Where Do We Go From Here?

It was September, 2008.

The Gate had started with a handful of people. Literally, like five of us gathered in our living room. And that had gone on for a few months, but now, it was clear, we needed to go public. A couple weeks before we wanted to start, we still had no place to meet when Hurricane Harry's called us back. The rest of that is history. Then, Hurricane Ike hit, and evacuees staying at Reed Arena kept Breakaway from meeting there- and Breakaway was the venue we chose to tell the world (or, well, Texas A&M and Blinn students) about us. We were postponed 2 or 3 times before that first night at Harry's, but when it finally got set in stone we were meeting that Sunday late in September, we realized we still needed a worship leader. We got one the Friday before that Launch Sunday.

The big night came, and nothing went right during set-up. The sound system at Harry's was incompatible with our stuff. The video wouldn't work. We began to panic. That first night we had 19 people. Some were friends coming to support us, but over half would become regular Gate people. Over the next three years, people came and went, we built a core group, and leaders were forged. Our style changed, we've had four sets of regular worship leaders, we've moved our spot in Harry's at least four times. But some of the people had been there up from the start.

Now, as 2012 is about to kick off, we have graduated the last of the original members of the Gate. The only originals are Kristin and I (and our kids). Essentially, we have had a 100% turnover rate.

Just like we planned.

In the last few weeks, I've been hearing from some our current members, curious about our direction and sudden leadership vacuum. When talking with other ministers and other Christian friends, I am often asked- either inherently or implicitly- the same question: Where does the Gate go from here?

My response has been to smile, and lean back just a little, and say: Now, we experiment.

From the start, one of the exciting things about The Gate has been that we have a chance to start fresh every semester, and about every four years we have a whole new church. It keeps us fresh, it keeps us expectant, and it keeps us busy. We cannot afford to rest and let the people come to us, we must now, more than ever, go to the people. Meeting in a bar is not enough- we must be proactive in sharing Christ. But more than that, we must offer the message of Christ in a unique way that stays true to the TRUTH of Christ, but is able to connect with a generation more than a little cynical about all things Christian.

I've been reading a book, called "You Lost Me" by David Kinnaman. It's a book about 18-29 year olds and the way they are mass-exodusing the church these days. He talks about three types of groups that these folks break down in to. Prodigals no longer call themselves Christians and pursue other faiths. Nomads still call themselves Christians, but are disconnected from faith communities and active lives for Christ. The last group is Exiles, and they are the ones who are still devoted to Christ- as much or more than most regular church-goers. But, they find that the human institution of church is failing and at points hindering them. They are scientists, artists, creatives, and new-thinkers, and the church (in their view) has stifled and downright ignored their passions. Even when those passions are attempting to reach those who need Christ.

I share this little book review because these Prodigals, Nomads, and Exiles are who the Gate has come to College Station for. But now, we need to be the Exiles. We need to be artists, creators, innovators, scientists. We need to learn not how to be good Christians at church, but how to be good Christians in the lab, the class, the law firm, and the dump truck. We need to learn how to share Christ with more than just our memorized verses and hollow platitudes. In fact, to reach this generation, we need to forget the platitudes and bumper sticker theology altogether. And Scripture- which is still sharper than a double edged sword- has no meaning to the masses if we don't provide living examples of it. They want to see it in action, not just hear it repeated to them again.

So, how does that new vision coincide with what has gone on on the road so far?

God provides.

It will probably be last minute. It will probably come from an unexpected source. It most likely won't look exactly like we expect.

But it will be undeniably God.

I've heard that trying to closely follow God is like trying to ride a wild stallion or hang onto the tail of a comet. It's dangerous, it's exhilarating , and it is scary. But to succeed in it is amazing. So where does the Gate go from here?

We're gonna find out what its like to ride the tail of a comet.

Listen(Trust)Do

Leslie looked at me and I could tell she was so not going to do what I was telling her.  She understood it, but there was some sort of disconnect between her listening and doing.

