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June, 2013

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Life on the sine wave

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This is the third guest post on this blog! The author, Jen, is currently studying mathematics at Warwick University, and is involved in many Christian societies on campus.

Spiritual highs and lows. We all experience them at some point in our Christian walk. There are days when God seems extremely close, our desire to pray and read his word very strong, and when we long to tell others about him.  And then there are the days when ours prayers seem mere words, reading the Bible is a chore, and we commit that sin again. CS Lewis reminds us that no spiritual high or low will last forever. And they don’t. But what results is almost as frustrating as being stuck in a low, as we oscillate between highs and lows, but feel like there’s no overall progress. Life on the sine-wave. Not drifting from God but not drawing closer, saved but not growing. But there are 3 important things to remember about the sine-wave experience.

sinx

Photo: Brandon Daniel, reused under CC License

Ups and downs are inevitable

Justified but not yet fully sanctified, redeemed but not yet transformed, call it what you like. We still live in a broken world and we still struggle with sin. We are God’s, and he is in our hearts, but the clean-up operation is taking longer than we would like and so we oscillate; we win the battle with one sin but then it comes back to life, or another rises to battle. We are all in a daily struggle with sin. Oscillating on the sine-wave is not a sign that we are weak, but on the contrary, shows that we are truly in Christ.

God doesn’t change

The great thing to remember is that, though our feelings come and go, His love for us does not.

CS Lewis, Mere Christianity

The Bible constantly reminds us that God is unchanging. He does not oscillate but remains loving, merciful, just and good. His love for us never changes, only our perception of it. There is nothing we can do, nothing we can be, nothing that will separate us from his love. He chose us when we were sinners and rebels; he will remain there in the oscillations. So we can praise him regardless of where we are on the sine-wave, because he still loves us and is with us, working for his plan and for good.

There can be progress alongside the ups and downs

Our life is not quite following the sine wave. It’s really more like the graph of x+sin(2x):

xsinx

Though we may not feel it, through the ups and downs, God is constantly transforming us to be more like him.  We are definitely not a finished work, but that means that there’s space for us to grow closer to God, day by day. Try this; next time you are in a spiritual dip, think back to the last time you were in one, or one you were in last year, and see if you can find any changes or ways God has brought you closer to him. More often than not, you will find something, or someone else will point it out for you. So although it feels like you are going nowhere, take heart. Because you’re not the one doing the sanctifying work – God is; and that means you are making progress. And one day you will be a finished work of God, made perfect like his Son.

So take heart, and, with our all-powerful, all-loving God at your side, keep on going on the x+sin(2x) wave!

Size doesn’t matter

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Seriously. At least in terms of prayer.

size

Photo: Scott Akerman, re-used under CC license.

Long prayers are not more powerful than short ones.

I’ve heard prayers that sound like an auction, with as much as possible crammed into them. Tons of words, no breathing space, and oh so much mumbling. I don’t think that’s what Paul had in mind when he talked about groanings.

If you’re trying to make your prayer longer, you will be likely to repeat yourself, to forget who you’re praying to and therefore repeat it every other second. Worse, you are likely to switch who you’re praying to, from a simple “Father” at the start of your prayer to a “Lord Jesus” in the middle, to finish with  a hesitation between “In Your name” and “In the name of Your Son”.

Remember: whether to the Son or to the Father you are praying to a God who knows you intimately and who does not need you to justify your prayers. Being thorough in your prayers is not necessary.

Short prayers are not better than long prayers

Being concise is neither a sign of holiness, nor a sign of a Spirit-inspired prayer.

God is alive. The Spirit is alive. If you’re afraid that your prayers will go on for too long, and deny the Spirit a breathing space (pun intended), you may not allow yourself to be transformed by prayer. You may end up simply going through the motions of liturgical prayer without meaning any of it, because these prayers have been crafted through the ages and better than anything you could produce. Or you may end up not praying at all, because prayer becomes a perilous exercise in brevity and precision.

Remember: God is eternal. He has all the  time to hear and listen to your prayers, so don’t rush it!

Silence is okay, too

Prayer meetings have a tendency to bring pressure onto individuals to pray out loud. If in a meeting there’s, say, five prayer topics, and by the end of the fourth round, all I’ve said is “Amen”, it feels like I ought to say something.

But if I say something for the sake of saying something; if, to phrase it differently, my spoken prayer is directed to the people around me rather than to God, I might as well not say anything.

Remember: We are instructed to be slow to speak and quick to listen.

So what’s the score?

Long or short or silent/contemplative, all prayer is good, and no type is better than the other! If you’re praying long prayers to look holy, stop! If you’re praying short prayers to look intellectual enough to make them concise, stop! For your own sake.

