In an age of information overload… the last thing any of us needs is more information about God. We need the practice of incarnation, by which God saves the lives of those whose intellectual assent has turned them dry as dust, who have run frighteningly low on the bread of life, who are dying to know more God in their bodies. Not more about God. More God.
Barbara Brown Taylor
For the majority of my life, I have struggled with an identity crisis. My guess is that the majority of us have. The most basic questions of our existence poke and pick at us. Due to this and the fact that I was born the son of a pastor, I chose something quick to throw myself upon. It was just that: Pastor’s Kid. Most people know the stigma that comes along with those words. Even in my childhood innocence I could feel the bite that comes with that phrase, the “disappointments of old” or the “failures.” I convinced myself early on that the pressure would never get to me. Naturally, I was wrong.
As I began to come of age, I could slowly feel the pressure from people to “do this” or “don’t do that” and in these quick little phrases that seem meaningless in the moment, each time some baggage was thrown onto me to carry. Whether it was the pressure of others or the standards that I set for myself I do not know for sure, but my mind was set on perfection. I just could not screw up. I convinced myself that the church was not a place for screw-ups. Everyone seems so happy and how could people ever have time for my problems. These things soon begin to catch up to me.
Years pass by and I am at the church any time the doors are open also “getting saved” any time the doors are open. The striving for perfection has become too much. Nothing is truly real to me. I give up for a while. I dive into some rough stuff, but how could I let anyone know that my soul is crying inside? Everyone else looks fine, so I need to look that way too. I have a solid “knowledge” and “understanding” of Scripture. I put on a great mask. Then one day, something clicked. I felt a nudge in my heart. It was real. I surrendered to Him.
Most days I still feel like that screwed-up kid, trying too hard to not let anyone know I am caving beneath the pressure. I fall more often than not. Even though I am no longer the son of a loving pastor, who has taught me more in these past few months about this topic, I still feel the pressure. I still put on the face. I still do not want to show “weakness.”
We want to be the person that lives with reckless abandon, but we are afraid. We are too busy trying to be God of our own life, trying to keep track of the “do’s and don’t’s” that we cannot see those around us who are struggling to find their own identity as much as we are. That one night when it clicked for just a second is what I go back to. This night is when some might say I “got saved.” I like to think that God saves me each day. I go back to it to remember that in the doubts, no one can take that sweet moment away from me. It allows me to have hope, hope that one day this will all be perfect again.
I will always need Him to save me, every single day of my life. This love that comes from Him crosses every barrier that we see in our world today. It breeds hopes that restoration will come. It has come. This love crosses race, age, and sexual orientation to bring us together. It brings us together so that a recovering pastor’s kid struggling daily with lust, pride, and trust can sit at the table with someone struggling with homosexuality or the social injustice piled up all around them. They can be unmasked and real. It is a place where doubts are heard and not shot down as “little faith.” It is a place where mind and heart are one. It is a place of true vulnerability.
This is the place I want to live in. A place where doubts are heard and there are not answers to every question. I think it is possible, but we must be willing to create it. I involves pain, which our culture tries to excommunicate by trying to self-medicate in so many ways, and, spoiler alert, it does not work. We must be willing to live in that pain and embrace it. In my life, I tried to become numb to all of the hurt in this world. In the process, I did not feel as much pain per say, but I missed out on the joy and good parts of life too.
Recently, I have been trying to open up to the prospect of pain in an attempt to feel again. I want to remember. It is hard to reconcile without trying to numb the pain or depression. However, the beauty is that we do not have to. God took the pain and shame that we deal with each day on the cross. In this attempt, I am really trying to forgive myself for the things that I have done and sometimes fall into again. In learning to forgive ourselves and commit to feel again. I think we can create a world of love that has a willingness to listen to the pain of the world around us. In this, the church would be different from the world. The church would be willing to meet people where they are and just be there. It is a place where Jesus was. A place that helps us grow and the world around us. It is a place where we find MORE GOD.