The Blue Parakeet

I just finished reading The Blue Parakeet by Scot McKnight.  I can’t tell you how much Phil and I both loved this book.

The title comes from an illustration Scot uses about seeing a blue parakeet in his yard one day.  He said he realized it didn’t belong there.  He says there are many passages in the Bible that are like blue parakeets…they stand out; they make you say, “What is that doing here?”

He goes on to say that we have to decide how we are going to deal with the “blue parakeet” parts of the Bible.  We either have to ignore them (which can stir up the other “birds”), or we have to try to tame them so they don’t bother us.  Another way to deal with them is to learn to enjoy them and understand them.  He then goes on to give instructions on how to read the Bible to get the most understanding out of what we read, and to learn how to apply it to our lives right now.  In a later post I'll give some examples of "blue parakeets" and talk about how to read them.

He says that the entire Bible has to be read as a Story.  That story has the following parts:

1.  God and creation

2.  Adam and Eve, made in the image of God, but then broken by sin

3.  God’s covenant community (Israel), where humans are restored to God, self, others, and the world

4.  Jesus Christ, who is the Story and in whose story we are to live

5.  The church as Jesus’ covenant community

6.  The consummation, when all the designs of our Creator God will finally be realized forever and ever

McKnight taught me that the point of every story in the Bible is to fit into this big Story…and that for my story to have relevance, I need to view it as a subplot to the Story of the Bible.

Many times when I read a book I put significant quotes here for you to read, but I can’t do that this time.  I would just have to quote the whole book.

You need to read this book if you have a desire for a greater understanding of God and His word.  It will give you much to think about.  

The First Question

Last week, I wrote about our friend Rachel and how finding her and her blog led us to deal with some hard questions in our faith.

The first question I had to deal with for myself was about homosexuality.  It all began when I found out that a dear friend of mine is gay.  Not only is he gay, but he is the pastor of a large active church in Indianapolis.

Jeff went to church with me when we were in junior high and high school.  He was the only person from school who also attended my church.  We dated some and were good friends.  One of the most attractive things to me about Jeff was his passion for Christ.  Everyone saw it.  Even our pastor told Jeff’s mom, “I believe God has something very special in mind for Jeff.”  Jeff told me later, “Liitle did he know…”

When we were sophomores Jeff moved to Colorado.  We wrote faithfully for a couple of years.  Jeff wrote long letters to me about his desire to serve the Lord with all his heart, soul, mind and strength.  But distance took its toll, and eventually we went our separate ways.  In the past few years, I learned he was back in Indianapolis, and pastor of a large church that welcomed a diverse congregation, including gays and lesbians.

I had to think about this.  I had to learn more about this.  My first step was to attend a workshop on homosexuality sponsored by Focus on the Family.  There were several speakers who had left the gay lifestyle to become straight, becoming part of traditional families. One of the most striking things they said was that Christians had done great harm to gays during the AIDS epidemic in the 80’s and 90’s.  Instead of acting in love and coming to minister to the gay community in their time of great need, most Christian groups took the position that this was God’s just judgment for their great sin.  In essence, we said, “Good riddance!”  This viewpoint is very prevalent even today. 

 But I knew that the information I got there was not the whole story.  I had to hear the other side of the story, directly from Jeff.  I contacted him, and on one of my trips to Indianapolis I arranged to meet him at a social event at his church. (I can’t tell you how nervous I was about all this.  It was like covert operations!)   I sat down to dinner with him and listened to his story.

Jeff went to college at Bob Jones University, an extremely conservative Christian college in South Carolina.  It was there that he came to grips with the fact that he was gay.  And that was a crisis point for him.  His great desire was to be a pastor, but he knew that was impossible because of what he was dealing with.  Jeff went on to Harvard Law School and practiced law in Washington, DC.  It was there he found a church that welcomed gays, and this changed his life.  This opened the door to his being able to fulfill his lifelong dream of being a pastor.  That is he how he came to be back in Indianapolis.

Jeff has written a book about his views on the Bible and homosexuality.  His view is that God’s judgment rests upon the promiscuity that often accompanies the homosexual lifestyle.  He believes that gays in committed monogamous relationships are able to live a strong Christian life.  He practices what he preaches and has been married to his spouse for over fifteen years.

When I met Jeff and talked to him after all these years, I was struck by a couple of things.   Jeff was very much the same person I remembered, and yes, even loved, so many years ago.  He was smart, engaging and fun to talk to, and none of his zeal for serving the Lord has diminished.  He speaks often about his faith, and engages in debates about his views (those lawyer skills come in handy).  He lives out his Christianity better than most people I know.

So what do I do with this?  How to I understand this?  This goes against everything I have ever been taught. 

