that just don't sound right

There are things that I hear people say that just don't sound right to me, but sometimes I don't know exactly why. One of them is that "my Christian friends are not as much fun and way more high maintenance than my non-Christian friends." Hmmm. While there may be some element of reality in that statement, especially when you are viewing a small slice of someone's life, I believe at its very foundation, this is a lie. And here is why:

1. People who follow and love God are committed to transformation. This is a slightly more taxing goal than having fun and going with the flow (understatement), but definitely more rewarding. A friend of mine said that it was very easy to hang out with his old friends, drinking and passing around a joint, but much of the time it was to avoid having to do the hard work of taking responsibility for one's life and to numb the pain that inevitably comes from this bumpy road we all find ourselves on. Being committed to transformation is about rooting out and eliminating anything that is an obstacle to loving wholeheartedly, living freely, and trusting a good God. A joyful countenance and a graceful, grateful nature are side effects of surrender to God's love, but real and lasting transformation is not an easy journey. It is only for the courageous. (Thanks to Michael Jones for articulating this point and getting me thinking about this.)

2. People who are friends of God are committed to walking through life with others, even when those "others" might not be a whole lot of fun to be around or a drain on our resources at times. It is easy to hang out with people of similar likes and dislikes, people who demand very little of you and who never challenge your self-sufficiency and independence. It is not so easy to be a part of a real familial community. To be clear, I am not endorsing ongoing bad or co-dependent behaviour, but we all go through phases where we have to face difficult situations and deal with certain destructive and unhealthy attitudes, in ourselves and in others. Some of us take a little longer to get through these challenges than others, but as long as there is a willingness to change, there is hope. I know I have been grateful for people who have had the patience and the graciousness to walk with me through my unlovely valleys. How could I not be willing to do this for someone else? This is what community is all about. The strong ones support the weak. We look out for each other. We don't let someone fall by the wayside. We don't walk away.

3. People who are brave enough to walk with God in a vulnerable and open way are some of the most stable, yet unpredictably funny and outrageous people I know. Their wildness is safe but not tame. They need no outside stimulus to have a good time. The gift of life is their excuse to party, and they do so with gratitude and generosity. They are real, truthful, genuine, and dependable. They engage with life in an earthy, deep way, but have the ability to transcend the banal distractions of life, including their own mistakes and those of others. They can make cleaning a toilet, putting together a bookshelf, taking out the garbage, making a meal for 12, or deciphering a messy spread sheet one of the most fun and memorable things you will ever do because all of life is holy and precious and large when God is in it.

I want to be a friend that people like to be around, but more than that, I want to be transformed into the likeness of Jesus. I don't know of any person more attractive than him, though he sure did piss some people off. I guess it just goes with the territory. Cheers!

This is a mysterious plant in the woods near my house. Earthy brown, yet filled with wisps of light, white fluff.

together

Yesterday I spent 3 hours at my university campus. It is interesting how one can be surrounded by thousands of people and still feel quite alone. I ate my supper in a large student lounge area and tried to prepare for a Bible study later that night. Nothing much was inspiring me and God seemed remote and distant. I have been living with a sense of displacement lately. I am not exactly sure where or with which group of people I belong. I enjoy my studies and my colleagues, but I don't feel totally at home there. I love the people I encounter in my faith community, but we are in flux right now as well, changing places and dynamics and comfort zones. Many of my friends are at a crossroads or on a bridge in their lives and that affects how we relate to each other.

So I was walking towards the library yesterday afternoon and talking to God. I began my usual litany and realised that my heart just wasn't in it. If I was going to be talking to the most powerful and interested party in the universe, what did I really want to say? What was the cry at the core of my being? I just want to be loved. Yes, God, I just want to know that I am loved today. And I left it at that. A few steps later, I thought I heard something, so I checked my phone. There was a text message from my friend, saying, "Matte, I hug you from here..."

A few hours later I was walking again, this time away from the library and towards a friend's house. As is my habit, I usually converse with God while I am walking. It has been my practice lately to ask God for a gift every day. His choice. I am working at becoming a better receiver, a more open person instead of an island, and the one I most want to be open to is God, so I have been trying to practice receiving whatever he has for me. However, this afternoon, a different prayer came from my mouth for some reason. Instead of asking God for a gift, I asked if I could be a gift to someone.

