This fall, my church is going through the Emotionally Healthy Church together. All the material is organized for small groups, sermons, congregational midweeks, and so forth.
Before continuing, I feel the need to explain something. The subtitle of the book is “A new paradigm for discipleship”. There are other words for discipleship, and I am going to use one of them. I will use the more theological word “santification”. The reason is not to quibble over words or insist that everyone should call it santification. I am doing this because the word discipleship in the ICoC subculture has so many assumed contexts and meanings, that a different word may serve the purpose of this article better. Again, this isn’t a slam against people using various terms to describe the same thing. Specifically, I am talking about the process by which Christians mature in their faith.
I am excited about studying a new paradigm for santification. Part of me is curious because it appears to be a novel approach. Keep in mind that I came from a church that said that maturty can only be accomplished in one way, high baptism rates. After 12 years of that, everything appears novel. A deeper part of me is interested at looking at a good model for santification instead of avoiding the bad model I’ve lived with for so long. Even I get tired of critique. More importantly, since I believe that a mature Christian does more than avoid sin, I look forward to becoming more mature in a deeper way than “not being like I was four years ago”.
Mostly, I just want to heal from some of the things that I have experienced at the hands of a few that claimed to be acting in the interests of God Almighty. I want to grow more mature in my faith, but I know that dealing with my past is a large obstacle. Knowing that I need to let go of the past is the beginning of the journey to use my experiences for the glory of God. However, whom among my friends in the ICoC subculture know how to do more than that? I suspect a precious few. I think my wife is one, she had dealt with her church ostracism at a critical time in her life. With professional, outside help, she was able to be healthy again. I think the chief editor of ICoC News is another that has found a way to be healthy.
I began my journey by writing down my thoughts here. I still write them here. I also continued with giving my life to others in serving and love. I found acceptance in my wife, church, and friends. I have a good relationship with the lead minister of my chruch and all members of leadership. My small group is full of people I enjoy, even if I don’t see them as much as I would like.
I’m sure this all sounds idyllic. I don’t want to overstate the things that have happened in my life. At the same time, there has been an overwhelming amount of blessing and encouragement for me.
However, all of this doesn’t help me to really deal with my past. It helps some, and I am not minimizing it. It’s just that things in my past and things our divisive brother in Portland are doing still hurt. In essence, I am doing what I have always been taught to do. The old paradigm for overcoming pain was to think happy thoughts and surround yourself with happiness. It was assumed that if you continually concentrated on happy thoughts and spent time in happy places, your emotions would change. Once your emotions changed, you’d stop hurting. I heard this preached in the pulpit and read it in a book or two. This way doesn’t help me, so I look for other ideas.
The six principles in the book are:
- Look Beneath the Surface
- Break the Power of the Past
- Live in Brokenness and Vulnerability
- Receive the Gift of Limits
- Embrace Grieving and Loss
- Make Incarnation Your Model for Living Well
Principle 3 is something I have read about in a book or two. Some of the other principles, however, are pretty much new to me, especially embracing grief and loss.
I am looking forward to seeing what happens in the near future.