I don’t have the answers.  I still find all this totally confusing.  But one thing I do know.  Once you put a face on homosexuality instead of just using it as a label, your perspective changes.  You’re forced to grapple with it, and there are no easy answers.

The other thing I know is that each person’s story matters.  The road they’ve taken… the problems they’ve dealt with…it all matters.  It matters to Jesus, and it better matter to me, if I truly want to follow Him.  That’s why I’m listening, and trying to learn what God wants me to do to meet the needs of friends who are dealing with homosexuality in their own lives, and in the lives of family members. 

Significance

On Friday morning we gathered to have our Friday Friends Bible study and fellowship.  This is a group of women of all ages coming together to learn from each other how to live the Christian life together.  I can’t tell you what this group has come to mean to me.  Everyone there has genuine care and concern for the others in the group.  The support that I’ve received from this group has made some heavy burdens feel a lot lighter.

In our study we are learning how to meditate on scripture.  I am so excited about this because I know this is a practice I need to engage in more often.  Although I am faithful to my daily Bible reading, that does not mean that I am meditating on the scriptures.  This week we studied verses that had to do with feeling forgotten, feeling like you’re not appreciated, feeling as if you don’t matter.

It all boils down to the need we have to feel significant in this world

We all desire it to some extent.  God has put it in our hearts.  That’s why we have to seek it His way, and that means seeking it through becoming a part of His story.  His story revolves around redeeming people and being a part of His kingdom work here on Earth.  The more involved with His story we are, the more significance our own story has.

There are several stay-at-home moms in our group, and they voiced their feelings.  “Is what I do enough?  Should I be doing more?”  There’s no magic formula for how much is enough.  It’s a part of our personal work to know what God expects from each of us individually.

We dug into the paradox between Jesus charge, “Don’t  do your good deeds publicly, to be admired by others,” to his command a few verses earlier, “Let your light shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.”  Obviously, it’s all about who gets the glory.

The verses we studied led me to a lot of thought-provoking questions:
            What things have I said and done am I looking forward to being revealed?
What things do I wish would remain hidden? How can I eradicate these things?
How can I be constantly aware that what I do for Christ is not in vain, even when I see no
evidence that what I do matters?

Good thoughts, good food, good friends.  What a blessing to be able to “work out our salvation” together!

A Profitable Week

Lots of activity this week centered around our involvement at Camp of the Woods in Canada.

On Monday night we invited several people interested in spending the summer at camp to dinner.  After dinner we discussed our desire to recruit summer staff for the camp.  We discussed dates and finances, including plans we have for securing funds.  There was a lot of enthusiasm for the task, and we enjoyed sharing our passion for this work.

If you’re reading this, and you know a young person who would be interested in hearing about the opportunity to serve in the ministry at Camp of the Woods, be sure to contact me so that I can get information out to them in a timely manner.

Wednesday night I spoke to the youth at church about a mission trip to camp in July.  There are several young people who have expressed an interest in working a week at the camp.  Some that were not interested in spending the whole summer are very interested in this shorter trip.  Our hopes are that once they’ve been there, the place will take hold of them as it has us.

Our friend Ashley has been working on a very sharp looking brochure that will contain all the information about our work at the camp and how friends can support the work.  We want to have it ready so that we can give it to people when they ask us what we’re going to do when we retire.  We are trying structure it so that others who are trying to raise support for spending the summer at camp will be able to send it out with their personal information on it.  It should be finished soon.  Kudos to you, Ashley!

On Sunday after church we’ll be meeting with any adults and families who are interested in the Canada trip.  I’ve had calls and texts wanting more information.  I’m anxious to see who’ll turn up.

Phil and I are so excited about all this activity.  We are anxious to expose others in our church family to this place we’ve come to love so much.  I’ll keep you posted here on our progress.  Keep us in your prayers.

Questions

I introduced you to my friend Rachel Held Evans in my last post.  I wanted to elaborate on some of the things I’ve learned from reading Rachel’s book and following her blog.

My favorite part of Rachel’s book deals with asking questions.

And yet I’m learning to love the questions, like locked rooms and mysterious books, like trees that clap their hands and fish that climb up cave walls, like mist that clings to the foothills of the Himalayas just like it clings to the Appalachians.  And slowly I am learning to live the questions, to follow the teachings of a radical rabbi, to live in an upside-down kingdom in which kings are humbled and servants exalted, to look for God in the eyes of the orphan and the widow, the homeless and the imprisoned, the poor and the sick.  My hope is that if I am patient, the questions themselves will dissolve into meaning, the answers won’t matter so much anymore, and perhaps it will all make sense to me on some distant, ordinary day.

Those who say that having childlike faith means not asking questions haven’t met too many children.  Anyone who has kids or loves kids or has spent more than five minutes with kids knows that kids ask a lot of questions.  Rarely are they satisfied with short answers, and rarely do they spend much time absorbing your response before moving on to the next "why?" or "how come?"

