Ideas That Have Ruined Me

Below is a list of ideas that have "ruined" me--i.e., ideas that have forever altered my way of perceiving and thinking about the world around me and how I interact with others' perceptions and thoughts. I hope to write more about each in the coming weeks.

1. At the end of the Bible's story, believers spend eternity on the renewed earth, not "in heaven." This has forever changed my reaction to much Christian music and thinking.
2. The importance of criticality and doubt in thinking, thanks to Pascal's reason-based doubt-proof-submission paradigm.
3. "All truth is God's truth," thanks to Calvin.
4. "Calling is the truth that God calls us to Himself so decisively that everything we do, everything we are, and everything we have is invested with a special dynamism and devotion lived out as a response to His summons," thanks to Os Guinness. (My apologies if the wording is out of order, as I'm writing from memory.)
5. "An intellectual is someone who loves ideas... A Christian intellectual is [one who does so] to the glory of God," thanks to James Sire.
6. "Learning results from what the student does and thinks and only from what the student does and thinks," thanks to Herbert Simon. In my mind, this idea has spent the last six months in an intergalactic collision with the idea that the way we "do church" is not specifically prescribed in either the Old or New Testament.

What ideas have "ruined" you?

Bloggin' Bout my Generation, Part III

So... what's the answer to this generation dilemma?

I don't have a foolproof solution, but I do have a suggestion.

My generation needs to transition from feeling challenged to feeling called.

We needed challenges. We needed to be pushed out of our comfort zones. We needed to be inspired to sacrificially serve God. We needed See You at the Pole rallies and Newsboys concerts and Summer Projects. Even those of us who haven't gone into "full-time ministry" needed them. (Perhaps we're the ones who needed them the most.) Those experiences, I believe, have made us unique, and we need to not be ashamed of that uniqueness.

But to hold onto our uniqueness, we need a sense of calling. Os Guinness defines calling as "the truth that God calls us to Himself so decisively that everything we are, everything we do, and everything we have in invested with a special devotion and dynamism lived out as a response to His summons and service." Challenges come in lumps (sometimes mountain-sized lumps); calling is continual. Challenges lead to growth in fits and spurts; calling leads to a journey. Challenge brings change from the top down; calling brings change from the bottom up.

Here's to praying we become a generation that answers its call. Not a call to abandon our "normal" lives in exchange for something "better," but to live out our extraordinary relationship with God in our "normal" lives. I think that's how God wants us to change the world, and I think He's prepared this generation of Christians to do it in a unique way.

The other side of the question is how the church can help us do that. I don't exactly know. But I hope current and future church leaders will see this need and dream of ways to encourage a new, called generation.

The Discipline of Dismay

My small group is going through Os Guinness' The Call. We recently had a discussion about Guinness' description of what Oswald Chambers called "the discipline of dismay." He describes it as the weightiness that settles in when, after the initial joy of following Jesus has passed, we realize that Jesus may be traveling somewhere we'll find unpleasant.

He gives the example of Jesus setting a course for Jerusalem, telling His disciples several times along the way that He was going there to die. (This setting makes their questions about who is the greatest seem even more ludicrous, but that's another blog for another day.)

It's at this point in the semester that the discipline of dismay sets in for me. There are six weeks left---only six!---and yet following Jesus for those six weeks seems so much more difficult than the previous nine. There are difficult conversations with students who have fallen behind; long-term projects come to an intense head; I get sick; multiple deadlines converge on the same day (and procrastination becomes a long-gone pleasure!); LOST offers more questions than answers...

(Okay; that last one is relatively tame, but it certainly doesn't help.)

It's also at this point in the semester that it's easiest to put false hope in the next semester, to begin planning for the next round of classes, when I know I'll "get it right."

But I need to learn what I can, and grow how I can, during this time. I need to accept the discipline of dismay, and not avoid it.

