Tag: community

Uncovering Paul

Posted on by Hilarey

Soon after 9-11, my oldest came home and prayed for the Muslims because “They make their ladies cover-up their heads.” I’m not sure where he got this, but people were turning all Muslims into caricatures of chaotic evil. It is interesting that this most grievous thing was given to my six-year-old as a prayer-worthy concern.

I first wrote about questioning my pastor regarding head coverings in my post Uncovered, and lately I realize that there have been very few pastors I haven’t asked multiple questions or wanted to dialogue “Why is (this) so?” In that instance, he didn’t know. And I don’t think he really cared. I mean, it applied to a different gender, culture and time than he did. Neither did it affect his authority to operate in the church.

Recently, I found great pleasure reading the book Vindicating the Vixens: Revisiting Sexualized, Marginalized and Vilified Women of the Bible, edited by Sandra Glahn. It was so beneficial (to me) to clarify the context of several Bible stories—and it’s the same reason I’m also enjoying Paul and Gender—Reclaiming the Apostle’s Vision for Men and Women of the Church by Cynthia Long Westfall. I’ve only just started it, and like Vindicating the Vixens, the first chapter is bringing me a completely different world-view/paradigm/cultural lens to Paul.

A fiction author I love once wrote a character to say she had no problem with Jesus. It was Paul she didn’t like. My feelings bordered on mutual—but I’ve been pressing into trusting that God is good. So, if a thing isn’t good—either it isn’t from God, or it’s misunderstood. So I ask, seek, knock, clarify. Lately, that’s manifested as reading Paul and Gender and switching my Bible app to track scripture through “the life of Paul.” So I can press in for the good about his writings.

I already knew Paul’s command in 1 Corinthians 11 to keep a woman’s head covered was more about protection and equality for the first century church than keeping a modern woman subservient in a display of culturally irrelevant, historic modesty.

Still, my head covering ignorance and a western context of systemic power disparity and exclusion made the passage difficult to digest. America’s lens was refined by beliefs like “all women are born that they may acknowledge themselves as inferior in consequence to the superiority of the male sex,” from John Calvin. So of course we looked at 1 Corinthians and said, yeah—Paul wants the women’s heads covered as a symbol of male authority. Men don’t need it since they’re directly under God… See that Calvin quote, and more, compiled by a blog I follow here.

So as we chew on the meat and spit out the gristle from our Western Schism church fathers, I love how Paul and Gender paints a more wholistic backdrop. Here, I hope to lay some of it out and evoke a metaphor of my own*. This is just one take on the passage, and I think people will study it more and more—now that women can officially open a bank account. I have to remember that only happened the year I was born. This is only the first generation of people entering seminary with an inherent interest instead of “Not my gender… doesn’t affect me.”

Our American belief is that a woman would never want to cover her head. In the breathtaking book A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini, the heroine receives a hijab. (My heart swells just thinking of that story.) Her initial reaction is that she feels treasured and protected. This was my first inkling of a different take on head coverings.

But every woman who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her head—it is the same as having her head shaved (NIV)

Let’s set the scene of the church in Corinth. Paul and Gender said “A woman of Corinth” was a euphemism for a prostitute.

From other reading, I’ve also understood that the setting is a time and culture where men can penetrate anyone they conquer or are in charge of—and it isn’t considered rape, homosexuality or adultery. It was culturally benign for them, like a spayed or neutered humpy dog. Merely a socially acceptable display of power.

And how do they know if a particular woman is off-limits? Her hair is hidden. A veil is the signal defining which women are protected and which are sexually at risk in this city where men with money and power can dominate anyone. If this conjures #MeToo and Epstein Island…the difference is: it isn’t socially acceptable. It doesn’t sit well with us.

Additionally, the veil maintains social class order. From the women’s perspectives, it’s hierarchy showing who has value. This woman is worthy and protected. This one is lesser, usable, discardable. For sale. We know social oppression was going on because the Corinthian church was jealous and quarreling with each other. Paul suggested they were doing more harm than good when they gathered because one would be drunk and another would go hungry during the Lord’s Supper. Paul and Gender said the law forbid a slave or a prostitute from covering her hair. So imagine the social oppression of a woman who had “no right” to cover up. “Who does she think she is?”

With head-coverings, a certain kind of man can scan a room and immediately see which woman he could have, and who is off-limits. Incidentally, modern men who are terrified of androgynous and transgender clothing still make me think of the certain type of person who wants to walk into a room and quickly ascertain who he could potentially dominate. I think it makes them uncomfortable not to know who they can fight or sleep with immediately.

Ok, still building the stage. Now take the cultural example of human (not chicken) breasts. In some places in the world, a woman’s exposed breasts aren’t immodest. But use our Western sensibilities and imagine a topless (topfree) photo in a magazine or behind a paywall—a picture of a woman’s breasts makes her “available.” You can see her nakedness so you can consider having her, imagine having her, or pretend.

Take that into a house church. They’re using the language of fictive kinship, calling each other brother and sister. And, at home, mom and sis take their veils off. And some guy thinks, “I’m curious what so-and-so’s wife looks like uncovered. After all, we’re, ahem, family.”

Let’s have all the ladies take off their veils!

Now, sister, stand before the congregation. Not a bare-chested home church in Indonesia at the turn of the 19th century, but a gathering in America. You’re about to deliver a message from God, to speak and to prophesy to the congregation. But first, they want you to take off your shirt. Since many of the Corinthians believers are “lower status,” the ex (or current) sex slave you’re sitting next too—I’ve seen her naked. And you’re my family. I should see you. Now stand straight and give the message with uncovered areola and nipple.

