A Picture of Our Relationship with God

I read a great post in Donald Miller's blog today and wanted to share a quote. It's a bit longer than I usually share, but it's only a portion of an ever longer, better post. This is a beautiful way to understand God and our relationship with Him. Here's a clip.

I had a long conversation with a distinguished scholar last month whose lifelong expertise is story structure. He is not a Christian. And as we talked, he said something that fascinated me. He said this:

“I understand you Christians. I understand the essence of your message. It’s this: If you are not a good person, you are going to burn in hell for all eternity.”

As I said, this man was a distinguished scholar and so it surprised me when he made this statement from a position of absolute knowing. There was no doubt in his voice. He wasn’t asking me to confirm. He knew. But he was absolutely wrong. That isn’t the essence of the Christian story, and anybody who believes so is a heretic.

Our story, and by our story I don’t mean the Christian story, I mean humanity’s story, is this:

The Trinity existed forever in a completely loving community. They were and are other focused, without what we think of as ego (though I believe they have something like ego, we would not recognize it in comparison to our own) and they created an existence, including you and I, to enjoy their company. That is the most loving thing a perfectly loving being could do. But love cannot be controlling, it has to set it’s muse free, so they gave humanity an option out. And humanity took it, thus, by necessity, there was a separation between pure good and anything other than pure good. So now, we who have been designed to be complete in God, seek affirmation and validation from each other as though our lives depend on it. But it doesn’t work. Nobody has agency but God. So God sends his son to earth and his son essentially says this:

“You guys have all walked away from God. He can’t have anything to do with you, because he is purely good. But look, I haven’t walked away from him, so if you marry me, and we become one, you’ll be reunited with the Trinity. He’ll look at you and see me. We’ll do this at a wedding in heaven. Until the wedding, though, just have faith. It’s as though it’s already done. But it’s going to kind of suck until then.”

So that’s where we are in our story. We are waiting for the wedding, and until then, we have hope, and we have an explanation for our hope.

Be sure to read the entire post: "How the Stories You Believe are Screwing With Your Mind". Not a complete theological treatise or explanation of the Gospel, by any means, (nor is it meant to be) but it is a wonderful starting point for discussing our faith. I can't wait to read Don's next book: A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. It's about the personal implications of story and it should be fascinating.

The Gospel of Jesus, More Like Marriage, Less Like Formula

We listened to a lot of podcasts on our drive to Florida and back (about 28 hours each way). Enjoyed plenty of John Ortberg, Rob Bell, Andy Stanley, Bill Hybels, Dave Ramsey, and others. The one that stood out to most to me was a talk by Donald Miller (of Blue Like Jazz fame - a great book, by the way!) that he gave at Seattle Pacific University called "The Gospel of Jesus, More Like Marriage, Less Like Formula". It's available free on iTunes - just search under Donald Miller. It's about an hour long and really forces you to think about what the Gospel really is and how evangelism works (and sometimes doesn't work). It was phenomenal! I strongly urge you to listen to it. Highly recommended!!