A Long January
For a very long time, I viewed church as the most sacred place. In the gathering of saints, the preaching of the Word, the collective singing of the body, God was near, present, moving. Growing up, the sacred and secular were segregated: we had Christian music, movies, bookstores, even a fast-food chain that was closed on Sundays. In the commodification of Christian-themed everything, we made the mysterious overt. Perhaps we forgot God is not limited by what we deem sacred; His presence can be felt and noticed in the daily, the mundane, the “disbelieving” neighbor (who may believe more than we realize).
Wendell Berry said “there are no unsacred places; there are only sacred and desecrated places.” Our embodied lives navigate through the sacred and secular everyday; our own growth can come in a multitude of ways, we too can learn from the “secular” folks around us (who aren’t actually secular), our souls can be moved by good art that doesn’t have “Christian” in the name, our theology can be deepened in books that aren’t sold at Lifeway. The beauty of sacred overflowing into “secular” spaces means we aren’t limited in our spiritual growth. If God can use a donkey, He can surely use the beauty of the world, the dignity of humanity (regardless of beliefs), the creations we create.
Lately, I’ve been thinking about the nuances of life, the maturing we do, the backtracking, the straying from side to side, the seasons of deep faith, and brutal dark nights of the soul. We are complex creatures, growing rapidly and then *seemingly* stalling. In “The Ragamuffin Gospel,” Brennan Manning writes,
“We want ever-sharp spirituality—push, pull, click, click, one saint that quick—and attempt to cultivate a particular virtue at a given point in time. Prudence in January, humility in February, fortitude in March, temperance in April. Score cards are provided for toting up gains and losses. The losses should diminish if you expect to meet charity in May. Sometimes May never comes. For many Christians, life is a long January.”
When I was young, Christianity was simple. I viewed faith through the lens of innocence. We were told: “know what you believe and why you believe it,” as if faith is an arrival and sound arguments are holy. But the problem with certainty is it leaves little room for wonder and curiosity. Mystery lies dormant in the guise of absolutes. We became poor listeners and ready debaters. “Having a defense” meant everyone who disagreed was just plain wrong; it spurred culture wars, created monolithic communities. We didn’t know how to function beyond the bubble of agreement because we’d grown to believe the other was a danger to our superior, holier selves.
Jesus says become like children in our wonder; Paul says put away childish things, a call, perhaps, to move on from the faith of youth into something vaster, deeper, more unknown. In some ways, I’ve found myself back at the beginning, reentering the faith through more mature eyes, retraining myself to listen rather than argue. “Imagine a world that is run by holy listeners,” writes John Chittister (“The Rule of Benedict”). What a beautiful concept: holy listeners, not virulent debaters. Community forms in the safe haven of listening spaces where everything (like Berry says) is touched by the sacred.
To grow up is to begin discovering Truth for oneself, a process that may be slow and long and weighty. For some of us: a long January. It means developing an embodied theology that encompasses our whole selves, faith that is personal and not just set upon our shoulders by our elders, growth that happens and transforms us beyond the church pews. It means finding God amidst the rubble of excess, legalism, and absolutes, accepting the abundant grace we’re reluctant to receive because of the assumption we’re too desecrated, too disbelieving, too far gone.
Brennan Manning writes, “When Jesus said, ‘Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy burdened,’ He assumed we would grow weary, discouraged, and disheartened along the way,” that life is hard and emotions overwhelm, that we will all experience the dark nights of the soul. “[Jesus] had no romantic notion of the cost of discipleship. He knew that following Him was as unsentimental as duty, as demanding as love. He knew that physical pain, the loss of loved ones, failure, loneliness, rejection, abandonment, and betrayal would sap our spirits; that the day would come when faith would no longer offer any drive, reassurance, or comfort; that prayer would lack any sense of reality or progress; that we would echo the cry of Teresa of Avila: ‘Lord, if this is the way you treat your friends, no wonder you have so few!’”
Jesus knew we’d grow up and realize the faith of childhood is not sustainable, that the “blessed assurances” are not enough, that the doubt would eventually overwhelm belief. Some carry on in much the same way, decades passing with quiet and simple faiths. They’ve made it to May and beyond.
I used to be afraid to ask questions. I thought it meant I was a fraud. But maybe it just meant I was still a child in need of putting off childish things. At 15, I thought I’d made it to May. At nearly 33, I think I may still be in January. My growth is minimal, my belief a mustard seed.
And yet, Jesus says, “come to me.” He accepts the tiny morsel of faith, a faith that can grow and flourish bit by bit in every discovery of the sacred.