Ford vs. The Frantics

My church small group is reading through The Call, by Os Guinness. We recently discussed Chapter 5, "By Him, To Him, For Him," which addresses the "Protestant distortion," which, as Guinness puts it, "[said] that work was made sacred. Whereas the Bible is realistic about work, seeing it after the fall as both creative and cursed, the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries lost the balance. Work was not only entirely good, but it was also virtually made holy in a crescendo of enthusiasm that was later termed 'the Protestant ethic.'"

Guinness illustrates this distortion with a series of quotes from that time.

"The man who builds a factory builds a temple. The man who works there worships there" (President Collidge). All right; I can understand & appreciate that. We should worship God in all we do (not just work, but including work).

"Work is the salvation of the human race, morally, physically, socially" (Henry Ford). Yikes! Sounds like someone is trying to drum up motivation to work at an assembly line...

At the same time, we can fall into the other trap of hating work altogether. Consider the following lines from "Kids of Summer" on Meet the Frantics (Are they still around?):

"I don't want to go to work again.
Think it's the only place I've ever been.
And I would rather be at home
Watching TV all alone
Than to be in this.

I feel it eatin' at my soul again.
My candle's burnin' and it's reached the end.
But there's nothing I can say
To make a difference anyway
To get me out of here.

I used to have a heart,
When we were the kids of summer.
But the dyin' had begun,
When you and I were young.

I don't want to go to sleep again.
By six a.m. I'm wishing I was dead.
A couple hours in the sack
Turn around and headin' back
To start the cycle again.

I gotta wear that stupid painted grin
When I just wanna jump right outta  my skin.
I need something that is true,
But there's nothin' I can do,
I gotta pay the bills."

How do we find the balance? How do we feel a sense of completing our calling, while at the same time paying the bills (and washing the laundry, and filling up the car with gas, and cleaning the bathroom, and washing the laundry again because you forgot to put it in the dryer after washing it yesterday...)?

Undergraduate Corner: Surviving Winter Break

On this blog, the first and third Tuesday of each month are dedicated to presenting discussion geared toward undergraduate students, in a series called, "Undergraduate Corner."

The end of the semester is not that far away. In just a few weeks, undergrads all over the country will be packing up their bags, selling back their textbooks, making sure they have that cute lab partner's cell number, and heading home. They'll finally get to sleep (for about 1.5 days straight) in their own bed, eat their favorite meal that their mother prepares (we call ours "Good Chicken"--does that name even need a description?), and spend a few glorious weeks not having to think about Salinger, free-body diagrams, or inelastic demand.

But Christian students may also find it difficult to spend time thinking about God.

Here's the scenario: The Christian college student returns home, and either 1. skips church (understandable given their dire need of sleep) or 2. goes back to their "old church" (is six months ago really that old?) and it simply isn't the same as it used to be (especially if half of their friends from high school aren't there) AND they're hearing the Christmas story which, although powerful, sounds familiar to them and they begin to zone out.

After a very short time, their few weeks of rest have passed, and they return to campus with bellies that are full but souls that are still deflated. And beginning the spring semester (which doesn't even offer the release of football, unless your team is headed to the national championship...) with a deflated soul makes it very long indeed.

So, I'd offer the following advice to Christian students who are just 1.5 months away from winter break:

1. Pick up a Christian book to read over break. I know you don't think that you'll want to read anything, but you might actually find it restful to use your brain on something other than schoolwork. Might I recommend Knowing God by Packer, which has simple language and self-contained chapters, or The Call by Guinness, which just might stir up your motivation to enter the spring semester with a renewed vigor?
2. Stay in touch with Christian friends from school. (Besides your cute lab partner...) Spend some time praying together. Share about what you're reading.
3. Reflect on what you've learned. The end of a college semester is such a rushed time---for students and faculty---such that we rarely have time to think back on what we've learned, how it all relates, how God is showing us His glory in all of it, and how He's using it all to prepare us for a life of service.

What are some suggestions you have for Christian undergrads on their way home?