No, the way God talks to me is in more subtle ways, using other people and their words to reach into my heart and confirm or answer my searching questions.
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When I was in high school, I had my first experience of encountering God. Oh, I had grown up with Him in my life before that. From the time I came into this world my parents were praying over me, for me, and as soon as I could talk, with me. But I had never experienced what some would call a conversion. I accepted Jesus into my heart when I was just a few years old, in the innocent way only a child can. Without understanding theology or reason or even right and wrong, I knew that I wanted to go to this wonderful place called Heaven when I died, and so I raised my hand along with several other young children that day.
But it wasn't until years later that I began wrestling with the idea of an all-powerful, all-knowing God that created this universe and has invited me to share it with Him. But my first questions didn't come in the form of intelligent mind-bending paradigms...it came from the heart.
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Placed in a private, Christian school with an average of 30 per class grade, I was quickly designated to the lonely position of "outcast." With my unruly curly hair, an apparently something else I couldn't define, I was an easy target. For the next 8 years I endured bullying, teasing, and just plain exclusiveness from other children. But that all changed drastically when I entered high school.
Switching to a public school of over 200 in my graduating class, I was terrified on my first day. Thoughts of standing in the cafeteria as table after table of students refused to share a seat with me filled my mind, and I was almost paralyzed when I walked onto the school bus. But it only took one day for me to realize what 8 years had not: It was NOT about me.
Not one student ever made fun of me in the four years I attended that high school, save one who made fun of everybody, and thus was also the brunt of many jokes himself. In fact, I made many friends and had the best time of my life as I enjoyed different classes and extra-curricular activities. I would gladly relive those years of my life over again.
But this presented a dilemma. Eight years I had been surrounded by claimed Christians, most of whom attended the same church I did. Eight years I had been made fun of, shunned, and hurt. And as soon as I entered into the wider, relatively "un" Christian realm, I was treated with kindness, fairness, and joy. Not that these people were perfect, but if you had to guess which ones were going to heaven based on their behviour and treatment of people, you'd definitely have to take the second group. (Does the part of scripture where Jesus says, "I never knew you" ring a bell here?)
So what was I to think of this God - whose "children" persecuted me and whose "enemies" welcomed me with open arms? I had seen and heard too much of Him to believe that He did NOT exist. That was too much of a leap for me. But there was one thing I could easily believe - that He either didn't know *I* existed, or He didn't care. Either one, for me, was a deal-breaker. If that's the kind of God that wanted me in Heaven, I'd rather, frankly, be in Hell. And I wasn't kidding.
So...I made a deal with Him. If He wanted me to be a Christian, then He'd have to touch me in some way, to really let me know that He cared about ME, that He loved me. Otherwise, I would no longer call myself a Christian...
Well, I won't go into details with the rest of the story, because I have more to tell, but let's just say that a visiting pastor mentionted that some people at the service that day "needed a touch from God" and to come up to be prayed for. It was the first time I had ever done so since I was a kid, and the words he prayed over me let me know that God did, indeed, know I was here...
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Fast forward several years. I had been through the gamut of church services where people erupted in laughter, singing, and falling down, all in the name of God. I wanted desperately to feel what I saw around me, but never really submitted to whatever it was that was going on.
The breaking point came when one woman at our church told about her vision of a laughing Jesus...that he looked like a clown, and she was able to laugh. For her it opened up a new way of relating to Jesus instead of the stern, unmoving figure she was used to picturing. But to many in the church, her story bordered not only on the rediculus, but on the blasphemus.
Thankfully, at the time, I was away at college. But back home, my church family, which I had known for almost 15 years, split apart. Most stayed, but many went in several directions. My own parents visited many churches for years afterwards, looking for a place they could call "home" as much as they had once called this church home. It broke my heart when I would visit at home and had to attend different churches where no one or very few knew me, but worse, it shook my foundation of faith.
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When my first daughter was born, we were attending a church we loved very much. We had friends, and the doctrine was sound, and I truly believe that we found a family of believers that walked and not just talked. But soon the questions would start forming in my own journey to becoming closer to God.
Raising Amber, I learned several things. But the most important was that the things she required was, in many circles of Christianity, considered odd, bad parenting, or at worst just plain wrong. I nursed her on demand and often. I slept with her in our bed, and carried her all the time so she didn't cry. I was, in short, attachment parenting. I would not wean her anytime soon, or move her to her own bed and room, or put her down to "cry it out" ever.
But articles from Focus on the Family or shows on the local Christian radio station would point out these very things as being less than the parent God had designed me to be. I thought hard about it, I prayed, and I searched my deepest being. If what I was doing was so wrong, why did I feel that it was the way God planned things to be?? I understand that you can not depend on feelings alone to make wise decisions, but how else was I to know what God wanted me to do? The Bible didn't have any verses about co-sleeping or child-led weaning...
