The Irony of my Missions-Saturated Upbringing

I heard the Amy Carmichael story too, but like those little girls in India it was only one of millions and did not have nearly the impact on me as others did. For example, Dr. Helen Roseveare or Don Richardson or the late missionary linguist, David Watters, to name only three missionaries I remember vividly from missions conferences, all had a far greater impact on me. Perhaps the most formative impressions came from rather mundane conversations around our dinner table over the years with my parents’ legion of missionary friends. Pictures of these people hung on our massive kitchen bulletin board. We prayed for them, and we received their prayer letters, (a literary genre employing some of the poorest and least inspiring writing known to man. The exceptions are rare and precious.) The irony was that while these missionary stories and messages gave me much to consider in terms of the church universal and how the gospel comes to people who don’t know it, all the while they failed to address the problem of my own lack of understanding of the gospel. If I was to catalogue sermons I’ve heard and sort them according to text, (and this would be a very large catalogue) the tally for Acts 1:8, Matthew 28: 19-20, and/or Isaiah 6 would win hands down. All this emphasis on mission actually probably did some harm when disconnected from the gospel and nurtured in the heady rule-based culture of the college campus.

I have a few very close personal friends who are missionaries. The thing I know for sure is they are no different than I am, and have the same crises of faith and the same struggles relating to evangelical culture as I do. We probably wouldn’t be close friends if that weren’t true. Because of their elevated position in evangelical narratives of furthering the kingdom of God through what is perceived as an ultimate sacrifice of giving up their native land, language, culture, close proximity to family, etc., their spiritual crises are filled with even greater angst because while they do not think of themselves as impervious to run-of-the-mill human struggles, they feel that expectation placed on them by some of their supporters. They are very aware of their own weaknesses, and being on display to their supporters while they are struggling to figure out whether they even believe in what they are doing only makes it more difficult. To admit such a struggle feels risky, inviting criticism regarding their spiritual qualifications to do the task, and so they struggle on alone, coerced to play the heroic role given to them by evangelicalism. One of my dearest friends is in this situation right now. I can pray. I can affirm the value of the struggle. God has to do the rest, just as he is doing for me.

Exposed

I feel like Anne of Green Gables, who in response to Marilla's criticism that she talked far too much, reasoned that Marilla should be glad for all the things she could say but didn't. I do apologize if there is some unwritten rule about how often a person should post. I assume it means I'm a little more screwed up than the rest of you.

The last Books & Culture (click on imaginary link) featured a review of a book that feels to me wonderfully damning of this evangelical culture we are resisting together. The book In the Land of Believers was written by a self-proclaimed atheist, who carried out a kind of ethnographic experiment to see if she could learn to “live as an evangelical” and thus learn what evangelicals were like as people “on their own terms.” Her participant observation involved pretending she was a new convert, joining a church, participating in sacraments of baptism and the Eucharist, going on a mission trip and leading a little girl in the sinner’s prayer… She hoped through her experiment to find more appreciation for these evangelicals, more compassion perhaps, and much to her surprise she succeeded. She felt like she actually found belonging and affection, even while her beliefs didn’t change at all! How damning is that!? She came to the conclusion (as she calmly resumed her secular life) that evangelicals would eventually see the light and become more moderate, more adaptive to the culture around them. She arrived at a belief that they weren’t really bad people, just somewhat misguided, and needed a little time to see the light, the “mystical oneness of all things.”

This is completely believable to me. I successfully lived as a believer for years, but am quite sure looking back that my actual understanding and embrace of the gospel came gradually and much later, in spite of the culture not because of it. Does this not seem like the ultimate indictment: that we can live happily and successfully in evangelical communities, without the notion that belief is actually the core? What kind of community might Jesus have in mind for His church to be that this kind of experiment would not work? Or is that the great mystery: that this kind of an experiment could always work, that it would always be possible to buy the field for a million other reasons than its true value, the pearl of great price? It seems plausible to consider that the gravest danger to the gospel may well be the very religious cultures in which it lives, replete with their easy distractions of superficial performance—activities—rather than the inconspicuous realities of roots growing deep into the hidden sources of nourishment and sustenance that comprise real spiritual life. It drives me to my knees.

Seduced by Solitary Greatness

I recently heard the complete Coronation Anthems of Handel in a choral concert, texts from Psalms 89, 21, and 45. The other half of the concert featured Telemann’s setting of Psalm 72, Deus judicium tuum, Solomon’s coronation psalm. If I was clever like Darby, I could provide links to both of these works, but do check them out if you have the inclination. They are full of majestic Baroque music, with imaginative lyrical diversions for appropriate texts, my favourite being Telemann’s wonderful bassoons gurgling away while the tenor sings “He shall come down like rain upon the mown grass; as showers that water the earth. In his days shall the righteous flourish; and abundance of peace until the moon disappears.” The characteristics of God’s rule—strong, just, merciful, righteous, executing salvation for the needy—are anticipated in the rule of a good king, and all the people rejoice with the possibilities of it. How great the king was in himself is not the theme. He would be great if his rule reflected the rule of God. He would be evil if it didn’t. But how perfect he personally was for the job is not the focus at all. What a challenge this is to our culture’s approach to highly visible positions of leadership.

