our culture today: fatherhood, brotherhood, and discipline.”

First is fatherhood.  “Manhood is passed in only one real way: from man to man.”  The rule sees the self-willed man who sets his own law based on his desires.  “This is the shepherdless man, the hedonistic man, the destructive man.”  “Cultivating good young men requires that we support structures that prioritize male-to-male mentorship.”

Secondly, along with the fatherhood of the monastery is its “brotherhood.”  “By intentionally living among brothers with a common vision, men set a higher standard toward which they could encourage each other and against which they could measure themselves.”

Finally, there is the life of abstinence, of asceticism, of discipline. The monks know “asceticism (spiritual discipline)…..is not a simple refusal of good things.  Rather, it is a way of disciplining the soul and a chief weapon in the battle against the self.” 

Beacom goes on to offer a simple formula for the duties of manhood: “protect, provide, and establish.” “We need,” the author suggests, “the moral equivalent of monasticism.”  What does this mean?  “We need to be intentional about cultivating male spaces for brotherhood and mentorship in the path of virtuous living.” 

The author closes with these words.  “Our men must be gentle, and they must also be men.  The idea of a gentle man embodies a fullness of vision that embraces all that is positive in men, including their unique ways of displaying gentleness, tenderness, and charity. We cannot have one without the other……..the tradition of the monastery embody some of what is best in the combination of manhood and gentleness for all men.” 

The early monastic movement was an attempt to flee from the world in order to save it.  The monks made a significant contribution in preserving western  culture.  Could the monastic model be modified so as to rescue men from our present dying culture, in order to help men to be “good timber” in our day?  Could it be that men banding together, might find a model among the monks?    

On April 15, 1912, when the liner Titanic was declared doomed, men gather each year on that date at the Titanic Memorial in Washington, D.C. The Men’s Titanic Society gather to honor the passenger who donned evening clothes in order to die like a gentleman. They annually offer a toast: “Chivalry, gallantry, bravery and grace….To the young and old, the rich and the poor, the ignorant and the learned, all who gave their lives nobly to save women and children.  To those brave men.”  

“Men seem to instinctively treat masculinity as the call to die so that others may live – the highest form of sacrifice,” notes Nancy Pearcey. That principle seems to be built into men’s created nature.  Pearcey, however, makes a distinction between a “good man” and “real man.”  She calls the “good man” ideal as the software of God’s creation, while the “real man” stereotype reveals the “virus of sin.”   

In her book, Pearcey notes the work of sociologists, who have discovered that active churchgoing evangelical men have the lowest rates of divorce and domestic violence,  while the “nominal” men who identify as Christians because of their cultural roots, but rarely attend church, have the highest rates of divorce and domestic violence – even higher than secular men.  These “nominal Christian men” often “internalize the real man script, while defending their behavior by pinning Christian language on their abusive beliefs.” 

“When it comes to real issues in the lives of real men, far too many religious leaders are looking the other way,” she observes.  Meanwhile books are being sold with titles such as, “I Hate Men,’ “The End of Men,” “Are Men Necessary,”Boys Adrift,” “Why Boys Fail” and “Why Men Hate Going to Church.”  

Pearcey makes this insightful observation: “On Mother’s Day, we hand out roses and praise mothers.  On Father’s Day, we tend to scold men and tell them to do better……We need to talk about the positive things men are doing, while also trying harder to find ways to reach out to the nominal men and speak the truth about what it means to be a good man.”  She warns the church, when she says, “The most common mistake pastors make is to assume that domestic violence is a marriage problem and to offer marital counseling – bringing both spouses into the office together.  The wife may be afraid to reveal any serious mistreatment.”  

Lord help me to be a “good man,” motivated by  your spirit,  not just pretending to be real. I don’t want to hide from you. “These people come near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me…..Woe to those who go to great depths to hide their plans from the Lord, who do their work in darkness and think, ‘Who sees us? Who will know?'” (Isaiah 29:13 & 15).  

My intentions are to be a “good man.”  But I am a work in progress.  Becoming  a “good man” can sometimes be painful.  Remember, Al, you are the clay; He is the potter.  I can not hide from God. “How foolish can you be? He is the Potter, and he is certainly greater than you, the clay!  Should the created thing say of the one who make it, ‘He didn’t make me’? Does a jar ever say, ‘The Potter who made me is stupid'” (Is. 29:16 NLT).

