sermon notes from the Vineyard Church of Milan 06/16/2013
video available at www.sundaystreams.com/go/MilanVineyard/ondemand
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Ever catch a vision for making a difference in someone’s life, maybe you were moved by compassion, or inspired to give your life to a purpose…only to find yourself burned out later? Your passion gone. Jaded. Feeling like it was a waste of time. Feeling like it was just a black hole of need that sucked all of your life, resources, and enthusiasm out of you and left you feeling guilty and frustrated. Like you would have been better off maybe if you’d just stayed home, if you’d just gone about your life, tending to your own needs and helping out the people you really enjoyed and loved, who gave back to you as much as you gave to them.
Or maybe you’ve kept your head above water, haven’t gotten bitter or angry, but it just seems like your dreams about making a difference haven’t panned out nearly like you thought they would. Seems like you just keep doing the same inconsequential thing over and over, the people you’re trying to help don’t seem to appreciate it at all, and you’ve basically set your big picture dreams on the shelf, gathering dust. And you’re wrapped up in all sorts of petty drama and dissatisfactions, and you’re just not sure how in the world it ended up like this.
A Thrival Guide for Outward Focused People: How to live outward focused lives and not get derailed or bogged down.
A 2 part companion to the outward focused lives series.
Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests, but each of you to the interests of others. In your relationships with one another, have the same attitude of mind Christ Jesus had:
Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
rather he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant...
from Philippians 2:1-11
Paul (formerly Saul) of Tarsus
It's powerfully appealing to say yes to humility, compassion, a purpose beyond "It's all about me" etc. – because the truth is, this is the image of God in us; it’s how we’re wired at the most profound levels.
BUT
How do you "value others above yourselves, looking to the interests of the others” and maintain a clear sense of yourself, not become a doormat, remain faithful to your purposes when others make unreasonable demands, keep from being overwhelmed by others' needs, etc?
We don’t just want to survive; we want to thrive. Which, it so happens, is Jesus’ desire for us as well. “I have come that they might have life, and have it to the full.”
So on to the Thrival Guide, part 2: LIVING THE DREAM (wide awake)
Outward focused lives would be so easy, and so rewarding, if only everyone was living them. Can you imagine? Everyone looking to the interests of the other, generously and freely loving one another. Noticing, helping, experiencing compassion. Everyone “otherish”, selfishness nowhere to be found.
3 comments on that dream.
1. This is the dream of the kingdom of God. When Jesus talks about God’s rule and reign permeating the earth, that’s part of what it would like. And Jesus’ followers are called to live by faith in his announcement that the Kingdom of God is here, near, approaching, encroaching on our present broken world. We’re called to live in anticipation of what God has promised to do, as if the future coming kingdom is already here, and as we do, our faith is rewarded with the blessings of that future coming kingdom.
2. This is what our relationship with God through Jesus is actually like (at least so far as his end of the relationship is concerned). We seek first the kingdom of God, and he takes care of all of our needs. He lives an outward focused life towards us and we live one towards him. And joy and love abound in our relationship with him.
3. This is not at all, not even in the least, what life is actually like here and now in most of our lives. Sure, wherever God’s kingdom has gotten a foothold, we see signs of this kind of experience (when it’s working right, it’s supposed to be how we relate to one another in the church, right?). But let’s be honest, sometimes the dream of the kingdom of God feels more like a pipe dream than a prophetic dream.
Let’s talk for a minute about what life is actually like here. Edwin Friedman, in his book “Failure of Nerve” says that many of our interactions with others take place in chronically anxious, emotionally regressive systems.
Everyone is anxious in our world. Anxious about perceived threats to their safety. Anxious about having enough in the midst of what feels like scarcity. Anxious about the trustworthiness of their connections to others in an increasingly fragmented and superficially connected world. Anxious about the trustworthiness of others in a world in which others are only reliably driven by their anxieties.
And our collective anxiety is chronic. Left unchecked, it isn’t going anywhere. Just the opposite, in fact. Everyone is made even more anxious by the consumer driven nature of our society, which plays on anxieties by using sophisticated anxiety enhancers (what we normally call “advertising”) to sell products and services. And, similarly, we are made more anxious still by political and religious systems that have learned to exploit anxieties to increase their power and the loyalty of their adherents. Whew, that much anxiety can make you a little anxious, can’t it? Which, it so happens, isn’t just ironically funny; it’s also profoundly true – anxiety can cause more anxiety; it’s a vicious, anxious cycle. [panic attacks…]
You get enough anxiety in a system (a family, a congregation, a company, a country, for that matter) and pretty soon it will become emotionally regressive. By emotionally regressive, I mean that the system adapts towards the least emotionally mature, so that over time, the least emotionally mature members of the group set the tone and agenda for the group. The group invests much of its energy in pacifying (or attempting to pacify) the anxious responses of the least emotionally mature members.