A few years ago, while pregnant with the twins, I read Rob Bell's Velvet Elvis. It changed my life. Now some may say "The Bible should do that for you, not some book." But let me explain. He finally put into words all the things my heart was thinking, and wondering. He talked about a God that wants more than anything to love the world that He created. That our focus as Christians shouldn't be less about showing people their sin, and more about showing them God's love through us. The New Testament Christians were in service to those around them. And the ones that act like modern day evangelicals, arguing about theology and bragging about who is more holy? They're the ones admonished in the epistles. And yet here we stand, pushing people away from God with our self-righteous standards and holier-than-thou attitudes, and we neglect the very people God passionately desires to be with. We act like we are the fortunate ones who were smart enough to accept Christ, and the rest of the world, well, fooey on them. But that's NOT how God sees it...The Bible says He rejoices more over the one lost sheep than all the sheep He already has. Maybe Christianity isn't what I've thought it was all these years...keeping track of the "rights" and the "wrongs", worrying about the proper interpretation of scripture, of the dogma we all knew but never understood. We treat the Bible as if IT were the god...as if it wasn't written by human hands. I read one man claim that the Bible speaks for itself as being infalible. Oh, then I guess THAT cinches it. I DO believe the Bible to be the Word of God, and I believe it is INSPIRED by God. But I believe humans wrote it, and that we can't claim to know what every word's intent was, or how much was written as story vs. hard fact. (There ARE things we can know, but whether Jonah was a true story or just a story....that kind of thing)
Then I read Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller. Again, the idea that God is actively seeking for a relationship with us...that He's not just sitting on His throne judging me, but that He's actually courting me, wooing me...and that my job is to love everyone around me, unconditionally...something not truly practiced in most churchs...(you've heard it..."but they're gay"..."she's getting an abortion - the murderer!"..."he swears and smokes and drinks...") Did Jesus run away from these people, or did He befriend them? (the verse about coming for the sick, not the healthy, comes to mind.)
But the most imporant thing is that as I turned to unschooling as a way of raising my children, continuing on the journey they began at birth, I learned even more principles about how to model the relationship God wants with us. We don't have to train our children to obey us, as most Christians believe. We think that obeying means trusting, but it doesn't. You can obey someone out of fear, which is what most of us are taught to do. If a child doenn't obey, they are spanked. This teaches a child that if they don't respond a certain way, they will be hurt. It does NOT teach them to trust the person hitting them.
On the other hand, if we show our children that we intend good things for them, that our goal is to make them happy, then when we DO say no, they are far more likely to listen because they TRUST that we have THEIR interest at heart, not OUR HIDDEN AGENDA. True trust comes from love.
And the point hit home with me just this week. I have been questioning the "why's" of life and death and several people in our community have lost loved ones tragically this last year. And I have been fearful about losing my own loved ones. And someone suggested the book The Shack by William P. Young.
I. Love. It. The first sentence that I cried at was this, "You don't believe that I love you, so you cannot trust me."
And that's it. That's the core. I have never truly believed that God. Loves. Me. Sure, it's the gospel message. Sure, that's what you always HEAR. But I never saw it modeled out - not by Christians, anyway. I always lived in fear that if I did the wrong thing, God would strike me down. I had to learn all the rules of living "the right way." Don't do this. Do this. Don't do that. And if I messed up, I knew that God would be disappointed. And yes, there is difinitely truth in that. But we somehow missed the part that emphasises how much God loves us...me. That no matter WHAT I do, He'll still love me. No matter how I am right now, He still loves me.
In the same way I love my children, even when they screw up, God loves me. Even when my kids are dirty, smelly, or less than happy. I still would die for them in a heartbeat. Like Jesus did for me.
I can have a relationship with my children that is give-give. I don't need to demand their obedience. I can serve them out of love, and naturally, they will want to serve back (I know it sounds contrary to what we were told...but that's just it. How do WE feel when someone serves us? We want to repay them with kindness...it's the way God desgined it!)
And then I saw this video with Rob Bell, and I cried some more. It's not that God will keep storms out of my life, but He will still be there, like a father, holding me closer than ever...and that's how I'll get through it. It's not just that He's God, and He knows best. It's that He love ME, and wants ME to be happy. If I truly, really, believe that, then I can trust Him when the unthinkable happens.
When Amber broke her arm, she squeeled out the words, "Oh, WHY?" in pain...and though I couldn't have prevented the break (technically speaking, I could wrap her in bubble wrap, but that is not living - same with out lives in this world), I WILL be there for her to help her as the arm heals. Her arm will never be the same as it was unbroken, but where the bone fused, it is now stronger. And so our faith with God can be stronger after a tragedy, if we trust Him, if we believe He loves us...
And though there are a TON of people out there criticizing Rob Bell, Donald Miller, and now William Young, I am one who has been touched by the idea that have allowed me to think outside the religious box I put God in. That I now see Him as someone interested in ME, and MY LIFE...and that Loving is more important than Getting It Right...
I've finally come back to the place where I started. If You love me God, then touch me...and He has.