At a recent pastor gathering, two other pastors shared their testimony of coming to Christ through the same man who helped me, Pastor Theodore Hax.  That has now been 65 years of the potter working on this clay (Al Hendrickson).  He is still shaping me, even when it hurts. 

Remnant bog site had an very revealing piece on the deathbed experience.  Pulitzer Prize-winning author and oncologist Siddhartha Mukherjee identified four common phrases expressed on deathbeds, emphasizing that each had a lesson for a fullness of life.  These four phases are:

            1. “I want to tell you that I love you.”

            2. “I want to tell you that I forgive you.”

             3. “Would you tell me that you love me?”

            4. “Would you give me your forgiveness?”

He also noted that delayed expressions of love and forgiveness can lead to regret as well as hinder personal and professional growth. Mukherjee challenged people, “to imbue expressions of love and forgiveness with genuine meaning, urging authenticity and personal significance in interpersonal connections.”   

I don’t know this man’s relationship to the Lord, but his insights are right on when it comes to the deathbed experiences, I have had the privilege of witnessing.  As a pastor I spent many hours with loved ones and their families, as they give support and encouragement to their loved one in their last moments of life.  These were some of the most sacred and holy moments of my life as a pastor, yet they can also be very challenging when I am not sure of the loved one’s relationship with the Lord. 

Now that I am in my mid-eights, I am able to view the deathbed experience from a completely new perspective, since I am no longer in the center but on to edge of life.  Parker Palmer words seem appropriate. “On the edge of everything you can see all kinds of things you can’t see from the center.” I assume my reflections is being read by men who are right in “the center” of life.  You are busy, preoccupied with making a living, caring for your family, wanting to succeed  in your vocation and simply keeping up with the obligations of a husband and father.  It is easy to let your personal relationships slip causing, “relational sins” (Larry Crabb).    

This blog, gives me the opportunity to encourage you with the importance of relating well to those closest to you.  Don’t wait till your deathbed experience to say you love those closest to you.  Don’t put off being forgiving in your relationships.  Remember the author’s challenge of sharing expressions of love and forgiveness with meaning and authenticity, knowing how important they are. 

My testimony – I praise God for his mercy and grace in my life.  I am like the blind man who found healing in Jesus.  His testimony was simple, “One thing I do know, I was blind but now I see!”  Early in my walk with the Lord, I did not see the blessing of having good relationships with my immediate family.  I had to  learn  by God’s grace to have a lifestyle of forgiveness, with a desire to love each family member with the love of the Lord.  The author is right  – “delaying expressions of love and forgiveness can lead to regret and hinder personal and professional growth.”

I am not quite sure about his final two phrases.  But I know this, as I try to visualize my deathbed, I can not demand or expect gestures of love and forgiveness.  But I can prepare “the soil” for such gestures by having sown the seeds of forgiveness and unconditional love to those closest to me. 

Men, I can not stress the importance of showing love and granting forgiveness to your family members.  Please don’t wait until you are on your deathbed.  “Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance” (I Cor. 13:7).    

Arron Renn  on his blog site, featured an article entitled “Christian Buddhism” by Dr. John Seel.   The opening sentence got my attention.  “A number of home grown features of today’s American evangelicalism echo Buddhist themes.”  We live in a mix and match world, where religious seekers are described as “Remixed.”  In Seel’s view there are Buddhist-like tendencies in conservative orthodox evangelical Christian circles due to a “low grade of biblical literacy” that leads “to an impotent faith that has little relevance in the real world of day-to-day existence.”  

There is a wide acceptance of a truncated gospel, that views the gospel as narrowly judicial and gnostic.  Forensic justification as a divine verdict of acquittal pronounced on the believing sinner, can make the cross the telos of Jesus’ redemptive purpose.  This view has been called the “two-chapter gospel” (fall + redemption) or the “gospel of sin management.”  But Dallas Willard and N. T Wright favor a kingdom-oriented gospel or a “four-chapter gospel” (creation +fall +redemption + restoration).  

