Last weekend, when I was supposed to have posted this, I was at a young adult retreat out in the middle of nowhere. No signal, no wi-fi — only massive bugs that bit like none other. On my 4-hour drive down, I could see messages flashing on my phone – questions, comments, and concerns from students, their parents, and school staff. Because the retreat occurred over a long weekend, I was unable to work for almost 4 days, and it bothered me so badly that I sometimes found it difficult to focus on the sermons and enjoy “free time” with the other attendees.

So now I’m one week late in writing my VOICE blog post, it’s 5:20am, and I’m at the airport on half an hour of sleep. After a few more legs of flight, I’ll be in China for a two-week mission trip, teaching English in universities as a means to build relationships for Christ.

Six years ago, on the same mission trip, our missionary contact shared three words that I have since spoken to others and myself countless times: “be, not ‘do’.”

Be, not do.

This phrase may very well summarize my greatest struggle. My life has been about “doing” for as long as I can remember, and for anyone like me, society calls for a relatively-conservative, performance-based, Asian, female Christian to be nothing less.

This spring, after months of sleepless nights and early mornings and “almost-sick” and “still sick” and being stricken with deep fear to the point where I could only sit and think of how scared I was of every day, I took a week for recuperation. (Granted, it was Spring Break, so my break was mandatory, but.)

During that time, I pushed aside the majority of work waiting for me, read a few chapters from Shauna Neiquist’s “Present Over Perfect,” and went to a different church to escape “being” and to simply hear and be. And I heard. God knew what I needed to hear from Him because the pastor spoke on how fear is a result of pride, pride the child of a lack of humility, and humility only gained when we allow God to take complete control of our lives through daily surrender, basking in His word, and choosing to let go of any incidence that causes me to bristle in defense.

It’s been better, since. Better, but a far cry from the complete surrender I want in Christ.

Yet the more I see my human incapacity to let go of all the tangled threads I’m clinging to, the more I know that God does not call me to do anything by myself.

A snippet from one of the messages at the retreat reads: “Godly character finds its identity solely in the Lord your God.” My frazzled doing, if it fully believed that all my worth rested in what God has done, is doing, and will do for me, would morph into a trusting being.

In Christ, we are both called to strive 100% to complete the tasks He has given us and to allow God to take 100% control of all circumstances.

We are human beings, not human doings.

And so six years after the words “be, not do” were spoken into my life, I’m encouraged to know that in my constant struggle to surrender my fear and pride and idolization of control, God is slowly but surely working His will into my life. I have been called to complete the good works in Him that He ordained for me before creation, but I have been saved in grace and faith, and it. Is. Not. My. Own. Doing.

The first thing I wrote was partisan and bit self-righteous, so I’m trying again. I believe it’s important to work to mend the divide that has become apparent in this election. To me, it seems that Christians have been the most divided by this election than any other in my memory. In my Facebook news-feed alone, there were radical supporters of both candidates, sharing both rational debates and illogical fake news.

One late night show host, Stephen Colbert, said this about the divide:

By every metric, we are more divided than ever as a nation…. How did our politics get so poisonous? I think it’s because we overdosed, especially this year. We drank too much of the poison. You take a little bit of it so you can hate the other side and it tastes kind of good and you like how it feels and there’s a gentle high to the condemnation.

I know I overdosed. It helped me feel good about myself. It still helps me feel good, until I realize the hypocrisy and self-righteousness in my own heart. One of the main problems with the poison is that it isolates me from people who think differently than myself. I call myself a tolerant person, but I become intolerant when people tell me their reasoning for acting/voting differently than I think they should. But I want to be able to love. How do I?

On Thursday night, I had the words of Handel’s Messiah running through my head “and He shall reign forever and forever.” So I started listening to the complete Handel’s Messiah and I now recommend it as an antidote for believers who are experiencing fear of the future. If you take my advice, don’t miss the solos, which often are in minor keys but end on a major chord. “Unto Us A Child is Born” especially struck a chord with me, with the lyrics “and He shall be called wonderful counselor, the mighty God, the everlasting Father, the Prince of peace.”

As Christians, we have more that brings us together than divides us. We have a King who is known as wonderful counselor and the prince of peace.

We believe these things about Jesus, that He:

• Became a man, entered our dark world, and suffered with us.
• Was rejected by the majority, unjustly accused, and sentenced to death.
• Arose from the dead, defeating the final enemy–death.
• Hears the prayers of the downtrodden.
• Calls us to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us.
• And much, much more…

Since this is a post-election follow-up to Luke’s post, I would like to quote him: “Very concerning things are happening, but because of that, God will make all things well.” I am concerned, but when I am, I think about our King Jesus, who is a wonderful counselor and Prince of peace, and try to live like it.

“What are you striving for?” a guest speaker at my church asked.

