I'm reading a book called Blue Like Jazz, and it's a great book. It's by the same guy who wrote Searching For God's Knows What , and I would highly recommend these books to you. In one of the chapters I just read, the author talks about how he led a college Bible study for a couple of years at a large church in Houston, and had all the acclaim and applause that he could ever want, but at one point he realized he was a phony, a fraud.
There is a point to this, believe me. Because I feel like he's describing me. Right now.
Anyway, he talks to the pastor and tells him that he's leaving, that he was going into the world to get his thinking straight. Here's the conversation that ensues:
Pastor: Can you tell me how you feel?
Don: No. I've tried to put words to it, you know, but I can't. I'm just really tired. Mentally drained. I feel like I am jumping through hoops or something. I don't feel like God is teaching through me. I feel like I am a fake person, you know. I say what I need to say, do what I need to do, but I don't really mean it.
Pastor: What does the real you want to say and do?
Don: I don't know. That's what the trip is about.
Pastor: Are you having a crisis of faith?
Don: Maybe. What is a crisis of faith?
Pastor: Do you believe in God?
Don: Yes, I want to go on a trip with Him.
Pastor: You aren't having any doubts at all?
Don: No, I don't have any doubts about God or anything; it's just me. I feel like I am constantly saying things I don't mean. I tell people they should share their faith, but I don't feel like sharing my faith. I tell people they should be in the Word, but I am only in the Word because I have to teach the Word. I said to a guy the other day, 'God bless you.' What does that mean? I have been saying that stuff all my life, but what does that mean? Then I started thinking about all the crap I say. All the cliches, all the parroted slogans. I have become an infomercial for God, and I don't even use the product. I don't want to be who I am anymore.
Pastor: So you think you should go away. Where will you go?
Don: America.
Pastor: America? We are in America right now, Don.
Don: Yeah, I know. But there are other parts to America. I'd like to see the other parts. I was looking at a map the other day, you know, and Texas was sort of brown with some green, a few hills, but then there were other places that were more green with big lumpy mountains. I'd like to go see those places.
Pastor: Do you think God is out there somewhere? Out there in the lumpy places?
Don: I think God is everywhere.
Pastor: Then why do you have to leave?
Don: Because I can't be here anymore. I don't feel whole here. I feel, well, partly whole. Incomplete. Tired. It has nothing to do with this church; it's all me. Something got crossed in the wires, and I became the person I should be and not the person I am. It feels like I should go back and get the preson I am and bring him here to the person I should be. Are you following me at all? Do you know what I am talking about, about the green lumpy places?
If I could, I would go. I would take my wife and daughter, and we would just go. I don't know where we would end up, I don't know what would happen, I don't know if I would end up finding myself in another ministry position, or if I would be working at a hardware store. I don't know if I would even go to church for awhile. I know that I would hang out at coffee shops, bars and other places that aren't church-like. I feel like I'm supposed to be this big Pez dispenser of wisdom for the church, that because I've been raised in the church and went to bible college and have been in the ministry for ten years, that I should have all the answers, that I should know exactly what to say, what to do, how to react, who to kiss butt to, who to encourage, who to pray for, how to overcome sin, where to turn for guidance, what to do when all hell breaks loose in your life, and I don't. My Pez dispenser is broken. Either that, or it's one of those dispensers that never really caught on, like a big Snorks Pez Dispenser.
Why won't I go? Fear. Fear for the unknown. Fear that I would never be able to get another ministry position again because I wigged out at the last one. Fear that I'm wrong and everyone else is right about this Christianity stuff, even though this author and me are like twins, I swear - and that by being wrong, I'm going to find myself at the wrong side of the line. Or that I'll hear something like this from Jesus: "I never knew you. Didn't you realize that you were supposed to like church? That you were supposed to look up to your bosses, you were supposed to not stir the waters, you were supposed to put on your Sunday suit, smile those pearly whites, and take the towns you lived in for me?"
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