Toward Fatherhood

“All language about God is ultimately mysterious,

but that is no excuse for sloppy or wooly thinking.”

~ N.T. Wright

Matt Redman sings a song called “Nothing but the Blood,” which I just can’t handle anymore. It’s a rewrite of an old hymn that I’m sure is still being pounded out on upright pianos in stiff, Southern Baptist churches across the country.

What can wash away my sin?

Nothing-but-the-blood of Jeeeesus.

What can make me whole again?

Nothing-but-the-blood of Jeeeesus.

The song always made me a little queasy, but Redman narrows the focus. “It’s the blood!” he shouts, eyes squinty with passion, “It’s the blood! It’s the blood! It’s YOUR blood!”

What the…?!

I’m all about Christians being a peculiar people, but careless, displaced metaphor is not the way to get there. I mean, this is some weird, macabre stuff. It’s like worshipping a severed limb. It’s like singing the praises of an organ donor by chanting, “KIDNEY! KIDNEY! KIDNEY!”

My real trouble, truth be told, is not the song itself, but the larger problem it emblemizes - this idea that “man looks on the outward appearance, but God looks on the heart” is just a way of saying that intention (“the heart”) trumps almost everything else - content, form, talent, logic, even certain realities of creation itself. See, whether our message is obfuscated by good-hearted inanery or a willful malice, it is hidden all the same. It is hidden from those who need it most.

Now, I know Jesus said “you’ll have to eat my flesh and drink my blood,” and that’s some pretty visceral imagery. There’s another verse that says, “without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sins.” It seems like a lot of believers read these verses and thought, “Aha! So Jesus’ blood is the magic bit!” Which I guess is how so many got so overly focused on communion.

But we’ve missed the point; Jesus’ blood is no magic potion, else literally “spilling it” would have been enough. Jesus could have had a simple bloodletting, put that in a vial, and saved the world. But that’s not the point. To the folks who first wrote these words, “the shedding of blood” meant the giving of a life. “Brought near by the blood of Christ,” “boldness to enter the Holiest [temple] by the blood of Jesus,” and “redeemed by the precious blood of Christ,” all are references to Jesus giving his life as a ransom for us.

Not a magical blood donation.

His life.

So I don’t want to hear any more blood worship; no more “pleading the blood,” no more “just one drop can save your soul.” It’s a well-meant, but grotesque and distracting transliteration of things written in the light of ancient, idiomatic connotation. We’ve foolishly forgotten the time and the original audience, and in doing so missed their understanding.

The same goes for other Christiany nonsense phrases, like “Take it to the cross!” “There’s power in that name!” and “Lift him up!”(Which is to say, literally, “Crucify him!”) These orphaned idioms are tossed out and about with such careless familiarity, as if everyone should know what they mean, as if we ourselves understand them…as if they were written in English, to us, by us.

N.T. Wright said it best, but my mom said it first:

“Think about what you are saying

Before you say it.”

This goes double for conversation relating to God. If our gospel is “sloppy or wooly” - if it is presented in an unthinking way - it is lost to the lost who are still thinking.

Why do you go to church? Why listen to the songs or the pastor or take your kids to sunday school - why even look anyone in the eye - unless you truly and fully believe that Jesus is exactly who he said he is?

A friend mused via Facebook: Why isn’t God more impatient with us? Aren’t we failing him constantly??

I’m sure it was 15 years ago now that I first investigated ‘God’s will for my life.’ Was there such a thing? Could I indeed miss it, and my life be a failure?? But all I could find in the Bible was general stuff like, “this is God’s will for you: your sanctification,” and, “give thanks in every situation - this is God’s will for you.”

Tonight I watched my 18-month-old son toddle around a friend’s living room. He flitted from one toy to another, exploring this one, trying that one out. I love how he loves to explore and learn. Lots of times he’ll trip and sprawl out on the floor, or bump his head, or get frustrated to tears when the wheels on his ride-on firetruck get hung up on the rug. It’s all part of his adventure, though. “So much of life,” I thought, “is not right or wrong; it’s just… living.”

I thought again about that question of Christians failing God. How does a son fail his father? My will for my son is far more about who he will become, than what he accomplishes today (except, of course, where the fomer depends on the latter). My general will for him is simple: learn, grow, and mature. My specific will is more tailored to his life stage: learn to mimic words, to obey, to swallow his food rather than leaving little globs of minced apples everywhere he goes.