Frankly, I’m a little surprised I even heard him. I often zone out, get distracted thinking about all the things I need to prepare for work on Monday, or am too busy critiquing what is being said to actually let my heart listen. But I heard him this time and my mind made the connection that he had been pushing towards throughout the entire sermon while at the same time my heart told me this was something I needed to hear. We all are striving for something. We’re all spending effort chasing after something. It could be entertainment, parties, friendships, romantic relationships, money, power, prestige…it could be all of those things.

I know what I currently AM striving for, but what SHOULD I be striving for?

The thing that hit me while sitting in church that Sunday was this: the things I’m striving for, they might not be bad things, but they’re not the most important thing. The most important thing is knowing God and knowing He knows me, personally. Everything else comes second. Am I striving to know God? Do I spend effort, actual effort, to know God more?

So yeah, God is helping me readjust how I think about my time and effort and what’s important. To be honest, I will probably need God to adjust my thinking again, soon. And again soon after that, and again after that.

Realign, refocus, renew, restore, redeem.

I admit, lately I’ve been having a hard time not getting really frustrated by “Christian” society/culture. Before I tell you why, let me say that I know I am deeply flawed. I have so many things that I need to let God change in my life. I’m not denying that. Still…

I wonder if you’ve noticed the same situation too? It’s when so-called Christians “zero in” on one sin, and treat it worse than others.

In English, doing something like this [i.e. talking about or choosing only what you want and disregarding the rest] can be called “cherry picking”.

This kind of cherry picking gives unbelievers the wrong impression! They think all Christians believe we’re better, or without sin. But, if we are serious disciples, we know that the Bible condemns such ideas as hypocritical and prideful.

Moreover, others won’t be able to see God’s TRUE JUSTICE if we only tell them that God judges the sins that we consider bad, while pretending that He ignores the ones we want to hide! That’s deceptive (and ignorant).

Often, recently, I’ve had to explain to several people that “No… homosexuality is not the only sin God hates. Any sexual activity that is not between a husband and wife who are in a committed, lifelong marriage-covenant-relationship (ex. having an affair, sex before marriage, incest, polygamy, etc.) is all against His perfect design… AND, in fact, lying, gossip, anger (uh-oh) :(, cheating, gluttony, lust, and a bunch of other things are also sins. ……
……
BUT FURTHERMORE, because of Christ, all of these things can be forgiven!
Washed clean, forever.

I should add that, sometimes the problem is that we Christians ADD things to the list that God never said were sins… legalism. — Nevertheless, whether we “add sins” or take them away, others can’t see God’s TRUE GRACE if we pretend like our “goodness” has anything to do with our salvation.

Either Jesus’ blood washes ALL of our sins, or NONE of them.

*sigh*

I don’t think that this problem will ever go away. I think it’s one of Satan’s tactics.
But it just seems like it’s so hard to share the gospel with people when almost everything they ever hear about Christianity is false, flawed, only half true, or told by people who only half-follow Christ…

Do you ever feel this way too?

When considering what I would write about, I had a small internal crisis. What can I write about that is actually me being authentic, not just writing a fluff piece about something slightly deep that’s safe to share? You see, I have a problem that’s actually skewing my perspective on the community of Christ and causing me to question anything anybody says about Christianity. I go to church and sing the songs and listen to the message and the whole time, I’m constantly condemning others based on my paranoid assumptions. 

I do the following:

• View every Christian leader with suspicion, especially if they sound confident. (Because confidence is fake)
• Hear a happy song and instantly assume the singer is a fake.
• Think people are fake when they’re crying during worship.
• Don’t give my money to charity, because I’m worried that it’s fake.
• Read a church sign and instantly jump to conclusions about the church.
• Assume I’m part of the spiritual elite because I’m better than that other fake person.
• Think, that person clearly does not understand _______. But I do. (Because I’m not a fake)

And I realize, I’m not really loving people. I’m using the many examples of public Christian failure to bolster my condemnation of people I don’t even know. It’s causing me to miss out on the beauty of Christian community.

It’s like the dwarfs in C.S. Lewis’ The Last Battle who refuse to see the new Narnia because of their paranoia and unbelief.

“[The dwarfs] will not let us help them. They have chosen cunning instead of belief. Their prison is only in their own minds, yet they are in that prison; and so afraid of being taken in that they cannot be taken out.”

Part of the beauty of the Christian community is that we all come together at the foot of the cross. We have all sinned, and we are all loved by the same Savior. “There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” Galatians 3:28

Some ways that I’m going to try to deal with my condemning paranoia (not in order of importance):

1. Write this blog post. Say the words “I don’t know. I’m struggling. I need help.” Especially because I don’t want to admit those things. I want to be independent and fix my own problems, thank you very much. But I’m sick of staying caught inside my own head trying to sort this all out… The second one is closely related, and better, because it involves community.
2. Go talk to people in real life about this problem. Even though I’m certain that nobody can understand me the way I understand myself! Oh wait, I don’t understand myself either.
3. I don’t know! I’m struggling! I need help! But the confusion is less having written this.