Psychologists say that the best way to handle children in this stage of development is not to answer their questions directly but instead to tell them stories.  As pediatrician Alan Greene explains, "After conversing with thousands of children, I’ve decided that what they really mean is, That’s interesting to me.  Let’s talk about that together.  Tell me more, please.”  Questions are a child’s way of expressing love and trust.  They are a child’s way of starting a dialogue.  They are a child’s way of saying “I want to have a conversation with you"…

If there’s one thing I know for sure, it’s that serious doubt—the kind that leads to despair—begins not when we start asking god questions but when, out of fear, we stop.  In our darkest hours of confusion and in our most glorious moments of clarity, we remain but curious and dependent little children, tugging frantically at God’s outstretched hands and pleading with every question and every prayer and every tantrum we can muster , ‘We want to have a conversation with you!’”

For all the years we have been married, Phil has had lots of questions about lots of things we find in the Bible, and things we have learned in church.  He has questions about everything from new Earth vs. old Earth to God’s involvement in our daily lives.  In the early days, whenever he would bring up these questions, I didn’t want to listen to them.  They made me afraid, and I didn’t want to think about what he was saying.  We did not have conversations about them.

In the past 7-8 years, I have changed.  I have begun to deal with questions that have come to my heart instead of just ignoring them or denying them.   I read books constantly that deal with questions of faith and have found many to be helpful resources in strengthening my faith in different areas.  My willingness to entertain questions has led to a rich dialogue with Phil.  We have great conversations on a regular basis (mostly over Mexican food at El Metate). 

It’s taken me all these years to understand this…  that the questions matter… that they don’t bother God…  that He is big enough to handle them…and that He loves the conversation it opens up with me.

Meeting Rachel

I started the day singing “O What a Beautiful Morning” as I watched the sunrise after a brisk pre-dawn walk with Mary.

I am ending my day with a full heart because of a new connection I got to make tonight.

Phil, Kathryn, and I, along with our good friend John Cofield, made a trip to Lee University to attend a book reading by a person who has become a huge part of our lives, who has influenced us greatly, and yet a person we had never met.

Rachel Held Evans was the featured speaker at Lee University’s 6th Annual Writer’s Festival.  She read passages from her book, Evolving in Monkey Town, which is a memoir about growing up in Dayton and having a very evangelical upbringing.  As a young adult she faced a crisis of faith, which she is continuing to work through.  She also read from the draft of her upcoming book, A Year of Biblical Womanhood, in which she shares what it was like to live the past year taking literally the scriptures about what a woman should and should not do.

I first came to know Rachel because she was going to church with Kathryn.  Kathryn suggested that I start following her blog, which I have been doing ever since.  Soon I was telling Phil, “You’ve got to read this,” and it wasn’t long before he was hooked too. 

Rachel’s blog has been a lifeline to us to open our hearts and minds to new ways of thinking about our faith.  She has directed us to books we should read, people we should follow, and practices we need to incorporate into our faith walk.  She has had such a big impact on Phil, and he would tell you that Rachel has given voice and thought to many of the issues he has struggled with for so long.  I have watched as he has taken her words to heart, as he has searched the scriptures for new answers, and as he has had a new desire to put his faith into action.

We all came away from the evening with so much to think about, so much to rejoice over.  And I’m looking forward to sharing some of those thoughts with you here. 

I'm Back!

I just looked at my blog, and it’s been a whole month since my last post.  That’s a long time for me to be quiet.

It hasn’t been that there’s not been anything going on.  The holidays are always busy with lots of family around and not much of a schedule to keep. 

We enjoyed a visit from Phil’s dad and my aunt Pauline.  I even made a quick trip to Indiana with Kathryn to take Pauline home and see some cousins that I haven’t seen for years. 

Kathryn at Abraham Lincoln's birthplace.  We stopped there on our trip to Indiana.

We also spent time at the zoo, beautifully lit for Christmas (free tickets thanks to my Aunt Sue), and toured the Children’s Museum with my friend Robin. They had a Barbie exhibit that had several dolls and accessories that I had played with in my childhood. It lets you know you’re old when toys that you actually owned are in a museum.

There’s lots of school stuff going on too.  Mary and I are changing our schedule.  She is going to work with all the elementary kids, and I’m going to work with the middle school students.  So far it’s making us both happier.  It’s also time to prepare for Science Olympiad, one of the highlights of the year.  I’m excited about competing well, but it’s very busy getting everyone ready.

Finally, I’ve been doing lots of reading.  I don’t know exactly what to say about all that, but it’s been very interesting.  I hope to share some of my thoughts on these books in upcoming posts.

So I’m back.