Kristin and I had decided that this summer we would work on teaching the kids to swim.  We bought season passes to the pool, new suits for the girls, and stocked up on sunscreen.  Pretty quickly, it was clear that Kenna, the four year old, was content to just hang at the pool, occasionally throwing us a bone by grabbing the sides of the pool and kicking.  But toss her a pool noodle and the "Uh-No" face came up.  So, patience there.  But Leslie, the six year old, she was ready.  Last summer she had mastered swimming with the noodle (we don't do floaties), so this was definitely the time.  We were making some progress on treading water, and so we moved to learning to float on the back.  This is where things went south.  Leslie would lay on the water, flat- and stiff- as aboard.  She would not lay her head back in the water for some reason, even though she had already gone completely under the water for more than 5 seconds repeatedly.  I instructed her to relax and stop being stiff or she'd sink.  She'd do that, but the second she felt my hand leave her back- stiff, then sink, then flail.  I know she was listening, because she would attempt to do what I said.  But when the time came to go into actual action- glub, glub,glub.

I, of course, grew frustrated.  It's what I do when things don't go the way I expect or hope.  Leslie got upset.  The lesson sunk fast.  

Later that weekend, preparing for our church's message on listening and doing from James 1, I replayed the scene.  Here's Leslie, listening.  Here's Leslie not doing.  Oh, how that so paralleled:  Here's Chad listening.  Here's Chad not doing.  So often, I read the scriptures, or feel an urge from God, or hear a song or message that is clearly God speaking to me.  I listen, get excited, then do...nothing.  

James 1:22-25:
 Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.  Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.  But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues in it—not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it—they will be blessed in what they do.  

Why do we- and lets face it, we all do this- just listen and not do?  Why do churches pack'em in by the thousands, but never affect real change?  Why do we read thousands of pages of books- the Bible included- and never apply what we learn?  Why do we choose to sink, when we could be swimming?

We fear other things too much and don't trust Him enough.

I saw this in Leslie when she wouldn't do what I said in the pool.  I believe my daughter trusts me, completely.  But even her depth of trust in me was outweighed by other factors like the water that would go in her ears, not being sure of what floating really is all about, and honestly, probably the fear of "What if THIS is the time my Dad lets me down?"

God asks us to do things all time.  We feel that nudge to go talk to someone, or stop and pray or read something specific.  These are basic, easy, relatively low risk things.  Like me asking Leslie or Kenna to let me carry them on my shoulders, or let me meet one of their friends.  Daily things.  But God asks us to something new, something we view as unfamiliar or even a little dangerous.  If He hasn't, He will.  There is a natural, normal, pause we give to that.  We weigh the cost of it, as the Bible tells us (Luke 14:25-34).  But we only proceed if our trust in God outweighs our fear of the other factors.  And honestly, I think even if we have trusted God with the big stuff before, there is a nagging question of, "What if THIS is the time my Father lets me down?"

The truth is, for us to practice Listening and Doing- Trusting has to be a part of the equation.  Because ultimately, our own understanding is what can keep us from doing what we've listened to.  God's response to that:
Trust in the LORD with all your heart 
   and lean not on your own understanding; 
 in all your ways submit to him, 
   and he will make your paths straight

                                           -Proverbs 3:5-6

Listen to Him.  Trust Him.  Do as He says.

PS- Kristin took over with Leslie after the failure of my teaching.  For some reason, floating on her belly was easier to take than her back.  So she'd float for a bit like that.  Then I tried something- I told her to kick and move her arms like we'd worked on.  She trusted me- because her trust was greater than her fear of the unknown- and took off swimming!

But I'm not giving up on her learning to float on her back.

I Will Not Give To God That Which Cost Me Nothing

But the king replied to Araunah, “No, I insist on paying you for it. I will not sacrifice to the LORD my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.” So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen and paid fifty shekels of silver for them.
- 2 Samuel 24:24

David has screwed up. Big time. He took a census, mainly to be able to boast in how awesome his army was. This ticked God off, because David (and because the people follow the king- Israel as well) was trusting in himself, and not God. So,God gives David a choice- 3 years of famine, 3 months of pursuit by enemies, or 3 days of plague. David goes with plague. So for three days, 70,000 people die, but God relents at the threshing floor of Araunah. David goes to build an altar of remembrance there, and Araunah wants to give it to him: no charge. This elicits David's response above. And it points us to true worship, thousands of years later.

