Why am I here?

Led a reflection of the Gospel of John (3:1-17). The ensuing discussion was interesting because, in various ways with different levels of intensity, the question which emerged, over and again, was "why am I here?" While everyone at the table was armed with the standard answers, text book Christianity if you will, none of them seemed to find solace in them. They all "get it" and they can all articulate the wonders of God and the glories of Christianity. That isn't the problem. The struggle is with the 'match up'; connecting what we say with real life.

The real question was probably what does God think about how I spend my day? Lots of us have jobs and most jobs do not easily fit into the category of "ministry." As one person asked, "When I say I do everything for the glory of God, what does that look like when I spend my day doing XYZ?"

The textbook answer is, "everything can glorify God if we want it to" and there are enough lovely articles written about amazing holy people doing mundane tasks with grace to inspire us to think it is true. But, truth be told, most of us have figured out that the artistic skill of the story teller has a part to play in that inspiration. Last night I read an obituary about an author, a WWI veteran, who was disillusioned by war and wrote negatively on WWII. His point was that the glory of war and the glory of heroism are not glorious. He saw it as a horrible waste of human life and destructive. Movies and songs make it sound so much more romantic than it really is. That is the thing about movies and songs. They can make everything sound better.

Doing dishes. Brushing your teeth. Pumping gas. Balancing checkbooks. Trucking tennis shoes. Making paint. Selling suits, bonds, high rises or sun glasses. We spend all day doing all manner of activities and the question is, how does God like it?

An answer, tentative but interesting, was uncovered in these verse: "The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of  it, but you do not know where it comes ffrom or where it goes. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit." For most of my life I have struggled with the flow of thought in this passage. (when reading John's Gospel, the flow of thought is generally not easy to follow). I tended to see the two sentences as talking about the Holy Spirit and sort of ignored the reference to "those born"; seeing it instead as expressing the mystery of how the Spirit works on them. However, last night, it struck me that maybe the primary reference is to believers. The pun (see previous blog) on wind/Spirit connects the sentences thematically, but there is a shift. It may mean, like the wind, the lives of those born again are wrapped in mystery. We do not know where we came from or where we are headed. We have speculation about it, but no one knows. Yet, we do know, kind of (another theme in John, the yes and no contrast). We know God is in control. We trust.

It is hard to know how God views human life. This is why we get judged in the end. Whatever else we know, we do know that the world he made consists of lots of things which are not religious. We know that much of our lives is spent dealing with things which do not remotely seem to glorify God. Yet, we can offer ourselves to him. Just as a goat or ram on an altar do not instantly make sense as a sacrifice, so our lives, filled with mundane tasks, do not readily appear to be a worthy sacrifice. But they can and do if we are willing.

Why am I here? to learn, to love, to honor God. The actual doing it may (at times) be rife with disatisfaction, depression, frustration, confusion, yet this mist shrouded existence is the world we live in. God knows what He is about. So we gird our loins, ask our questions, and then we coninue the journey. From here to there, like the wind, driven along, perhaps imperceptively, by the Spirit.