What did you expect?

Life can get really confusing when you switch back and forth between perspectives


I feel as if I often see my life in two parts. There's life. And then there's life with Jesus. It's subtle, the difference. But it certainly exists. I can even talk about Jesus and use words in my "life" perspective so it seems like I'm always in my "life with Jesus" perspective, but I'm not.


Does that even make sense?




Our generation has become professionally trained in being disconnectedly connected. We can be plugged in, hooked up, and decked out, with social media sites, smart phones, and the internet. And, at the same time, totally disengaged. We're encouraged to pseudo-relationship the people we meet in the name of "networking". One of my engineering professors explained that advanced "networking" (I am fairly certain increased usage of that word is mainly due to the chic nature it imposes on the user) has come about because of the drive to communicate ideas. Technology has skyrocketed in attempt to keep up. We are beginning to understand the vast knowledge store that lies untapped in...each other. And our ideas. And communicating those ideas. Progress? Perhaps. The Romans, and many other empires, experienced the same, but careful. There is no new thing under the sun.




What I have become painfully aware of is that I do this to Jesus. I do this ADHD multitasking, waiting for the idea through the blah blah blah. I straight up pray for the facts most of the time, for solutions. My whole attitude is about the progress He can help me make. How am I supposed to live? Where am I supposed to go? What am I supposed to do? How do I handle this? Just tell me Lord, just stream me that celestial info, give me the download of direction so I can go. Life has become about progress. Progress of self, progress of understanding, progress of knowledge. So my experiences with Him get reduced to what I learned-a 5 minute sound byte I can tell someone over coffee that sounds pretty stinking spiritual; another how-to that I can add to my repertoire.


Because my "life" is about me, and my "life with Jesus" is about Jesus, and if what I learn in my "life with Jesus" benefits my "life" then I can bring it in, mention it, act like I'm living in His presence all along, but I'm not really engaged. Not really plugged into His heart. Just using what I learned to sound that way. So I get a pat on the back, because I am obviously growing in wisdom.


I wonder though, if our society did not measure progress by how much apparent understanding we had or how progressed our lives looked, but by intimacy with the heart of God, would I pass that test?


I don't know. I suspect not.




I suppose this all came about because I'm really confused as to why I can read passages like Hebrews 11  and then go about my day completely immersed in things that never really mattered much at all, like studying for the mcat or interpreting mixed signals from a certain individual. Completely caught up in my life kingdom. It seems innocent, and perhaps it is for other people, but deep down I know that I am praying in one perspective and living in another. I let my "life with Jesus" perspective come in when my "life" perspective needs a bailout.


 It causes all sorts of problems, because my expectations live in "life with Jesus" and most of me lives in "life". "Life" is where my time, and thought, and energy goes. I can read Hebrews 11, about people who lived without much comfort or ease, who were tortured, who were rejected, who lived solely in one perspective, who were of one mind, who looked forward to and lived for a country they belonged to while passing through one they were simply born into.
And then I can go on about my business, content to dwell in lesser things. Content to pray small, urging God to fix the things in my own life that cause me discomfort, imploring that He make paths and overcome mountains so that my life may be more comfortable and so I may feel less and less like I don't belong here.


We're invited to live free. But we'd prefer to stay crippled. Because we've learned how to be almost comfortable in our infirmities, nevermind that we were made to walk. We're invited to live a different kind of life. One where faith is the ground at our feet, and comfort is a state we are hoping for, not living in. Where hope is what drives us, and love is what sustains us, and the pleasure of Jesus is all we live for. But we settle for lives filled with insignificant problems that we give significance to, lives devoted to feeling as if we belong here. We say we want Jesus, but what we really want is for Him to enter our world, not to step into His.


That's not feasible. He's too big for our little kingdoms. Life demands that we choose one or the other. Be of one mind. Be of one perspective. Life for this life, or live for the next, but choose.




Do you belong here or not?