But here’s the thing: when my son disobeys me (which is quite regularly), I call it “disobedience.” When he misbehaves, it’s “misbehaviour.” See how simple that is? The word “failure” never enters my mind. Can you even imagine any good father who might say, “Ah yeah, my kid is a failure. Fails me all the time. But he’s all I’ve got to work with.”

Childhood is not a pass/fail endeavor. It’s all stages of growth. We may reach certain goals ahead of schedule; others may take a while. We may disappoint, hurt, even anger our Father, but the “F” word will never enter his mind.

Sex is a conundrum, a living thing, intricate and complex. It’s difficult to fully grasp, even for those who know it well. For those who’ve met it in passing, or not at all, sex is gravely misunderstood, idolized and maligned and desperately sought, like Tolkien’s Ring.

But if we fail to understand sex, who will teach our children?

Worse, who is teaching them?

Last night I re-read a newsletter from Ransomed Heart. John Eldredge spoke of a generation of thin souls, anchorless and wafting, ghostly like silk curtains. So many of us lack the legacy of true fathers, family history, deep thought, personal suffering, and the ancient traditions that deeply root us in our world, that grant to all great men and women their quiet authority and beautiful, connected strength. Eldredge calls this quality “ontological density.” It is a weighty and a significant existence.

Eldredge’s words remind me of a desire I’ve noticed in myself of late, a need to move away from Nerf footballs and throwaway razors, toward hand-sewn boot leather and heavy-handled shaving blades used with a badger brush. I think about whether my sons will read the books I own, whether they’ll ride my 1500 Vulcan one day, or use my fishing tackle after I’m gone.

Increasingly, I want to invest in things that will last, to die surrounded by leather and steel, not paper and foil. In the end, I want these belongings to speak of me - a substantial soul, weighty with joyful memories and sorrow too, muscled from wrestling with significant thoughts and ideas, warmed by the waning firelight of so many great adventures.

“The Thirties is a decade of excavation.

It is also a decade of establishing a bedrock foundation of intimate and personal relationship with Jesus, with the Father, and with the Holy Spirit.”

~ Morgan Snyder, The Thirties Decade

…Hence my current wrestling and wordy, public processing of church and spirituality and Jesus-ness. Something deep in my heart wants to know where I am and where I’m headed with Papa, as a man, as a father and a spiritual leader…

As the stage crew finished setting up, several thousand congregants pressed forward, grinning and jostling, bouncing and humming with anticipation. Every mind had a favorite song playing on repeat, hoping it might be first on the set list. Suddenly the lights went down, and the first notes drifted out, soft and fragrant as incense. Ten thousand faces turned skyward, and as many hands. Thousands of human voices rose in unison, good, bad, ugly and unashamed, joining in a sincere expression of hope and love and longing. They were in the presence of royalty, and they sang to him. Sang with him. They sang as one body.

Purple rain, purple rain…” Prince moaned.

The clouds began to weep, and my eyes misted. “Heart-warming” was too cliche; this was…awe-inspiring. Life-affirming. It was just so deeply and distinctly and richly…human! All these people, these souls, agreeing together in song, voices floating heavenward in the darkness. It was genuinely powerful and moving.

This thing we call “the presence of the Lord” during our modern worship services - the deep, emotional stirring we experience “where two or more are gathered together” - is not a uniquely Christian experience. You can find it at rock concerts, around campfires, at pep rallies and football games. Wherever people gather in song for a single purpose outside of ourselves, we generate a spiritual energy, or synergy, or bouyancy. It’s a human experience, not particularly a Christian one. What sets us apart of children of God is why we do this.

It’s to whom our energy is devoted that makes us a peculiar people.

In fact, it’s distinctly unfair to say that the Lord has arrived, or that Jesus is suddenly among us, or that the Spirit has finally fallen down on us during the worship service; Jesus has already promised to be with us always - even to the end of the world! The father is so attentive, he notices if a stupid goose is injured; Jesus is closer than a brother; the Spirit is our constant comforter and teacher…and we dare suggest that we’ve been here waiting for HIM to finally show up?

No, I dare say it is WE who have finally shown up.

We, who were at the store, at work, on Facebook, getting the kids ready.

We, who were doing homework, fighting fires, spatting with spouses

We, who were scattered and stretched, distraught, distracted.