The telos of the gospel is not merely dealing with the forensic guilt of sin but inaugurating a new kind of resurrection life within the believer.  The failure to appreciate a holistic understanding of the gospel is a “foundation flaw” of Christians today. Willard notes,  “The final hope of Christian is not simply ‘going to heaven,’ but resurrection into God’s new creation, the ‘new heaven and new earth.'” In other words, the gospel is not about getting you into heaven, but to get heaven into you via the indwelling presence of Christ through his Holy Spirit. 

An alternative spiritual story differs in three ways.  First, the story begins here, right now.  Willard maintains, “The gospel is the good news of the presence and availability of life in the kingdom, now and forever, through the reliance on Jesus the Anointed. ” Secondly, eternal life is an intimate interactive relationship with Jesus in daily life.  Thirdly, “the gospel is about making this invisible spiritual connection visible in our bodies and transformative in our world now.” Wright summarizes  this view by saying, “the work of salvation, in its full sense, is 1) about whole human beings, not merely souls, 2)about the present, not simply the future; and 3) about what God does through us, not merely what God does in and for us.”    

Seel sees the influence of Eastern religious perspective in three ways.  First, the aim is to connect with the divine spark within which is intrinsic to your being.  This brings about a sacralized autonomy or a spiritualized self-centeredness.  Secondly, this connection is invisible, immaterial, and impersonal. Rather than connecting to a person, we are connecting to a cosmic energy.  Thirdly, these connections do nothing to challenge  the autonomy of self.  These connections are all Gnostic in spirit.  

“But on closer examination, the promise of the gospel requires repenting of your self-centered life orientation, placing yourself before a personal and moral Creator, acknowledging your sin, and then through accepting the grace of the cross connecting to an indwelling incarnate presence of God within that becomes the presence, purpose and power of your life.”  The great tradition of  Christianity tells a much different and better story.  

My testimony – I daily cry out for discernment to have a clear understanding of my walk with Jesus.  I am not a Christian Buddhist.  Why!! 1) I confess I am a beloved sinner,  loved by God is my stink.  He saved me.  2) God lives within me.  I have joined the dance of the Trinity.  4)  I now live in the presence of the kingdom,  and 5) It is God who works in and through me, not myself.  All honor and glory go to Him.

In the book of Malachi, God, warns of religious worship actually being contemptuous of God, by offering defiled sacrifices in worship.   God accuses his people of despising him with their “shoddy, sloppy, defiling worship” (Mal 1:7 -Message).  “The altar of God is not important anymore; worship of God is no longer a priority ……And when you offer worthless animals for sacrifices in worship, animals that you’re trying to get rid of – the blind and sick and crippled animals – isn’t that defiling” (Mal. 1:8 – Message).  

God  exhorts them, “Get on your knees and pray that I will be gracious to you.  Your priests have gotten everyone in trouble.  With this kind of conduct, do you think I’ll pay attention to you” ( Mal 1:9).  God reminds them that all over the world He is honored and worshipped.  He, however, tells them, “All except you.  Instead of honoring me, you profane me.  You profane me when you say, ‘Worship is not important, and what we bring to worship is of no account,’ and when you say, ‘I’m bored – this doesn’t do anything for me.’….And when you do offer something to me, it’s a hand-me-down, or broken, or useless.  Do you think I’m going to accept it?” (Mal 1:12-13 – Message).

Then God expresses how serious he view shoddy, sloppy and defiling worship.  ” A curse on the person who makes a big show of doing something great for me – an expensive sacrifice, say – and then at the last minute brings in something puny and worthless!  I’m a great king, God-of-the Angel-Armies, honored far and wide, and I’ll not put up with it” (Mal. 1:14 – Message). 

I am convicted of how quiet I have been regarding the profane manner God is treated in our culture. As nation we have lost our way.  Our worship of God does not reflect an awe of an holy and almighty God.  Our worship is “shoddy, sloppy and defiling.” By dishonoring God with our indifference,  judgment can already be discerned by the faithful “watchmen” looking into the future.  Malachi’s prophecy is warning us, “Count on it: The day is coming, raging like a forest fire” Mal. 4:1 – Message).  “All the arrogant people who do evil things, will be burned up, like stove wood, burned to a crip, nothing left but scorching earth and ash – a black day” (Mal 4:2-3).  

