renovation

On Meditation (Lenten Reflections, Week 5)

/ Bo / 2 Comments

Meditation has fallen out of fashion in Christianity these days. Sure, there are segments of Christendom that still practice this ages-old discipline, but when it comes to the evangelical tradition of the Church in America, practicing meditation makes Christians uncomfortable. To a lot of well-intentioned disciples, meditation has become synonymous with Eastern mysticism, New Age spirituality, and other religious traditions like Hinduism and Buddhism. A lot of evangelicals would be at a loss to understand its place within the Christian faith.

That is not merely disappointing. It is profoundly tragic.

If you have been following along with these “reflections” throughout the season of Lent, you know that what I have been endeavoring to describe is the internal metamorphosis that a follower of Jesus experiences when he or she submits to the soul-restoring work of the Holy Spirit. The metaphor I have been using to loosely explain this process of transformation is that of renovating an old, rundown house. Taking something that has fallen into disrepair from both seasons of suffering interior neglect and weathering exterior storms, and returning it to something even more beautiful than it was in its earliest, most innocent years.

So, imagine you began all the dirty work of ths renovation: evaluating the broken places, cleaning out the junk, and tearing out the shabby, damaged remnants of old construction, and then, before you set to work restoring and rebuilding this old house, you blacked over all the windows and sealed up all the doorways, never to uncover them again. It’s absurd, not only because any beautification of a home demands the influence of natural light from repaired and cleaned windows, but because you would essentially be going about your renovation work in a cave.

This is what spiritual formation looks like devoid of meditation. Or, to put it simpler, when we remove the practice of meditation from our prayers for transformation, we end up stumbling around in the dark. We fail to see the extent of decrepitude in our souls because we have shut out the Light that illumines these dark places, that reveals them to us so that we might either tear them away or restore them. And we fail to find joy and freedom in the removal of our selfish narratives because we are not considering them according to God’s redeeming wisdom.

In my previous post, I wrote about the process of katharsis, the willingness to delve into the dusty corners and shadowy spaces of our souls in order to get to the root of the problem, to address not simply our sinful acts, but rather the sinful conditions, or habits, that cause these behaviors. To find and treat the deep-seated wounds that influence our self-destructive narratives. But katharsis done with our backs turned to God’s searchlight will never be effective in transforming us, and will only be a miserable experience of identifying the many core failures and doubts that have burrowed too deep for us to reach.

Many Christians fear the concept of meditation because its fundamental aspect is shutting up and being still. It is willingly opening up our dark, dilapidated houses to the Spirit’s sweeping, comprehensive evaluation of our condition, and He doesn’t miss anything – any cracks in the drywall, any warping of the floor, any unswept chimneys. As the Apostle Paul writes about the perfect wisdom of God’s Spirit:

The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. For who knows a person’s thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God… The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit. The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things…

1 Corinthians 2:10-11, 14-15, NIV

While meditation in other traditions of spirituality may be more concerned with emptying one’s mind and contemplating some innocuous, external concept of truth, Christian meditation is about looking inward, following the Spirit of God as he advances through the corridors of your soul, shining God’s steadfast light of wisdom and truth – the truth of His unconditional love and desire for you to be made whole – into every space.

“Be still and know that I am God,” insists Psalm 46; “I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in all the earth.” This is a call for meditation not on some innocuous, external truth, but on an intimately powerful truth that doesn’t empty us of our personalities and individual passions, but refines them according to God’s perfect purposes. But we will never experience this refinement, or comprehend His purposes, if we don’t allow the Spirit in – if we don’t cease our own strivings and allow the home inspector into our spaces to further illuminate what must be done.

In meditation, we momentarily stop praying about what we think our problems are and how they should be fixed. We fall silent. We breathe deeply. We remain still, and with inwardly turned eyes we consider what lies at the root of these issues. We wait on the Spirit to stimulate our minds, revealing just how deep our rebellion goes. We do not fear this revelation because it is done in the light of a great love. And in the strength of His mercy, we begin to address these deeper blights on our souls. We do not wallow or mope in guilt; instead, we celebrate that God’s light is reaching deeper and deeper into the core of who we are. Through it all, we remember the Great Truth:

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God.

John 3:16-21, NIV

So, may you not misunderstand meditation, and may you not neglect it. May you experience the excitement and abiding peace that comes when you allow God’s Spirit to walk through the many rooms of your life, loving each one, seeing in them a beauty you have never permitted yourself to see before. May you bid farewell to the roots of selfishness and celebrate the planting of holiness, and may you bask in the golden light that fills a soul made new.