Imagine a family of 5 with a temper tantrum throwing toddler. Mom & Dad (the most emotionally mature members, presumably) decide the family needs a walk to the park to get some fresh air and have some fun. 10 steps down the sidewalk, T4 (temper tantrum throwing toddler) realizes he doesn’t have his favourite red hat, and starts throwing a fit when Mom says he’ll just have to survive without it. So she sends big brother back in the house to find it. 5 minutes later, big brother comes back empty handed. T4 really starts to lose it now. Meanwhile, big sister has gotten bored with the waiting, and decides she has to go to the bathroom. Dad’s fed up with these kids, so he’s checked out, checking his Twitter feed on his smartphone as chaos erupts around him.
Mom, frustrated after spending the last 5 minutes trying to calm T4 down by telling him that she’s sure big brother will find it, and to just be patient, it’s coming, and look over there, it’s a plane in the sky woohoo, takes big sis back to the house for the bathroom, and to look for the hat herself. T4 calms down for a bit, knowing he’s got Mom on the case now, and big brother has taken on the role of pacifier, distracting T4 with funny faces. Back in the house, Big sis has used up the toilet paper and is yelling for Mom to bring her more, loudly enough that Dad can hear it outside. Mom, of course, is turning the house inside out for the red hat, and yelling back at Big Sis to calm down and be patient, or just use some Kleenex for heaven’s sake! She finally finds the hat, gets the toilet paper, and comes back out to give the hat to T4.
But T4 is nowhere to be found. He wandered off while Dad composed an ironic tweet about their “fun” family outing underway, and Big Bro was distracted trying to whistle with a blade of grass, repeatedly asking Dad to show him how, but of course Dad just kept saying “in a minute, in a minute!” Mom now, seeing T4 across the street playing with a worm on the sidewalk, is ticked off at Dad for not paying attention and endangering T4’s life. She pulls herself together though, determined to make the best of it, yells at Big Bro and Big Sis to shut up, because they’ve started bickering about who gets the biggest blade of grass, and runs over to show T4 the hat she has found. T4 of course, doesn’t care anymore, and instead starts to scream bloody murder because Mom is taking him away from this worm that is now fascinating him. A well intentioned neighbour, whose sidewalk T4 happens to have been making friends with the worm on, gently suggests, with a pointed look, that maybe T4 needs some discipline, not a worm or a hat.
The nerve! Mom reaches down and grabs the worm, snatches T4, brings him back to Dad, whispering under her breath what the neighbour just said. Dad, offended, consoles his wife, and begins a new tweet condemning high and mighty people with holier than thou attitudes offering unsolicited parenting advice, while Mom, fed up, hauls the kids back to the house for an early bed time. Which, of course, turns into Mom passing out on the couch while the kids watch America’s Funniest Home videos and raiding the snack cupboard for Cheetos.
Exhausted yet? Not as exhausted as that family.
Those parents started off outward focused, didn’t they? Good parents, tuned in to the needs of their family, heading out with the best intentions (which, if they’d worked out, would have been life giving for everyone, right? Win, win, benefits multiplying, exactly like we’d talked about in our outward focused lives series). Only some anxiety or emotional immaturity on the part of the very people they were trying to help derailed them, dragged them down, made them turn in on themselves and give up on their dream. That’s what emotionally regressive systems do.
All these same dynamics, of course, don’t just happen in families with toddlers. They happen with adult siblings and parents, they happen in congregations, in small groups, in neighbourhood associations, in workplaces, everywhere there are broken people with needs and hurts.
So what’s an outward focused person to do?
An outward focused person who wants to thrive, and make a difference, must do two things.
Self-differentiate.
And stay connected.
Let’s break those two things down, briefly.
To self-differentiate is to gain a clear sense of who you are and what your purpose is. To have a strong grip on what you and your life are all about. As a student of Jesus, you might describe it as knowing who God made you to be and what he made you to do.