The concert called to mind a college presidential inauguration in the evangelical tradition that I was involved with a number of years ago. The campus buzzed with the outstanding competency of the incoming president, and while there were prayers for God’s blessing and anointing, in retrospect, it seems we were asking God to stamp us, the gifted and competent, with His approval. We were not seeking God himself as our blessing. It came back to me rather vividly at this concert because I remembered I had been considering one of the Coronation Anthems for the inauguration ceremony, until I was told that the president specially requested a choral rendition of this Wayne Watson tune for his inauguration service. (I sincerely hope I’m not dumping on anyone’s favourite song):

Now, all I have is now to be faithful, to be holy
and to shine, lighting up the darkness


Right now, I really have no choice but to voice the truth to the nations


A generation looking for God



Chorus: For such a time as this I was placed upon the earth


To hear the voice of God 
and do His will, whatever it is


For such a time as this, for now and all the days He gives


I am here, I am here, and I am His, for such a time as this…

The refrain of course recalls the saving of Israel by Esther’s courageous entreaty of King Ahasuerus. But Esther’s expectation at that time was death, “If I perish, I perish.” It was her God-fearing uncle who persuaded her to take this risk by proposing that perhaps she had come to the throne “for such a time as this.” However, neither of them were calculating the status of their actions for posterity. They were just trying to make sure there would be posterity. It seems like a classic twist of evangelicalism to take such a biblical story, and interpret it as a self-conscious, inflated ministry vision that places yourself at the centre of some big new work of God. As I see it, this is not just the problem of evangelicalism as a system, although perhaps we are more blind to it in ourselves, as if we were no longer prone to these self-centered narratives that show up everywhere: academe, politics, business. We want so badly to be that unique story, to make a mark no one else has made, and to be conscious of exactly what we’ve done so we can modestly take credit whenever someone notices, and boy, we sure hope they do. Incidentally, this college president was fired recently and his name will go down in infamy in the annals of the organization. “And all the people rejoiced” characterized his dismissal much more than any other part of his tenure. It makes me wonder if everyone’s focus had been more on God’s character whether the outcome would have been different. Speculation, I know, but I really wonder. I recently came across this statement in Archibald Alexander’s address to the general assembly of the Presbyterian Church in 1808: “It is a lamentable truth that talents, which qualify a man to do little good, enable him to do much mischief. So much easier is it to destroy than to edify.” I need look no further than myself for evidence that this is true. For me, the gospel is proving the only effective corrective.

No Third Eye

One of the most important classes I took in my recent degree was an acting class. I learned more in this class than the teacher will ever know. As far as I know she is not a religious person, but unwittingly she taught me a great deal, among other things, about why the approach to personal piety in evangelicalism is less than compelling.

As an actor, she was most strongly influenced by students of Stanislavski, who revolutionized theatre when he acted on his observations about what kind of stage presence provoked his actual interest as an onlooker. The story goes that he was sitting in the dark theatre watching the rehearsal of some star actor. At that time, the style was a highly presentational kind of theatre that emphasized the delivery, complete with gestures and calculated everything: facial expressions, intonation, pauses. Enter a repairman, to work on some mechanical deficiency of the stage, and he dropped his toolbox, tools scattering everywhere! He was mortified to so crudely interrupt the great actor in his work. What Stanislavski realized as he observed the whole encounter has had an enormous effect on the way that acting is taught. Stanislavski was riveted to the repairman in his embarrassed scramble to pick up his tools and retreat to obscurity, and the skilled contortions of the actor went unnoticed as long as the repairman was on the stage. Why should a lowly repairman compel such a fascination? Stanislavski realized that the answer was that he could see the interior life of the repairman clearly. The actor’s interior life was irrelevant, obscured by his rehearsed lines and gestures. The real interior life of the repairman compelled engagement; the rehearsed façade of the actor did not. The exercises she put us through during each three hour class were all about helping us to be present in the moment, helping us rid ourselves of making choices with the awareness of an audience, what she called “the third eye,” and instead to really notice and engage our acting partners’ reactions, attitudes, facial expressions, etc. My favorite thing she said that will go with me forever: “Your partner is more important than your line.”

When I consider the two great commandments, loving God and loving neighbour, the two great Others, my upbringing emphasized my part; I’m learning that I can only fulfill those commandments if I’m completely engaged by the Other. If I am, I’ll be less prone to self-consciously agonize about whether or not I’ve sacrificed enough or done the will of God to the letter. At any given point, I can safely assume I haven’t in fact, but that will not be the point. Someday, those may at long last no longer be the questions I’m asking.

faith is not a meritorious act

I've been thinking about many of your posts, especially Caron's reflections on the pride we can find in being "saved" (cf. Mandy Moore movie). As both an upstanding Christian at my Christian school (which was, in my view, ever slipping closer to complete depravity) and an upstanding Christian at my secular prep school (already totally lost, of course) I felt a great deal of subtle pride in being a good kid. I think it stemmed from a strong life-of-the-mind and self-consciousness of belief.

