Transformation: Communion, Not Competence

Jesus’ story is not a religious story about trying harder to get it all right.  In fact, the entire narrative of the Bible is about how we can’t get everything right on our own.  The Apostle Paul says in fact that the laws of the Bible were given, in part, to reveal this to us: we can’t get it all right.  (Yes, he actually says this!  See Romans 5-8.)  And when Jesus says, “be perfect,” he’s not throwing us onto the hamster wheel of performance and will power.  He’s provoking us into the cycle of trying to transform our hearts into something we deem acceptable only to discover that we will never succeed. 

Of course, we may be able to curb our behavior—and so we should—the sort of repentance we are talking about often comes after we have exhausted all the resources of our will power, and the paradox is that we should and must employ our will power as we seek transformation.  Still, the deeper, unsorted parts of our heart are never straightened out by will power alone.  In fact, the way we become “perfect” is by accepting this reality!  Until you believe this and accept it, you’ll always be resisting grace, even if you are proclaiming it.

Furthermore, to be a sinner, according to the scripture, does not mean “to be a person who has done bad things that they need to confess” so that they can try to do better.  Yes, we confess what we’ve missed, of course.  Tremendous energy for transformation is released when we do this sincerely.  We also curb our behavior and try to do better, which really just means seeking to do well, with good intentions.  However, it must go further, for confession and repentance and being a sinner is not just a doing thing, it’s a being thing.  When we repent and confess as sinners, we are confessing that we will never be complete on our own, and that we will never get it all right!

The good news is that Jesus was never looking for this from us, anyway.  He is way more interested in communion than he is in our competence.  On that long walk (see Transformation I), as I was in the midst of berating myself, the strangest image floated into my mind: I saw a Facebook page and the infamous words, “It’s Complicated.”  I think somehow the Holy Spirit must have dropped this thought into my mind, as suddenly I was confessing, “Jesus, my heart is complicated.  I’m complicated.  And I just have to bring to you all these things about myself I don’t like, because I’m drowning in focusing on them and trying to hide them.”  Suddenly, I felt two things I had not felt all day: relief and joy.  I experienced, not as concept but as reality, that Jesus is way more interested in being with me than he is in judging the parts of me I deem unsorted.  He sees through all that, anyway, to the true self he created and loves.  I can only see that when I befriend my weaknesses and stop hating them. 

Questions for Reflection and Response

Where in your life do you struggle to believe that God could adopt you even when you are still so unsorted? 
What is it about your life that you most believe disqualifies you?

If you identify that thing, good work!  Now, can you take it a step further? 

Give thanks for that thing.  Not because you like it or because you want it to stay as it is, but because it’s an opportunity to celebrate that God still says “yes” over you, even while you’re unsorted.

Transformation: Confession and Repentance, The Foundation of Transformation

Following Jesus is all about transformation.  After all, Paul says that the only thing that matters is becoming a new creation (Galatians 6:15).  So, how does it happen?  How, exactly, are we transformed?  This is the question at the center of spiritual life.  And since everything is spiritual, it’s the question at the heart of…well, everything. 

Jesus makes is clear that transformation always begins with confession and repentance.  “Repent and believe” is his first invitation (Mark 1:15).

Unfortunately, because words are malleable and easily tainted, these two words can feel like somber, churchy words.  Images of self-flagellating monks may come to mind; or of crazies standing on 5th Avenue with “Turn or Burn” signs. “Repentance” has often been co-opted by those pedaling the message “repent or perish!” rather than Jesus’ invitation to “repent and believe.”

Furthermore, we often have assumptions about what confession and repentance is and, namely, that it’s about listing all the things done wrong or identifying all the weak parts of our hearts.

Recently I was on a long walk, trying to clear my head, feeling exhausted.  The landscape around me was all gorgeous trees and flowers, but I was all misery.  I was whipping myself—in my own mind, anyway--for all the things that are still so incomplete within me.  Why do I care so much what people think about me?  Why am I so desperate to be understood and affirmed?  Why am I so committed to comfort rather than risk?  Why can’t I stop?  How do I change myself?!   I was frustrated that I could not find the “transformation switch.”

Clearly my notion of confession and repentance often involves a heavy dose of beating myself up for my weaknesses, as if being hard on myself can make me a new creation.  But what if transformation is not about overcoming weaknesses?  What if grace is not “another chance to get it right?”

Try this thought on, even if you don’t believe it: you don’t come to Jesus through your strengths, you come through your weaknesses.  You don’t come to God through your competence, but through humility.

This is the step that mere religion can never get.  In a world committed to looking strong and competent, religion—even and sometimes especially Christianity—drifts into performance, with the belief that if we do well enough, we’ll be transformed.  But what we all discover is that no matter how much we mature, we never arrive.  There are always parts of our heart that remain beyond our grasp, which no ritual can cleanse.  Religion, in fact, is often just the ego’s game of trying to become acceptable on our own terms without having to be dependent on another, or in this case, The Other.  Our ego—the part of us that wants to look and feel good and never appear vulnerable--always wants to pay its own way and never wants to have to be dependent on any one else, even God!  If we follow the ego, religion will just be about trying to manage our sin and do better, and confession and repentance will be reduced to a merely ritualistic mechanism.  

Only when we come to not only profess but also believe Jesus will we discover that Jesus is not interested in our competence, he’s interested in communion and in receiving us in our weakness.  The invitation to follow Jesus is a radical call to humility.

A Prayer for Grounding in Confession and Repentance

Jesus, I am weak, and I rejoice in my weakness, that I may be found in the grace poured on the poor and powerless.  Forgive me for trying to hide the parts of my heart I deem unacceptable.  I confess that as much as I try, I’m never going to get everything right.  I repent—I turn—from all the ways I’ve tried to be sufficient on my own, and I marvel at the reality that you adopt me and accept me, even when I’m so unsorted.  How can you be so good?  Please teach me, by your Spirit, to trust you fully. 

Through Christ my Lord, Amen.