Jesus was tough to follow. Not just because He spoke in thinly veiled parables and seemed to prefer going on foot everywhere. He was (and is) hard to follow because He expects so much from us.

Wait. Jesus expects things from us? How does that jive with the modern idea that Jesus is all about grace and forgiveness and taking care of us?

The truth is, it doesn't. And it does. Jesus does offer grace, forgiveness and provision. And He requires nothing of us to receive His salvation- His rescue from our failures and mistakes and sins. But if you take His name, if you claim to KNOW Him, there better be some evidence.

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’
-Matthew 7:21-23

Jesus says doing things in His name doesn't mean you know Him. Just because one attends church, wears a cross or ichthus, obeys the 'rules,' prays and reads the Bible doesn't mean they know Him. For a lot of people, we become fearful and concerned that we don't really know Him, that we are just faking it- with the best of intentions. I've been there.

I've had those times of doubting my relationship with God. Not that He was holding up His end, but that I was being genuine in mine. I've had times in my life when my consistency with prayer and time in the Bible was like clockwork. But looking back, my relationship with Jesus was at best distant. I was doing things that seemed right because that's what everyone said I was supposed to do to have a 'strong relationship with God.' The problem is, prayer and Bible study- just like "prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles" can be done without a relationship with God. The Bible tells us that the name of Jesus is powerful, and we see that people without God in their lives can do miraculous things. And they can do things that seem holy, but are in fact...well, selfish.

The Lord says:

“These people come near to me with their mouth
and honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
Their worship of me
is based on merely human rules they have been taught.

- Isaiah 29:13

All the way back to the Old Testament, people were faking it. Maybe that's not entirely accurate, maybe it was more that they were fooling themselves. They were doing what man said we had to do, not what The LORD said to do. The Pharisees came about because of this type of thinking, and they were the biggest opposition to Jesus. Why? Because He spoke of knowing and listening to the Words of the Father- they wanted to just keep reading and re-interpreting to maintain their control, their way of living.

They didn't want to give anything to God that cost them something.

So, what does it mean for us? Can we be secure in our relationship with Jesus? Or will we be the people Jesus says He never knew?

I believe we can answer that. Starting with the Matthew passage above- what Jesus tells us is that those who do the will of the Father will enter the Kingdom of Heaven. The only way for us know the will of the Father is to listen for it- and the best way to listen and respond to someone is to be in a relationship with them. The will of the Father, when we look at the whole of Scripture, is that we desire and pursue knowing Him. Not knowing about Him, but knowing Him like you know friends and family. The Isaiah passage is God summing that idea up into bringing your heart near to Him. And you don't do that by giving Him lip service and going through the motions. So, how do our hearts draw near to Him?

The answer is: How do you draw your heart near to a loved one? You want to be with them. You make time for them- real, genuine time, not just to check it off. You give them your attention, your affection, and you desire- deeply- them returning theirs. If you love them enough, you will sacrifice your own will and desires and schedules to be with them.

And so we come back to David. He wouldn't give to God anything that cost him nothing. David, we hear, is a man after God's heart. If we want God, it is going to cost us. It'll cost us our precious sins and selfishness. It may cost our comfort and security. It may cost us earthly relationships and success. It will most definitely cost us our lives. We may not die physically, but we must relinquish all that we hold dear to Him. We must be willing to walk away from attitudes, actions, hobbies, interests, and ideologies. See, He demands it all. And He has the right to demand our all.

After all, He gave us His all on the Cross.

So I challenge you, whatever it is that holds you back from Him today- give it to Him. Though the cost may seem more than you can bear, the cost of hearing Jesus say He never knew you is far more than you can imagine.

How Jesus Beat Temptation and You Can, Too!

What if Jesus sinned?

It's a scary thought, really. I mean, if Jesus had sinned, we'd still be in need of a Savior. He was perfect in His life, so His sacrifice was worthy- perfect, that is- to fulfill the law's demands for punishment. The problem is, I think we tend to forget or at least gloss over the fact that Jesus could have sinned.

