Journal of an Awakening

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Before my awakening, I was in a state of lethargy, and now I have begun to do too much. If doing some things is a part of spiritual recovery, it is easy to believe that doing more will be better -- easy to believe, and destructively wrong.

After a number of activities last night, I felt a beckoning from God to lie down and be with him. I lay down, and made being with him one more activity -- I was trying to do something to accomplish being with him. I felt a prompting to stop, and did, with hesitation -- trying to let go, and beginning to succeed.

The next thing I knew, I awoke from a nap, wonderfully refreshed and filled with his presence.

Discipline is essential to spiritual growth, and there are several things I am doing as a matter of discipline: Bible reading, e-mailing prayer requests to my friends and praying for their prayer requests, transcribing the lyrics to hymns into a collection, and this journal. But the disciplines are for faith, not faith for the disciplines, and I have felt a freedom to not be bound too tightly by the disciplines. Yesterday I did not enter a hymn, and it felt wonderful.

One of the questions or doubts I have concerns my professional future. I have a master's degree in applied mathematics, with a computational science and engineering option, and want to work as a mathematician or at least a programmer. Use it or lose it skills are beginning to atrophy. I think it will be sad if I acquire this education and then never really use it -- I am trying to hold that out, open to God to work with. It's his domain, not mine.

I was angry and not in a state to write, because my brother Joseph was playing a computer game with a very annoying sound track right below me, and prayed a little, then slowly entered and sang "O the deep, deep love of Jesus". That put me in the right state of mind to write again. (It reminds me of the passage in A Wind in the Door when Proginoskes tells Meg to recite the multiplication tables in order to get her thoughts straight to prepare for (or deal with, I don't remember which) the Mr. Jenkins trial.)

I visited my friend Robin, a few days after we spoke and that first spark was lit, to see if there were any words of wisdom that he could share with me, any direction or advice. I asked him what he had been learning, and he said a number of things. Nearly all of them were things I had reasoned out theologically, but there is sometimes a difference between reasoning out a truth as a doctrinal proposition and coming to own it, to breathe it. The lesson above about manna, for instance, was one I had thought out before (and I do not wish in the least to denigrate learning something intellectually. I am served very well by my intellectual knowledge, and I am worshipping God when I reason things out). But there was one he mentioned that hit me. Although I had reasoned it out, I am not sure how well I've assimilated it.

That has to do with where your identity comes from. The Christian's identity should come from Christ, and I realized that my identity in very large part comes from what Curtis would have referred to as competence -- what I can do. I am very intelligent and have a number of talents, and when I think about myself... perhaps you could say that I have feet partly of iron and partly of clay. Being a Christian is a very large part of my identity, but so are the talents that I have. I realized a couple of days ago that many of my fantasies are about having some (usually odd) superhuman power, such as knowing the contents of all the books ever written, or speaking a thousand languages at a native proficiency. Those fantasies express something very revealing; they answer in some way the question of "What, in my heart of hearts, do I really believe would be an expression of who I would like to be?" Who you would like to be is usually an expression of who you are, a magnified and concentrated sense if you will. A hint of how this is, might be shown in that a black man's fantasies will have him be a black man, and a white man's fantasies will have him be a white man: a black man does not become more of the essence of a black man by becoming white, nor a white man become more of the essence of a white man by becoming black. (I realize that this isn't the whole picture, but I don't want to add all the nuances now.)

The importance of "Who do you understand yourself to be?" might be observed in a fact about the early Christian Church. The society they lived in was quite sharply divided and segregated by race, gender, and social status. Feelings of superiority and hatred were the norm; an organization like the KKK would not seem to people to be abnormal or disappointing.

In this context, there appeared what both itself and outsiders recognized as a new race: Christians. There really was not any longer Jew nor Greek nor barbarian, male nor female, slave nor free. People mingled across those boundaries, and a large part of this was because their identities were not "I am a free Jewish man," but simply "I am a Christian." (Martyr's Mirror records some early martyrs who, when asked their names, simply answered, "Christian.") People were still (for example) free African men, but the core of their identity, the core answer to the question, "Who am I?", was Christian.