Just let that visceral feeling you have land and settle for a minute. It might give you a bit of empathy for the forced unveiling of a Muslim woman or a first century Corinth lady.

Modesty is cultural. If the woman has never had her hair exposed, it drapes her in a sexually vulnerable, naked sensation (and possibly position, depending on the crowd.) In Corinth, it would have felt shameful to some women. As shameful as having her head shaved—the punishment for infidelity and promiscuity. Shame is a particularly difficult emotion in that it is so isolating. Flowing hair would have been highly arousing to some listeners. I imagine some brothers in the church wouldn’t even hear your message if you stood bare-chested before them—even though boobies are available to see anytime, online. (I guess for some it wouldn’t even matter if you’re covered up. They still know you have ’em and they’ll look right through your shirt!)

Now, a slave girl whose entire life has been exposed and marked by her availability, low class and low worth, stands before the crowd and speaks to a congregation. A group which possibly includes her owners. In any other context, they are her social superiors and her uncovered head is the blatant visual reminder.

Paul’s directive is “all you all” women wear veils.

Equality in the church. Protection in the church.

Paul said something different to Timothy regarding the women of Ephesus who ostentatiously flaunted wealth and status. He told them to show appropriate situational propriety in their adornments like braided hair. But to Corinth, he addresses their specific issue and says, “Here, in the gathering of believers, no one is low class. No one is unprotected. No one is sexually available. Listen to her words and don’t look at her like that, Corinthians.”

A man ought not to cover his head, since he is the image and glory of God; but woman is the glory of man (NIV)

Additionally, there’s a contrast with the directive that the men should not cover their head. Paul and Gender suggests that a man of high status would want to be invisible when in a posture of supplication. It was the cultural norm for him to cover that up. Paul says, rather, males are to be vulnerable, with their “spiritual transformation is on display.”

A man’s uncovered head doesn’t bring up sexuality to the imagination of the hearers, it lowers him from his elevated status to equal, to fellow believer. “Exchange a covering of pride for exposed humility, all you men who could dominate anyone.” This would have been as jarring as some of the other things Paul said to them, such as, “You are all the bride of Christ.”

But here’s an even lovelier thing about this letter from Paul! He gives it to the Corinthian church as a non-contentious individual church decision. Because the other churches aren’t dealing with it. Verse 16.

Paul wants the church to learn to discern and make decisions because it will one day judge the world and angels.

Paul and Gender, page 35 says, “Women and men were supposed to be learning to exercise good judgment in ordinary matters in preparation for future responsibilities. Therefore, if women were (correctly) refusing to submit to suggestions or directions to not veil or to remove their veils, the Corinthian Church needed to be convinced that women should be allowed to use their own judgment or follow their own convictions in this matter.”

How can I not love Paul for this?

Westfall also asserts that the veil is a demonstration of her choice, her authority over herself. She writes, “However, as the subject of the sentence, the nominative woman is the subject of the infinitive, the one who has authority.”

It is for this reason that a woman ought to have authority over her own head, because of the angels (NIV)

So the Corinthian head covered is a symbol of her own authority over her own head as she stands before God and the heavenly realm. This is why (counter-culturally) Paul tells a lowly slave girl to illegally wear a veil when she prophesies over the congregation in the privacy of a house church.

This unmarried girl is not veiled to signify the authority of men. She is elevated to equal status to the rest of the congregation before the Lord. Because God uses the things this world despises to shame the powerful. And she gets to make her own choice if she wants to display her hair when she edifies, strengthens, encourages, comforts and instructs the people**.

Diving into scripture like this reveals God’s intentions regarding our interdependence and treatment of each other—not to split hairs over hair scarves and cleavage. When a woman enters the four walls of your church building with more or less covering indicative of the life and culture she lives—remember:

Don’t look at her that way. Listen to her words.

*Thoughts from Paul and Gender are mingled with my own. So if there is something incorrect or irritating—assume it is me and not the book or the author.
**I was raised in a congregation and spent time in churches that believed in Cessation. Looking back now, I wonder if the doctrine has a purpose to maintain control from the top down, with the added benefit of avoiding a text which refers to women instructing men. I cannot find a compelling reason to believe in the cessation of (some) gifts, because prophecy (specifically) is the only gift that shows up in every list I can find regarding spiritual gifts. And, we’re warned to not suppress it. See 1 Corinthians 12:7-11, 27-30, Romans 12:6-8 & Ephesians 4:11-13. Keep reading the first letter to Corinthians to see details about how prophecy should look.

1 Corinthians 14
Vs 3 the one who prophesies speaks to people for their strengthening, encouraging and comfort
Vs 5 so that the church may be edified
Vs 22 it’s for believers
Vs 24-25 it’s for unbelievers to be convicted of sin, their hearts and secrets laid bare, it incites worship
Vs 29 two or three should do it taking turns, it should be weighed for truth
Vs 31 says prophecy is for instruction and encouragement, and all should have a turn

You’ll notice, a few verses later, Paul says women should be silent in church. Which contradicts Chapter 11 if you think Paul tells all women to prophesy and all women to be silent in the same letter. I assume Paul and Gender will cover this, but I haven’t gotten to it yet. The explanation I’ve previously heard is that verse 34 & 35 had to do with women who’d never previously sat in a learning environment or studied spiritual things. They were randomly interrupting the service, calling out questions across the room. He tells them to wait and go home to ask their husbands instead of being disruptive. If you get too fixated on the inerrant letter of your translation—you would think only married women get to ask clarifying questions and single women have to wonder about God until they have a husband. All of chapter 14 chapter is about removing disruptions and creating order while using tounges and prophecy, so this makes more sense than women being told not to speak unless they are prophesying, but men can interrupt willy-nilly.