Luke 4 contains one of three versions of the temptation in the desert- all of them begin with Jesus being led into the desert by the Holy Spirit. Wait- check that out- Jesus was led by the Spirit knowingly into a situation that would hold massive temptation. It is almost like Jesus was being tested by the Spirit- and His Father. Now, the other 2/3's of the Trinity did not cause the temptation, but they did put Jesus in Satan's cross-hairs (heh, pun un-intended). The Father and the Spirit knew that a Savior who got a free pass would not be much of a Savior- Jesus had to be able to actually face and resist temptation to be the perfect sacrificial Lamb of God. If Jesus had never faced temptation, He would not know how to relate to us when we are tempted. Instead, Jesus listened to the tempting voice of Satan, and said, "Nope."

It wasn't just that He refused to give in, it was how. He responded, each time, with Scripture. Not a hollow kind of Scripture memory, words Jesus chose to use were pointed to the specific temptation of Satan.

What Kind of Bread?
When Satan tempted with bread, Jesus spoke words that referred to Deuteronomy 8:3, "He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your ancestors had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD." Luke only records Jesus saying the "man doesn't live on bread alone" part, but the reference is clearly stating that man needs the words of God. Jesus knew of this need, because He had come to the desert after His baptism- a baptism in which He heard His Father proclaim, "You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.” (Luke 3:22) Jesus is telling Satan (and us) that the affirmation of our Father is more sustenance than any bread- literal or figurative. Jesus knew the power of those words, and used that power to withstand all of Satan's attacks.

Power Play
Satan next appeals to the power hungry. Fortunately Jesus is not power hungry. The Accuser offers power over all the world- something I believe Satan had the authority to give, you know, being the prince of this world and all. The funny thing is, Satan offers what Jesus will ultimately have anyway. Jesus will reign over the earth- so the temptation Satan offered was a short cut. Worship Satan, get power now without suffering the Cross. Jesus responds by saying something that hearkened back to Deuteronomy 6:13. Jesus says worship, where Deuteronomy says "Fear the LORD your God, serve him only and take your oaths in his name." Revere God only. No one else is above the Father, not Satan, not the Son. See, Satan says worship me, but the real temptation was for Jesus to be a 'self-made man.' To get all the power coming to Him by way of a path apart from the Father's Will. The worship would ultimately be a worship of Himself apart from the Father, because He had made it Himself. Jesus knew that for the Father's plan to work, He had to stick to it, and at the heart of it all, Jesus loved and revered the Father more than Himself.

Don't Test Me
Finally, Satan throws his curve. He quotes the Psalms about Jesus having the power to command the angels to protect Him. The appeal here is to entitlement. "Jesus, the Father OWES you protection." Again Jesus goes to that book that we so often glance past quickly, Deuteronomy 6:16: "Do not put the LORD your God to the test as you did at Massah." Massah is the place where the Israelites called God out, saying He brought them out of the plentiful food and water (and slavery) of Egypt to die in the dry, foodless desert. Moses was told to strike a rock, and water flowed. But the damage had been done, the Israelites had claimed their entitlement- "If we're really the Chosen Ones, come through. Hold up your end of the bargain- if you're really there." Jesus knew that the Father OWED Him nothing. Jesus was a servant of His Father...and a Servant of all people. To claim His importance in such a way as Satan tempted would be Jesus claiming His own greatness- that He was more than us. And though He is more than us, He came to walk amongst us, to know our sufferings, to know our pains. And yes, to know our temptations.

That's the heart of the temptation in the desert. To get Jesus to take the easy way out. And really, that's the same temptation we face daily- to take the easy, self-centered path. None of us are called to be Savior like Jesus was, but I bet we're called to live a life of importance to God. When we face temptation and give in, we are surrendering the greater plan the Father has for us. Yes, we will fail. But we must, at some point, face those temptations that derail and respond as Jesus did.

And how did He respond? Out of a vibrant and active relationship with His Father. No matter what defenses we set up against temptation, they will fail if our relationship with God is weak. Jesus was secure and strong in His relationship. He was walking in that strength when He went into the desert to be tested. Just as He walked with the Father in all of His days. And when Satan returned to tempt at a more opportune time, as Luke 4:13 says, Jesus was ready.

For He still walked hand and hand with the Father. And nothing could separate that.

Imagine what we could be if we lived like Jesus did through His temptation.