We, who suddenly find ourselves in a sanctuary, a safe place, cut off from the chaos,

Unplugged, quieted, recentered…and suddenly…we can see Jesus again.

Oh, there he is! We cry, He’s here! He’s here!!

Of course I’m here, He replies easily with a smile, Where have you been?

“So…” said my sweet and very pregnant wife upon hearing all this, “Why does that matter?”

A good question. Knowledge is just fancy books on a shelf, after all; truth is the soil from which our soul food grows. Truth is what we need for life.

Truth is, this mindset matters very much, because it’s part of a larger set of ideas about our father’s heart, and his ideas about relationship with us. If God is a guy who comes and goes, descends when he feels like it, speaks only after we’ve groveled sufficiently…well that makes him kind of a mean guy, doesn’t it. A harsh master. A terrible boss. An unfit father. That way of thinking puts all the burden on us, the kids, to make the relationship work.

It makes us the loving ones, and him the wanderer. Or the genie. Or the magic idol who comes to life at the sounds of the secret incantations.

But he is none of those things. He is Papa, and he loves you and me more than life itself.

What does that mean to you? If it doesn’t fit your theology, scrap your theology. Truth is: he has promised to love you and never leave.

My wife and I have been looking for a church to settle into for four years now. We’re searching for the triune elements of a steady “home” church: a welcoming community, a relatable worship style, and challenging teaching. The first two we find in abundance; what we’re hard-pressed to find, however, is the latter. We might visit an old-school, hard-knocks Baptist church, or a hipster-loving, Starbucks-serving reformed Vineyard congregation, but the same problem pops up everywhere we look:

These church leaders seem to think that God is hard to know.

Old-time-religiony pastors in starched hair and pressed shirts preach holy fire and unapproachable splendour. Fall on your knees and hear the angel voices!

They present a God who is too hot to touch and too bright to look at. He is holy, and utterly unapproachable.

Modern and post-modern co-pastors (ever the team players) in faded denim and snap shirts teach love and…love and love. And acceptance and good will and love. They never dive any deeper than that, because they strive to be “seeker-friendly,” and any truth deeper than that might frighten away newcomers.

They present just a bit of a single facet of God, because the rest of him is just too scary. He is loving…and simply unapproachable.

But I know otherwise.

And you want to know otherwise.

Now…there was this guy featured on WBEZ’s This American Life a while back, who swore up and down he’d disproved Einstein’s theory of relativity. He was a tradesman, unqualified to speak on the subject; but he’d read as much as he could, thought really hard about his position, and he stood ready to argue with anyone who would listen.

Of course, he was totally wrong.

He was just a guy with a limited understanding of physics, who took his inability to understand advanced science to mean that advanced science had it all wrong.

I feel a bit like that guy when I say, “Um…hello? All you pastors, teachers, and leaders God’s people? Uh…I think a lot of you have missed something. Something big. You’ve forgotten…the thing about God is…

…He’s really easy to know.”

I feel like a plumber telling a board of directors that their underlying approach to business is flawed. Nonetheless, I say it: God can be known - he wants to be known - and known well.

“As the Heavens are above the earth,” cried the preacher, “So my ways are above your ways, and my thoughts above your thoughts.”

His point was that God is so huge and ancient and mysterious. Which is true, in the sense that my one-year-old son has no idea how I make our truck take us places, or how I cook food on the stove or throw a football higher than the top of my head. He doesn’t understand a lot of what I say. He has no idea where I go when I leave for work.

He knows very little of how or why, but he knows me - his dad - very well. He runs to me in times of danger or need. He looks to me for encouragement and direction. He finds deep comfort in my presence at naptime, and trusts me to come get him when he wakes. When he gets older, I expect we’ll interact on increasingly important topics, like school and girls and the meaning of being a man. But we’ll also talk about what’s on TV and what’s for dinner and those new shoes he’s been diggin.

Because that’s what all good relationships are: the deep and the shallow, the memorable and the mundane, all jumbled together, all of it mattering and carrying significance because of love. All of them metaphors pointing us to the great, one, original love.

See, the hugeness and mystery, fire and love are all true, but none of them are the whole truth. The whole truth is so much lovelier and life-giving. Why would God call himself “Father” and call me “Son” if our relationship was to be anything less?

In the beginning, God created relational metaphors.

He created fathers.

He created marriage.

God created sisters and brothers and cousins and friends.