But. If everyone in your prayer meeting tends to pray long prayers, it is likely that your short prayers will stand out. The converse also holds. If your prayers stand out, it is likely (though by no means automatic) that you are continuing to do them out of misplaced pride; and it is likely (though again by no means automatic) that it disrupts your friends’ prayer by being surprising.

So… adapt. For their sake. And maybe for your own, as you may find you like a new approach to prayer. But not out of a misplaced notion that one type of prayer is more effective than the other.

Punctures and the Spirit: 10 lessons

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Sometimes, we feel deflated; like the Spirit (1) has left us; and it feels a bit like riding a bike with a flat tyre. In more ways than one, the simile is helpful:

puncturePhoto: SamuraiGhost, re-used under CC License

1. You can avoid punctures easily, by very carefully checking where you ride. The thing is, if you do, you might as well be walking, you’d be quicker.
There is a famous apocryphal story of a person who would engage in contemplative prayer before any decision, including getting out of bed. That sort of behaviour is safe, but not quite commendable.

2. Even without a puncture, tyres go flat. They’re porous. Therefore, they need regular top-ups. Just the same with our spiritual life: being baptised, or giving your life to Jesus, or whatever you did at the start of your Christian journey is still there. But on its own, it gets weak. Get praying.

3. A puncture needs repairing. You can try to bike on a flat tyre. It will be exhausting, especially uphill; and you won’t go quite as fast. Don’t rely on your own steam to get stuff done; make sure that you are relying on the Spirit. If you don’t, you may still get it done – but it will be far less pleasant.

4. Repairing does not need to be immediate. Especially if you have it in the middle of oncoming traffic. In order to carry out the relevant repairs, you need to stop and take the time to do it properly… and you can’t always do that in the middle of our busy lives. Don’t get me wrong, the repairs must happen, but it’s alright to finish off urgent tasks before dealing with the repairs. Get out of the oncoming traffic. But don’t use that as an excuse to keep on putting off the repairs.

5. Repairing requires the appropriate tools. If you carry them with you, it will allow you to have a speedier answer (I remember how a tour guide in Amsterdam carried around spare inner tubes). Biblical knowledge, prayer discipline, routine – all these are tools that can support your spiritual life. Find the ones that work with your type of punctures, and keep them around with you, even when you don’t need them. If nothing else, they can be of service to someone else with a puncture.

6. Having a friend with the adequate know-how can help. Someone to talk to, someone to support you in prayer, is always beneficial.

7. You need to deflate the inner tube a fair bit before you can get the tyres off. If you just keep on going at full steam, you won’t manage to fix the punctures. All you’ll do is pump air back into your tyre, and that will last every time less.

8. Most punctures are invisible. That’s why you do the whole inner-tube-in-a-bucket-of-water thing. If no matter what the amount of prayer you do, no matter your willingness to get closer to God, you keep on drifting away, there might be something holding you back. Find the hole in the inner tube, and fix it.

9. If you don’t make sure the inside of the tyre no longer has any glass shards in it, your inner tube will perforate quickly, although not necessarily immediately. Some punctures come from our daily habits, others from our environment, others from part of our identity. If we manage to repair, through prayer for instance, our inner tube, but go back to the same routine, we’re going to get another puncture quickly.

10. Even when a tyre seems to be flat, there’s still some air in it. Just because we don’t feel it quite as strongly as before, or even not at all, it doesn’t mean the Spirit has left us altogether! On the contrary, the Spirit is always with us, even when we don’t feel it.

Do you have any to add?

(1) Fittingly, the Greek for Spirit is πνεῦμα, which also means breath!

Simply being

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Catholics and Protestants differ on a variety of points; and on the relative importance of these points. To a Catholic, the sacrament of the Eucharist is primordial, but a Protestant can easily have communion once a month, if that. To a Protestant, there is a wealth of Catholic doctrines that sound heretical; but I suspect that stuff like the Immaculate Conception is about as abhorrent to most Protestants as an Arminian point of view is to Calvinists: in short, there are disagreements, but not to the point of considering the other non-Christian.

simplybeing

Photo: Andrea Schaffer, re-used under CC license

There is, however, one particular difference around which passions are unleashed. Protestants tend to be adamant about sola fide, salvation through faith alone, at the exclusion of works before and after conversion; whereas Catholics would tend to argue that works after conversion are a way unto salvation (1). And yet Protestants and Catholics alike agree on the good nature of works, and on their necessity after conversion: after all, faith without works is dead.