In "The Pursuit of God," A.W. Tozer says, "Faith is not in itself a meritorious act; the merit is in the One toward whom it is directed. Faith is a redirecting of our sight ... sin has twisted our vision inward and made it self-regarding."

Sin can twist our vision of our own faith inward, so we focus on our faith as fact, as identity, and as an end, rather than actually directing our actions and thoughts to God. At a conference at Georgetown last week, Evangelicals and Muslims came together and had an honest conversation about the nature of faith and witness. The Muslims exhorted us to think about faith as action, not as belief. Without abandoning the creeds, I think there's some truth to that.

The Dangers of Narrative

One of my best friends grew up in Ethiopia where her parents were missionaries. One of her brothers is now a writer and college professor in eastern Canada, her other brother and sister are missionaries in Africa and South America. She has spent her adult life as a farmer’s wife and a mother of three in rural Alberta. She has plenty of friends from boarding school who spiritually and emotionally didn’t survive; she considers herself one of the lucky ones, not in the sense that she has it all figured out, but in the sense that she is at least still trying to sort it out at all. I think she’d say that marrying a farmer, at least marrying her particular farmer, was a gracious gift of God to her: a partner in sorting out life who, although growing up in the church, had his feet solidly on the ground and was not given to grand narratives about his life and work. For all that some of us desired these kinds of narratives, I think my friend had experienced such narratives from the other side, and wanted no part.

I played for their wedding twenty-five years ago. Over the years, they have taught me much about authentic Christianity. Take hospitality for example. This is not something she is primarily inclined to read about, blog about, discuss, or start a program for at church (nothing wrong with any of those things). But if you showed up on her doorstep needing help, she’d invite you in and help you in any way she could. She invites people over plenty, but loves people dropping by unannounced. Whenever I do it seems she was just hoping I’d come, even if she’s in the middle of something. Depending on the time of day, I might get to help her water the flowers, or weed, or pick beans, or run into town to pick up the mail, or make a salad for lunch, or do the dishes, or drink Merlot on her patio, but a refreshing visit I have always found. When I discovered I had to have major surgery two summers ago, I called her. She was prepared to get on a plane if I said the word. At least on the surface, she has a different life to her parents’, but it is no less grounded in understanding the gospel and making the gospel understandable to others. For her that has entailed, among other things, helping her daughter with Down’s Syndrome make a meaningful contribution to the world, supporting other families of children with disabilities, walking alongside friends whose marriages fall apart, praying for her children to understand the gospel in spite of all her inadequacies as a parent, loving her husband and working with him through the ups and downs of agriculture, caring for aging parents, taking meals to the field, making coffee for whoever is around at coffee time, going to funerals and retirement parties, weddings and graduations of neighbors and people in the community… all of this very ordinary activity. I can say without exaggeration that if it wasn’t for her presence in my life, whether I’d still be trying to sort it all out is doubtful. God provided her to teach me, and she isn’t aware of half of what she has done that helped me understand the gospel better. She literally has no idea. It’s not that she doesn’t make intentional choices, like reaching out to a friend who is too stubborn or messed up to initiate. It’s just that she doesn’t consider these actions to be anything but responding in the moment. It is not a grand vision she was aware of before it happened. It’s not a grand vision at all. As deeply as I value her friendship, her life is not a perfect success story, and my telling it as I have, emphasizing that it has made a big difference to me, does not elevate it to the stuff of legend. God uses her beloved flawed ordinariness to do His work. As far as I can tell, that’s as good as it gets. The evangelicalism I grew up with did not appear to understand this. The grand narratives were the only ones worth telling, and given the emphasis of the bible college, many of those narratives were missionary narratives. Even still in alumni communiqués, there are grand narratives about the college's latest endeavor, and then the "family gallery": pictures, statistics about when each person graduated, and some statement of ministry involvements. Suffice it to say I’ve never sent anything in. But Jesus (the gospel) says: “So you also, when you have done all that you were commanded, say, ‘We are unworthy servants; we have only done what was our duty.’” As disappointing as it may be to realize I’m merely the hired help, isn’t it something of a relief?

devotional practices

wondering. how were you taught to enact your christian life when you were young?  your piety, as the puritans would have said. what were your early notions of devotional practice, reading the bible, prayer, etc?

did you do daily devotions with devotional books? randomly open the text to receive a special word from the lord?

little prayer methods, like ACTS (adoration, confession, thanksgiving, supplication)? other ways of prayer?

what do you do now? the same things? different things? what do you make of the language of devotion? "daily devo," "time with the lord," "quiet time,"  etc.

is it important to change that vocabulary? change those practices? keep them the same? re-name them?