A Ceremony of Grief

Posted on by Hilarey

When my husband and I were younger, I wanted to adopt. We went through two home studies. We attended classes, borrowed children’s beds, planned with our kids, and informed our neighbors. Finally, we brought in a young sibling group. Health and Welfare wanted a trial situation as part of the interview process. We didn’t finish the trial.

In the aftermath, when I was returning the crib and other items, I tried to hide my brokenness as I stood before the woman who’d loaned them. She looked at me and asked how I was “really doing” in that way of people who actually want to know—and aren’t just exchanging passing niceties. I told her I didn’t think I was doing good. “I might even feel a little…” and here is where I whispered my shame, “…depressed?”

She said, “Oh Hilarey! Of course you are. You’ve had an adoption miscarriage.” She explained that people bring casseroles for new babies but no one normally visits if you lose a baby. We mourn miscarriages alone. She also reminded me that even though I didn’t have the physical loss from my body, we had prepared our home, brains, and hearts for new family members. We had spent time (years) envisioning it and suddenly it was taken away. It was like a death had happened in our family and no one acknowledged it. Since then, if I have known of a miscarriage—I’ve tried to reach out.

A quick blessing for women in the light of Mother’s Day this weekend. Christ wept over Jerusalem and said how he longed to gather her children like a hen gathers chicks under her wings. Any desire you have inside of you to nurture, comfort, or protect—reflects the heart of God. If you have unsatisfied longings for family, you are in that phase of pouring out from your body and lacking rest and comfort for yourself, your children have moved on, or you have been rejected by those you love… May you feel the tender promise that God has not forgotten you.

Death of a dream

It was painful to release the idea of our imagined family. It can hurt to let go of any goal or dream. Recently, I’ve seen different dream-deaths in my close community. Major changes or plans of major changes. My husband moved to a new company and left the one where he’d worked for more than a decade. Even intentional changes can land you somewhere between feeling slightly unsettled to completely losing your footing in the overwhelm of irrevocable change.

Sometimes a dream dies peacefully in its sleep, and sometimes it twists and writhes like a B movie actor.

In my experience, that’s been the pain for me. The death throes. The last gasps of air when you thought the dream had already passed over. Any sudden reminders that you still want it—even though you thought you had let it go.

You don’t always know something is an idol until you cannot have it.

I used to visit with a refugee friend from Iraq who shared a verbal tradition about the story of Jonah in Nineveh. She told me that when the people realized their danger and the depth of their sin, they didn’t allow any man or animal to drink even a sip of water for three days. The mommas would not nurse their babies; they let them cry.

I didn’t believe her. I couldn’t imagine a nursing mom doing that. Forget the pain of swelling, mastitis and your milk drying up. Think of how a baby’s life at the time was already so precarious, infant mortality was likely high, a woman’s future was her progeny, and women risked so much in childbirth.

Ours wasn’t the kind of relationship where I could argue with her or express doubt, and she was so insistent. She assured me that the cows were screaming, and the entire city was wailing and crying out together as one. She’d descended from the people, so she knew.

I pulled out Jonah and reread the story. In chapter 3, verse 7 and 8 the king says, Do not let people or animals, herds or flocks, taste anything; do not let them eat or drink.

It could be literal, but nearly literal would still get the point across. What I received in the exchange was another example of where I cannot help, at least initially, to understand the Bible through the lens I have. In America, we encourage drinking plenty of water while fasting.

Recently, our church had a corporate fast for lent. The preacher kept coughing. Someone brought him a water bottle. I was sitting next to a young girl from east Africa and she looked at me with incredulous confusion. After the service, she asked, “I thought we were fasting this week.” She likely wondered why he callously tempted the entire congregation. (It was not a mandatory fast. People took part in whatever capacity they desired.) Once we talked, I discovered that in her culture, fasting meant nothing touched her lips, food or drink, sunrise to sunset. She ate and drank water at night.

It wasn’t just culture that dictated how Nineveh reacted to Jonah—but contrition. I realized I might not have experienced that kind of remorse, certainly not on such a scale. There have been many times that I’ve felt so much emotion that I wasn’t hungry… but never so much impending doom that for three days I wouldn’t even put a bowl of water in front of the cat. And that sound of my captive animal, crying out and maybe even eventually giving up in order to save energy, would resonate and echo within my soul.

But the communal experience—it would help you grieve with the sounds everywhere. And in the context of this, to mourn their pride and violence with a visceral ritual would be life-changing. You would cross over and never want to return to that sin.

I think our culture tries to hide grief. We keep uncomfortable things like disability and weakness hidden away. To the point than many people didn’t know their president, Franklin Rosevelt, was paralyzed from the waist down. Depending on your church culture, it could be worse. Because feeling pain must mean you aren’t trusting God if your religion promises finances, freedom, health and good married sex when you obey him. You can be sad about it for a minute… but now, where is your joy in the Lord? Haven’t you learned what you needed to from that trial yet, so it can be over?

Of course, some people never leave their pain to the point of wearing it as an identity. I know I have been on all sides of this. Either wondering why someone is still wallowing, hiding how I am not yet better, or letting my loss influence everything I say, do, and think. So we isolate.