Works are an expression of an identity

I see works after faith as an expression of a new identity: one of a people redeemed and unconditionally loved, with a drive to serve God and neighbour. If it is the expression of an identity, then, it is not a karma-like tally of good versus bad deeds, where grace might be so diminished to prevent salvation or increased to the point of making the cross unnecessary.

Seeing works as the expression of my identity as Christians has a few implications:

1. Firstly, an identity is a pervasive element. It is permanently active, and these works do not happen at pre-determined times. Being a Christian is not a Sunday-only thing; but far more than that, it’s not a Sunday and midweek church/Christian Union-only thing. It is rather unsurprising, then, that we are told to pray at all times.

2. Secondly, an identity has an arguably predominant interactive element. The way in which it is displayed depends on who is around us. It doesn’t mean being two-faced about what we say depending on our entourage, but it does mean that we should adapt our action to those around us. Not just in style (although that is important too) but also in nature. See, that’s a major part of the Incarnation: that Jesus’s heart goes out to people, not simply to situations.

Being a Christian means being available

I think that if we start seeing works in that way, we will also start to try to be Christians rather than to do Christian stuff. Part of that means we should avoid being busy. That’s not to say that we should be idle. Quite the contrary! But we should be interruptible and available. We should be able to consider our works as who we are when we are not doing anything.

Otherwise, our identity will become what we do, and pride will be just around the corner from that.

(1) For a more detailed, yet probably more headache-inducing account of the commonalities and differences of Catholic/Protestant beliefs, read Hooker

Liturgy: dust off our feet

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I love liturgy. Not as a set of dead rules, but as something that brings life to common worship. In the more modern evangelical circles, however, where congregational polity is more frequent, it feels rather out of place. After all, clinging on to set words rather than hoping for the inspiration of the Holy Spirit comes across as Romish, backward and at its worst, in contradiction of what Paul says. To people who aren’t used to liturgy, it can look like brainwashing – speaking the words of the prayer without engaging your brain, nor your spirit.

liturgy

Photo: Joe Dunckley, reused under CC license.

So it’s natural that us liturgy-lovers subconsciously jump to its defense. I’ve had conversations with friends where liturgy was defended as, simply, unavoidable. That whether official or not, there was always some level of modern liturgy lurking in the background. I’ve laughed when I saw videos taking fun of Christianese, because they describe exactly what that modern liturgy looks like. I’ve smiled at the use of “Amen” as a pious “Over” or “Over and out”.

But when I look at modern evangelical or charismatic Christianity in that way, all I’m doing is bring their practices down to the level of my, for wont of a better word, insecurities about traditional liturgy. Rather than looking at the positive in the very nature of liturgy, I’m discarding it as something we all do anyway. But in doing that, I don’t leave myself any space to say anything good about liturgy. So all I can do is look at some parts of the liturgy – specific prayers – and explain how much of a good prayer they are. And I have done that on a few occasions here. What I can’t do, is say why using more or less ancient forms of public worship is a good idea in and of itself.

Before I get into that, I should frame what I’m saying. Here’s what Hooker says:

True it is, the ancienter, the better ceremonies of religion are; howbeit, not absolutely true and without exception: but true only so far forth as those different ages do agree in the state of those things, for which at the first those rites, orders, and ceremonies, were instituted.

Preface to the Laws; chapter IV.4

Liturgy does not take precedence over relevance. If it really jars with either law or common secular practice, then you really need another reason to justify keeping the traditional liturgy going.

But as long as it’s not at complete odds with the culture of the age, Hooker concedes: the ancienter, the better. Why is that?

Going with tradition means inscribing yourself in a long line of worshippers before you and after you. There’s a famous image from Jewish tradition suggesting disciples should seek to be covered in the dust of their rabbi (as a result of being so close to them). I like to see liturgy in the same way as I see this dust: in itself, it is nearly insignificant; but it goes hand in hand with the attitude of a follower. And when the disciple turns rabbi, some of that dust will fall on their disciples; making  an unbroken, worshipping communion that stretches through the ages.

But rejecting tradition means breaking that line. And that means breaking yourself off from future generations of worshippers too. The dust that you have lifted will be shaken off the sandals of those who follow you.

That’s why the ancienter the liturgy, the better. Because, intrinsically, it goes hand in hand with the truly humble attitude of following our forebears and allows us to lead on future generations. And simply on the basis that it has been kept alive for this long, suggesting that there might actually be something in it after all!

Liturgy is not a straitjacket, nor should it be treated as such. It is, however, wonderful to use it as a support for our worship: accepting it where appropriate and making it our own. To make it our own can take so many forms, too! We can mix it up, drawing from a variety of traditions; we can write our own prayers; we can experiment a little bit too. But let’s not be ashamed to look at the past to order our services.