I Think The Church Needs – I

God Gives Us What We Want. For People Who Want Nothing To Do With Peace, Joy, Reconciliation And Peace... God Will Give You What You Want. I See People Make Unbelievably Destructive Choices.

God Then Makes People Whom He Puts Right In The Middle Of All This Loaded Creation. Commanding Them To Care For Creation, To Manage It, To Lovingly Use It, To Creatively Order It... They Are Environmentalists. Being Deeply Connected With Their Environment Is Who They Are. For Them To Be Anything Else Or To Deny Their Divine Responsibility To Care For All That God Has Made Would Be To Deny Something That Is At The Core Of Their Existence. This Is Why Litter And Pollution Are Spiritual Issues.

Take Faith, For Example. For Many People In Our World, The Opposite Of Faith Is Doubt. The Goal, Then, Within This Understanding, Is To Eliminate Doubt. But Faith And Doubt Aren't Opposites. Doubt Is Often A Sign That Your Faith Has A Pulse, That It's Alive And Well And Exploring And Searching. Faith And Doubt Aren't Opposites, They Are, It Turns Out, Excellent Dance Partners.

Some Communities Don't Permit Open, Honest Inquiry About The Things That Matter Most. Lots Of People Have Voiced A Concern, Expressed A Doubt, Or Raised A Question, Only To Be Told By Their Family, Church, Friends, Or Tribe: "we Don't Discuss Those Things Here." I Believe The Discussion Itself Is Divine. Abraham Does His Best To Bargain With God, Most Of The Book Of Job Consists Of Arguments By Job And His Friends About The Deepest Questions Of Human Suffering, God Is Practically On Trial In The Book Of Lamentations, And Jesus Responds To Almost Every Question He's Asked With...a Question.

What You Believe About The Future Shapes, Informs, And Determines How You Live Now.