Real God

I think I grew up with a mostly sterile God. I got a wonderful spiritual foundation at a church that was gounded in the Word, but the God I came to know growing up really only wanted to hear hymns and not any other kind of music and He appreciated prayer in a kind of formula. He liked for you to sit really still and quiet and listen for a long time. He was especially fond of church camp. It was His preference that if you were going to get to know Him, you should walk down an aisle and discuss it with someone first. And He liked code words like "saved."

As I blog, I am constantly aware that I might be offending someone, and I don't want to offend people. However, I don't want to spend an entire paragraph apologizing and qualifying. Anyone that knows me well (which is pretty much anyone who reads this blog) knows my history, so I am not going to go into a diatribe of "don't get me wrong."

I have spent the past year and a half analyzing (without even really knowing that that is what I was doing) all that I have ever thought or believed about God and the church. And I am sure that I have always known that the God I met and came to know cries with you, hurts with you, provides for you. The God with whom I formed a relationship was close to you when you were in pain.

But I am not sure that He saves parking spots for you or gives you raises at work. Do you know what I mean?

And in my year and a half of anaylasis, I have come to think that I want a different God. Or a different kind of God. If this is selfish, let me know. But I'll explain:

I heard a segment on a Christian radio show about a year ago on which there was a guest speaker. She was the wife of a very prominent pastor of a very large mega-church here in Houston. There was a caller asking her this: "Why have I not found a spouse, even when I have waited patiently on God and He knows that is the desire of my heart. All of my friends are married; why am I not married?"
And the guest said this: "You know, God's not going to give to one and not give to another."

And I became angry. I thought, how wrong. How misleading. When I have friends who desperately want children and will never be able to have them. When I see people work hard and are good and loving parents and lose their jobs. When I see dear, loving men and women who may never, ever get married. When I see loved ones battle cancer and watch as some are cured and some are not. And on and on . . . I thought of the guest speaker, "How dare she!"

I heard a pastor not long after hearing that guest speaker say this to His congregation: "God will not give you more than you can handle."

And I thought, yes He will. Oh, yes, He will. Has the man never read the book of Job? Has he never dealt with real situations and real people? I thought that perhaps a better way to word it would be, God won't give you more than HE can handle, but saying it the other way around gives people nothing more than a way to fall into guilt when they can't handle it.

I've gone in a direction with this post that I hadn't intended. Let me try to get back.

The kind of God I want isn't the pretty pedastal God. I want the God that doesn't have to have answers for what He does or does not do, and that doesn't promise health and wealth. I want the God who doesn't have the memory span of a human, who doesn't forget tsunamis and earthquakes. I want the God who is getting dirty as he lays beneath tons of rubble with people who are dying horrible deaths due to natural disasters. I want the God whose heart is broken because there are real people dying of torture and disease and hunger; who is close to small children who have no one to be close to them. I want a God who doesn't have to dress up for church or walk an aisle. I want a God who will get dirty in the midst of tragedy, instead of sitting on the sidelines patting your head.

I want a God who is with someone, really in the midst of someone, whose pain is so great that they start to self-destruct. I want to know what that means, that God is with you. I want a God whose love is more than something that sounds good in a sermon or on a greeting card, whose love is difficult and comforting and understanding and sobbing and giving. I want a God who can make sense of this whole big painful world.

Am I asking too much?

God, to me, does not have to be pretty. He can do the hard stuff. He can go beyond a feeling and become a fact. He can get in my face. In fact, I'd prefer that. The God I want really talks, and is really heard. And He doesn't need code words. He can be known. Where is that God? Who is He? Where do I find Him?

I do not want God to be sterile. I don't want to have to tiptoe around Him or have to be careful around Him. I want Him to be dangerous. I want Him to be real.

And for the record, I also really like church camp. :o)