How do I know when to help and when not to?
To be alive today is to be in a continual state of having your conscience pricked, for worthy reasons! Vince shares how prayer has helped him wisely and compassionately navigate that reality.
SPEAKER NOTES
How do I know when to help and when not to?
Story
You may know if you’ve heard me speak before I didn’t grow up spiritual.
I had familiarity with some of the forms and symbols and stories of Christian faith, but I was not encouraged to pray or build a relationship with God of my own.
So when, as a young adult, I eventually ended up in a very spirituality-focused church, where personal relationship with God was encouraged, and prayer was intentionally modeled and taught, and the idea of God being communicative (listening and speaking) was emphasized, that was both really intriguing AND really strange and new.
One of the things I’d hear that really stood out to me is people saying things like “I’ll pray about it”. Like when there was an ask made of someone, or an opportunity to help a neighbor or friend, or give time or money to some effort was before a person… “I’ll pray about it,” people would say.
I knew “I’ll think about it” — like “I’ll weigh the pros and cons, consider my budget, check the calendar", that made sense to me — but I remember at the time wondering: “Pray about it? What’s the point of that?!”
And my questioning wasn’t actually motivated by a skepticism that God is communicative (at this point I’d had some spiritual experience I couldn’t explain, where it felt like there was a God who was guiding and loving and cared for me personally, so I was open to the idea that God is communicative).
Rather, it was more like: Isn’t there no point to “praying about it”? If there is a God who cares for people, won’t the answer to “should I help?” always be yes?”.
I wonder what you think about that wondering from young adult Vince? I wonder if you’ve ever had the same wondering?
Gradually, I realized there can be a lot of wisdom in “I’ll pray about it”, but it took some discovery.
I remember hearing a pastor (who eventually would become a friend and colleague) say something that cut to the core of me, which I’ve passed on here at BLC many times, so maybe you’ve heard it before:
“You are not responsible for not doing what God is not calling you to do.”
This pastor was pitching a very different proposition. God might not say yes?! It's an open question?! But if I’m not responsible, then who will be?!
And right there was the discovery I needed to make.
I was at the time (and still am!) a hyper-responsible person. My childhood, as the even-keel kid among more volatile siblings, formed in me this sense that everything always is my responsibility.
To put it one way, I have a very active (maybe over-active) conscience.
So, predictably, I unconsciously reasoned: if I go to God about any potential responsibility, it will be confirmed that: that, like everything else, is my responsibility.
Hence my conclusion: what’s the point of praying about whether I should help when prompted? If God is good, won’t the answer always be yes?
But my conclusion was NOT built on a notion of God’s goodness, it was built on a notion of my hyper-responsibility. Light bulb!
And, looking at it that way, that’s a pretty “me at the center of the world” thing to assume
- for one thing, it’s a little self-important…
- but, more than that, if there is a good God who is trying to guide me toward helping and serving others, wouldn’t it follow that God is trying to do that with everyone else too, AND NOT JUST ME?!
God doesn’t need or require me to take on all responsibility, just some responsibility, an appropriate amount of responsibility — What a relief for my over-active conscience!
This is the wisdom that “I’ll pray about that” can bring to us — the question that brings to God is NOT an abstract “Is this a worthy thing to do? for anyone? in theory?”
The question is a very specific, concrete, situational: “God, is this an appropriate responsibility for me, right now, in this current moment?”
THIS has become an indispensable practice to me, when an ask is made of me, when an opportunity to give of my time or money is before me, when a matter in the world grieves me… “God, what are you calling me to in this? How are you guiding me here?”
- It works in tandem so well with “I’ll think about it” — the weighing of pros and cons, the checking of the calendar or budget
- To add to that consideration a spiritual sense of “God, how are you guiding me?” given these pros and cons — so helpful!
- AND it works so well as a check and balance to my feelings in any given moment about my capacity
- As someone who struggles with hyper-responsibility and over-active conscience, I’m grateful to live in a time and culture where “Self-Care” has become an often-discussed topic
- we are highly attuned today to the feeling of caring for others at the expense of caring for one’s self
- BUT if the only data I am relying on are my feelings in a given moment to determine my capacity to care for others or help or serve when prompted*,* that is far too reactive to be useful and I’m in danger of too quickly regarding asks for help as impositions.
- Feelings are like waves, they crash against the shore, and I feel them intensely, but then they recede.
- Feelings are important to consider, but not feelings alone. They’re important to consider as one thing among other things.
- Adding to our feelings a spiritual consideration: “God, how are you guiding me?” given these feelings — now THAT is some more solid ground for deciding what responsibilities to take on or not.
- As someone who struggles with hyper-responsibility and over-active conscience, I’m grateful to live in a time and culture where “Self-Care” has become an often-discussed topic
Scripture
The mystical streams of Christianity point to the ==Gospel of John’s== portrayal of Jesus to describe this sort of prayer:
Very truly I tell you, [Jesus said,] the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does. For the Father loves the Son and shows him all he does.