But for those, whose worship is whole hearted and sincere it will be like a sunrise.  “The sun of righteousness will dawn on those who honor my name, healing radiating from its wings.  You will be bursting with energy, like colts, frisky and frolicking.  And you’ll tromp on the wicked. They’ll be nothing but ashes under your feet on that Day” (Mal. 4:2-3 – Message). 

Writing this blog on Malachi’s prophecy has convicted me.  I want to publicly make a commitment.  First, I will not be silent.  I will quietly, yet confidently warn those in my sphere of influence that God’s judgment is coming on a nation that profanes Him.  Secondly, I will make my warning as simply as this:  Jesus is Lord and King of all history – He has already won the battle – His kingdom is here – We have a choice to make – Make him Lord or suffer the consequences.  

Since I am in the fourth quarter of my life here on earth,  thirdly, I will “not be ashamed of the of the gospel, because it is the power of God for salvation of everyone who believes” (Romans 1:16).  Only Jesus can save us from ourselves and fourthly, I am willing to count the cost of following Jesus. “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me” (Mark 8:34). 

This is the title of a new book by Noelle Mering.  She wrote a condensed article about the woke movement for Ralph Martin’s monthly newsletter.  She contends there are victims of the movement, who need healing.  There are those who, “have been given some poison of ideology that has harmed and wounded them.” Others have simply been deceived.  Then there are others who are “the source of the poison and need to be stopped.” This all causes confusion.  “Some people need to be befriended and listened to.  Other people need to be woken up.  And the people doing immediate harm need to be stopped.” 

The woke movement started in the Garden, where Adam and Eve were tempted to be as god.  “It is a self-deification movement,” writes Mering, “that corrodes the human person as well as friendships, families, and relationships.”  Following Marx, woke sees “every person either as an oppressor or the oppressed.” Marx believed, “the biggest obstacles to a revolution as faith, family, and the father.”  Why?  “All three give us a particular identity and help us to feel named and known.  They root us and give us purpose.” 

The poison of the movement is “a redefining of what a human is.”  According to Mering, woke has three dogmas.  “The first dogma emphasizes the group and sublimates the person.  It redefines humanity according to society’s hatred and demands uniformity of thought.  Identity is found in fighting oppression.  It creates a society looking for a perpetrator and seeking victimhood.”  Instead of being children of a loving God, “the movement defines us by society’s hatred.” 

The second dogma, “emphasizes will at the expense of reason.  It attempts to re-engineer society by claiming that society and humanity have no fundamental nature….our feelings and desires define us and that we should pursue transgressive identities…..moral law is oppressive and innocence is a form of dominance that must be destroyed.”  We are oppressed by our own internal repression, which is based on a moral law that is really a social construct and not actually real. 

The third dogma, “emphasizes power over authority.  It harms the whole family by targeting and weakening the father.  This harms our understanding of God as well.”  Targeting fathers implodes the human family.  But warms Mering, “the real target is our Lord.” 

But Mering is hopeful.  “Social re-engineers think,” observes Mering, “human nature is putty, but the human person longs for and is made to know, love, and serve God.”  The woke movement understands, “everything is systemically wrong around me.”  As believers we say, “What is wrong with me?  Mea culpa.”  Each of us is self-accused; We don’t accuse others.  “From there,” she declares, “we can bravely call out the lies that are harming people.”  “The thin veneer of ideology will not satisfy the human soul.  We all need to know they are named and known by God.”  

In my opinion, the poison of Woke has already done much harm to families and especially the young. Men, we need to be alert to the intention of this poison in our society.  We are no longer seen as beloved children of God, but victims of society’s hate.  The moral law and reason are  devalued, while personal choice is promoted.  Men need to know Woke has them in their crosshairs, with its emphasis on power over authority.  Mering points out that faith, family and faith are the biggest roadblocks in the movement, since any authority is seen as oppressive.

Men, don’t be deceived by this poison.  Don’t allow those in your family to be wounded.  We must wake up. “Awake, O sleeper, rise up from the dead, and Christ will give you light” (Eph 5:14).   