Sometimes you need to grieve. And grief takes time. Your time, not someone else’s.

When you can’t move out of the grief

But sometimes the pain is just keeping something already dead connected to a machine. It’s clinging to the way you wish things were. I think we also refuse to mourn because either we hold the dream up higher than what God has for us, or we don’t want to admit failure.

I want to suggest that releasing a dream will be less painful than the alternatives of living in delusion or cultivating a deep root of bitterness.

I see now why some cultures hired mourners to wail at the home where a death had taken place. To voice your own heart-cry and legitimize the pain enough to let it pass. So that when you have mourned, you cross over. You stand up and wash your face. You do not camp in the slightly hidden shame of unprocessed grief.

Lisa Terkeurst writes in the last chapter of her book Good Boundaries and Goodbyes about this when she mentions having “a million little funerals” and opening up her hands to let each one go.

We have very little ceremony to mark the passing of something other than actual death, as a healthy way to grieve. Sometimes we don’t even know we need to mourn the release of a dream.

What I am proposing is to find a ritual to let something go. A sort of liturgy or ceremony to mark an ending. We have ceremonies for weddings and baptisms to show before and after. I think it might be worth creating a way to pass over the threshold and acknowledge the change when a dream dies.

Create a visual reminder of the change in your life. Light a candle, or blow one out, write a ditty, bake a cake, hang a banner… or throw a wake. And do it with your community.

Here is the way Mike Meyer’s character in So I Married an Axe Murderer mourned the end of his relationships:


It’s Probably Her Fault

Posted on by Hilarey

I loved the first cover of my first novel. Partly because, 11 years ago, it communicated to the reader: this isn’t going to be your typical Christian fiction. I didn’t want to bait and switch.

I knew it hit the mark when I participated in a Christian fair at a community park. I set up a bookseller’s table with a few of my writer friends. An angry, sweaty-faced man stormed up with his pubescent daughter, picked up my book and started yelling at her with an extended finger. “You asked what the pastor meant by immodest! This is immodest. This is… alluring!”

He went on to belittle her for men’s lust. Then he turned and leveled his disgusted gaze towards me. He would not hand me the book, but dropped it on the table with a derisive smirk (he showed me!) and marched her away in tears. She turned ashamed eyes back toward me for a moment, so apologetic for her crime of being a girl.

Drink more water or it’s your fault

In my youth, I heard water neutralizes an acid stomach. And on the flip side, sometimes pain in your stomach meant not enough acid. Which, of course, water also helps. I think there was a thread of “pain is a construct of your mind” philosophy also woven into that. The point was: you never actually needed antacids. You just needed to drink more water. Pain was probably your fault.

When I finally broke down and bought Tums, I still felt guilt that I had eaten the wrong things. Eaten too fast. I hadn’t had enough water.

We create these rules in our minds as a sort of safekeeping. To throw out to the universe, “That would never happen to me!” and “Look, see, how I have protected myself. I followed a rule!” When others suffer, we blame. You must not have followed a rule. It’s your fault.

It’s either my fault or your fault

Every time I hear a man say that he wishes women would be sensitive and “put a little more clothing on.” I die a little inside. But… only if he’s a believer.

What he’s saying is, “It’s the women you gave us, Lord!” He is trying to make someone else responsible, so his external situations can allow him to believe that he has relinquished his inner life over to God.

Cultural modesty does not prevent rape, so what do you mean by covered up?

I laughed a little when my uncle first told me he was “a conservative Christian.” In my mind, I thought, dude, you’re from California. You don’t know what conservative is. You let your wife wear pants. (I realize now this is a political alignment, and not an expression of faith.)

Should a woman hide her shoulders so LDS men know she’s wearing garments, sealed in the temple to someone else?

Can a woman show that she has two legs like a man? I loved the exchange in the novel, The Poisonwood Bible, by Barbara Kingsolver. The missionary tried to get the African women to cover their naked breasts according to his cultural sensitivity (quite an inconvenience to nursing and working at the same time) while his wife wore pants and the men of the village couldn’t look her in the eye. They appropriately bounced their gaze away.

If you’re in certain parts of the world, maybe she needs to cover her hair. Or become as pious as a Hasidic Jew, shave her hair and wear a wig, so no one accidentally views the immodest glory of her natural hair. Surely that will make it easier for men to praise God for their maleness.

I’ve likely written before that in the autobiography Infidel, Ayaan Hirsi Ali describes how the need to hide and sequester her womanhood never ended—only escalated—in her submission. Even fully hidden from view with a veil obscuring her face, men’s lust arose from the sound of her walking. The echo of her womanly shoes tapping down the hall brought up images of shapely legs, so her equally pious male friend asked her to wear soft-soled shoes.

‘Ezer a guy out, all you fine helper people. It’s really hard not to sin.

There’s nothing a helper can do to make it easier for him to turn his heart, mind, and soul over to God. Not even drinking more water.

I don’t care about outside the church or the unbelieving culture at large. It only bothers me in the body. And it seems more prevalent to me the more that roles and gender are segregated in the church.

I used to not care so much about equality or women who preached because I do not desire to pastor. My hot button was abuse due to those roles. But I’m to the point that whenever I hear the term “male leadership” or “husbands, lead your wife,” I cringe because none are free when power discrepancy is justified scripturally.

The more the man views himself as set apart, and the more gender-based responsibility he assumes… the more she is lowered from a divine image bearer to his object. Possibly a treasured object under his loving care to whom he will wash the feet of, and give his life up for, yes—but an object of his, nonetheless.