I am not at that point yet. A large part of my identity comes from speaking French and ranking 7th nationally in the 1989 MathCounts competition, for instance. It has been very difficult for me to not have, or be frustrated in applying, or slowly be losing, some of those abilities. Those things are to be enjoyed and used, and are blessings from God, but... My friend Robin was able to say that he had realized that if he were to lose (for example) his computer abilities, it would be an adjustment, but it would not be that difficult to go on; he would not have lost who he was. I'm not at that point yet. I think that (say) being paralyzed from the waist down would be an easier adjustment than having my intelligence move to an average level.

I think this is important, but I don't know what to do about it. Pray and be open to God, perhaps; he'll move on when he wants to, and maybe I'm not ready for that. God doesn't try to do everything at once; we couldn't take it. He works on us slowly and patiently; he isn't in a hurry.

There were a few insights I had theologically, and I thought about including them, but decided not to. This is a journal of how I am doing spiritually, not primarily a theological writing. (I think some of the above may have shifted too much to writing a lecture for readers from writing a journal as I grow close to God. I'll try to shift back.)

I am starting to feel a bit burned out. I have been trying too hard to accomplish what is God's to do. So today I am taking a sabbath -- keeping up my spiritual disciplines and the normal things of the Christian walk, but ceasing the heroic efforts to draw close to God. And tomorrow, Sunday, I hope not to resume those efforts I keep falling into, but simply to wait, open to however God may or may not surprise me.

Today has been a good day. I had a good, long, and unplanned conversation with my 14 year old brother Joseph. Deep, open conversations are something I have wanted and not had for a while. I've had people willing to talk and listen, but when the time comes I haven't found much to say. (That is frustrating -- wanting to talk and having someone to talk with, but not to actually be able to say anything.)

I thought a bit about what Robin said -- about being closer to God, and being more open to other people. I think the two are linked for him. I was able this time to be open to Joseph, to listen and engage when he was ready to talk.

One thing that I have been thinking with, out of this, is that I have been affected by the scientific method. The aspect of the method that is relevant here is that you reproduce initial conditions to bring about the same outcome -- a matter in which the scientific method reflects human and even animal psychology. It runs deep in me, and it is something I have to let go of in this regard.

In spiritual life, I do not (at least on some scales) have an experimental apparatus before me to manipulate in order to get desired effects. The conversation I had with Joseph was a good conversation, but I know I can't bring about another such conversation by repeating what I did before this one. The more immature side of me would also like to have over again the experience at the train tracks, but I know that I cannot cause that to be repeated. God can, but I can't. These experiences are to be enjoyed, then cherished and let go of when they are over. God will grant fresh experiences, like writing this journal entry for me (I didn't think I'd have anything to say after a day's rest), but the manna must be fresh each day. The temptation is perennial to regard God as my personal genie -- but he is not, and I cannot control what he does, not even by faithfully repeating whatever I did to which he responded with a blessing. He answers prayers, and even his unpredictability is part of his love. He is faithful, and responds to his people's reaching up to him. He blesses people as they receive Communion. But there is something in spiritual life -- or at least the speck of it I'm experiencing now -- that is quite unpredictable, where God responds to us as he will and refuses to be manipulated by our doing what we did before a blessing.

Tomorrow after church, instead of seeking out people to listen to me, I'll try to seek out someone I can listen to. I mean to ask, "How are you?" -- slowly -- and then wait and listen to the answer.

What I first thought of writing today is that the spectacular feelings come first and often give way to deeper work -- those feelings are a good, but not the only or the greatest good. And I am feeling slightly melancholy now. But there were three un-requested unexpected and delightful surprises that came today.

When I was growing up, I had a miniature collie named Goldie. (A miniature collie is a dog like Lassie on TV, only smaller.) She was a wonderful dog, a good breed to have with children. When I was a little boy, I covered her back with Vaseline. Then my brother Matthew (3 years younger) covered her back with peanut butter. Then we both covered her back with honey. Later and finally, Ben and Joe (10 years younger) covered her with honey. The poor dog hated baths. I have a lot of fond memories of her.

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