Okay. I understand why it’s so difficult to respond to a post on the over-whelming excellencies of the Alabama football program, but I thought the Saban quote might lead to an interesting discussion.
The quote is actually from Jim Rohn —
We must all suffer one of two things: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret or disappointment.
— although frequently quoted by Saban — with attribution.
Rohn is exactly right. The question in Christian terms is simply, as a child of God, what life outcome would disappoint me? Is there anything about the congregation I’m a member of, the Kingdom I’m a citizen of, or the life I walk with Jesus that could wind up a disappointment to me?
If I retire well, catch lots of fish, hit lots of golf balls, and play with lots of grandchildren, will I be disappointed? Is that enough?
What is the point of my life? What goals have I set — Christian, Kingdom-oriented goals — that could be disappointed and so are important enough to suffer some discipline today?
For Alabama football players, the goals are national championships and big NFL contracts. Those who undertake the discipline largely achieve both. (Saban has never recruited a player at Alabama or LSU who didn’t win a national championship if he stayed with the team for his full eligibility.)
As a Christian, what is my equivalent of a championship? A growing church? Children who are active in church? A changed Church of Christ denomination?
Indeed, is there anything that could go so badly in terms of my church and Christian walk that I’d consider my life a disappointment?
I dare say that most Christians don’t have a good answer for this question — having almost entirely secular life goals. In fact, most couldn’t get much past having a pleasant Sunday morning weekly assembly and lots of friends at church (I hope I’m wrong and know there are exceptions, of course).
If their present congregation were to fail, they’d move on to another congregation, make new friends, and have a different but nonetheless pleasant Sunday morning experience every week. And that would be quite enough — because we see Christianity as being about God saving us and hauling us off to heaven. We’re consumers. Target or Wal-Mart. Price and convenience. Any church that gets us to heaven and is, you know, pleasant is quite good enough.
God really, really loves us, so much that he wants to spend eternity with us — and our purpose on earth is to pass the time comfortably, with good friends, trying to help a little, I suppose, but not really being invested in the Kingdom. I mean, you’re not invested in the Kingdom if you have nothing to lose.
To most of us, it’s not mission. It’s not a passion for much of anything — except, you know, pleasantness. We’ll get upset over a rearrangement of the pews or a change in musical style or a change in the order of the service because such things offend our goal: a pleasant Sunday morning service.
Few of us ask whether such changes might serve God’s greater goal of reaching the lost or pushing us to rethink our entire purpose in having been saved.
Thus, I think much of the ennui and same-old-sameness of church is not about selfishness so much as having an utter lack of goals — and therefore being unable to be disappointed except by a few creature comforts, the style of the music, or how wildly the song leader waves his arm.
And with no risk of disappointment, there’s no need for discipline. No pain; no gain. Nothing to be gained; no reason to endure anything.
I hope I’m wrong. And if I’m wrong, tell me what goals there are that are worth the pain of discipline. And, no, “heaven” doesn’t count. I’m talking about goals that are accomplishable in this lifetime, in this age, in this existence.
Heaven is accomplished for the saved. God didn’t leave you here after he saved you just to wait. No, we’re here to endure the pain of discipline so that God will not be disappointed — in what?
(Rom 5:3-5 ESV) 3 Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, 4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, 5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.
As I get older goal setting is less important to me than when I was a young man. So often goal setting involves some assumptions about our future and those assumptions frequently turn out to be wrong. Jesus’ ministry seems to have been largely a day to day ministry- responding to the opportunities for ministry that confronted him in the ordinary course of his life. If I had to put my aspiration for God in terms of a goal I would characterize it as trying to see more clearly each day Jesus in the needs of those who cross my path.
But intentions are just that and therefore void. We are truly called to serve others not
just ourselves in worship formalities. Many faithful attenders have not felt this calling.
We fail in leadership if we neglect tutoring, the young especially, in kingdom service.
We will invariably fail unless we show them through example. Teach them to lighten
the load of the needy, the infirm, widows, and to not disappoint the children who look
up to them.
I don’t really go to church, but if I did the pleasantness is exactly what I’d be seeking. I’d hope to actually find that Jesus’ easy yoke/light burden was a true statement. I would not, on the other hand, be looking for a Zig Ziglar-type character to come in to teach us how to work really really hard in order to…well…work really really hard.