And I don’t think Jesus’s intent when he said “when you look at a woman with lust you have already sinned” means a man should remove her from his line of sight instead of submitting his heart. I mean, he should both submit to God and submit to women out of reverence to Christ.

If you’re afraid you’re going to pinch the tush of every female you see in the memory care facility during your senility—then view all women as your sister/daughters now, in the secret places of your reasoning. I heard a pastor once say that if you put a muzzle on a mean dog, you still have a mean dog. And I think during old age, we lose some muzzles of society. Hiding less of my sarcastic thoughts now that I’m fifty is a perfect example.

Neither should he keep women from the inner sanctum/lair because of the reminder that her sex difference is a portable temptation to him. Soft-soled shoes won’t remove lust just because she is neither seen nor heard. I wonder if, like objectification, the segregation of gender roles, and the ardent belief that men and women cannot be friends (because her organs dictate her one role) actually exasperates lust.

I know that belief contributes to the deep pain of the childless in the church. She is your friend, too. I have some close friends that might argue this point with me. But I think unpracticed interaction and segregation breeds, “She smiled at me. That means she probably wants to have sex with me,” as much as it reveals how the core belief of inequality spreads its tentacles into all interactions. Approaching an unavailable woman shows your belief that females have one function for you.

Sister, there is no way to prevent someone else from sinning against you. And if men will not see women as equal standing in the body of Christ, segregating or deferring to the gender at large will not change it. Differences are needed in community.

How to change it? Step up.

I believe using your gifting, according to your faith, and in whatever space will allow you, will move things. When we arrived in Israel for our tour, our Southern Baptist pastor raised his eyebrows at me and said “The tour guide is a woman?! Uh oh. We’ll see how this goes…” I was so annoyed that I, out of the whole group, was the one to whom he showed his prejudice.

Her people had escaped the Spanish inquisition. She was a born-again Jewess, living in the holy land and her family had practiced Jewish traditions and rituals her whole life. She had intimate knowledge of things like the Passover supper and which coins were exchanged in the first century temple. She spoke three languages. But she had this one thing against her—a uterus. At the end of the tour, our pastor asked his “heavy hitters” to kick in a little more money. He wanted to pay her extra because of her unanticipated value: she didn’t hold back her teaching.

As we’re being conformed to the image of Christ, we should not should stop trying to renew our minds or move toward the new kingdom. The kingdom where both men and women are now the priests of God, fully endowed with all the gifts of the spirit to shine light, regardless of our unique organs related to procreation.

And (this is only for the men who lead through gender instead of spirit-gifting) when you think of yourself as the head of everything—realize how often you ask her to step in for you. How you create a paradigm where you declare you are the leader, but are not empowered through gender alone, so you blame the girls.

Give your husband sex and then he’ll be faithful to you.
Take care of your body and then he’ll be attracted to you.
Dress modestly, then he will see you as a sister.
Submit first, then he will love you.
If you follow him, then he will lead.

I don’t think this is a problem for humans who weren’t raised in the church. I don’t think it’s an issue for girls who weren’t told, “Men only want one thing from you. Girls have (only) one precious gift. One thing of value.”

And I also don’t believe it’s a problem for men who view women as equal.

Back ordered and out-of-print Christianity

Movements sell books. I think much of the purity movement was people who rejected the sexual freedom of their youth. They over-corrected, and wanted a rule to corral suffering this side of heaven—to blame pain and dysfunction on something that could be controlled. Drink more water and it won’t be your fault! Or, they wanted absolution: I didn’t know the rule—so it wasn’t my fault. They wanted to redeem their virginity through their children and so promised them a false god, a sexual prosperity that they had no intimate knowledge of.

How we long for simple, descriptive, reproducible formulas! Tweetable existentialism. A theology with a man’s name on it.

I used to dismiss Jehovah’s Witnesses because (to my understanding) they weren’t allowed to read the Bible unless they viewed it through the lens of the Watchtower’s interpretation and accompanying literature. At least they are honest in their gatekeeping.

Now, I realize it’s the same in our churchyard. So much of what we peddle for book sales is a tangent to the gospel; slapping a man’s last name on our affiliation and pledging allegiance to it. We search for commentaries that explain what we want to believe. Or we sit under people who write commentaries that prove what we want to believe. One human cannot accurately contain all the deep mysteries of God—we were designed for community. So even if it that doctrine has sustained a couple hundred years, parts of it will be wind and its followers the reeds.

Making the straight and narrow, straighter and narrower since 1845

The Southern Baptist faction began for segregation. Churches were allowing non-whites in their congregations and they wanted to keep the truer faith of the good ol’ days. I was raised in the faith and given a hearty fear of liberal sects like the American Baptists. Now, as an adult, I’m becoming increasingly averse to historical denominations, dogma containing surnames, and movements. No matter how new, no matter how old. The dividing walls are not just gender, but a more systemic problem of gatekeeping and control of the money machine.

The other morning I read a blog by a woman who wrote a disclaimer that she was, after all, still Eve‘s daughter. She was diminishing God’s ability to speak truth through her since she believed all women were fundamentally more likely to be deceived. The theology she puts her faith in sells a lot of books and has for centuries. It was like saying, “I wish I could ask a man about this—since I can’t trust my lady-brain. Unfortunately, every time I try to, he thinks I want to sleep with him.”

The real upset is when laypeople and uneducated start digging. Even worse, armchair theologians like me reading the Bible and trying to parse out truth. As my dad reminded me, “Well, anyone can put up a blog.”