About a minute later, I came upon a lady standing at one of the street corners, holding a piece of paper. She caught my eye and started in my direction. I began to sidestep her and raise a hand to let her know that, sorry, I was not interested in hearing her sad story and giving her money. But her question, in French, was not about money. It was asking for help with finding an address, so I stopped and looked at the paper.

She pointed to the street signs at the corner and told me how she was having trouble finding the correct number. We glanced at the paper together, and she realised that she was not on the right street. I pointed her in the right direction, and we walked together for a bit. She told me she had been wandering around for 15 minutes, unable to find her way to her destination. She had come out of the metro and taken a wrong turn, it seemed, and ended up blocks away from where she should be. In frustration, she said, "I'm so stupid!" I gently disagreed with her and pointed out that it wasn't that much further. We walked together for a few blocks, not saying much, and arrived at the correct street. She held out the paper to me again, asking me to help her find the specific address. I turned in a circle on the street corner, looking for numbers, and then spotted them on a building across the street. I showed it to her and she smiled, relieved.

As she crossed the street and headed off to her destination, she called back to me. "Merci beaucoup. Vous êtes un ange." Then she repeated it in English, just to make sure that I understood. "You are an angel!" I smiled in acknowledgement of her gratitude and stood there, watching until she had safely entered the building. Then I realised that I had just been a gift to that woman.

There is nothing magic about my prayers, nothing at all. Many days I ask for things to change and nothing seems to happen. But this day, after these two experiences, I heard a still, small voice say: "Do you see what happens when you are in agreement with me? When you are real and open and unselfish?" I was quite overwhelmed by the simple power of walking with God and walking with another person.

Today my prayer is: God, I want to do something together with you.

This is the park near my house on a beautiful fall day earlier this week.

coming out of the closet...kinda

I voted on Sunday. Montreal was having its municipal elections and we got to vote four times. Once for the mayor of Montreal, once for our local borough mayor (St-Laurent), once for the city councilor and once for the borough councilor. I am not all that up on municipal politics, so I decided to inform myself. In case you are not aware of the plethora of intricate and complex issues at stake when you vote in Montreal, here are a few of the things going on:

1. The current mayor and his party have been plagued by scandal. There have been numerous accusations about crooked contracts, bloated costs, Mafia connections, and political pay-offs. It seems to be the way we do business in this city.

2. The main opposition to the current mayor was from a woman who has spent 39 years working for the Parti Quebecois (the political party dedicated to promoting Quebec sovereignty and separation from Canada). She was one of the main forces behind the mega-city merger and wants to centralize power and take it out of the hands of the boroughs. She joined herself with a strong federalist and they promised to provide a broad and comprehensive basis of experience and viewpoints. Unfortunately, 2 weeks before the election, her right-hand man was implicated in a bribe and immediately resigned.

3. The third option was a man with little experience in city government. He promised more bike paths, a new tram system, and a greener downtown (less cars). He was squeaky clean in his finances, but he also believed that smoking was good for his health and that man never walked on the moon.

4. I will not even mention the communist or the gay pride candidates.

After some discussion with Dean and a few friends, I did not know what to do. I quite easily decided which councilors and borough mayoral candidate to vote for, but the city mayoral race left me dumbfounded. Each person had a major flaw and each person also had potential to do something good for the city, I believed, despite their patchy pasts. Do we not all have regrettable things in our past? All my research just convinced me all the more of these things. Dean was going to vote for the current mayor and he was very vocal about it. He will never vote for a separatist and he thought the other guy was a loose cannon.

All these questions were swirling around in my head the morning of the election. Who would do the best for the city? for my interests? Who would clean up the scandals? Who had the most experience? Who would stick to a budget and not raise taxes? Who would make things better instead of worse? My thoughts jumped from one to the other, alighting on no answer. So I asked God, "What is the question I should be asking? Can we just boil it down to one question instead of six?" And that morning I read John 18 where Jesus says to Pilate, the Roman governor: "Everyone who cares for truth, who has any feeling for the truth, recognizes my voice."

