In honor of the holiday weekend I thought I would write a Halloween themed post. And I could think of no better way to kick it off than with a picture of my dog in her Halloween costume! We don’t normally dress her up, but the town where I live had a massive pumpkin festival in which we competed to break the world record for most carved pumpkins. The record was 32,000 and we only made it to 26,000, but we still had a lot of fun and Ellie showed her team spirit with her costume.

(This particular picture makes me laugh because I think she looks like an evil dictator.)

Keeping with the Halloween theme, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about a popular show on the Travel Channel. It’s called “Ghost Adventures,” but it’s not your average ghost show.

The program is shot in a documentary style by 3 guys who spend the night in reportedly haunted places and report their findings. The show itself is not designed to be scary–no spooky music or raspy voiced narrators or up-close camera shots of them whispering, “I’m so scared!” It’s more of a scientific approach as the leader of the group aims to disprove supernatural skeptics. He explains during the opening segment of each show that he once had his own encounter with a ghost, and has since been driven by the desire to prove their existence in the world.

This show is fascinating to me because I think these men are sincere, and I also think they have no idea just what they’re messing with. In fact, one of the men admitted that his marriage eventually fell apart after he couldn’t stop having nightmares about a specific haunted location. As I’ve watched the show, it has given me a lot to think about in terms of spiritual warfare.

I’m also not the only one who finds this show interesting. It has grown in popularity and the Travel Channel shows it all the time. However, Ghost Adventures’ rise in popularity is not necessarily a unique phenomenon– it belongs to a long line of “haunted” entertainment (haunted houses, ghost stories, ghost tours, etc.) that consumers just can’t seem to get enough of.

The question is why? Why are people so captivated by stories about ghosts? And more strangely, why do people enjoy being scared by them? In an age when the supernatural realm is so publicly frowned upon and largely absent from mainstream media, why do these shows maintain such unchallenged acceptance?

Well you might be surprised to know that this is a question theologians have studied. In particular, theologian Rudolph Otto and the more familiar C.S. Lewis examined what this desire to be scared by ghosts tells us. According to both Otto and Lewis, the feeling of fear, dread, and awe that we experience when hearing a scary ghost story or watching a show about ghosts is the result of an encounter with the “numinous.” In his book The Problem of Pain, Lewis describes the numinous the following way:

“In all developed religion we find three strands or elements, and in Christianity one more. The first of these is what Professor Otto calls the experience of the Numinous. Those who have not met this term may be introduced to it by the following device. Suppose you were told there was a tiger in the next room: you would know that you were in danger and would probably feel fear. But if you were told ‘There is a ghost in the next room’, and believed it, you would feel, indeed, what is often called fear, but a different kind. It would not be based on the knowledge of danger, for no one is primarily afraid of what a ghost may do to him, but of mere fact that it is a ghost. It is ‘uncanny’ rather than dangerous, and the special kind of fear it excites may be called Dread. With the Uncanny one has reached the fringes of the Numinous. Now suppose that you were told simply ‘There is a mighty spirit in the room’, and believed it. Your feelings would then be even less like the mere fear of danger: but the disturbance would be profound. You would feel wonder and a certain shrinking–a sense of inadequacy to cope with such a visitant and of prostration before it–an emotion which might be express in Shakespeare’s words ‘Under it my genius is rebuked’. This Feeling may be described as awe, and the object which excites is as the Numinous.”

The above description may bring to mind the scene in Isaiah 6:5 when Isaiah stands before the holy God, trembling and confessing, “Woe to me! I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips.” That fear, awe and dread is what a human experiences in the presence of something holy, other, and completely transcendent. It is both a wonderful and frightful experience, and as Lewis explains, we encounter the fringes of that same sensation when interacting with lesser elements of the spiritual realm.

The reason people like to experience this particular kind of fear is that, without realizing it, they are glimpsing an echo of what it’s like to encounter God. Whenever we interact with the metaphysical, whether it is through worship, ghost stories, or even a truly magnificent work of art, it causes our souls to shudder in a way that is both frightening and marvelous. That is why humans seek after that feeling, not knowing that it is ultimately found in God.

