About Standards

Lafou, I'm afraid I've been thinking. A dangerous pastime, I know.

My thinking is more of the to-get-me-off-the-hook kind of thinking than anything else. I've been thinking about people and how we are and whether we're all really messed up or whether we're really OK on the inside, with a few bumps and bruises (or major amputations and gushing flesh wounds for some) on the outside. If we're all pretty much good, if par for the course is being a decent human being, then this whole savior business is a bit over the top. I mean, we'll get along just fine here, if we're all decent at the core, and then we'll see what happens afterwards, no need for divine intervention in each human life. But if we're screwed up inside and we're headed forever in the wrong direction, then we're screwed for here and the hereafter if there's no savior. So it really depends on us, how we really are, whether there's a need for me to go through all the 'saved life' trouble.

Enter Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog. I've been wanting to reference this for some time (and what does that say about my life?). At the beginning of Act Two, Dr. Horrible (LOVE Neil Patrick Harris) and Penny sing about their views of the world. 'I cannot believe my eyes, how the world's filled with filth and lies,' and 'I cannot believe my eyes- is the world finally growing wise?' Penny's got the happy view, obviously, since she doesn't end the musical by being inducted into the Evil League of Evil, with good in the homeless people and Captain Hammer, corporate tool. She also sees the good in Billy, aka Doctor Horrible, but he only sees the problems in the world. Now, I'm sure that someone out there has come up with the perfect idea- combine the two together. See the bad and the good in the world and fix the bad while you cherish the good. Which is lovely, I'm all for that instead of cutting off the head of the human race, but the question still remains- is the bad from our cores, or is it from the outside? Is there good in everybody's heart, to keep safe and sound, or do we listen close to everybody's heart only to hear the breaking sound?

So say that nobody's perfect, but nobody's perfectly bad either. Can I say that? Is that right? Because it seems to me that we've all got that part of us that needs to die- in some, it's bigger than others, but remember the good thief is just as clean as the rest of us. At the same time, we've all got some good, some something that is worth saving, something that demands a savior because it cannot be allowed to perish with all the rest of the junk that we toss out when we throw in the towel at the end of our metaphorical day. If you like to toss around the world soul, I'd call that our soul. At the end of a semester talking about heaven and hell (for class credit, I may add), my last essay for my exam about the nature of the soul ended with the idea that perhaps a soul isn't something that we can identify. Maybe it's the part of us that God loves, for whatever reasons He loves us. The part worth saving.

Now to the getting-me-off-the-hook part. If everyone's broken on some level, then I'm fine if I'm broken too. Par for the course. And if I'm just as worth saving as the next person, then just being saved is enough, like the next person. Except I'm not off the hook. No matter how I reason that no one's perfect, that they don't have to be better so why do I, that I don't have to change the status-quo in my life because my life isn't really that bad, I still get stuck with this discomfort, like I know better and I'm ignoring something. I know what causes the discomfort. I know why it's here and I know what I need to do.

I just can't try hard enough to be good enough to make the discomfort go away. If it's not one thing, it's another. We're called to be better, to do better, to show the world that there is better out there and to tell them how to get to it, to work on the metaphorical evil laugh, if you will. But these results of our call are all just symptoms. The cause is something crazy-scary-terribly deep. We're not doing anything for our own sanctification, or we're not supposed to be, anyway. We're not in this to get something out of it, heaven or a better life or whatever. We are in this because we love this Man and we're ready to follow Him with everything. Christian meets the cross pretty early in Pilgrim's Progress. There's so much more to life after salvation. But you can't live it peaceably unless you're willing to live it. Every second of every day, you're called to do superhuman things not for yourself, not even for others, but for Him. You don't sneak candy bars off the line and call it part of your shift treat when you really just wanted one. You don't sleep in until 11 because you don't want to be bothered with living any more hours of life than you have to. You don't write off a kid because he's not paying attention, a problem causer and just kinda out there. You don't cut corners on any job. You don't assume that someone else is going to help. You be better because He deserves your better, your best, not your barely coping.

And you can't do this by yourself. You can't be the best every second of every day. It doesn't happen. You break down- gravity stops us, I think, or something kinda like it. The friction of a soul that's fighting the system. So after you try to do this alone and fail, you realize that you need something else and it has to be supernatural. No promises that you won't still fall, but promises that you will be what you were meant to be all along. Oh, the Holy Spirit. I wish I understood this better. Somewhere along the way, after you've promised Christ that you can indeed pick up your cross and after you've realized that the spirit might be more willing than the weak flesh, but it's not winning any races, you realize that your spirit has to be His. You have to trade out your brokenness for His peace, His wholeness, because your brokenness patched up isn't going to cut it.

But even then, you still have to pick up your mat. The wonderful thing about God is that He'll take your barely coping, He'll take your brokenness, anything you want to offer up, He's ready and willing to have because He isn't prideful like us. He doesn't say to us, 'No, you rejected me. I'm not going to take your crap anymore.' He doesn't deserve it, but we can't give Him what He deserves until He brings us to it. We have to be better- and I just found this out: To be better, you have to do better. No one's going to study for you, to make you the best in the class. Those people actually work for it. No one's going to keep you accountable every step of your every day. You've got to choose to do the supernatural- the Spirit is willing when you are. Oh, but what a choice!

Last day at Wesley. I vacuumed up a ton of hair and blue fuzz (why is the entirety of my life covered in blue fuzz? Isn't dust grey?) and I cleaned the shower and the sinks and washed some dishes and moved a couch and rearranged my room. Feeling celebratory and hoping that that one guy who was supposed to move in hadn't yet or at least didn't mind piano playing, I headed down to the sanctuary. Last time in there, just me and God chilling. Sometimes I'm not sure that He wouldn't rather me stay in my room where I can keep my hypocrisy to myself and not pretend like we're on good speaking terms when I sing to Him, but I can find Him there. Or maybe it's that I'm more willing to search for Him there. Anyway, I walked out, past the furnishings and random things that remind me of the home I grew up in and down the staircase to the bricks and chairs that remind me of the high school I should have wised up in and into the room that if it had green carpet would remind me of the sanctuary that I first sang in. You get to be privy next to the hymn that I ended on. 'Are Ye Able?'

“Are ye able,” said the Master,
“To be crucified with Me?”
“Yea,” the sturdy dreamers answered,
“To the death we follow Thee.”

Lord, we are able. Our spirits are Thine.
Remold them, make us, like Thee, divine.
Thy guiding radiance above us shall be
A beacon to God, to love and loyalty.

I've been a sturdy dreamer (Mark 10:35-40, BTW) for quite some time. I'm a talker. I'm big on telling people to do, but I'm not so big on actually doing, you understand. That's why there's a refrain, so people like me can get it into our minds by singing it multiple times. Yes, I'm able, when my spirit's His and I'm made like Him. And it has happy consequences. Now I know the fine print is important and that you have to do everything in the fine print to make life work out, but that's not the point. The point, my friends, the point is, that I am able. So I will.