The Un-Penned God

I grew up on a ranch. We raised sheep mostly, but had a dozen or so cows as well. I was involved in 4-H, particularly in the sheep exhibitions, but one year my parents and I decided to try our hand at a heifer. So, we bought one from a neighbor, and drove her the mile or so home and placed her in a pen we had built to contain her. The fence was high, she had plenty of food and water, and shelter was good.

She promptly jumped the fence and headed home- to her home. We caught her, placed her back in the pen, but quickly realized adjustments had to be made to keep her contained. But she was still too crazy to get in the pen with her and try to tame her. Honestly, we didn't have a clue what to do with her, so my heifer showing career ended before it started.

I think back to that time in my early teen years and one thing is vivid: that cow was too wild to be contained, too strong to be tamed. You could see it in her eyes like a fire: "You don't know who you're dealing with." Eventually we released her to be with the other cows, and she went on to have lots of babies and live her life, her way.

I draw a lot of comparisons to that incident and how I often view God. I mean, I recognize the power of God, and even notice His wildness at times (seriously, watch a Texas thunderstorm sometime), but I often try to pen Him up into my idea of what God should be. Really, we all do it. We want Him to be more like us, to make sense when He talks and with what He does. We want his complexities and His justice to be only as deep and as understandable as human complexities and justice.

In essence, we want God to exist within us- that is to say, within the boundaries of our understanding. Anything outside of that is grounds for immediately discounting or distrusting God.

Man has always been this way. Ancient cultures handled it more with religion, going so far as to create new gods to explain the strange and scary things they saw. Even more sophisticated cultures like the Greeks and Romans went this way. They went out of their way to try to appease the gods, so they made statues to all of them, and even statues to gods they didn't yet know about just in case that god got mad at them and attacked. Really, though, it wasn't about protecting themselves from the gods as it was exercising control over them. At least, that's how Paul saw it.

On one of his trips, Paul came face to face with idolatry, aka man's pen for God. In an attempt to serve a god that made sense, they just made one up. Paul addressed this thinking like this:

“The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else. From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands. God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’
--Acts 17:24-28

To me, seeing God as not being dependent on us is tremendously freeing. These words remind me that it is God who has mastery over me, not the other way around. And then, the fact that He actually penned us in (he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands) in an effort to call us to Him. He has set out to tame us- but not like we think.

I think we believe God sets rules to keep us from fun. God has actually set rules up to make life better. He wants to tame us from the actions that destroy us, but He wants us to be adventurous and full of life in our pursuit of Him. In that, He has set no limits. That leads me to my favorite part of this passage: 'For in him we live and move and have our being.’ Paul quotes a pagan philosopher who spoke a truth he didn't fully understand. That truth is that we exist in God. Not in an Eastern Mysticism "We are all god" way, but in a "God made us to exist for Him, whether we acknowledge it or not" way. He enables us to do what we do, even refuse Him.

Because God is big enough for that.

And no matter how hard we try, with idolatry or watering Him down to fit what we are comfortable with, we will not pen Him. His eyes are filled with a fire, not unlike the heifer of my youth, that screams of passion and power, and warns us that we don't know who we are messing with.

Love is Violence

If you have ever loved someone, you know this: Love Hurts.

With love, you can hurt someone or be hurt by someone. It may be a word, an action, an inaction, or a even a thought that does the violence, but a violence is nonetheless done. Just this past weekend, at a family gathering, I snapped a picture of our six year old. As I looked at the picture in the view finder, I made an audible grown. For the face I had captured was not the cute little six year old, but a face that seemed a good fifteen years older. That little face brought a flood of feelings and anticipations: the first time she'll not want us to walk all the way to the door of school, the first boy, the first date, college departure; having to let her go a little at each juncture. In that picture, I loved her so much, and was so injured in my heart because of it.

When we love, there is a violence inside of us, a passion that more than turns our heart, it tears it. This emotional hurt doesn't just come from bad things, but good as well. Seeing one we love succeed swells our heart to a breaking point, watching them find their own way makes our heart break at the thought that when they find it, they won't need us as much.

