Despondency

So…. I went to Centre Street on Tuesday night…. Centre Street church is one of Calgary’s largest churches & has a reputation for lots happening there, lots of people coming & yeah, well, a reputation that you can ‘meet people’ there….

…and that’s why I went. To meet people, well, specifically to meet women in the hopes of meeting ‘a’ woman that I could ask out on a date (or some such thing)….

Tuesday was Valentine’s day. I was actually having a fantastic Valentine’s day. Part of the Sunday prior to this was working out some heart stuff & reaching this point of being really happy being single, or at least really happy being me in the current state that I’m in. And so by Tuesday, Valentine’s day, I was still coasting on being pretty happy about my life & not bitter & cursing the day like some of my other single friends were….

….and I went to Centre Street Church in the hopes of meeting someone just ‘cause I figured I should. I thought I should get out there & expand my ‘circles’, meet new people, see if I could meet someone where sparks flew & chemistry ignited…. & yeah, perhaps lofty & unrealistic goals for a one night visit to a ‘young adults’ meeting, but yeah…. I just figured I’d go & see what happens.

So yeah, the evening was spent listening to people sing, watching people praying fervently, listening to people talking about their unfaithfulness to God & how they look for other lovers instead of only Him. They ushered all of us ‘new comers’ into a room where they went through the whole spiel of how things worked with their groups. First you come to the newcomer’s class, then you go to breakout groups, then you join a small group; usually the small groups are same-sex, so you can more freely talk about your ‘temptations’. They listed off the 20 different things you could get involved in for ‘ministry’ or social events or retreats or whatever & talked about Friday night’s sports events & all this stuff…

….and yeah, I walked away from the night pretty frustrated about the whole thing. Last night the frustration turned to depression & despondency. Lucky for me I had a good friend’s shoulder to cry on (literally) for a while otherwise, I think I’d be doing way worse than I am now.

At the newcomer’s class they talked about how this ‘young adults’ group had a reputation of being a ‘meat-market’ of a place to find a spouse and they talked about how that really the desire of the ministry was to help people grow closer to God and so the ministry was more organized to help people with their spiritual growth instead of making contact with members of the opposite sex. “Really the best way to find someone,” the preacher man said, “is to pursue God fully and when your walk with Him is strong, then He’ll bring along the right person at the right time.”

That statement was one of the ones that sort of hurt the worst last night. Part of the despondency was from feeling a lack of options or just a terror of the unknown. I’d always assumed I’d bump into my future-wife somewhere, likely through church. And I’ve been looking for this ‘meeting’, often only to find hearts that I don’t recognize; no one that my heart ‘knows’, no one that feels like ‘home’ to me…. I’m now at a phase in life where I’m not so sure I could ‘find’ a woman who would fit with me at church. I’ve changed. I’m not very ‘church’ like in the sense that I don’t toe the line anymore. I don’t enjoy going to church (if church means sitting through some singing & a message). The thought of contorting myself or flagellating myself/beating myself up for the sake of getting ‘closer to God’ makes me sick (I’m abusive of myself enough without falling into the religious patterns of guilt, shame, fear for not meeting an impossible standard). I won’t live my life through WWJD (What Would Jesus Do?) or other Christian slogans that rob us from encountering a God who engages us, who makes us think, a God who is beyond giving us rules & commands of “do this”/”don’t do that”…. Certainly God gives commands, but as John says, “the commandments of the Lord are not grievous/burdensome”; anything God tells us is principles that keep us safe & are for our ‘good’. It doesn’t mean that God can’t deal with things when we walk out of safety or out of ‘good’. (and I think a lot, He actually calls us away from ‘safety’ to the place of risk, to the place of loving others). More than anything God’s commandment is love, which looks different that the commandments in the church….

Mostly I just get the sense that I’m not ‘good enough’ for most Christian women… I’m not ‘pure’ enough… (& I’m likely too stiff/straight-laced for non-church women).

But yeah, if I can’t find ‘her’ in a church, then where? I think finding a Christian date/person-to-possibly-marry, is maybe still a good idea for me, but if you can’t meet them in church, then where do you go? (barring the internet which I’m still leaving as the fall back plan – though I don’t relish that idea either).