On Confession (Lenten Reflections, Week 4)

/ Bo / Leave a comment

Now pride and hate, they live inside me
I need your love enough to guide me
Help me walk across these borders
I’m a pilgrim in deep waters

Faithful God, like faithful sunrise
Help me break from all these old ties
Lead me all to that is holy
Break these chains, but break them slowly

from “Mansions” by Burlap to Cashmere
from the album, Anybody Out There?

Confession is both an instinctual mode of prayer – what I like to call a posture – and also a spiritual discipline.

A mode, or posture, of prayer refers to what a follower of Jesus prays about. Confession is part of an “inward” posture. It is the kind of prayer that gazes not upward at God’s majesty, nor outward at the needs of others, but into the depths of our individual selves – and into the darkening residue of grime that accumulates the longer we tarry in this present world. It is a means of katharsis, the essential first step in spiritual transformation that I wrote about in last week’s post. Confessional prayer is the way we gather up and expel the junk that piles up in our souls. Prayer by prayer, we identify the rust and rot of self-centeredness and we tear it out, clearing our houses, preparing them for further renovations courtesy of the Holy Spirit.

But confession is not simply a type of prayer. It is also a spiritual discipline – that is, something we apply ourselves to. Something we work at. Something we strive to improve in, even master, in our pursuit of purity and blamelessness (a pursuit that often takes a lifetime for a devoted follower to experience, as Paul infers in Philippians 1:9-11).

There is a reason why Catholic churches include confessional booths, and why their spiritual leaders insist parishioners visit them regularly. Despite the way pop culture treats these little closets as either priestly power plays, impromptu counseling centers, or ineffectual shrines to narcissism, very early in to this whole Christianity thing the Church recognized that the act of confession is not simply a one time statement of belief in the sufficiency of Christ’s sacrifice. Rather, it is a necessary practice of prayer – something anyone who desires to follow the Savior’s way must make room for in his or her life.

In the evangelical tradition – which is, sadly, becoming much more scattershot and tangled in the poison of partisanship and nationalism – we don’t always do a good job of teaching confession as a discipline of prayer. (Truth be told, we don’t do a good job of teaching the disciplines much at all anymore.) We tend to refer to prayer in primarily general terms, I think because, deep down, we feel like going into detail about its many, many different methods and disciplines and techniques will end up confusing people. There may be some truth to that inclination, but the problem that inevitably arises from generalizing prayer is that generations of believers grow up within a faith tradition that fails to train people how to pray.

As such, when a run-of-the-mill evangelical believer hears the word “confession,” he will usually think of one of two things. One, the stereotype of a confession booth, or, two, the moment a person professes Jesus as Savior. “If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord,” the Apostle Paul writes to the believers in Rome, “and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved” (Romans 10:9).

But that is only the start of the discipline of confession. It is an extraordinarily powerful first confession, for sure, but it is certainly not meant to be the last. Not because forgiveness is contingent upon our actual naming of each sin we have committed, but rather because it is through confession that we continue to identify not merely our sinful acts but even more the selfish inclinations and lingering weaknesses weighing down our souls. In other words, when you “invite Jesus into your heart as your personal Lord and Savior” as the saying goes, this act breaks the stranglehold of sin on your life; it does not, however, eradicate your selfish nature altogether. You are just as susceptible to act selfishly as you were before you first confessed Christ as Savior.

Confession, then, is the discipline that teaches us just how far God’s forgiveness reaches. As we seek to live as renewed, repurposed children of our heavenly Father, we engage in the process of katharsis, and, by confession, we continue to clean house of all those old, imbedded wounds and the deep-set tendencies to assert our own will over the will of the Great Architect.

When we pray our prayers of confession, we are not informing God of our wrongdoing and wrongbeing. What we are actually doing is agreeing with him that, yes, our flesh is indeed corrupted by worldly obsessions. We are not telling God anything he doesn’t know, but just because God knows it all doesn’t mean there isn’t profound power in naming these things before him. Confession has always been more for us than it is for God.

Lastly, it is important to remember that there is more to the discipline of confession than merely through listing off our individual sinful deeds, as if we are simply taking a depressing, masochistic inventory of all our bad behaviors at day’s end. On the contrary, time spent in confession should leave a follower of Jesus rejuvenated rather than drained. Filled with a sense of freedom and peace rather than sorrow and guilt. Confession begins heavy, but it ends light. In confession, we identify healthy practices that must replace our sinful habits. We take comfort in God’s mercy, and find confidence in his grace to commit again to obedience and purity. We marvel at the endless reach of his perfect, healing love.