Of course, the quest for the numinous can be a dangerous one, as I believe the men on Ghost Adventures have experienced first-hand. If you fixate on the wrong source, you will not only miss God altogether but instead fall into idolatry or a preoccupation with a darker, perilous realm. Even so, I see the popularity of shows like Ghost Adventures as a clear indicator that our country is spiritually thirsty. While science has made it unpopular to explore the supernatural in a legitimate, acceptable way, shows like Ghost Adventures offer a back door approach to asking questions about the supernatural realm in a less politically charged manner. They also provide us with a great way to start conversations that ultimately lead to the one true source of awe and wonder, a holy God.

A couple weeks ago my dog had to undergo minor surgery to have her teeth cleaned. The vet had to put her under anesthesia to clean the plaque off her teeth and pull a few teeth that were infected. I know I KNOW–I sound like one of THOSE dog people. But seriously, my fear of being that stereotype is why I put off having her teeth cleaned until now. Up until now I kept thinking, “Uh, she’s a dog. Dogs in the wild don’t get their teeth cleaned. I think she’ll be fine.” Come to find out that small dogs have bad teeth because of their genetics and if left unattended they can get severe infections. My bad.

But anyways, she had the teeth cleaning, the anesthesia, the whole nine yards, and since then we’ve been treating her like a baby. During the first day or two she didn’t feel well at all so we gave her pain meds and antibiotics around the clock. The pain meds were a liquid, which made them easy to ingest, but the antibiotics come in pill form, which means we had to get creative about giving them to her.

Our solution? Pepperoni. We found that if we wrapped that tiny little pill in half a pepperoni, she would swallow it in a split second. I don’t even know how she could taste the pepperoni when she ate it that fast. But suffice it to say, the pepperoni did its job. It successfully doctored up the medicine so that she would take it, and get better.

What does any of this have to do with Easter and Resurrection? Well last week I saw that a colleague of mine, Jared Wilson, had posted the following thought on his facebook status:

“Jared wishes churches would stop treating the resurrection like it’s the medicine you put in a donut to trick the dog.”

Now I thought this was a sharp idea. But when I ran it by my Women’s Bible Study last week, it totally flopped. People were looking at my like “Whaaaat?” But after reflecting on it I think I realized the problem–people don’t wrap their dog’s medicine in donuts. People wrap their dog’s medicine in meat or cheese or something small the dog can easily swallow…like pepperonis!

So I thought I would try this illustration again, because I think it’s a good one! The basic idea is this–the medicine I gave my dog was an antibiotic, something that she needed if she was going to fight the infection in her mouth. But the medicine had to be dressed up and doctored before she would accept it. The fact that it would heal her was not enough for her to accept it.

While my dog has an excuse for this behavior since she’s a dog, we treat the Resurrection of Christ the same way. Whenever we share the Gospel with people, we either ignore the Resurrection part of the story, or we dress it up so that it’s flashier or more appealing…AS IF IT NEEDS IT! If there is any story in the Bible, any doctrine or belief in the entire Christian tradition that does NOT need dressing up, it’s the Resurrection. The Resurrection is the best news that we have! It is what makes the Gospel the Gospel. We have eternal life because Jesus was resurrected, and we need only have faith in Him for the same outcome.

We don’t need to fancy up the Resurrection. If you find yourself having trouble selling the Resurrection, then perhaps it’s because you haven’t truly reflected on it lately. If you spend some time pondering the perfect and world-transforming miracle that took place in the Resurrection, then you wouldn’t have to dress it up. Its goodness would be written across your face.

The Resurrection is not a spiritual medicine that makes us well but is hard to swallow. It is beautiful and glorious. Now that Easter is here, sit at your Father’s feet and bask in the good thing He has done for us! He is Risen!!!!!!!

This week as I have reflected on the nature of suffering, there is one final thing I’d like to add. In my lesson Wednesday I mentioned the plethora of bad teaching on suffering. Throughout the history of mankind, theologians and philosophers alike have struggled to find meaning and purposeful reflection on this very difficult topic, so it’s no wonder that pastors today continue to fumble the ball.