I am preparing a meditation on Matthew 12:18-21.  Matthew is quoting a prophecy of Isaiah regarding Jesus.  He records these words just after the political and religious leaders of Jesus’ day wanting to kill him.  Mark’s gospel tells us, “Then the Pharisees went out and began to plot with the Herodians how they might kill Jesus.”  The religious and secular leaders, who did not care for each other, were united in their hatred of Jesus.  Imagine – they wanted to kill Jesus.

The influencers in our nation- the ones who shape the dominant narrative, want to get rid of the memory of King Jesus.  They are in the process of removing the memory and relevance of Jesus. But the true narrative sees things differently.  Pilate ask Jesus if he was a king.  Jesus replied, “Yes, it is as you say” (Luke 23:3)  Then Jesus let Pilate know, he is not in charge.  “You would have no power over me at all unless it were given to you from above” (John 19:11). Jesus was secure in his Lordship over all things, knowing, “The Father loves the Son and has placed everything in his hands” (John 3:35).

Matthew 12 has a certain relevance in our day, when King Jesus is getting such bad press.  With all the confusion and uncertainty about who is really in charge of our nation, I gladly submit to King Jesus, He reign in all the earth and His final victory over evil is assured.  He taught us to pray, “Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven’ (Matt. 6:10).

By this time in Jesus’ ministry, public opinion had already began to question his credibility.  He had to withdraw from the public, while still healing the sick.  But he warned them, “not to tell who he was” (Matt. 12:16).  Similar to our day, there are mixed opinions regarding Jesus.  

“Look at my servant, whom I have chosen.  He is my beloved, who pleases me” (v. 18).  Matthew challenge us to consider the lordship of Jesus.  Not only is he the beloved of the Father, but also the Father’s  chosen servant, coming into our world on a  rescue mission.  The Father loves him and is pleased in what he is doing.  

Then Isaiah notes, “I will put my Spirit upon him, and he will proclaim justice to the nations” (v. 18).  What an encouragement to each of us.  The very Spirit of God is upon Jesus.  Through his sojourn among us, He will straighten out all right and wrong.  He will be the final judge and jury in world affairs.  This is God’s promise to us.

In the meantime, “He will not fight or shout or raise his voice in public” (v. 19)  Wow, what a relief to hear these words.  King Jesus, who is working out justice on the earth will have no need to protest, demonstrate and shout for justice.  He simply will go about getting things in order, in a quiet and decisive manner

He will not use force or coercion to win over brutality and force.  Rather, “He will not crush the weakest reed or put out a flickering candle” (v. 20).  Imagine the hope and comfort in these words for the downtrodden and outcast in world affairs.  Remember his mother’s words, “He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble” (Luke 1:52).

Isaiah closes with these words, “Finally he will cause justice to be victorious.  And his name will be the hope of all the world” (v.  21-22). In Jesus we are truly “on the right side of history.”  Men, I pray today that your hope for a better future is in Jesus.   

I met recently with a male friend, I consider a “soul mate.”  He is someone with whom I can to talk about what is going on in my soul.  I have committed to allow him to know me for who I am – the good, the bad, and the ugly.  I want to be more of an honest man, integrating my head and heart. 

After our meeting together, I felt led to write a blog on my sharing with my friend.  I began by telling him how I had found myself, once again, in the pit.  As he listened to my story, he was helping my climb out, so I could walk in the light.  

Every man has this experience every now and then.  Each has his own unique pit.  The Psalmist knew what the pit was like.  Here are some descriptions of his actual experience. “Do not let the floodwaters engulf me or the depths swallow over me or the pit close its mouth over me” (Ps 69:15). This feels like a man either in the pit or aware that he is sinking.  

In Ps. 143:7 the palmist descriptions himself actually sinking. “Answer me quickly, O Lord; my spirit fails.  Do not hide your face from me or I will be like those who go down to the pit.”  This is definitely a cry for help.

The Psalmist in Psalm 103:4 expresses thanks for God’s help in getting out of the pit.  “…..who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion.” 

Reading and meditating on Ps. 40:2, I find real help  when I feel myself in the pit.  “He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand.” Down in the pit it is slimy; God places us on solid ground.