Those parents didn’t have a clear sense of themselves and their purpose did they? If they did, they lost themselves very quickly. Their purpose became what the anxious system needed it to become in order for the anxious system to thrive: pacifiers of the emotionally immature demands of T4. As for who they were at some essential level, the anxious system dis-integrated them; all their unique gifts, talents, personalities, passions smushed down and overwhelmed. They weren’t distinctly anybody anymore, except frazzled.
That will happen eventually to any insufficiently self-differentiated person who pursues an outward focused life in the midst of all these chronically anxious systems.
But it didn’t happen to Jesus.
One story for now (there are several where he illustrates this same dynamic; we’ll look at this one and a couple of others in more depth next week).
1 Now a man named Lazarus was sick. He was from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. 2 (This Mary, whose brother Lazarus now lay sick, was the same one who poured perfume on the Lord and wiped his feet with her hair.) 3 So the sisters sent word to Jesus, "Lord, the one you love is sick."
4 When he heard this, Jesus said, "This sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God's glory so that God's Son may be glorified through it." 5 Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. 6 So when he heard that Lazarus was sick, he stayed where he was two more days, 7 and then he said to his disciples, "Let us go back to Judea."
8 "But Rabbi," they said, "a short while ago the Jews there tried to stone you, and yet you are going back?"
9 Jesus answered, "Are there not twelve hours of daylight? Those who walk in the daytime will not stumble, for they see by this world's light. 10 It is when people walk at night that they stumble, for they have no light."
11 After he had said this, he went on to tell them, "Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I am going there to wake him up."
12 His disciples replied, "Lord, if he sleeps, he will get better." 13 Jesus had been speaking of his death, but his disciples thought he meant natural sleep.
14 So then he told them plainly, "Lazarus is dead, 15 and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him."
16 Then Thomas (also known as Didymus) said to the rest of the disciples, "Let us also go, that we may die with him."
John 11
First, do you notice what a non-anxious presence Jesus is? He waits 2 days to go, even though his good friend is dying (and does, in fact, die), and even though Lazarus’s sisters are wanting him to come right away. And he goes despite the death threats and the discouragement of his disciples.
What allows him to maintain such a non-anxious presence? He knows who he is, and what he’s about.
Which leads to the second key: staying connected. Don’t get wrapped up; do remain present. [junior high boys camp; supernanny sleep separation technique]
One of the temptations when you’re self-differentiated and you encounter an emotionally regressive, anxious system is to totally disengage from it. To stay far, far away. Which is fine, but it’s not an option for the outward focused person who has compassion on the people stuck in it. Like Jesus is and does.
Which is why we see Jesus staying connected. He doesn’t get wrapped up in their anxiety; he doesn’t let it stop him from being himself or from going after his purposes. In part because his purposes involve them.
He’s training his disciples to be a non-anxious, healing presence like he is. He’s going to be raising Lazarus from the dead to bless Lazarus’ sisters and bring glory to his Father and teach the world something profound about the reality of the kingdom of God. So he stays connected. He stays with his disciples, inviting them to join him in his purpose. Reassuring them that although everything may look dark to them, he sees light on the landscape. Reassuring them that God has a good purpose in all of this, that things are going to turn out OK. And he stays connected to Lazarus, and Mary and Martha. Because he loves all of them, in spite of their anxiety and emotional immaturity.
We can learn to be the same way. To be, like Jesus, outward focused people who serve others wholeheartedly and generously, while maintaining a clear sense of who we are and what we are about. And God’s power will be with us along the way, filling us and this world with the life of the heavens. More on how we can do that next week. For now, some practical suggestions.
Practical Suggestions:
1. Read John 11 this week, and take notes. Note the different examples of anxiety present in the systems Jesus is involved with. Note the ways you see Jesus keeping a firm grip on his clear sense of himself and his purpose. Notice the ways and instances where you see Jesus not keeping his distance, but staying connected. Ask yourself if there are any parallels to the groups of people you find yourself in. Write it all down; email me what you discover, if you’d like. If you find anything interesting, I might just include it in the message next week.
2. Do a self-inventory. Have you lost a grip on yourself and your purpose in any important settings? In your family? In your workplace? Especially in any role where you might be looked to as a leader? Have you stopped being connected to any of those people or groups as a result of your inability to maintain a non-anxious presence among them? In prayer, just tell God what you see about yourself and ask him to show you if the real problem is the system you’re in or if the problem is how you’ve responded to it.
3. Get help. If the story about T4 and the red hat hit a little bit too close to home, find some parents you respect and ask for help. It doesn’t have to stay that way forever.