With that in mind, I want to add a number of things that suffering is NOT. These points are taken from the Driscoll sermon I mentioned in my last post, and I think they provides some helpful boundaries for not only interpreting our own suffering, but comforting others in their suffering as well:

• Suffering does not make you a victim. While it’s important that we not blame ourselves or believe that God is somehow punishing us when tragedy strikes, it is also important that we understand sin has consequences. For instance, choosing to have unsafe sex can result in contracting diseases. Choosing to date someone that you know is wrong can result in massive heartache. In these instances God’s is not punishing you, but there are very real consequence for your bad decisions.
• Suffering is not to be pursued. There is some very faulty theology that exalts the path of suffering and considers it to be more virtuous. This belief is problematic in two ways:

1. In Genesis 1 God declares the world and all that is in it to be good. Then in 1 Timothy 6:17 we are reminded that God gives us richly all things to enjoy. While we should never let material things become our master, they are not evil. To resist the good things of this world and impose suffering on our ourselves is to deny the gifts that God has given us. This thinking also strays into a kind of heretical theology called gnosticism.
2. The pursuit of suffering is rooted in guilt. As I have mentioned before, the suffering that we as Christians endure is not a punishment from God. Jesus received that punishment on the cross. The suffering we endure is a result of living in a thoroughly broken world. God is a redeemer and He can use it, but for us to pursue suffering for its own sake indicates a belief that Jesus’ sacrifice was not enough to restore our relationship with God. Instead, we find ways to add to the meaning and power of his sacrifice. The pursuit of suffering is not the only way we do this–any action that is driven by the belief that we must make ourselves better in order to be accepted is rooted in the same errant belief. Do not imply that Christ’s crucifixion is somehow inadequate by seeking out suffering. Jesus’ dying words, “It is finished,” remind us that his suffering and death was not only enough, but also complete.

• Suffering is not to be excused because God uses it. Driscoll told the story of a father who beat his sons growing up. Reflecting upon their childhood the father concluded, “Well, look how good they turned out! I must have done something right!” The father’s actions were inexcusably wrong, and the fact that God redeemed the situation was no validation of the father’s behavior. God, by His very character, can take a bad situation and make it good, but that does not mean the evil actions of a person are somehow justified. Sin is sin no matter how God uses it.
• Suffering is no excuse to allow evil. I CANNOT emphasize this point enough, especially when talking to women. In fact, I wish I had mentioned it on Wednesday. Do NOT allow people to sin in the name of your own sanctification! If you are in an abusive relationship and you feel God has used it to grow your relationship with Him, then praise God, but the man who is abusing you needs to be sanctified too. Call the police and let God deal with him! You are facilitating evil by allowing Him to abuse you. God HATES the actions of any person who treats you as less than the beautiful, divine image that you are. Never ever excuse your own suffering when it enables the twisted sin of another person in your life.
• Not all suffering has an explanation. In the face of tragedy we desperately seek to understand why. It is this desperation that often leads us to superficial answers. There are some things we will never know this side of eternity, so we must find solace in the knowledge that God DOES love us, even when we don’t feel it.

If you find yourself in a place of despair right now, please know that God has not forgotten you. I don’t know why you are there, but I do know the character of your Father. It is the character of One who could easily distance Himself from our pain, but instead became a man to share in our suffering. It is the character of One who is so intimately tied to His people, so much so that we are called His “body.” When we are wounded, His own body is wounded. So remember His character! He grieves along side of you and aches when your heart aches, but not as one without power or hope. God is also a redeemer. He is loving and He is good. In those darkest of moments, place your hope in Him.

In my last post I explained that I’ll be out of the country for the week, so in honor of my new blog design I’m doing a week of Best of She Worships posts. Coming in at #5 is “Everybody’s Poop Looks the Same.”

Right now I am in the throes of a massive head cold, so I’ve decided to depart from my usual quasi-intellectualism and write about something that’s a little bit more at my current functioning capacity. Bear with me.

(And my apologies to those of you who are offended at the use of the word “poop,” or if you’re like my friend Joe, who is utterly disgusted by girls who make any kind of reference to this bodily function.)

As we all know, most dating relationships go through a series of stages of comfortability. There’s the stage in which you will let your boyfriend see you wearing sweats, when you let him see you without make-up, when you let him kiss you before you’ve brushed your teeth, etc.