So, may you not shy away from the act of confession. May you make it one of the good habits that replaces the self-centered clutter littering your soul. May you run desperately into your moments of confession, eager for the cleansing that it brings, and the peace that sweeps through you like a cool wind in the heat of the day. May you confess your brokenness in such a way that you cannot help but lift up praises to the One who holds the power to put all things back together again.

On Purgation (Lenten Reflections, Week 3)

/ Bo / 4 Comments

In last week’s post, I compared repentance and the process of transformation that follows to the demolition and renovation of a house. I told you that spiritual maturity doesn’t come all at once, and that there is much work for us to do in order to experience the qualities of transformation.

So, exactly what kind of work am I talking about?

Early in the fourth century C.E., a Roman general named Constantine won a series of decisive battles against his political opponents, and for whatever reason, he felt that the God of the Christians somehow had a hand in this success. In his ascension to the throne, Constantine legalized and rapidly legitimized Christianity throughout the empire. And even if he didn’t end up professing the faith until he was on his death-bed, this was nothing short of a watershed moment not just for the Christian faith, but for religious history in general. Suddenly, it was perfectly legal to profess Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior of the world. It was completely above-board to gather regularly in order to praise “the one true God.” From that moment on, being a Christian wasn’t just harmless – it was the gold standard of Roman citizenship.

In response to this whiplash-like shift in Christianity’s relationship with culture, devoted followers of the Risen One realized that what once had been the ideal expression of faithfulness was no longer possible. Before Constantine, Christians who lived out their love for Jesus without compromise were often martyred – burned alive on stakes or pyres, tortured before gathered crowds, and, of course, crucified. And yet, as horrific an event as martyrdom was, the persecuted Church came to see it as the ultimate act of fidelity to God. Now, however, with the complete decriminalization of the Christian faith, martyrdom was off the table as a means of expressing one’s matchless devotion to God.

In response to “imperial Christianity,” many Christians who found this new, cultural faith suspect chose a new ideal expression of faithfulness. They withdrew from society and all of its creature comforts. They exiled themselves to remote deserts and harsh wilderness environments where culture could not tempt and taint them. And they began teaching a new method of spiritual practice – the way of asceticism. Granted, ascetics were nothing new, but joining fierce simplicity and the pursuit of suffering with Christian devotion had never been the norm. However, these “Desert Fathers” insisted not only on the need to remove oneself from the worldly trappings of civilization, but also to purge the carnal accumulations that affix themselves to our souls.

They spoke of something known as katharsis, the willingness to search our souls and identify the selfishness and weaknesses bedded down in the dark, hidden places within us. In order to rid ourselves of the earthly debris and spiritual rot pervading our inner beings, we must first recognize the extent of it. The standard practices of the ascetics – silence, solitude, fasting, even flagellation – puts the believer in a position for this deep “soul-searching,” and leads them to cry out for God’s divine, inside-out renovation.

As a pastor, while I don’t advocate full-blown asceticism, I do recommend believers learn about and attempt most of the ascetic practices (self-flagellation not being one of them). These ancient spiritual disciplines are incredibly powerful experiences, and accomplish much more than katharsis. However, the process of purgation is certainly one of their primary benefits.

Jesus himself seemed to support the concept of katharsis. A large portion of his famous “Sermon on the Mount” focuses on the inner catalysts for sinful behaviors. Consider the following statements from Matthew 5:

“You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘You shall not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.’ But I tell you that anyone who is angry with a brother or sister will be subject to judgment.” (21-22)

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” (27-28)

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also.” (38-39)

The worst thing we can do in our interpretations of Jesus’ sermon is to chalk these statements up to hyperbole. While the Savior does indeed make use of exaggeration in his rhetoric, none of the above statements are wholly hyperbolic. Rather, they are indicative of his understanding that sin is not simply something that is done, but also something that invades us like a parasite, festers, and methodically corrupts us. It is both a contagion and a cancer.

Concurrently, the other dangerous thing modern-day Christians can do is consider personal holiness to be an unattainable ideal – a pipe dream no normal person will ever experience. As a pastor, I am deeply committed to proclaiming the gospel of God’s grace – of unconditional, divine love that knows no bounds. However, just because believers live under God’s extraordinary grace does not mean we should be okay with our sin and weakness. While not necessarily biblical, the old adage, “God loves you as you are, but he loves you too much to let you stay that way” is a truth we must accept if we ever want to enter intentionally into the process of spiritual transformation.

These days, while we may get a rush out of shaming those we disagree with, when it comes to our own, individual sense of shame, we don’t like to spend a lot of time thinking about it. If we pray about our sin, we are quick to name what we did wrong, ask for Christ’s covering of those actions, and move on. And while there is nothing incorrect about such prayers, they rarely reach the full, purgative experience they should – the kind of exercise in prayer and meditation that not only names our sins, but allows the Holy Spirit to point his searchlight into the dank recesses of a soul that has housed a capacity for such evil habits. We must not wallow in our sin, but we must not ignore its far-reaching roots either.