He introduced us to children.

Now why did he do that?

Human relationships aren’t the alternative to closeness with God; they are his heaven-facing mirrors. They teach us about God’s nature, using flesh-and-blood textbooks.

We were created in God’s image in a real world, and our real-world relationships are part of that original design. Fundamentally, these real-world relationships are imperfect but real reflections of God. Like us. One Creator formed physical and spiritual and relational realms; by nature they are reflective of him, and of each other.

So then, shouldn’t our relationship with Jesus make sense in this physical, relational world?

These are messages I’ve heard from Christians about God in recent times:

Suffering is endurable because it glorifies God.

I must find out God’s will for my every decision in life.

We are God’s “great romance.”

Worship is comparable to ‘spiritual sex’ with God.

Some of these things might sound nutty to you. Some might sound true. Useful. Noble, even. But do they make sense in the real world he created? Does it make sense that my father is pleased whenever I suffer? Would a good dad plan out all my decisions for me - for the rest of my life?

Am I my own father’s romantic interest?

So many of our heartfelt paintings of God entirely miss the essence of being a father’s child. When we miss that essence, we paint strange portraits, surreal forms in misleading hues.

When we use overly-impassioned imagery and extreme proclamations to describe our papa, we muddle up our own perceptions. We make him far off and hard to understand. Worst of all, we obscure him from those who don’t know him yet, or know him well.

What if Christianity makes sense in the real world?

What if the essence of following Jesus is exactly how he described it - a lasting friendship, a new childhood, a relief from burdens?

I believe it is.

What do you believe?

So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good gifts to those who ask him?

~ Jesus

John Eldredge points out in his latest book, Beautiful Outlaw (which I highly recommend), a great irony of Christianity: in our honest and earnest desire to honor Jesus fittingly, we defy the approachability he worked so hard to demonstrate. We take him by force, shove him back, back, away from us, up to the isolated pedestal we’ve set up for him. THIS is where a KING belongs, we declare, dusting off our hands and bowing, at last satisfied with the severity of our sacrifice.

We gave him up, set him in a high and lonely place, above all others.

He is exalted.

Except this was never what he wanted. Jesus crossed over from the majestic realm of Heaven, to that of men and fallen angels. He put on a smelly, tired human skin. He learned to talk, to walk, to sweat, to yawn, to hurt, to obey. He traveled on foot with men both learned and unlearned, arms around their shoulders, patiently teaching and talking and listening. They fished together, camped in wild places, hiked mountains, sailed seas, rowed boats…healed men. Fed the poor. Raised the dead. Cast out devils. All so these men could know, and teach others, how fiercely and deeply the Father loved them.

“So…” said one of them after a while, “…when do we get to see what the Father is like?”

Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father! So why are you asking me to show him to you?

~ Jesus

It seems silly to me when I read the story.

But not unfamiliar.

“Father, come near!” we cry, “come down from heaven and show who you are!”

“Rain down!”

“Fall on us!”

And on and on.

I don’t say this to denigrate our songs by any means; I LOVE those songs, so raw in their passion and longing and love for the One Who Loved Us First. What I’m saying is that we’ve ALREADY seen the Father. He HAS shown us who he is. But we shove him away, then cry plaintively, “Where are you? When will we finally get to meet you?”

So I have to ask…what if we’re being the standoffish ones in this relationship?

What if he’s already visible and relatable and understandable in this, the real world?

“…every inclination of [man’s] heart is evil from childhood…”

~ from Genesis 8:21

My sons, this is something I’ve wanted to explain to you. Back in Adam’s day, men lived for a thousand years, and expressed evil in newer and deeper ways constantly, until all the world was corrupt and misused. So the Lord limited our time on Earth to 120 years, thus limiting our capacity for evil.

We are different from those ancient folks, but not entirely. Think about the evils you don’t do…and how many of those inactions are tied to consequences - from inconvenience, to rude looks, to jail time and death. Consequences are guardrails that keep us from following our human inclinations right off the edge of a cliff.

I tell you this so you won’t be alarmed when sinful imaginations arise in your heart; this is just something we have to deal with as human beings - remainders of our old selves. Reminders of The Fall. When it happens, dodge the thought, turn toward what is good and right, and thank your Papa and Jesus for freeing you from slavery to sin. For terraforming your heart and enlightening your mind. For restoring you to the man you were always meant to be.