But perhaps one of the ultimate relationship benchmarks is the Smelly Bathroom stage. Prior to this stage, you will do whatever it takes to fool your significant other into thinking that you simply do not produce the Big Number 2. You will go across the street, find a bathroom in another part of the building, house, or apartment, or if you don’t have that option, you’ll turn on the bathroom fan and run some water. Or for those of us who are really ashamed, we’ll hold it…much to the dismay of our intestinal tract.

But eventually there comes a point at which you quit putting on the charade, and you just go for it. Sometimes this happens with your foreknowledge, other times you are so desperate that you have no choice and mother nature forces you.

But whatever the circumstances, you reach a point at which you are no longer ashamed in the way you used to be. You have now owned up to the reality that you do in fact poop, and amazingly your boyfriend is still attracted to you, so you have a new level of connectedness and acceptance that you didn’t have before.

What is truly ironic about this whole process is the shame and embarrassment that we associate with this bodily function, even though EVERYBODY does it. Why is it that we feel the need to pretend that we are the only human being in the history of time that doesn’t have to do this? Why aren’t we comfortable with the reality that it’s a normal part of life?

When you get right down to it, everyone poops. And not only that, but everyone’s poop pretty much looks exactly the same (unless you’ve had one of those cheesy burritos from Taco Bell…but let’s not make rules based upon exceptions). We all do it, so what’s the big deal?

Well I got to thinking about this, and I had a striking realization–we engage in the same game of pretend when it comes to sin. Just like the inevitability of an occasional poop, everybody sins. With the exception of Christ, there has never been a single person on earth who has lived a sinless life. Yet we carry on these charades, acting as if we don’t sin, and being ashamed and embarrassed that someone might find us out. In the same way that we’ll run across the street just to find a toilet, we’ll go to extreme measures to hide the sin in our lives, even from the people with whom we are closest.

And this secrecy keeps us in bondage. We are constantly trying to position our lives in such a way that will hide the unattractive parts. But that is no way to live, and it only contributes to a much larger trend in which ALL people think they’re the only ones.

So we need to start being honest about the fact that everyone sins. And just like poop, our sin pretty much looks the same. Scripture tells us that we have not endured any temptation that is uncommon to man (1 Cor. 10:13), so while you may secretly believe that you’re a particularly bad person, God would have to disagree. We are all equally fallen, and all in need of grace, so let’s start talking about it.

Once we create a community in which we can be open about our sin, we might just experience an effect that is similar to the “smelly bathroom” stage of a dating relationship–yes it’s gross, but you are still loved and accepted anyway. That’s a good place to be.

Yesterday I was hanging out with two of my girl friends chatting about life, and we got to talking about how we handle hard times in our lives. We were discussing whether it’s healthy to “indulge” our emotions–just give into what we’re feeling and throw logic to the wind. I think most women have been faced with this temptation.

Well one of my friends was explaining that whenever she gets into a place like that, her husband has trouble relating to her because she gets really “emo” and he doesn’t always know how to respond.

That stopped me. Emo?

I asked her to elaborate. “What do you mean you get emo?” She explained that she just feels really dark and likes to listen to dark music and mull over her feelings and write stories that have kind of twisted endings that reflect the way she’s feeling. Then she looked back at us and asked, “Do you think that’s ok?”

Heck yes I think it’s ok, and let me tell you why. Actually, let me begin with a caveat to this discussion. It’s NOT healthy for us as women to be mastered or controlled by our emotions. Emotion can cloud our vision of truth, and truth is our life saver when we’re drowning in fear, insecurity, doubt and guilt. We need truth, so any idea that we can just be emotional for the sake of it is dangerous. I am not saying that here.

Having said that, here’s why I like my friend’s “emo” confession. Christians have this thing about not experiencing our pain. Or at least not being honest about it. When you ask someone who’s going through a hard time how they’re doing, you’ll rarely get an honest answer like, “You know, it just really sucks right now,” or “I don’t really feel close to God.” Usually you’ll hear something more like, “It’s hard, but I’m trying to lean on God.”