I love this passage.
- For one thing, it’s a classic example of Jesus favoring parental love as his primary metaphor for God, over other popular metaphors for the divine of his day like “imperial ruler” or “warrior king” or “scrupulous judge”.
- But, more to the point of Christian mystics throughout the ages, they draw from this passage the idea of a personal back and forth between Jesus and God, as Jesus discerns: what is faithfulness to my life’s call? what is my responsibility in any given moment? Jesus is not alone in that discernment; Jesus is looking to God, whom he experiences as a Loving Father, and God is guiding him, showing him “what the Father is doing, so he can do likewise”. The activity of discernment is not pressurized or exhausting; it is characterized by love and guidance.
- And, according to the Christian mystics’ reading of the Gospel of John, Jesus’ experience here is a template for all people: We are not alone in our discernment of what is our responsibility in any given moment. We can look to God, in any given moment, to what the Father is doing, so we can do likewise. That activity can be characterized by love and guidance, not pressure and exhaustion.
Zoom out
To zoom out for a second,
- Perhaps you feel you can relate to me on a personal level as hyper-responsible and having an over-active conscience, or perhaps not.
- Personality wise, it’s probably a bell curve, and a group of people the size of our church will be distributed across that bell curve
- BUT beyond our personality differences, there are cultural realities common to us all, and I would argue that, in our technologically-connected and information-saturated Internet age, however over or under active your conscience, to be alive today is to have your conscience in a constant state of pricked.
- For worthy reasons! — Our consciences are not wrong; they are just overwhelmed.
- Because no need or ask for help or tragic situation anywhere in the world is hidden to us today. We can, and often do, hear about everything the moment we take our phones out of our pockets.
- And then of course, within our more immediate social networks, there have never been more communication avenues for the asks and needs of those in our lives to surface and present themselves to us.
So I think one question of our time is:
- What do we do in this reality of living in a constant state of our consciences being pricked?
- We can’t pretend that we could sanely or sustainably respond to every prick of our conscience — take it from someone who has struggled with hyper-responsibility, long before High-Speed Internet was a thing in everyone’s home
- This inevitably will burn you out or leave you numb or leave you feeling forever like you’re not doing enough.
- But neither can we turn cynical! That is no way to live.
- A necessary task before all of us in the modern world is to cultivate ways — beyond just one’s conscience, and beyond just one’s feelings in any given moment about self-capacity — to wisely and compassionately discern one’s responsibility to others and to the world.
- The kind of spirituality I’m talking about this morning has been exactly this to me — it helps me to pray and wait and listen and “do only what I see the Father doing” in any given moment.
- I can be sure that a good God will guide me to take up some responsibility, an appropriate amount of responsibility
- AND I can be sure that that good God is not solely relying on me, but is also trying to guide everyone else in the world — thank God!
- What the Father is modeling for me may be different than what the Father is modeling for someone else
- This kind of spirituality is also so helpful to me because it is dynamic and responsive in real time —
- There is no such thing as a manual or glossary that explains what to do in every life situation,
- And that is why I’m so drawn to the idea of prayer to a communicative God, discerning with me personally in real time what responsibilities to take or not, as each new, unique situation presents itself to me.
Practical
For me, this happens in both regular rhythms of prayer and in spur of the moment prayers.
- As I often share, my personal best time for prayer is getting up early in the morning before any of my kids are up. And often a part of that prayer is: “Here are the asks before me today, God; what are you calling me to join you in doing?” And sometimes I have a follow up question: “God, how can I kindly and in accordance with my values tell that person I can’t help?” And I’ll wait for wise, kind words to emerge in my mind.
- Other times, it’s spur of the moment — Keziah or I will be asked to donate to a cause, and I’ll just take 30 seconds to pray. How much God? And there’s no fireworks to such listening prayer, but I’ve learned taking a beat, trusting that God can speak when I ask such a question in prayer is so beneficial for my sanity.
I’m curious to hear if any of you all have your own experiences praying in this way — if you’re up for it, please share in Discord for everyone’s benefit!
If you’re not as experienced in this kind of prayer, one practical thing you can try is a $20 experiment.
I’ve done this in a large group before, so it had some “we’re all doing this together accountability to it”, but you can do it alone too.
You take a $20 bill, and you pray: “God, who do you want me to give this $20 to?” And then you listen internally.
- I remember one time I did this, and I gave the $20 to someone I encountered who was unhoused.
- Another time, I tipped a barista $20 for a $3 coffee.
- Another time, when I did this with a group of people, we were all out to eat and pooled our $20 to tip the waiter a massive amount.
Sometimes people can feel stuck trying things like this, like “how do I know what’s God vs. what’s just my own thoughts?”