And there is the thing: when we watch those we love grow as people, we are not just seeing them go through difficulties and victories- we are sharing in them. Our hearts hurt because they are attached to those we love, and the pulling and tugging that goes on as our connection is stressed and strained and relaxed and back to stressed is a violence. I believe its why we have such a hard time loving a lot of people, it just hurts us too much.

Now imagine how God feels.

We have a very small, relatively, number of people we are called to love. God loves every being who has ever lived- and even those who have yet to live. Each heartbreak they experience, each swelling hope they find, He feels it. He smiles at their happiness and when the gravity of emotion swings the other way, His heart breaks in their sorrow.

His love is an active love, more so than any of our love. He has taking great action to show us His love, and to make His love available to us. He has gone to war for His beloved, His chosen. He spent much of the Old Testament fighting literal wars for the hearts of the Israelites. He has waged a spiritual war from the beginning for the souls of Mankind. His violent love reached a peak when, out of His love for us and for His own holiness, He killed His own Son. Make no mistake, God SENT Jesus to die. And I believe Jesus knew it was out of love that He sent him to die. Love for us. Love for His Son. Love for all of Creation.

God is love. John says this in 1 John. If we know that love hurts, what must the existence of God, who is love, be like? If God is love, He cannot be some fat, lazy, inactive God who merely observes the plight of His beloved. Would you sit idly by while your beloved went to their death, or would you rise up to fight for them? God is moved by love, and there are times His movements are violent. There are times that His love for us moves Him to violently shake our lives to wake us up. There are times He must violently defend our honor, or even violently rebuke us. In it all, I believe God suffers with us in our trials.

He truly feels our pain.

And because He loves, He endures.

And if we love Him, then we too must endure. When He doesn't make sense. When He doesn't seem to speak. When He doesn't seem to act. When He seems harsh. When He convicts and punishes us.

Because all of that is God working through the pain of His existence.

Because God is love.

From the outside looking in, you can't understand it; From the inside looking out, you can't explain it.

We are His portion and He is our prize,
Drawn to redemption by the grace in His eyes,
If His grace is an ocean, we're all sinking.
And Heaven meets earth like an unforeseen kiss,
And my heart turns violently inside of my chest,
I don't have time to maintain these regrets,
When I think about, the way
Oh! how He loves us,
Oh! how He loves.
How He Loves ( David Crowder Version)

I'm starting to take at least one day a week to listen to worship music on the drive to work. Normally, I try to pray, but I often fall into the rut of just talking to God and not listening. There is nothing wrong with sharing our heart with God, asking Him, thanking Him, sharing our problems. But like any relationship, we need it to not be one sided.

Lately, How He Loves by The David Crowder*Band has been the song that speaks to me. Really, since it came out it has profoundly affected me. When John Mark McMillan wrote it, it was written about a man who stated if he could, by dying, shake the youth of the world for Christ, so be it. And that day he was killed in car accident. Its a song about the unseen world of God touching ours. No, make that invading ours.

The excerpt I posted above is no doubt my favorite part. It speaks the answer to the question of "Why do I believe in God?" That answer is simple- I believe because I have been caught up in Him. I have been hypnotized by Christ through His grace and His love. He has blessed me unexpectedly ( the unforeseen/sloppy wet kiss line). He has caused me to be in conflict with myself, my heart does turn violently inside my chest each time I come to a decision point of choosing my way or God's.

The funny thing about these experiences of God that I've had is that they are not verifiable, at least, not scientifically so. I did not come to believe in grace because someone showed me a diagram of how it works- I believe it because I have relief when I confess my sins and because I have seen grace shown from a follower of Christ to another human being. Regardless of the differences between them. I do not believe in God's love because He sent me roses, I believe because I have known a comfort that comes as if from nowhere and everywhere at the same time. I do not believe in God's power because I can look at an inventory of His armory, but because I have seen examples of His power demonstrated in storms and fires and mountains and oceans- and in the power of His people that are able to endure.