Now leaning on God isn’t bad, but sometimes I wonder if this language is a smoke screen for escape. We’re escaping the voice of God and what He’s trying to say through the pain. We’re “leaning on God” to get us out of the lesson He’s trying to teach us. It’s kind of like people who act, and THEN ask God to bless their actions without having consulted Him in the first place. We just assume God wants us out of the darkness, so that’s what we ask for. But maybe He doesn’t. Maybe He wants us to stay there for awhile.

Sometimes God wants us to contemplate the darkness. I think that’s why he shoves it in Paul’s face in 2 Corinthians 12. Paul complains that he pleaded with God numerous times to remove the thorn in his flesh, but God continually refused. God wanted Paul to face the pain, to face his weakness, understand his fragility. Only then, when his pride and sense of personal strength was removed from his line of vision could he get an unobstructed view of God’s grace.

That’s why Paul then boasts in his weakness. His weakness became the means by which he finally saw God’s glorious strength. Until then, Paul’s “self-esteem” (literally, esteeming of himself) had eclipsed his vision of God. Until then, he didn’t fully understand from what he’d been delivered.

That’s why I encouraged my friend to ponder her darkness. Ponder the things that weigh her down and ask what God is trying to teach her through it. Get emo. Granted, our experience of these emotions should be directed toward God–not feeling for feeling’s sake. And certainly not sadism. But when you’re feeling low or depressed or dark, don’t be ashamed. You are not less of a Christian for struggling with the darkness. The authenticity of your faith is not measured by how cheerful you feel (Remember that the next time someone tells you that Christians should be “known by” how joyful we are. Where does Scripture say that? While joy is a fruit of the Spirit, last I checked we’re to be known by our love, not our can-do attitudes). On the contrary, your pain, or even blah-ness, can be a means for better understanding yourself, and God.

Until we do the hard work of contemplating our weakness, our understanding of it and God’s subsequent grace will be little more than head knowledge. In spite of our intentions, it will be superficial. This superficiality is rampant amidst evangelicalism. It’s not that Christians are intentionally fake. Their intentions are actually quite pure, but they’re just out of touch with their humanity. I personally have trouble relating to people who are chipper all the time because I don’t feel that way myself, and the world feels the same. In fact, I suspect that the world has a better understanding of the darkness of humanity than many Christians. Many individuals in the secular realm aren’t afraid to confront it. That’s why the darkness of the soul has inspired countless songs, paintings and poems.

But that kind of secular reflection can only lead to despair. There is no hope apart from Christ. Which is why we need to enter into that conversation. The world knows how dark humanity can be, so Christian pretensions that “everything is fine with me and Jesus” does not resound with them. We need to admit the depth of the darkness. Only then will we be in a position to point people to the light.

So as weird as it sounds, we need to get emo. We need to study the darkness and understand the brokenness of humanity better than anyone else. We need to confront our depravity and our pain head on. The better we understand it, the more magnificent God’s grace will appear. And perhaps people will then believe us when we claim to have been in darkness, but have seen the light.

Right now I’m reading a really great book entitled “Practical Theology for Women” by Wendy Horger Alsup. So far I feel like this is the book I would have written had I been given the chance. So much of what she says about theology is almost verbatim what I have written about and taught women myself. And I consider that an incredible testimony to the work of the Holy Spirit! Obviously God is on the move if He is impressing such a consistent message on the hearts of women who are thousands of miles apart.

In my reading so far, there is one thing Alsup has articulated better than I have been able to myself. One of the reasons women hold back when it comes to theology is a fear of being un-leadable. Whether a married women doesn’t want to surpass her husband, or a single women doesn’t want to intimidate guys out of pursuing her, there’s a resulting negative stigma attached to the study of theology.

In response to this thinking, I’ve always encouraged women to remember that iron sharpens iron. If you push yourself then you’ll push men to step up in response. If you refuse to grow then you’ll remain stagnant. You’ll either be stagnant single, or stagnant with someone else.