William Tyndale was executed because he translated directly from Greek and Hebrew instead of the church-authorized Latin Vulgate. The original texts undermined key doctrines of The Church. Plus, he translated into the English common tongue. The educated couldn’t fathom someone as a lowly as a plow-hand understanding holy scripture.

If no one is making money off it—is it really a valid doctrine?

Back when I thought I was called to be a missionary, I came across a lovely little book by Amy Carmichael, called Mimosa. It is the story of a young girl who hears the simplest of gospel messages one afternoon and receives it. The family could only send one child to the missionary school, so she returned home.

She grows up, becomes a wife and a mother and spends her life in a village far away from any Christians, the Bible, or Christian culture. She’s reunited to the writer decades later—only to find that with this tiny seed of God’s love for her, she’d lived a life convicted of, and in obedience to, many biblical concepts that directly opposed the culture of India where she made her home. Simple things like, it didn’t honor the God who loved her to go into debt she couldn’t repay. And big things, like trust in the Almighty for an empty belly.

I wonder about all the time I spend pondering women’s roles in the American church, when so many in the world don’t have access to “drink more water.” I’m sure we give too much effort talking about concepts, and laminating membership cards to Apollos or Paul, when, if we were just moving around outside in the world—the Holy Spirit would tell us how to take the next step.

But on the flip side, as we watch the exodus of believers who leave wounded and disillusioned from faith spaces, maybe it’s time for more armchair theologians to examine the dogma of our tradition.

And here is where it lands so heavy on me. No one questions your gifting when you are ministering outside the churchyard. The only place any of this applies is inside the building with a logo and a security team, where you can buy their books.

Giving, Accepting and Celebrating Love

Posted on by Hilarey

I received some council this week, which I desperately needed. And I will share some of my thoughts processing it in honor of today.

If you swing from opposite ends between pride and debasement, arrogance and self loathing—try to remember that following God is all about walking in the uncomfortable tension in the middle.

We see tension everywhere in scripture. Like the “already—but not yet” concept of salvation. We see it in that tenuous path between law and grace, where we are completely commanded to follow the Lord in fearful-awe, and completely forgiven when we do not, trusting his loving long-suffering and gentleness.

Abstinence can be easier than moderation because it’s difficult to balance. Some of the most unattractive things about faith groups are when they do not walk in this tension and set up camp on either end. All fearful law or cheap grace. But again, and again, we rest in knowing that two things can be true.

As you love yourself

The admonition I received was that inside the greatest two Commandments, a third component is inferred. That you are loving yourself.

Love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, mind, and soul. Love your neighbor as yourself.

Somehow, we translate this into “love your neighbor more than yourself.”

It seems to be coming full circle for me, with the book I read last fall on boundaries. Setting aside the false doctrine of unworthiness, allowing destruction to wreak havoc in your life because, after all, “Christ laid down his life as a sacrifice.” So all Christians should be devalued as a reflection of him.

Somehow, we know that’s not right, and here’s where we dabble in riding the pendulum. Trying to counteract shame with self-exaltation. Deep insecurity often fronts with bravado.

Intentionally laying down your life as a gift is far different from allowing others to control you and orchestrate destruction in your soul.

But, it’s quite a journey from:
you don’t have a right to boundaries…
to:
boundaries are godly…
then:
not only do you have a right to them, but it’s poor stewardship if you do not protect your relationship with God.

You actually have a responsibility, believer, to create a divide that keeps chaos out of your soul.

Back to self

I was also encouraged that the middle tension between pride and self debasement is actually self-confidence.

Confident in God’s love for you. Confident in who he says you are, and that you are made in his image.

So on this day we celebrate love, I want to encourage you to confidently love yourself.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

I decided to rewrite this verse to myself, so I could see how I was doing. Whether or not you received a love letter today, I think it would be beautiful to rewrite this verse (or paraphrase it out loud) to yourself as well.

Here is what I found:
I’m impatient when I want a quick fix. I’m not kind in my self-talk. Internal pride and external boasting destroy me inside and out. My body is a temple, and I am free to honor it. Self-seeking is choosing the moment over the lasting. Being angry with myself and then listing my wrongs is mimicking the accuser, and not my Lord. Instead of taking pleasure in things that are not from God—rejoice in seeking and finding truth. Protect and guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life. Trust that you’re made in the image of God, and his arm is not too short to save you. Hope and persevere, which is to anticipate in joy, even while you endure without seeing the promise.

To compare: I’m impatient when I want a quick fix. (Love is patient.) I’m not kind in my self-talk. (Love is kind.) Internal pride and external boasting destroy me inside and out. (Love does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.) My body is a temple, and I am free to honor it. (Love does not dishonor.) Self-seeking is choosing the moment over the lasting. (Love is not self-seeking.) Being angry with myself and then listing my wrongs is mimicking the accuser, and not my Lord. (Love is not easily angered and keeps no record of wrongs.)

You get the picture.

If your first self-check doesn’t reveal any areas of confident success, that’s part of the process. Next, rewrite to yourself as a promise.

Happy Valentine’s Day. You are loved.

One Body, One Hope—But it Looks Different

Posted on by Hilarey

I didn’t mean to go so far over my 7 or 8 minute goal in one post. But when I skip weeks, it builds up. There’s a lot of verse links in this one, I hope you double check them all and spend some time pondering their validity. I’d love the conversation.

