Two opposing stories
Get Your Story Going was last week’s post. I was looking forward to crafting a post full of your stories, but had a moment with the Holy Spirit. And I can’t write anything else story-related without first addressing this looming question: How can we both believe in God and believe these very opposing narratives?
I know my attempt at this post will be met with some opposition and possibly a walking away. Please know my heart and that I have written this with sensitivity, tears, and the Holy Spirit present in the writing, editing, and editing again of this post.
How can we both believe in God and believe these very opposing narratives?
Guns or no guns. Masks or no masks. Pro-choice or pro-life. CNN or FOX. Border or no border. Democrat or Republican. This side or that side. We choose a side and fuel our side by being selective with whom we follow.
We claim diversity everywhere else, but our social media feed.
We only follow those who are on our side.
We’ve made it about us and them. And what’s more heartbreaking is that this mentality is just as prevalent in the American Church between Christians. Us is always right with some minor tweaking that keeps us humble and them, well, them, they never have a name, and that’s exactly how it stays opposed. We choose not to come close and learn their names. Learning names and coming close don’t necessarily change the narrative, but it breaks through our comfortable soundproof walls we’ve erected.
I believe a majority reading this post believe that we have a dominant story. A story that is greater than ourselves. A story that requires submission and surrender, two postures that don’t come natural for any of us. There’s only one story to center our lives around and it is in the person of Jesus Christ. All others are secondary.
However, believing something requires a different energy than living something. My dad taught me I can believe that a chair will hold me up, but it requires faith for me to go and sit in the chair that I believe will hold me up. You can believe in God, but not live for God. You can believe what you hear on the news, but have never come close to it.
Unless we come close we are susceptible to believe anything about everything.
What I really think is happening is that people are fighting hard to get things back to comfortable and this lie we’re believing is that we have to choose a side in order to do that. If you want to do life Jesus’ way, you’ve got to abandon your life of comfort. (I wrote an entire chapter about Comfort in Love Where You Live.) Starting with the moment He came to dwell on planet earth to His ascension, He was always choosing people over pleasure, coming close over comforts, and love over sides.
You know you’re comfortable if you’re only concerned about your health, wealth, and well-being. If the feelings and emotions of our black brothers and sisters don’t cause you to hurt with them. If you refuse to make space in your neighborhood, community and church for people not like you. And let’s just go ahead and spotlight this:
If we have to even use the phrase ‘not like me,’ we’re drawing a comfortable protective bubble around ourselves.
God knows who He created and that we’re not going to see life the same way, but He did author love and gave it to us freely so that we at the very least, and at the very most, have that to give away.
We couldn’t have been more opposed to God than when He sent His only Son, Jesus, to come close to us. Sin separates a holy, perfect God from every single one of us. The only way to change the narrative was to be among us, touch us, serve us, love us, lay down His life for us. And so He did!
How do we change the narrative?
Acknowledge reality.
Dr. Russell Moore said this in a recent article: “Joe Biden has been elected president. Millions of babies are being aborted. The pandemic is real. So is racial injustice—both personal and systemic. So is the sexual abuse of women and children. If Christians are people of truth, we ought to be the first to acknowledge reality.”
Believe the truth.
I read this in Eugene Peterson’s book, Run With the Horses, “Why do we so easily swallow the lies? We want shortcuts. There is only one way. If we are going to be complete human beings, we are going to have to do it with God. We will have to be rescued from these despotic egos that reduce us to something less than human. We will have to expose the life of self-centeredness and proclaim the truth of God-centeredness....Truth is inward: we must experience within ourselves that which we profess. Truth is social: we must share with others what we profess. Statistics are farce. Popularity is a smoke screen. All that matters is God.”
Come close.
Because of conversations over the past 10 years, friends and acquaintances have assumed that living in California has changed our views. It has, but not in the ways you might assume. The truth is Marcy, Michael, Mandy, Cotton Candy (yes, we know someone who goes by this name), Michelle, Ivan, Martha, Ken and Kellie, Linda, Josh, Indigo, and many more, they’ve changed our views. We’re not all in agreement, but we’ve learned their story. We’ve sat with them in their pain. We walked with them in a season. We’ve shared meals together. We’ve prayed for them, yes, even at times when they were more like enemies than neighbors. Our views have changed because we’ve come close to one another. In some cases, it’s still two opposing stories, but that is secondary.
Coming close doesn’t solve it all. It gets messier because what we’ve been taught by family, teachers, pastors, leaders, and others gets thrown into question as we listen to our neighbor’s story of abuse, abandonment, fear, and struggle. This is the Jesus way. He comes in between two opposing stories like a double-edged sword. Hebrews 4:12 says, “For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.”
I know it can be more complicated than this and Scripture says a whole lot about sin, but what will be the narrative you and I live out? That they’re wrong and I’m right? Or Jesus made a way for me and you and all of us and I’m going to love Him and love you?
It really is that simple. As simple as we make it for the little ones in our lives we raise and teach. Love God with all of your heart and love your neighbor as yourself.
I’m praying God crosses your path and my path this week with someone we NEED to come close to in order to better understand His love for our world.
As for me, I’m choosing to live differently in 2021 because I’m not going to live opposed, but purposed. Not divided, but decided. Decided that I’m going to love you no matter what. Even when it stings that you believe the other story. I’m going to purpose in my heart and mind to go out of my way to show you I care. I have decided to follow Jesus. No turning back. No turning back.
If you made it this far, thank you. If you’re wrestling with your faith as you seek to follow Jesus, I’m on the same journey and would love to email you on a regular basis. Consider clicking here. And if I was able to write what you’ve been trying to say, know that I had 4 very close people read and pray over this. Consider sharing this with others in your life to get the conversation going.