Here at A&M there is a saying, "From the outside looking in, you can't understand it; From the inside looking out, you can't explain it." It may sound dismissive, but I think that believing in God can be the same. God doesn't make sense, He doesn't translate well to a person who doesn't know faith in Him. This is not an excuse for us to be elitist or uppity about us having a 'special knowledge.' In fact, there is no special knowledge at all, just a different relationship gained by engaging God. That is really what the Aggie quote is all about. If you want to understand the Aggie Spirit, you have to experience it by engaging it. No amount of explanation or charts or logic will truly make it clear to you. You have to be immersed in it.

If you want to understand God, you have to let the grace in His eyes draw you to redemption. You have to allow your defenses to drop, to let your guard down, to be caught up in Him. Sink in the ocean of grace to understand that He loves you so much that nothing you've done or could ever do is too much for Him to wash away. You will be so lost in the abundance of God, that any regrets you have held onto- for past mistakes or indulgences, or for failures- could not be held onto.

If you want to get to know another person, looking up their vital stats, their facts and figures won't help you. (Unless its for fantasy football, then, maybe.) Sitting down with them, allowing their conversation to wash over you, learning the way they talk, the little quirks of their personality, this is how you know them.

So when I sit in the car, letting the words of the song wash over me, letting the voice of God speak to me as He would like, then I come to know Him, and why I believe in Him.

Why God?

Warning: How you read the title of this post says a lot about where you might be spiritually.

If you read it with an implied comma between the two words, you are questioning something that is happening to you. If you read it without an implied comma, you are questioning God- His existence/character/relevance/etc. Both readings are really about the same thing:

Belief.

America, by and large, believes in God. In general, it is the Judeo-Christian God, if the numerous studies from groups like the Barna Institute are to be accepted. Most of these studies have somewhere in the neighborhood of 85% of Americans calling themselves Christians. It is almost as though we just accept that God is real because it is a part of our cultural identity. We are American therefore we are Christian, therefore we believe in God. If asked why we believe in God, we give an answer that belies this belief- "I was raised to believe in God."

This is not a response that is invalid- but it is a response that lacks maturity of belief. I would argue that most of these people who say they believe in God believe it in much the same way they were raised to believe in Santa Claus. The only difference is that at some point it becomes culturally unacceptable to believe in Santa. If there were more social repurcussions for believing in God, I bet fewer people would claim Him.

Why?

I believe it is because we fail to ask "Why(,) God?" I would bet that many of the 15% who do not call themselves Christian have asked this question, and thier answer was one in which God was not needed- or at least the Judeo-Christian God was not needed. Maybe we fear asking "Why God?" because we fear the answer is that God is like Santa Claus, and we remember the pain of that truth coming home to our heart. To learn that God is not real would be too much for us, and rather than ask hard questions, we choose to remain blissfully ignorant. Or maybe we never question "Why God?" because we are supposed to have faith and trust God. Even Jesus said, "Don't put God to the test." (Luke 4:12)

My answer to this: God can take it.

I believe God is real- He is no Santa Claus. And I believe we need to test our faith, we must determine if WE believe God is real. Faith is not always about blind submission (though there are times when we need to just take a leap of faith). We need not test God like Satan was tempting Jesus to do- "God, if you're real, do something for my benefit and my glory." But we do need to test our belief.

We do this by experience. We seek answers- from friends, family, science, religion, scripture- most importantly we need to seek answers from what we encounter. I believe God is real because of what I see of Him in nature and in the lives of those around me. I believe in God because of what I have read about Him. I believe in God because of those times when I have experienced something that has no other explanation but God.

I believe in God because of the answers I've gotten when I asked, "Why, God?"

When my father died, I asked "Why,God?" and was answered with His comfort. When the ministry has seemed fruitless, I've asked "Why, God?" and been answered with a lesson in patience. When attacked, I've asked "Why, God?" and been answered with deliverance by various means. When good has come, I've asked "Why, God?" and been answered with peace.

I've asked "Why God?" and I've asked "Why, God?" I haven't always liked the answer, or the timing of the answer, but each one has served to deepen and mature my belief. I have feared asking the question, but to be honest with myself and with God, I must ask it. We all must ask it.

So when you ask me, "Why God?" I will respond that I choose to believe in God because I have experienced Him. I have encountered Him. And following those answers in my life there has come validation from others, from Scripture, and from doctrine.

But first and foremost, I believe in God because He has believed in me enough to reveal Himself.

And He believes in you.