So the question I asked was, "Who will tell the truth?" Nothing else mattered right then. Not the past mistakes, not the future promises, not the affiliation or experience, nothing but their potential to embrace truth. I looked at all the candidates again and decided that I would definitely not vote for the current mayor. I did believe that # 3 was an honest man, but he seemed to have a skewed view of reality and a hard time recognizing truth at times. That left me with the woman. The separatist, as Dean called her. It was an uncomfortable choice. I have never supported anyone who was not a federalist. My western Canadian family and friends would have all shuddered that I was even considering the possibility, even though city politics are quite different from national politics.

Dean and I walked to the voting station Sunday afternoon and both cast our ballots. Afterwards, he asked me who I voted for and I coyly avoided the question. I did not want to see his reaction. I knew he would be disappointed and perhaps angry and embarrassed at my answer. I did tell him later on that night and we survived the conflict. A friend had jokingly warned me that if I voted for the PQ woman, our marriage would be over. I responded that everything would be fine, because we did not believe in separation. It was a funny moment. But I did take away a few things with me that Sunday afternoon.

1. God is often not concerned with the same things that we are concerned about in a political situation. He loves and cares for each candidate as much as he cares for us. They are real people with real families and if I invited them into my home for dinner, I would no doubt see what made them want to serve the city in the first place.

2. It is good to listen to the opinions and thoughts of others, but in the end, I must take responsibility for my own actions and stand by them with confidence. I bring a voice to this world that no one else does and even if I sing a wrong note on occasion, I still must sing to the best of my ability.

3. I live in Quebec where almost half of the population has voted for the Parti Quebecois at one point or another. It is good for me to try to understand what they are thinking and why. It is not a disgrace or a dishonor to the rest of Canada to put myself into the shoes of my neighbors and walk with them. We may disagree, but that does not make us any less part of the same family.

4. I know that despite my limited knowledge and my weak choices, God is still in charge. Jesus said to Pilate: "You have not a shred of authority over me except what has been given you from heaven." (John 19) And that's the final word.

I am not a separatist, but I am not ashamed to stand with one. Perhaps that's the reason some people started talking about separation in the first place: they felt that people were not willing to stand beside them.

This is a photo I took on our walk back from the polling station on Sunday. Beautiful fall sky and tall grass.

hand off

Control freak confession #17: Lately I am realising that my style of leadership/friendship is sometimes too heavy-handed. I see things, I know things, I have some life experience and wisdom, of that there is no doubt. But does that give me the right or responsibility to try to steer other people's lives? I am beginning to think not. Trying to actively guide others has felt like the responsible and loving thing to do, but in truth, it primarily satisfies my sense of well-being when we are all going the same direction (MINE) and involved in the same things (WHAT I THINK IS IMPORTANT) and helps me feel successful. God is just not that one-dimensional nor that boring. Unity is not stuffing all the working parts into the same box and dragging them behind me. It is much more beautiful and strange than that.

Control is like my hand grabbing onto someone or something that I love, trying to keep them or it in line with my idea of godliness, and today I feel God prying my fingers off, one at a time. First, he loosens my index finger. This is the digit that I use to point out things that are wrong in a situation, wrong in someone's life, wrong about how people relate to God and how they are missing the mark. Apparently, this is not my job. The Holy Spirit convicts and God's kindness leads to repentance. His love is a wooing love. Sigh. One less thing I need to do, I guess.

Then he pulls my middle finger away from steering wheel of my life and my friends and my church family and my occupations. This is the finger that does two things: it is the strongest one in holding onto things and not letting go, but it is also the fastest one to lose patience in the middle of conflict and tell everyone to f*** off. It knows no middle ground. It is the place I dig in my stubborn heels and insist that we are going to see this thing through (tunnel vision), especially the way I intend it to go, or I get disgusted and disappointed and flip everyone off, threatening to walk away. Neither are all that useful. God's patience is as longsuffering as his mercy. His mercy comes in an open hand, not pushy or threatening.

Then the next two fingers come off together. They are the co-dependent ones, not able to do anything without the influence of the other. They are looking for support and affirmation and someone to do life with, but in an unhealthy way, always looking for their cue from someone else, lacking confidence to act bravely and selflessly. Jesus is my bravery.