My favorite recipe app shut down at the start of winter. I wasn’t able to print or bookmark the recipes I’d saved. They are lost to me. It reminds me that years ago I had a daydream where I was reading a digital Bible, and the words started changing and updating to propaganda and lies while I read it. (Since I knew didn’t want to write an apocalyptic novel, I realized my imagination was telling me that I needed to know my Bible, not just know where it’s stored.)

And even still, I prefer the convenience of my digital Bible. Although I use Bible Project frequently, my favorite daily app is Olive Tree. I read through and start over. Occasionally, I try themed reading plans. Every year I am more in awe, and assured it is the Word of God. It always takes me much longer than a year to read through, and I just finished Revelation.

There is a lot going on in this book. And I’m currently contemplating how intriguing it is that even though there is one God, one body, one hope… Jesus Christ introduces and represents himself differently to the seven churches.

To the first church, he introduces himself as the one who holds the seven stars in his right hand and walks among the seven lamp stands. Revelation 2:1
To the second, he is the first and the last, who died and came to life. Verse 2:8
Then, he declares he is the one with the sharp two-edged sword. Verse 2:12
Next, he doesn’t have a sword. He tells the church that he has eyes like a flame of fire, with feet of burnished bronze. Verse 2:18
In chapter three verse one he describes himself with a similarity to the first church displaying seven stars. But now, he has the seven spirits of God with those stars.
In 3:7, he is the holy one, the true one. And he has the key of David; he opens what no one will shut and shuts what no one opens.
To the last church in 3:14 he is the Amen. The faithful and true witness, the beginning of God’s creation.

Superficially we can look at this is and realize, he’s different to different people. It’s true, you can find God in art, you can find God in science. If something is truly good, it comes from God, no matter the label. And even though Jesus is the only gate, we have to allow that some things look different from our different angles.

We can take that too far, though. The New Testament is clear that rejecting Jesus is rejecting God. We don’t want to risk making a god of our own design and saying all actions and paths lead to him.

Really, all paths lead to decisions. Continually, eventually, your decisions lead you toward or away from the heart of Christ. And just because you acknowledge that Jesus is the gate—or you have said that magic prayer—it doesn’t mean your decisions and actions are still running after his heart.

And, the decisions we need to make each day haven’t changed. I must decide if I am going to do what I want (or eat the fruit) and call my own choices wisdom. Listen, I don’t think Adam and Eve bit down in nervous, regretful, guilt. They rationalized that what they were doing was advantageous, desirous…smart. They elevated their choice with justification and reason. That’s how we end up blocked from the tree of life. It’s how we end up with everyone doing “what is right in their own eyes,” as demonstrated in the historical-chaos-accounts of the Old Testament.

The decision is still to do what he says is best for human flourishing—or to continue tasting and cultivating your palate toward bitterness, rage, anger, or immorality. And rationalizing it.

My path looks different from yours

However, I do giggle at the thought of one church saying to another that God Most High is clearly the one with the sharp, two-edged sword. And the other church replying, “Heavens no, you apostate from hell, God Most High has seven stars in his hand and walks among the seven lamp stands.”

And then the battle ensues. They slaughter each other for generations over the doctrine of swords and stars. Sometimes the church of the seven spirits helps, because after all, they have the commonality of the seven stars, and they can set the lamp stands aside for a minute to get rid of the sword church. Or at the very least, the factions split and they badmouth each other across town while the non-believers look on and roll their eyes.

We are told that our love for each other will prove we are disciples. Why then, is it so surprising that pseudo-love (sex) is more compelling to the world than our division and fear?

We see a greater totality of God when we’re connected to others who are different from ourselves and who see God differently. The church in Asia, the church in Africa, the church in Europe… the church across the street, all have things we don’t know about—and need. When the body is complete, we have access to all the body’s functions and resources. Swords and stars.

There is a similarity in Revelation after Christ introduces himself differently. In each of Christ’s messages to the seven churches, there’s a reward for “the one who conquers, is victorious, or overcomes.”

I believe the promises that follow the admonitions are for all who overcome, even though specific churches needed specific encouragements, and… specific warnings that pertain to particular broken things in their individual culture.

Here is the list of those promises: the one who overcomes gets to eat of the tree of life in the paradise of God (2:7). The one who overcomes will not be hurt by the second death (2:11). They will get some of the hidden manna and a white stone with a new name written on that stone that no one knows (2:17). They will have authority over the nations, to rule. And they will receive the morning star (2:26-28). They will be clothed in white garments, their name will never be blotted out of the book of life and Christ will confess their name before the father and angels (3:5). They will become a pillar in the temple of God, never to leave it. And Christ says he will write on them the name of his God, the name of the city of God…and Christ’s own new name (3:12).

To be completely transparent about why I say all of those rewards apply to all the churches: It’s because I tend to take all the promises from the Bible for personal application—if not direct receipt. I cling to David’s promises in the Psalms as something I have access to. But, to be fair, I also believe all the warnings still apply to me as well. It’s not à la cate: good stuff for me, and the warnings for the Jews.

Your path looks different from mine

This is not the only time God looks different. Our unique brains, cultures and experiences make it difficult to agree on how to build a compost pile, much less how to live in sincere peace with God Most High. So, our multifaceted Christ also pursues us differently according to our individual needs. Sometimes he comes after us like the shepherd who leaves the flock behind, to search us out. Then, carries our trembling hide home with more rejoicing than he has for the 99.

But sometimes, he waits patiently for us to return like the prodigal father. Running to us only after we turn toward home. Waiting until we want him, before he falls on our neck with a kiss.