I love what the writer on spirituality ==Dallas Willard== says in response to this:
“God comes to us precisely in and through our thoughts, perceptions and experiences… He can approach our conscious life only through them, for they are the substance of our lives.”
So it’s not about “what’s God vs. what’s just my own thoughts” — when God speaks, it’s both — God uses the mental furniture of our own minds to speak to us.
- Not every thought is God speaking to us obviously.
- But do you ever have a thought that is particularly hopeful or loving or encouraging or connecting or convicting in a good way (not a guilt-tripping way)?
- The Christian Mystics throughout history would encourage us to regard those thoughts as God guiding us, speaking to us, like Jesus experienced.
- Things like a $20 experiment can help us log experience practicing that sort of listening prayer.
I wonder if that helps you feel like you can imagine how this sort of spirituality can look or sound for you in your daily life.
Embrace it! You can hear from God!
Context
To close, let me place all this in some context for our church —
- Over this next month, on Sundays here at BLC, we’re going to be underlining the fact that there are legitimate needs and asks and cries for help all around us
- Especially in the winter, when so many of us struggle with loneliness cooped up in our homes, when those among us most forgotten by our larger societal structures are in most danger physically, economically, and socially...
- There are needs and asks and cries for help all around us.
- We are not underlining this to guilt us all into action!
- We are underlining this because to not do so is to bury our heads in the sand.
- We don’t want to do that. We want to live as courageously and intentionally as we can in the midst of the challenges of reality.
Jesus said that the whole of his Hebrew Tradition’s call on life was summed up by: love God and love your neighbor as yourself.
Early on when this church started 11 years ago, we heard someone, inspired by Jesus’ summary, use the word “Neighbor” as a verb — like “to neighbor”, or “to do the work of neighboring”.
We liked that because it
- BOTH felt like it captured the significance of Jesus summarizing “the meaning of life” according to his tradition
- AND yet it had a humility to it —
- it’s not a claim to know how to change the world; it’s just a promise to contribute to goodness best one can by loving one’s neighbors.
- Like I’ve talked about this morning, it’s not a commitment to carry all responsibility; it's a commitment to carry some responsibility, the appropriate amount of responsibility God is guiding us toward in any given moment.
- Humility is so often missing in our modern era — we think we can solve every problem with technology, and we too quickly judge the “backward” ways of those who have gone before us.
- I heard someone say recently the world needs less people who want to “change the world”, and more people who want to just “change their neighborhood” — and that struck me as deeply true.
- I was with a couple other people in our church this past week for a little informal book club, as we had all read and been moved by the famous 19th century Russian novel The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky.
- And one scene from the book that stood out to us was a character expressing angst over their experience that the more they “loved humankind” the more they found they “detest their neighbor”
- Like: to make love an abstract idea that you hold “in general” for “all people” is, in a paradoxical way, detrimental to a commitment to actively love the particular human, the neighbor, right in front of you.
- Because if love is just an ideal, people become just instruments in the service of your ideal, they’re dehumanized
- Which challenges the day-to-day call of honoring and respecting the distinct humanity of actual people in your life.
- Dostoevsky is pointing to this humbling paradox in the 19th century, and today, in our Globalized, Interconnected, Internet Age, it feels all the more true!
So “Neighboring” is the word we have adopted as a church, and that’s our theme this month.
- Again, NOT as a guilt trip,
- BUT as an attempt to live as courageously and intentionally as we can, given our reality,
- believing that God is always communicating to us, to help us discern in each moment what responsibilities to take up or not.
We’ll do several different things these Sundays focused on Neighboring:
- We’ll have some more messages from me and Hayley, like today.
- But we’re also hoping to have some interviews with community organizers beyond BLC, who we are connected to, and who are doing good neighboring work.
- We’re waiting for confirmation, but I’m hopeful these will happen.
- And then one of the Sundays this month, the kids of BLC are actually going to be preparing and helping lead our time together, so we can all participate in a specific Neighboring project, serving older adults experiencing isolation
- You’ll hear more about that from them as the month goes on!
- If you’re a parent of an older kid (8 and up), and you think they’d like an experience of group leadership and event planning and service, let me know, and they can join in this! The first planning session is next Sunday, January 12.
- Also, we’re looking for one more adult volunteer to help out, so also let me know if that’s you!
- And, finally, our church’s Solidarity Team has been working on increasing the bonds of mutual aid and support between people in our church community,
- and are asking all of us to help with that by filling out an ==online form== this month
- This form will ask you about the resources and services and time you are, in general, able to offer to others
- And the goal is to end up with a database that can help Hayley and I as pastors (with help from our Solidarity Team) spark neighboring connections among people in our church
- You’ll hear more about this as it materializes, but the first step is: we need lots of us to fill it out!
- So follow the QR code, and keep the page open on your phone to fill out later, or it’ll go out in email today too.
Okay, let me pray for us…