And while I still believe that’s an important point to remember, Alsup offers an even more compelling perspective that I want to share with you. Responding to a woman in her church who did not feel it was “wise for her personally to dive too deeply into the Bible,” Alsup offered the following insight:

“God forbid that women should avoid studying the deep things of the Word lest they surpass the understanding of the men in their lives! Studying theology–such as the Holy Spirit’s role in convicting man of sin, and God’s sovereignty over all creation–will curb, not enhance, a woman’s sinful tendency to nag and manipulate her husband. My husband can bear witness to the fact that a better understanding of God’s character, that is, theology, makes me a better wife.”

Amen and amen and AMEN!!!

We have got it backwards when we think that refusing to learn about the things of God will somehow make us better wives, girlfriends, friends, or disciples of Christ. Theology, the study of God’s transformational character, teaches us all the things that help us to love better, serve harder, and persevere longer. Women who pursue God whole-heartedly can only expect to have better, more Christ-centered relationships as a result. May we NEVER think ourselves wise to resist such a God-honoring pursuit.

Before I got married I literally lived off a diet of frozen dinners, cereal, and take out food…unless, of course, one of my roommates cooked real food and I mooched off her.

What’s weird is that ever since I got married 5 weeks ago I’ve been driven by this compulsion to cook actual meals for my husband each week. This has never happened to me before. It’s as if my inner home-maker has been lying dormant for the last 28 years of my life until now. My inner feminist is mortified.

But what’s even weirder is that in spite of the fact that I’ve attained a college degree, a Master of Divinity, traveled the world and accomplished a lot of things, my entire life’s purpose and value on this earth now hinges entirely on whether or not I can cook a spaghetti sauce that tastes as good as my husband’s mom’s. Don’t worry, he hasn’t told me this…I just feel it. Deep within my soul.

As a result of this need to be perfect in the kitchen, combined with a complete lack of preparation, there have been some pretty significant disappointments along the way. Such as the “garlic incident,” in which I thought “clove” referred to the whole head of garlic. No one ever explained to me what a “clove” is (MOM!) so we had some really garlic-y chili one night.

It’s as if my inner desire to cook magnificent meals is some sort of cruel joke by God. He has instilled me with a desire without granting me the ability to fulfill it.

Thankfully a number of my friends have told me similar stories, and they’ve all encouraged me with the advice that I will get better if I keep working at it. In the mean time, I’ve learned how important it is to stick to the recipe. For a novice like me, recipes are clutch because I’m basically like a baby learning to walk. I need someone holding my hand with every step until I learn how much oil is necessary and how much salt is too much. Once I learn these recipes in and out, and once I’ve acquired enough cooking knowledge to understand the lingo and to know what will work and what won’t, then I can start to experiment. Until then I’ve gotta go by the book.

Now the reason I’m sharing this tale of cooking perseverance is that it actually reminded me of some words from C.S. Lewis. In Mere Christianity he writes,

“Until you have given up your self to Him you will not have a real self… Christ will indeed give you a real personality.”

This idea has always been tough to wrap my mind around. The idea that God will give us our real personality, that the Christian life is the key to our true selves–what does that even mean?

Fortunately my little foray into the world of cooking has shed some new light on it for me. Clearly, I was not born a brilliant cook. If my husband sent me into the kitchen and asked me to whip up some pan seared chilean sea bass with a side of braised fennel and gruyere potato rosti, I would immediately crumple to the floor in a pile of sobbing. There’s no way I could begin to create that without a recipe…and several years of cooking experience. And a dictionary.

I need recipes to teach me the basics. I need directions to shape me and mold me into a chef. Recipes teach me the boundaries of cooking, the essentials and the non-essentials. Then, once I’m thoroughly versed in the recipes and rules of cooking, once I know them like the back of my hand, then I can begin to experiment. When I conform my skill set to the rules of cooking, I’m then free to cook recipes that reflect my particular tastes without destroying the food. I couldn’t experience that freedom without first learning the rules. In the world of cooking, rules are a form of freedom.

What does all of this have to do with C.S. Lewis? Well a human being is a lot like a recipe. In the same way that cake needs flour, sugar and eggs before it can even be a cake, human beings have some essential ingredients as well. God created us to be made of compassion, love, patience, and faith, among other things. Without these ingredients, we cannot be truly ourselves. Any attempt to forge an identity without these essential ingredients is like trying to make a cake using sausage and mayonnaise. It might be unique, but it’s not really a cake.