Last to be coaxed out of this controlling grip is the thumb. It is the opposing finger. It always sees the alternate view. It says, "No," before it knows why, just because there is surely something that won't work about what is proposed. It doesn't like to be told what to do, and hates not being the one with the final say. It believes it is there to provide a necessary check and balance, but in reality, it doesn't work all that well with anyone; it just pushes against everything instead of cooperating and providing support. It knows how to make a fist, too, and really has little concept of what its intended position is. God knows how to cradle someone softly, or how to enclose them in the safety of his hand.

This is my hand on my life. This is my hand on the church community I am trying to serve. This is my hand on my friends. This is my hand on my family and my possessions. This is my hand on my job, my school, my cat, my household, and my soul. But then the kind driving instructor comes along and now we are learning a new way to journey. Hands off is not for the faint of heart. Brake off. Heart engaged. Surrender is the most courageous and effective thing I will do all day.

This is me and my hands a few years ago in my office. Hey, Matte, it's not that scary.

I am her

I don't know about the church. I love her. I am frustrated with her. I am her. I have spent so much of my life investing in her, trying to help her find her hidden beauty, coaxing small steps forward out of her, and telling her inspiring, mesmerising, and often bewildering stories. At times, I have to admit, I have given her stern lectures about her disappointing behaviour. But there have been lots of good times, too. We have laughed at life's oddities and joys. We have gone on road trips that have changed us. We have eaten the best meals together, so much more tasty because of the hours spent elbow to elbow in the kitchen. We have strung flowers from ceilings and stripped off our clothes and jumped about foolishly and called it art, or worship, or both.

I am deeply committed to her as a part of me and a part of Jesus. When I am with her the human and divine come crashing together, sometimes painfully, but most times like a symphony being written by a group of gifted children who are still learning the fine art of playing together. The sweet notes take your breath away, and when you hear them, you forget all the sour notes that were tripped over on the way there. Sometimes it feels more like a tug of war, or a standoff. Sometimes it is like that peaceful moment just before you fall asleep. Always there is movement. At least that is my hope.

Last night one of my friends stated that we live in a place where people have deep wounding in the area of commitment. That much is becoming obvious to me. I cannot count the number of times I have been the only person to show up on time, to come prepared with a prayer and some thoughts, or to suggest a plan of study or an activity. I am always there. It is what I do. I am trying to be faithful. I no longer get annoyed at people not responding to my emails, not returning my phone calls, only showing up when it is convenient, and almost never coming up with any initiative of their own. If people don't want to do it, I cannot make them. We are not a healthy body in some ways for though we love and care for each other in a very familial way, we have very little sustainability, much less growth.

Part of the problem is that I probably carry too much of this weight of sustaining and building something: I long to see the emergence of a vibrant community of people that welcome Jesus and the outsider with equal excitement. I cannot make that happen, and perhaps I am using all the wrong avenues to try to nurture it. How do we heal that deep wound that never wants to commit, to give oneself totally? That always wants the option to bow out? I don't know. Lately I have found myself toying with the idea of not showing up and seeing if anyone notices. But that's no solution - that's just walking away because it is hard.

What I can do is this: I can bring myself to that frightening place of commitment every day. I cannot drag anyone else with me. I cannot force them to do the holy face plant of surrender in front of King Jesus and then to take up his great heartbreaking love for Montreal with all its demands. All I can do is point out some of those passions buried deep inside of them and then ask if they are willing to do the work of digging them up so that we can fan them into life. And while they are thinking about it, I will still be here. As a friend. As someone who wants to learn life together. As someone who is willing to go first.

Being the church is never about showing up to a meeting or taking on a role, but about talking to people the way Jesus talked to them, walking beside them the way he did, and pursuing their healing and freedom while he is pursuing ours. It should be our life, happening everywhere and all the time. If we are not living like this, we are not extensions of him. We are not his body. Sometimes we have to learn what we are not before we can see what we truly are and can become.

I don't know about the church, but I know someone who does. I will have to trust him, because I am her.

This is photo of a maple leaf in the woods earlier this month. Oh, Canada!

