Trampolines and Bricks

Tonight I decided that I needed to read something by someone with an alternative Christianity – not the cut and dried black and white traditional kind. My first choice was Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller. Its subtitle is “Nonreligious Thoughts About Christian Spirituality” so it definitely fit the bill. Only, I couldn’t find my copy. My second choice was Shane Claiborne’s The Irresistible Revolution. Both are books I’ve read before, but in light of everything that’s happened to me recently, I really felt I needed to read something like those again. But of course, I couldn’t find that one either. What gives? Do I have an invisible book snatcher in my apartment (or car)? So I moved on to my third choice – Velvet Elvis by Rob Bell. Of course, I’ve read this one before as well. But in reading the intro and first chapter, I do believe I’ve figured out why this is the book I’m reading right now.

For thousands of years followers of Jesus, like artists, have understood that we have to keep going, exploring what it means to live in harmony with God and each other. The Christian faith tradition is filled with change and growth and transformation. Jesus took part in this process by calling people to rethink faith and the Bible and hope and love and everything else, and by inviting them into the endless process of working out how to live as God created us to live.

The challenge for Christians then is to live with great passion and conviction, remaining open and flexible, awayre that this life is not the last painting.

Times change. God doesn’t, but times do. We learn and grow, and the world around us shifts, and the Christian faith is alive only when it is listening, morphing, innovating, letting go of whatever has gotten in the way of Jesus and embracing whatever will help us be more and more the people God wants us to be.

Sounds kind of familiar doesn’t it? Of course, Rob writes far more eloquently than I, but he’s described exactly what I’ve been looking for.

We must keep reforming the way the Christian faith is defined, lived, and explained.

The problem isn’t Jesus; the problem is what comes with Jesus.

For many people the word Christian conjures up all sorts of images that have nothing to do with who Jesus is and how he taught us to live. This must change.

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I’m part of a communitry, a movement of people who have been living, exploring, discussing, sharing, and experiencing new understandings of Christian faith.

And we love it. We are alive in ways we never thought possible. We are caught up in something we gladly give our lives to. This is the plce that I write from: a place of joy and freedom, as a member of a community wanting to invite others to come along on the journey. We are just getting started. I have as many questions as answers, and I’m convinced that we’re only scratching the surface. What I do know is that this pursuit of Jesus is leading us backward as much as forward.

If it is true, then it isn’t new.

Yes! That’s what I want. To follow Jesus, not the man made religion that Christianity has become.

I’m convinced being generous is a better way to live.

I’m convinced forgiving people and not carrying around bitterness is a better way to live.

I’m convinced having compassion is a better way to live.

I’m convinced pursuing peace in every situation is a better way to live.

I’m convinced listening to the wisdom of others is a better way to live.

I’m convinced being honest with people is a better way to live.

What are you convinced of? Rob uses this incredible metaphor of trampolines and brick walls to describe how faith should be versus how it often is.

When we jump, we begin to see the need for springs. The springs help make sense of these deeper realities that drive how we live every day. The springs aren’t God. The springs aren’t Jesus. The springs are statements and beliefs about our faith that help give words to the depth that we are experiencing in our jumping. I would call these the doctrines of the Christian faith.

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Somebody recently gave me a videotpe of a lecture given by a man who traveled around speaking about the creation of the world. At one point in his lecture, he said if you deny that God created the world in six literal twenty-four hour days, then you are denying that Jesus ever died on the cross. It’s a bizarre leap of logic to make, I would say.

But he was serious.

It his me while I was watching that for him faith isn’t a trampoline; it’s a wall of bricks. Each of the core doctrines for him is like an individual brick that stacks on top of the others. If you pull one out, the whole wall starts to crumble. It appears quite strong and rigid, but if you begin to rethink or discuss even on brick, the whole thing is in danger.

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Often it appears as though you have to agree with all of the bricks exactly as they are or you can’t join.

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I can jump and still have questions.

A Christian doesn’t avoid the questions; a Christian embraces them. In fact, to truly pursue the living God, we have to see the need for questions.

Questions are not scary.

What is scary is when people don’t have any.

What is tragic is faith that has no room for them.

And then there’s the really obvious observation:

A trampoline only works if you take your feet off the firm, stable ground and jump into the air and let the trampoline propel you upward. Talking about trampolines isn’t jumping; it’s talking. Two vastly different things. And so we jump and we invite others to jump with us, to live the way of Jesus and see what happens. You don’t have to know anything about the springs to pursue living “the way”.

In brickworld, the focus often becomes getting people to believe the right things so they can be “in”. There is often a list of however many doctrines, and the goal is to get people to intellectually assent to these things being true. Once we believe the right things, then we’re in. And once we’re in, the goal often becomes learning how to get others in with us. I know this is harsh, but in many settings it is true. It is possible in these settings to be in, and to believe all of the correct things, and even to be effective at getting others in, and yet our hearts can remain unaffected. It’s possible to believe all the right things and be miserable. It’s possible to believe all the right doctrines and not live as Jesus teaches us to live. This is why I am so passionate about the trampoline. I want to invite people to actually live this way so the life Jesus offers gradually becomes their life. It becomes less and less about talking, and more and more about the experience we are actually having.

I know that was a lot of quoting. But Rob says it so much better than I ever could so I wanted you to read his words. I want that way of life. I want that kind of passion for life. I don’t want to be a follower of “brickianity” anymore.