It is no easy thing to let the Spirit of God shine his light into the shadows of our souls. But it is an essential part of transformation. To return to the renovation metaphor, it is the moment we enter inside our decrepit houses and begin identifying all the things that must be purged, swept up, and stripped away before the work of renewal can begin. Sometimes, this cleansing is easy – shoving excess clutter into trash bags, or pulling down old screens caked with dust. Other times, however, we find cracked beams, rotting floorboards, and purposeless walls, all of which must be torn away, piece by piece, if this old house will ever be made beautiful again.

So, may you not shy away from katharsis, no matter how uncomfortable those first forays into the cobwebbed cellar of your life may be. This is dirty work – no one ever said it wouldn’t be. But you have a co-laborer with you every step of the way. He holds a bright light from which no dirt or decay can hide. He is here to show you everything this old, rundown soul can be. Trust him. He’s been doing this kind of work for thousands of years.

On Transformation (Lenten Reflections, Week 2)

/ Bo / 1 Comment

Sometimes you’ll find what you’re waiting for
Was all along just waiting for you
To turn around and reconcile
And it may be broken down
All the bridges burned like an old ghost town
But this, my son, can be made new

–  from “Morning Light” by Josh Garrells
from the album, Home

I find it helpful to think of spiritual formation like a house undergoing major renovation. If the sheer number of home improvement and DIY cable shows are any indicator, renovation seems to be a popular practice these days.

As most people know, before you can begin to spruce up your home, you must first tear everything old and ugly out of it. The old fixtures, the purposeless walls, the accumulated junk of a life lived according to the old reality – all of these are removed to make way for something better. Something new.

In last week’s post, I wrote about the role of repentance in both the season of Lent and the daily life of a follower of Jesus. The Greek word, metanoia, refers to a transformation of mind, not just behavior. It describes a drastic change in the way one appropriates reality itself. It is the moment in which the architect unfurls the blueprints he has drawn up for your house, revealing to you the specific ways he wants to use the available space, repurpose the core structures, and reclaim the original materials buried beneath years of strategically concealing decor.

When we recognize these blueprints to be the superior appropriation of our living spaces, we “repent” of our old ways of seeing and using our houses. We recognize the potential, as well as all the ways the old structure has gone wrong, or fallen into disrepair. Most importantly of all, we accept that redemption is possible.

But there is still work to do. Not the work of salvation – that happened the moment the architect sat down to craft his blueprints – but the work of renovation. And it is not easy work. There is much to tear out, strip away, disentangle, and remove. There is demolition and deep cleaning. Without these things, the architect’s vision can never be fully realized.

In using this metaphor to describe spiritual transformation, the first truth we must grasp is that conversion is the beginning of our souls’ renovation, not the end result. Perhaps you grew up in a faith tradition that put all its preaching and teaching stock into persuading people to “accept Jesus Christ as their personal Lord and Savior,” (which is certainly a wonderful and virtuous pursuit), but then did little to help those newborn new creations learn how to live according to the greater reality of God’s kingdom.

That is ineffectual evangelism. We do not preach the gospel simply to coerce people into a decision, as if there is nothing more to salvation than getting a check by your name in the Book of Life. Rather, we teach people “to obey everything I have commanded you” (Matthew 28:20).

Conversion – from the Latin conversio – means “to be turned around.” Having perceived the better way that runs counter to our old paradigm of life, we begin to move in this different direction. Thus, the journey is only beginning.

The season of Lent can be a time for believers old and new to remember this. If it were possible to turn on a dime – to suddenly become humble, morally upright, self-sacrificing disciples of Jesus with one single decision – all we would need is Ash Wednesday, and only once in our lives. But, instead, we not only have an annual day of repentance, we also have the month and a half that proceeds from it. Lent is a season defined by daily, obedient practices that train us in the principles of God’s kingdom. It is the season of demolition and deep cleaning, of removing the detritus that so frequently prevents us from pursuing the Architect’s superior purpose for our lives.

You have work to do. This renovation isn’t a weekend project. It’s not a three-month restoration or even a full year’s undertaking. No, it is a life-long endeavor. But for those of us who will rise each day in the recognition that God’s mercy is abundant and sufficient every day, little by little we will see this house transformed. We will behold beauty overtaking the battered places. The weak spots will receive reinforcements. The cluttered and useless spaces will be clarified and remodeled.

We are made new not in a single moment, but over a lifetime.