NOTE: I realise that the correct grammatical structure would be "I am she," but the blog just wrote itself this way and I like it. Apologies to all speakers of good English.

relapse

Someone must have rearranged our bedroom furniture during the night. I got up this morning , it seems, on the proverbial wrong side of the bed. After a month of blessed and undeserved contentment and gratitude in my heart, I felt the old brain start to go in negative patterns again this morning. The sad thing is not that this happened (and will occasionally happen), but that I allowed myself to go down that road, to stay on that track, and ended up saying things to people that I now regret. Yes, apologies have been given, and I have to trust that forgiveness and redemption are bigger than my blunders.

It started when I got irritated and annoyed because one little thing did not happen the way I wanted it to this morning. My prayer as I walked to the bank this afternoon was "God, I am a control freak. Please help me to be a lover instead." It is so hard to remain out of control of my life. I can do okay for a period of time and then WHAM I just get tired of not having a say in how things go. I want to write the "to do" list for God and for others, thinking that having my needs and desires met will be good for mankind. My version of "the good life" is very small and self-centred, if I am honest with myself. It takes very little into account except how to feel at ease with myself and my circumstances.

However (big however), God's love knows no bounds. His grace is more than enough for any shit that plops in my way. God is not scared off by bad moods and frustration, because hope is greater than all of it, and he always has plenty to offer. He never walks away. He gives good gifts, especially when I ask for them, and waits for me to open wide, ready to receive whatever they are.

I have the potential to be an incredible receiver. Sometimes I forget that and jump into the position of quarterback. Then I try to throw my own plays to myself. No wonder it never quite works out. Let me be content with receiving. Let me practise and practise until I do it so well that it becomes second nature to me. And let me untwist my heart from its painful contortions of confusion: trust is not helplessness, though it often feels like it.

Being a control freak results in chronic disappointment. Being a lover ends in being in love.

This is a pond where beavers have built a dam somewhere in the Laurentians.

the zone

We are in an interesting place as a faith community, literally. The lease on the space we currently rent expires at the end of the month, and we are unable to renew it due to zoning issues. We found a new space that was smaller and much better suited to our needs (with our own private bathrooms!) and after we met with the landlord and signed a lease, that space also fell through due to a zoning ruling. The Director of Urban Planning suggested that we rent space from an existing church in order to avoid the zoning problem. Now we would be perfectly happy to share space with another church, but most of the congregations are housed in old, formal, cavernous, pewed buildings not conducive to our casual and interactive worship and teaching style. At Vineyard Montreal, we have couches and sit in a semi-circle and you are free to interrupt the speaker with a question or comment at any time. Plus, where would the drums go? Sadly, meeting as a church in a non-traditional church space seems a bit difficult in Montreal.

So on October 31, we will be homeless as a church. Sort of. One of the brainstorming ideas that we tossed around was that if nothing worked out, we could just go hang out with another church a few blocks away that also did church outside of the conventional box. They are associated with a totally different denomination, but they have much the same vision and demographics as we do. They also meet the same time as our group, and not far away. I mentioned this in passing to a few of the people in our group on Saturday, and I was surprised at the strong reaction I got. One person teared up. Another smiled broadly. I was told that there was something profound about this joining together, about not erecting a fence to protect what we had.

I took the words seriously. After consulting with Dean (who was still in China but called me late that night just to chat), I phoned the point man of the other church Sunday morning and he was very excited by the possibility of meeting together as one group for a period of time. He said he would talk to his people that night. I said I would do the same, and we would see what came of it. That evening, I sat down on a PA speaker after my thanksgiving talk (which had consisted of a bible story, discussing some Dutch and Canadian art, and a music video from Sister Act 2), and asked the folks on the couches what they thought of the idea of being part of something bigger than just ourselves, at least for a time. The response was overwhelmingly positive. There was an excitement about the "coming together" experiment that I had not anticipated.

On Sunday night, November 1, we will be heading over to Reggie's Bar at one of the largest universities in Montreal to join in worshipping our great God with a group of people that we don't know called The Living Room. They have asked us to perhaps lead one of the meetings in a few weeks. We are trying it for a month and seeing what comes of it. Perhaps God wants to do something here that we would never have dreamed of had it not been for inflexible zoning regulations.

I have no idea what we will be doing with our music equipment, couches, desks and various tables and chairs that we have in our current space, but we have found a place for the people, and that is the most important thing.

This is a photo of a stick in a ditch, somehow beautiful in all its muddy tangle.