Stolen or Lost

As often happens, I'm jumping off from something someone said who may actually read this.  If that's you, or you know who it is, please note that I am being careful to divorce the statement from the person.  As I've stated before, I'm dealing with ideas in this blog, which are the things the internet is made of, and not attacking people.  Truthfully, the statement is nothing more than a point of departure that got me thinking.  So I'm thankful for that and move on in the spirit of healthy salonic discussion and the "you" I address below is not that person, but a strawman I've set up for express purposes of tearing down. (that's actually what 'strawman' means, though people rarely use it correctly.)

So what is this now much anticipated statement?  That God wants his church back.  Yeah, that's it.  If you're let down, you obviously don't read this blog much.  At first, my reaction was "Who took it?"  Who could take it?  Is That-Than-Which-Nothing-Greater-Can-Be-Conceived so easily thwarted that anything which is His could be taken, stolen, or lost?

Now, of course, I get the statement.  I know how it was intended: as a clever way to describe a truth.  So no big deal.  But it lingered.  So as I pondered why, I came to see this as a symptom of the very kind of thinking which has led to the problem being addressed in the first place.  That problem is a lack of true relationship, true following of God's Reality.  See, I know several people right now who are on this journey away from the institutionalized church.  They call it different names, but this has been a grand revelation for them.  I'm happy for them and supportive.  I really am, because I am quite frankly tired of being out here in the woods by myself...both metaphorically and physically.  But more importantly, as one who came through this path myself, I get it.  I know the jaw dropping joy and boundless, sometimes sickening freedom of it.  Come on and catch up so we can move on together!  I hope these thoughts help.

But it's important to recognize that this is not a new thing.  It's not a "move of God."  Honestly, you gotta drop that kind of vocabulary altogether, bro.  God doesn't move like that.  Isn't that what you're waking up to?  His work hasn't been constrained to the various human institutions that come and go.  Sure he's moved through them, but not because of any thing they were.  Not because of anything they 'got right'.  To say so is just a deeper layer of the Pharisaical doctrines that Jesus was so against.  They'd taken the truth and twisted it to their own purposes.  Blind guides.

No God only moves one way.  It's the same way he always moves.  It's the way that Jesus came to show us, and the reason so few in his generation got it.  What were they expecting?  A hero.  A Warrior King.  A Righteous Ruler to wield true Divine Authority and set right all that was wrong.  They got this from their scriptures, just like we get our fallacies.

But what was Jesus?  Not that!  He said over and over, the Kingdom of God is not what men think.  It's within.  It's spiritual.  It's unseen.  He didn't overthrow society, he stepped out of it while staying right in it.  He crossed planes and walked right by those who thought they had it figured out.  The ruler who failed; that's him on the surface.  Just another radical who died.

You see where I'm going with this?  But what he did was change people on the inside.  He made them different.  He healed what was broken at the deepest levels.  I'll say it again, God only moves one way.  And that way is the way he's always moved: in the hearts of each individual person.  In those deep places where our own internal eye can barely see.  That's where he does his work.

Everything that occurs on the physical level is just a manifestation of this change.  A projection of a mutlidimensional existence into 3 dimensions.  It all comes from that.  On our own, we can't keep from getting the cart first.

So, remember that while this may be new to you, and the greatest thing ever.  It is...to you.  But you aren't the first, not even the early generation, man.  We had these same 'movements' in the mid '90's.  Right down to the house churches and all, bro.  I'm not saying their bad.  Walk your walk out.  You can't be expected anywhere on the path but where you are.  But realize things are just well in God's Kingdom.  They've never been shaken by winds of change in the world.  No one can take God's church, man.  He can't lose it either.  What was lost is us.  What's coming back is you.  What he's changing is your mind, not the world.  you thought you knew how it worked, but you've learned better now.

Read more old books.  Rome had it.  18th century France had it.  19th century England had it.  Early 20th century Europe had it.  Same abuses, same institutions painted in the fashions of the day.  And the same people realizing what's real and what isn't.  The same people awakening to what you are feeling now.

I know it's tough to shed old habits, and you'll probably get it wrong for many more years.  I'm just a little further down the path myself, so I'll be a different person soon too.  But one thing I can see from my view of the bend that you haven't gotten to yet is the lack of the preachy interaction.  Man, everything you learn isn't a revelation for everyone else.  Heed it.  Share it for sure.  But know, you aren't always gonna be at the head of the charge.  In truth, you never really were.  You just thought so, bro.

Now, jog on up here and let's go further up and further in together!