But yeah, what bothered me about the preacher’s statement was just this idea that “if you are good, God will bless you. If you are bad, God will withhold blessing from you”. It’s just so frustrating for me to think that I’ve done things “right” – or at least “right” in the eyes of what I was told a good Christian man was supposed to be. On the outside, I did the stuff I was supposed to do, read my bible, prayed, shared my faith, went to church, ministered to the poor, helped out with ‘ministry’ things, loved people…. And, again on the outside, I didn’t do the stuff I wasn’t supposed to: I didn’t drink, smoke, do drugs, have sex, go to wild parties, tell off-colour jokes, lie, steal, cheat. Frick, I’m the guy who still feels bad about crossing the street unless I have a little white man light telling me it’s ‘lawful’ to walk across… and in all of it, through all the years, what I’ve longed for most was just someone to share my heart & life with.

And so it makes me mad (and sad) to hear some guy in ‘authority’ say, “follow God & He’ll bless you & give you the desires of your heart” and to sit there going, “God, I thought I was following you, and my heart just has this huge gaping hole in it that still cries out for someone to, not fill the hole, but to share the ache of life….” And so somewhere along the way, if I’m to interpret this guy’s words as ‘truth’, either I didn’t follow God enough, didn’t do enough, push enough, pray enough, work enough to make God happy with me, or God has abandoned me, or failed, or ignored me….

…and yeah, I’ve seen lots of other people, friends, who haven’t ‘done it right’ and yet their lives are blessed. They have aspects of their hearts desires. They have good & bad, rich & poor, better & worse, & many of them have a spouse to share all of these with them. And yeah, I’m totally not bitter that my friends find blessing or find that special someone when I have not. I’m happy for them, but it just makes me go that this advice from the preacher is total B.S. ‘cause God is unreasonably good & blesses us just ‘cause He longs & loves to bless us. He doesn’t work with us like a dog trainer; giving us the doggy treat when we do right & rubbing our noses in it when we make mistakes….

…and I’m not saying that I’m not blessed, or that I’m not happy (most times). I have a fantastic life & through the full times & the empty times I’ve tasted the wealth of human experience & drunk it down like rich wine. I’ve experienced the joys of closeness & intimacy & I’ve experienced the soul-crushing weight of loneliness, abandonment & despair… and in each place I’ve met Jesus; I’ve found His presence there, sweet & good & beautiful; full of love & full of grace….

All I’m saying is don’t feel me these lines of crap anymore. Don’t treat me like I’m some dumb kid who is sitting in Sunday school eating all this stuff up & marvelling at your ‘wisdom’. I’ve seen life, I’ve been through the ‘system’ of church involvement. I’ve been to small groups & seen the good & the bad. Experienced the closeness of when it works & the fraud of when you’re just going through the motions. I know that God will be good regardless; that nothing can keep us from His love or from His hand of blessing. With God, even the hard times are good, even His reprimands or discipline is sweet – all is designed to make us long for His presence, for His touch….

…my heart hurt for people on Tuesday night. It was hard to watch people hiding themselves for the sake of being spiritual. So many people, good people, were talking about how they just needed to focus more ‘cause Jesus should be ‘enough’ for them & they shouldn’t need to be looking for another person to be a part of their life. And yeah, this is such a lie. Yes, Jesus is ‘enough’. But at the same time, in the story of creation, Adam exists in the garden with God & is ‘full’ in God’s presence. Adam lacks nothing, but yet is empty, yet he is missing something. And God, who knew this would happen all along, goes, “ah, this is not good” and so makes woman, separating her from man, so that she can be joined together with man & the two would live a lifetime of becoming ‘one flesh’ again & again….

God made us in His image, an image of trinity, an image of relationship, an image of love. We humans cannot thrive without love. Sure we can survive. We can grit our teeth through it all & get by, but we’re not really living to the full. We cannot exist apart from relationship – both with the divine & with the finite – we need people, we are made to ache for them, we are made to ache for love, to ache for union, to ache for a spouse, a mate, a life-partner, to ache for someone to share our hearts & lives with, for someone with whom we can know/be known, love/be loved…. Here in the church, even on Valentine’s day, we treat those who long for love like sinners, like they are feeble & weak & ‘less spiritual’ than those who have denied their own hearts, denied their creation & through piety have stifled the natural desires & longings & gifts that God has given them….

It just frustrates me so badly how we in the ‘church’ continue to misrepresent God. We stand between people & God & block their access to Him. Instead of waving them on to His always open embrace, we block the path & say, “no, you must be clean to approach a holy God”. We deny people the free grace & cleansing blood of Christ that He longs to pour out on every one…

…and yeah, maybe I’m stuck with internet dating…. I’m not going to survive many more sermons that make my blood boil like that (or that give power to the voices of ‘not enough’).