That said, we need to learn the ingredients to being truly human, and then pursue them. And this task is harder than it sounds. The world often teaches us behaviors that are sub-human–it teaches us selfishness, greed, anger, impatience, lust and pride. Because these behaviors are all sub-human, we become less ourselves when we mimic them.

With that in mind, we have to retrain ourselves to be human. This may sound silly, but given the degree to which we are taught otherwise by the world around us it’s an important discipline to undertake. We have to conform ourselves to those attributes which make us the image of God. And after we’ve thoroughly trained ourselves and molded ourselves according to that which makes us truly human, we will be disciplined in a way that sets us free. Our attempts at uniqueness will no longer be mere imitations of something we see around us, human-concocted ideas of being different, but will instead be a natural expression of who God created us to be, free of sub-human distortions.

I know that got kind of deep and theological all of a sudden, but I hope the analogy clarifies Lewis’ words. Right now I’m a terrible cook, so any attempt to make my spaghetti “special” will guarantee it a non-stop trip to the garbage disposal. I’ve gotta learn the essentials of cooking spaghetti before I’ll be free to experiment like that. And it’s the same with the Christian life. I need to learn love, mercy, grace, dedication to God and submission to His will before I can really know what it means to be myself. Only then in that context will my pursuit of uniqueness mirror my true self as God created me, rather than a carbon copy picture of the world.

Right now I’m in sort of a postpartum wedding depression as I try to remember just what it was I did with my time before I started planning a wedding. It’s almost anti-climactic now that it’s over. Not that I don’t love being married, but you put all your time and energy into ONE day, and then it’s over. Poof!

In the days following the wedding, I began to reflect on how much of myself I poured into this event and I started to feel ashamed, if not hypocritical. A wedding can really mess with your perspective as you gradually become totally consumed by it. I went into the whole process intending to keep a level-head, not like those “other brides” I had known. But I’m not entirely sure that is a possible goal. Almost inevitably, I succumbed to the very same pitfalls into which I had watched many other brides fall.

When I looked at how much time I put into planning the menu and the wedding favors and the table centerpieces, and I compared that with the message of the wedding ceremony–namely, the centrality of Christ–I felt convicted that there was a huge discrepancy. On the one hand, I wanted it to be all about the Gospel; on the other hand, I was essentially losing myself in the preparations. That doesn’t exactly seem to match up.

However, I have begun to wonder if my conviction is rightly placed. I have started to suspect that the preparations themselves are a part of the divine reflection that marriage is meant to be. In the Bible there are a lot of parallels between marriage and the Christian life–Christ is the groom and his bride is the Church–so we focus on this illustration the day of the wedding and the days that follow.

But here’s the thing–a wedding doesn’t just happen out of nowhere. It’s not like one day my husband and I decided to get married, so the next day we went to the church and said our vows. We spent months and months preparing ourselves for one another. We took classes, we read books, we prayed, and we made sure that the day itself would glorify God. And in addition to all that, we had actually been preparing long before we even met each other. For the last 28 years my parents have been praying for me, and I’ve been praying as well. I’ve tried to guard my purity and be the kind of woman with whom a godly man would want to partner.

With all of that in mind, one might say that on some level, preparation for marriage has actually defined my entire life up to this point.

Is this degree of readiness inappropriate? Or is it exactly what God had in mind as He designed marriage to reflect our relationship with Him? Are such thorough preparations not the very thing God intends for us as we prepare for our heavenly bridegroom, Jesus Christ? In the same way that a bride pours herself into preparing for that special day when she becomes one with her groom, are we not called to do the same?

In Matthew 25 Jesus tells the story of 10 virgins, 5 wise and 5 foolish, who are waiting on their bridegroom throughout the night. When the groom finally arrives, 5 are prepared and ready to meet him, so they immediately join him at the wedding banquet. The other 5, however, are not prepared and must return to their homes to get ready. In doing so, they miss the bridegroom and are left outside the wedding banquet.