That burned me out on church. Ministry ideas, meetings to discuss these ideas, etc. etc. And at the end of the day it is all effort, and the only peace that comes is from being tired. This is basically the result of trying to attach individualism and American biz practices to a non-profit spiritual experience. As displayed by comparing our usefulness to God to winning NCAA championships.
I see all of this as extremely broken. At the core. From every angle. Christianity, especially at the Protestant end, in my mind, would be best served by one thing: a chill pill.
Perhaps we miss the boat when we try to convert spiritual callings into temporal measurables. In his desire to love his wife, a believer takes her on date night every Friday, washes the dishes every night except Sunday, and has not left his dirty underwear on the bedpost in over six months. Any of these things can be expressions of love, and the entire program can lack it entirely. I like Jesus’ sort of goals: go everywhere, and make disciples to Me when you get there. Hard to nail down the quarterly measurables on this one, but clearly ambitious.
Jesus said, “No man who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.” And why would any plowman start plowing and then look back? To see how he’s doing so far. That’s a human mindset, not a kingdom one. Our passion is for the Person, not the progress. But I would suggest that such passion will bear much fruit.
Charles, I think you put it perfectly. Jon, I hope you will try another church soon. Even at my lowest, and that was about as low as you can be and still be alive, I never gave up on church. The worship nourished me and there’s always at least one person each time who blessed me in their interaction with me. I have severe anxiety and I often can’t make it all the way through the service but even then I’m blessed by the part that I can get through. The small group I’m in has become like an extended family for me. My ministry now is primarily in my urban neighborhood and at church I take much more than I give after a lifetime of being one of the core group. But there is a season for everything and I’m content with where God seems to have put me now. I hope you can find a supportive and loving church family.
Gary —
Oh, my church is amazing. Top to bottom. I just don’t go b/c I don’t think I am a healthy person to have in the assembly. When you lack faith at the very core of everything (bible inspiration, etc.) it makes everything else null and void. It is hard to get worked into a stupor about evangelism or women’s roles when you have little faith in what got you there in the first place.
So that leaves me grasping — and about the only thing to which I can grab on is Jesus’ message. Whether Jesus is who he says he is…I don’t know. I know he was a much better person than me, so I have no problem following him. But his message of justice is solid and something I can base my life around. But frankly, I don’t really need church for that.
Jon, speaking for myself I think you are a healthy enough person for church by far even if all you can hold on to is Jesus and his teachings. Everything else is optional. What one believes about Scripture does not affect one’s salvation or standing with God. The early Christians had no New Testament. All that matters is to believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, the Anointed One of God who has come into our world with the good news of the coming Kingdom reign of God and to begin to live in that direction however imperfectly. It sounds like your church is not a good fit for you but there are a lot of churches of Jesus’s disciples out there. Finding one that will accept you as you are, as I have, can be a wonderful blessing in your life.
Yeah, I can’t necessarily put full faith in the statements you made — I end up at about a Pascal’s Wager. And yes, my church is amazing. They’d have no trouble with my struggles — they’d gently say that everyone has crises of faith at times.
For me, it more comes to that if I don’t necessarily have faith on the ground-floor matters, I don’t see any reason to spend 4hrs a week there.
Jon, sometimes it ceases to be helpful to keep pursuing questions in our lives and faith as rational matters. Sometimes it helps to be nonrational for awhile. What has helped me tremendously at times in my life is experiencing worship in new and powerful ways. The most wonderful worship experience I ever had was a Good Friday service in a Catholic church. I have too many disagreements with Roman Catholicism to be a Catholic but I absolutely love Catholic liturgy. Charismatic worship has also at times in my life been a powerful experience. I know worship is to be primarily about God but it can still have a powerful and wondrous effect on the worshiper. The often nonrational (or at least less explicitly rational) experience of worship strangely often in time indirectly breaks up the rational logjams in our minds. In one of the psalms the psalmist writes, “This I know that God is for me.” That has been a reassuring truth for me at times in my life when not much else has made sense in my confused life.
Good thoughts, Gary. I actually wrote on my blog yesterday about baseline faith, or rather, the idea that we just kind of have to pick a team and run with it.
That said, I did a 3 part series writing a defense of homosexuality — take a look and tell me what you think. There is no conversation in the replies because 1) only about 20 people probably read it and 2) any replies are made on FB.
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