Asking Myself: When have you felt God's presence most acutely in your life?

This is the 26th post in my series "Asking Myself," in which I weekly ponder one question posed in Teresa Blythe's rich book, 50 Ways to Pray. You can find the start of the series here and last week's post here. The first nine posts focused on theological musings, while posts 10 to 25 prayerfully consider the specific questions Jesus posed in the New Testament. This post begins a new theme: Questions on Spirituality.

Q: When have you felt God's presence most acutely in your life?

First off, I have to get something off my chest. The wording of Blythe's question made me feel "less-than." Specifically, the terms "felt" and "most acutely" trigger a bit of sadness for me because despite my love of the "still, small voice" in 1 Kings 19:13,  I start thinking of and comparing myself to those more awe-inspiring moments of God's presence recorded throughout scripture. There's Moses and the burning bush, Samuel and his audible midnight commission, Jacob's ladder, Mary's angelic visit, Elizabeth's womb acrobatics, the upper room and its rushing wind, Stephen's near-to-death heavenly vision and Paul's blind-struck road to Damascus. 

I definitely think stories like these more than qualify as genuine experiences of God's undeniable presence, but they aren't like my experience. I've never had a burning bush or bright light or dislocated hip socket, or dancing fetus ... well... at least not as a result of a heavenly encounter. 

I'm not sure why I feel compelled to compare my own experience or set my expectations on these sorts of "acute" experiences of the felt-presence of God. I don't know whether it's purely the pages of scripture filtered through my mind's eye that cause me to covet a similarly supernatural experience, or if somewhere along the line my "presence theology" was formed by well-intentioned pastors and leaders who had their own checklists for what qualifies as "feeling" "God's presence" "acutely"... but there's a tension in this question for me.

Jesus Asks: Do you love Me? (John 21:17)

This is the 25th post in my series "Asking Myself," in which I weekly ponder one question posed in Teresa Blythe's rich book, 50 Ways to Pray. You can find the start of the series here and last week's post here. The first nine posts focused on theological musings, while posts 10 to the present prayerfully consider the specific questions Jesus posed in the New Testament.

Q: Do you love Me? (John 21:17)

I love the way Jesus loves his fishermen disciples in this story: Appearing to them after the long haul of their work night with good company and good smells of toasty bread and fish and campfire. They didn't even talk until they'd eaten their beach breakfast. 

The metaphor latent in the scene was doing all the talking-- the simple meal sustaining them like it had the five thousand, the net of 153 fish overflowing beyond their imaginations. Jesus was still with them preforming practical miracles that open gates to otherworldly miracles.

After breakfast, Jesus addresses Peter, using his birth name, "Simon Son of John," perhaps a gentle jab at him for returning to swiftly to his old place and old ways. 

"Do you love me more than these?" (John 21:15)

Peter had been so sure he was all in the night before the crucifixion. He loved Jesus the most, more than any of the disciples, more than that pesky "other disciple" who had dubbed himself the "one Jesus loved." Peter loved Jesus enough to chop off ears and perhaps to go to a cross himself before he'd let the Romans lay a hand on the Christ, the Son of the Living God. Well, he had said as much. And he believed what he said, he believed that wild passion he felt for Jesus. 

But in the end, he just roostered out. He denied loving, following and even knowing Jesus before the day dawned. 

Jesus Asks: Have you believed because you have seen Me?

This is the 24th post in my series "Asking Myself," in which I weekly ponder one question posed in Teresa Blythe's rich book, 50 Ways to Pray. You can find the start of the series here and last week's post here. The first nine posts focused on theological musings, while posts 10 to the present prayerfully consider the specific questions Jesus posed in the New Testament.

Q: Have you believed because you have seen me? (John 20:29)

Did Thomas (and the other locked-room disciples) eventually believe in the resurrection because Jesus appeared in the flesh? I'm gonna say the answer is yes.  Jesus asks this of his doubtful disciple rhetorically, probably with the same heart-piercing expression he gave Peter when thrice asking if he loved Him. 

In your average church sermon, the preacher frowns upon"Doubting Thomas," the anti-example of what faith should look like. The disheartened disciple even gets a little nasty about it-- he wants to stick his fingers into the flesh wounds and see dripping blood before he'll believe. Yet I can hardly blame Thomas for wanting to see some proof that his teacher had in fact reappeared after being dead and buried for three days. 

In the version I commonly read, the New Living Translation, this verse, is not a question at all, but a statement. Here's the story in John 20:24-29:

One of the twelve disciples, Thomas (nicknamed the Twin), was not with the others when Jesus came. They told him, "We have seen the Lord!" But he replied, "I won't believe it unless I see the nail wounds in his hands, put my fingers into them, and place my hand into the wound in his side."
Eight days later the disciples were together again, and this time Thomas was with them. The doors were locked; but suddenly, as before, Jesus was standing among them. "Peace be with you," he said. Then he said to Thomas, "Put your finger here, and look at my hands. Put your hand into the wound in my side. Don't be faithless any longer. Believe!"
"My Lord and my God!" Thomas exclaimed.
Then Jesus told him, "You believe because you have seen me. Blessed are those who believe without seeing me."

For me, the question (or statement) is essentially about acceptance of the mysterious, otherworldly, death-defying nature of God, and it brings to mind memories of times in my Christian life when I was confronted with the "miraculous."

Jesus Asks: Does this offend you?

This is the 23rd post in my series "Asking Myself," in which I weekly ponder one question posed in Teresa Blythe's rich book, 50 Ways to Pray. This week, I diverge slightly in that I'm choosing a question Jesus asked that is not in Blythe's list, though I'm still following the spirit of the exercise as I ponder the question. You can find the start of the series here and last week's post here. The first nine posts focused on theological musings, while posts 10 to the present prayerfully consider the specific questions Jesus posed in the New Testament.

Q: Does this offend you? (John 6:61)

Jesus asks his disciples this question after they complain that talk of eating his flesh and drinking his blood are, to put it nicely, difficult to understand.

Does that offend you? How would I answer the question? In short, yes. Things Jesus says often offend me. Perhaps I'm not truly offended by the ideas in John 6, since my church upbringing has normalized the idea that we should joyfully "Taste and see that the Lord is Good!" We used the words "partake" of Jesus as our "divine portion." He's the "Bread of Life," the "true wine." He is satisfying and sweet. Wholesome and fortifying. All of these rewordings make poetic the very gruesome task of eating someone's flesh and drinking their blood. 

But I'm offended by what seems an intentional test or trap. Jesus knew his disciples were mostly unlearned. They weren't schooled to make big metaphoric leaps of logic. (And, let's face it, even the learned Nicodemus couldn't stomach the idea of being born again.) So eating flesh and drinking blood would be quite shocking. It would cause even the most ardent disciple to pause and say, "Come again?"

It bothers me that Jesus seems to use this language almost precisely because it has shock value, because the seeming vulgarity will catch people off guard. 

So I wonder, is Jesus really asking, "Does it offend you that I can be so crass, so unconventional, and shocking? Do you think it offensive that I am not predictable and tame and man-pleasing? Does it offend you that you encounter entirely unheard of ideas when you're under my teaching? Does it bother you that I defy defining? That I don't fit the mold of your day's notions of a good Messiah?"