Not That God

He had been coming to our group for a few weeks. His hesitation was apparent. He was different from most of the group, but I don’t think he completely knew it. He set himself apart by his tattoos, pierced lip, and punk-rock veneer, but it was easy to see those were simply “no trespassing” signs. As the warm welcome slowly melted away his layers of insecurity, there was a sense that he was beginning to feel at home. I wanted him to feel at home.

He had been hurt. This wasn’t something he said outright. In fact, he said very few things at all. Butt you could tell. He wanted to be loved. He wanted answers to so many questions. He wanted to know God, but he wasn’t sure about the God he did or did not believe in.

We’ll call him Mark. After a few weeks of distance, Mark had come to be at home with us. I hoped he would stay.

As the five-minute countdown was displayed on the screen and the group slowly filtered toward the seats, I saw Mark run in the back door. He was upset. He was lost, and he came running to one of the few homes he had known.

In my mind I was rehearsing the message. I was thinking logistics. As he ran up to me, the countdown continued to march forward. The pressure of time was on me. A greater pressure was crushing Mark.

We stepped to the side, and he wept. I put my arm around him. My prayers immediately flowed for him, yet one eye was still on the descending numbers on the screen.

As Mark began to compose himself, I asked him what was wrong. Through gulping sobs, he told me he had just learned his father was sick—very sick. While his father was remaining strong and attempting to cast a good light on the situation, Mark knew what was coming. He couldn’t tell me much, but he didn’t need to. Mark was confused. How could this be happening? He was only seventeen. Seventeen-year-olds need their dads. They are supposed to have their dads. God is supposed to give them their dads. Whatever foundation of belief he had been laying about God was caught in a windstorm of doubt, fear, and insecurity.

I didn’t know what to say. Nothing prepares you for this. I asked what his dad’s name was and began to pray for him. It wasn’t what Mark wanted, but he resigned himself to it. As the countdown reached a minute and thirty seconds, I asked him to stay for the group time. I planned to talk with Mark about what he was going through after the gathering. Mark didn’t want to talk (1:00). It became clear he wasn’t so much asking me for something as he was telling me.

Time was running short. I knew I had to make a decision. Mark made it for me. Everything he had been learning (45 seconds), everything he had heard about the goodness and love of God was in the throes of a raging tempest (30 seconds). He had been hurt before (15 seconds). He was hurt again (10 seconds). All I could say was, “I’m so sorry.” He turned and ran down the hall (5 seconds). I turned and looked at the clock (3 seconds, 2seconds, 1 second). It was time to go talk about the love and goodness of God.

A. W. Tozer said, “What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.” It saturates who we are. Our theistic worldview drips everywhere we go. Nothing affects our inner and outer lives—how we pray, how we walk through joy and suffering—more than this.

Our view of God and the world is largely informed by how we define certain words like good, bad, fair, and love. This is significant for us because we use these words to define our perceived past, present, and future. We are taught the meanings of these words from a very young age. My three-year-old knows these words and uses them loosely. However, as we walk through life and interact with others, we are continually molding redefinitions and reapplications of these terms.

Our definitions of these words greatly influence what becomes our worldview. Our worldview is a sort of lens through which we perceive the world. Everyone’s lens is different. It doesn’t make the world different. It simply shapes how we uniquely understand it. Our worldview may be shaded or smeared by certain experiences, hurts, or areas of perceived conflict avoidance.

There is a question I want to ask throughout this book: What if our worldview is different than God’s? In other words, what if our definitions of these terms inform our view of God, ourselves, and our circumstances more than God’s definitions? That is an important question. It causes tension and leads to investigation.

The vast majority of this book is written so that people can read from that place—in the land of investigative tension. This is a good place to be. God continually places us here to produce faith or reveal our true hearts. It is a refining fire.