This is indeed an analogy for our lives. The parallels between Christ and the Church do not begin on the wedding day–they begin long before. As I frantically rushed about doing all I could to make the wedding day perfect, I was participating in a story far greater than I realized. My preparations were a picture of how we should live our lives in preparation to meet our heavenly bridegroom. These preparations should literally consume us–every minute of every day we should be readying ourselves for the day we meet our Savior. Like a bride in a white dress, we want to stand before him knowing we did our best to honor and serve him, without a spot or stain of pride or disobedience. We must throw ourselves into these preparations like a crazy bride who will do anything to make her wedding day perfect. After all, as much as I love my husband, I desire to please my Savior so much more!

So yes, I did get a little carried away with the wedding preparations. But I think God knew that would happen to just about every bride who ever said “I do,” and perhaps He even planted that drive within us. Why? Because it is a perfect reflection of the avidness with which we should approach our heavenly union with God. Whether you’re married, engaged, or forever single, the analogy transcends all relationship statuses. We are all to be in a state of preparation for marriage, living each day in preparation for our most adoring groom.

Well I am back from my honeymoon and it was awesome! I had a wonderful time with my new husband, and special thanks to David Goodman for posting his thoughts on science, theology, and birth control.

Without trying to beat a dead horse, I want to close out this discussion today with a few final thoughts. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the science involved in the debate, I hope this was helpful. The reason I asked David to post his own perspectives is that a) I am completely incompetent in all things science, and b) I frequently hear Christians excuse some methods of birth control on scientific grounds. For instance, countless fetuses fail to survive on their own, so is there really that much of a difference whether a fetus fails to survive due to nature or birth control?

It is at this point in our discussion that I become wary of how greatly we are letting science determine our theology. While science can tell us things about the world, the purpose of science is not to explain the why behind it. While we should indeed give ear to the scientific community, we must not give authority to science that it does not possess.

That said, even if many fetuses fail to survive, that is God’s call to make, not ours. In no other arena do we allow ourselves the freedom to take another person’s life simply on the grounds that they might die anyway, so it is strange that we hedge on this one.

But with all the science aside, I have one final word to all my female readers out there:

Ladies, God has created a world in which our bodies are Ground Zero for the beginning of life. The creation of a new person, a divine image bearer for which God has a purpose and a plan–it all begins inside of us. This is a gift, but it is also a responsibility. We owe it to God and ourselves to study and learn as much as we can about how God created us, for what purpose, and how best we can be stewards of it. This does NOT mean we all have to churn out babies, but it does mean we must never be casual about it. Never. The creation of a new life that bears the image of God is a serious, beautiful thing, and I hope that these last few posts have challenged you to consider how you understand your body within God’s greater story for the world.

Your body is beautiful and wonderfully made. God has a special plan for you, and for many of you that involves children. But no matter the plan, I pray we will be a generation of women who seek to honor God in ALL that we do, offering a prophetic voice of hope and clarity in a world that consistently devalues human dignity, treating people more and more like things to be used than reflections of their gracious Maker. We must be defenders of the glory of God in one another, and that begins with defending the glory of God in ourselves.

While I’m on my honeymoon, my friend David Goodman will be posting his thoughts about the relationship between science and theology. Now before you tune out because this sounds nerdy/boring, you should know that my conversations with him have surrounded the issue of birth control, and that’s why I’ve asked him to post. He is going into his 4th year of medical school at UNC-Chapel Hill and has wrestled with this topic a lot as he considers the ethics of prescribing birth control, and how it coincides with his pro-life beliefs. He is a godly man, as well as being super sharp, so I thought you all would benefit from his insights!

 Hello blog world.  She Worships has been invaded by a dude, most notably illustrated in the picture from Rocky IV situated to the left.  No, this is not a shameless plug to get Sly Stallone on Sharon‘s blog.  This was the image that came to my mind when Sharon asked me to write about the relationship between science and theology.  You see in the film Rocky is a fiery, passionate boxer with a mission to prove going up against the formidable Russian Ivan Drago, the machine-man that represents the overwhelming strength of the Cold War USSR who crushes opponents with almost superhuman force.  At one point in the fight Rocky is dancing around the ring, taking punches from the Russian and taunting him saying “You ain’t so bad!” in an effort to tire him out.