In Psalm 30 the Psalmist expresses, “I will exalt you, O Lord, for you lifted me out of the depths.”  (Psalm 30:1). He goes on to testify, “O Lord, you brought me up from the grave; you spared me from going down into the pit” (v. 3).  He questions his experience of being in the pit.  “What gain is there in my destruction, in my going down into the pit?  Will the dust praise you?  Will it proclaim your faithfulness? (v. 9).

Psalm 88 is a very dark Psalm, as it expressed a desperate cry for help.  The Psalmist prays, “For my soul is full of trouble and my life draws near the grave.  I am counted among those who go down to the pit; I am like a man without strength.”

For many years I avoided talking about the times I felt in the pit.  It was not continues, but circumstances would cause me to fall into a pit time and again.  My confession, which is not easy to make, is that I so often felt like a little boy, feeling sorry for myself.  Feeling full of self-pity and self-loathing caused me to be angry with myself for failing to be at the “top of my spiritual game.” 

My testimony is that with my friend Bruce, I could  get beyond my shame, acknowledge freely my self-centeredness, while wanting to be back on the surface out of the “miry clay.”  A true friend will not look down into the pit to either scold  or exhort you to get out.  He might come down into the pit, and encourage you  But most of all he will listen, acknowledge your condition in the pit, and point  you to Jesus, while saying “Al, cry out for mercy and grace.”  God will pull me out.  

This is the title of a blog  by Ronald Rolheiser, a Catholic spiritual writer.  He makes reference to Carmelite nun, Constance Fitzgerald, who uses the word “impasse” in reference to the dark night of the soul.  She visualizes the dark night as a crucible of purifying in which, “the way out is the way through.”   “We are  unable to go back to the way things were, nor able to move forward.  All the former ways we understood. imagined and felt about things, especially in relation to God, faith and prayer, no longer worked for us.  We are unable to  think, imagine or feel our way out.  We are stuck at an impasse – no way back and no way forward.  How do we move beyond the impasse?”

The impasse has shown me my spiritual immaturity, along with the lack of depth in my spiritual formation. I have  been learning to live in the “dark night”  crying out for God to be merciful, as I allow him to transform more of my life into the image of Jesus. It has been a bumpy ride for me, learning slowly to give up control and  the need to understand.   In this journey, God’s Word has been my guide, as I have learned to listen to the deep longing of my soul. My thoughts and feelings have had to be refined through pain and confusion. This is the ultimate liminal space, a crucible in which I  needed to be purified. 

“The way out of a dark night of this kind,” notes Rolheiser, “is through ‘contemplation‘,  staying with the impasse, waiting patiently inside it, and waiting for God to break the impasse by transforming our imagination, intellect, and heart…..this impasse is a challenge for us to become mystics, not that we begin to search for extraordinary religious experience, but that we let our disillusion, broken symbols, and failed meanings become the space wherein God can reset our faith, feelings, imagination and intellect inside a new horizon wherein everything is radically reinterpreted.” 

So what should our response be?  Rolheiser asks, “How do we contemplate?”  “We do it by sitting in the  tension, helpless, patient, open, waiting, and staying there however long it takes for us to receive in the depth of our souls a new way of imagining, thinking, and feeling about God, faith, and prayer – beyond the impasse.”  This impasse notes Rolheiser, “is precisely what assures us that the new vision which is given to us comes from God and is not the product of our imagination or projection or self-interest.”  

Until the early 80’s I had no idea of this rich contemplative stream found within the Catholic tradition.  I have been immersed in this stream ever since, while not leaving my evangelical, biblical roots.  Jesus’ prayer in  John 17:26 has been a guide for me: “I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.”   I am invited into the loving relationship with the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  This gets to the heart of the contemplative journey with the Lord.

Here are some phrases from the article I identified with: 1) crucible of purifying – often a painful death to my ego,  2) “an impasse”- patiently waiting in the Lord’s presence,  3) contemplation –  receiving from God without my self imposed filters,  4)  Mystic – loving intimate relationship.   

Don’t let the word “mystic” scare you.  A mystic is simply one, who loves Jesus and wants to be conformed to his image.  “For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God” (Col 3:3)