Sometimes he draws us into the pain of the wilderness to remove our distraction, or semblance of strength, and to see our need. He wants us to experience calling out to him so we can experience his answer.

Sometimes he wants us to wait patiently for him. And don’t think you can experience “patiently” without a difficult stretch of time in longing.

Different reactions to the choice

In the parable of the dinner feast, Christ says in Luke 14:16–24 that many people have excuses for why they cannot come to the feast, or at least come right now. The excuses are interesting to me: owning land, working, getting married. All things greatly valued in American Christendom. Is it not ironic that we preach “Get a job, buy dirt, make a bio family and then you’ll experience God’s blessing…” when those are the specific entrapments that actually kept people from going to the feast in the parable?

We’ll just skip over the obvious parable of the same seed falling on different soil and consider the varied reactions when Paul preached in Athens in Acts 17:22-34. Some laughed, some said they’d hear more later, and some believed. I think the ones who go to church every week, tell other people they’re going to hell, while rationalizing their own discrete sins, are the “We’d like to hear more on this topic” group.

When Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead in John 11:44, the people who watched reacted in two different ways. “Many of the Jews, therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what he did, believed in him, but some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done.” Verses 45 & 46.

Even though a dead man had been restored to life—they were more concerned about upsetting their societal structure, their man-made religious government.

And then, even some of those who believed the miracle of Lazarus still rejected the call to live it out. John 12:42-43 says “Nevertheless, many even of the authorities believed in him, but for fear of the Pharisees they did not confess it, so that they would not be put out of the synagogue; for they loved the glory that comes from man more than the glory that comes from God.”

Different reactions to the ongoing choice

Freewill is obviously destructive to the world. But, don’t forget: freewill from believers hurts people just as much. It is possible to go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of truth. Just because you walk through the gate, it doesn’t mean you loose the dignity of your free choice.

In Matthew 21:28-32 the parable is of two sons—so I think of them as children of God, as believers. Did you think after your wedding day that you would never have another decision regarding your sexual morality? Did you think it would always be the easy, first choice to obey God after conversion? In actuality, once abiding has reigned in some of the outwardly demonstrated sins like rage and drunkenness, you can start to feel the less obvious inflammation of subtle diseases, like jealousy.

Those continual choices of submission, after we come to the Lord, actually increase. The boys in the parable were told to work in the vineyard. One said no, but then later went. One said yes, but did not go. Jesus asked the men who had dedicated their entire life to studying the scriptures, “Which son obeyed?”

These devout men said it was the first who obeyed. Because action matters more than the promise, right? Here’s where Jesus gets insult-y. He replied to them the worst, most unlikely converts, and outcast enemies of your society will enter heaven before you. Verse 32.

Hmm, are there any unlikely converts and outcast enemies according to your church’s “about page”?

We’re missing something if we think either obeyed. So don’t bother giving lip service to God or others about your faith. Prove it with your actions and your love.

The same answer

Ok, so different parts of the body, different angles of view, but our obedience will have similarities. We get hung up on allowable and cultural differences like who’s in the buffet line for sacrificed meat—but submission is evident by fruit of the spirit.

Also, allow that in all our differences, we also grow and learn at different speeds. But make no mistake. Jesus said, if you love me, you will keep my commands. The follower of Jesus won’t be the one who tells others to obey from blog, podcast, pulpit or book. Even Paul said he could be disqualified while leading others to God—if he wasn’t careful. Nor will true followers be the one who merely prophesy in his name…or who do amazing miracles. It will be the one who practices abiding in love and obedience.

We mistake God being for long-suffering with us, as permission, and his long-suffering with others, as participation in evil.

This bucks at the “Grace is so dang cheap, it’s free!” doctrine I’ve met along the way. I’m still working through it, but it jolts me every time I read, “Not all who cry Lord, Lord, will enter heaven. But only the one who does the will of my father.” Matthew 7:21

He is still calling you

Since some will stand before God at the end and be surprised that he says, “I never knew you,” we should rethink the once-saved-always-saved, one-and-done-magic-prayer, and then live-like-hell-in-religiosity (while condemning the unlikely converts and outcast enemies) religion. I used to tell myself that the ones who cried out “Lord, Lord” were probably going to be the other orthodox or Episcopalians. Just some denomination I didn’t belong to and didn’t know much about. But no, I am the church.

And if you think there is submission involved in coming to the end of yourself and understanding that you need God for salvation… ponder the submission it takes to daily choose his way against your desire. To hourly accept letting go of the things you want, and understand, and are familiar, for the things that he says are better.

Believer, he is still calling you to more, to go deeper. Relinquish more. Abide more. Change more. Don’t ignore it. Hebrews 3 says it is an ongoing choice to not turn away from the living God.

Crowds surrounded him and wanted to be tangential to Christ. We can still mingle tangentially, prophesy and weep for the lost—but never submit to God. Because when Christ gave the call to the masses that surrounded him to follow and obey, not everyone did. Some had really good excuses. (Excuses are not the same as clarification, questions and wrestling with God.)

Look how it played out, Peter fell to his knees when Christ told him, “Follow me and I will make you a fisher of men.”
When James & John got the call, they left their dad & boat.
But other men he called said, “Let me first bury my dad,” or “Let me say goodbye to my family.”

As an adult, you get to live the life you want. Sure, only within your power and circumstance, but all your justifications, excuses and responses dictate your life. You have this ongoing choice to walk toward or away from the heart of Christ.

Is there anything you are waiting on, or need to take care of, or bury before you answer the call to go deeper?

Don’t waste your time saying goodbye to it.