The Invitation

“Emotionally, how does it feel to be wrong?” asked Kathryn Schulz in a presentation I recently watched on TED Talks. Peering out into the crowd, she listened for some responses.

“Dreadful.”

“Embarrassing.”

A thumbs-down from the girl in the background.

Schulz points out that these were great answers, but they were answers to a different question: “You guys are answering the question, ‘How does it feel to realize you’re wrong?’” She continued, “Being wrong feels like being right.”

Much of the time, we live our lives thinking we’re right, especially us as Christians.

Recently, a fellow Christian and I sent messages back and forth, aiming to resolve a conflict. “Sorry that I expected as a man of God you would…” she wrote, feeling my Christianity threatened. “Apparently we are in two different places spiritually,” the following sentence proclaimed.

The statements interrogated my spirituality deeply, as I saw her godliness surpassing mine, and suddenly, I sat astonished.

---
The other week, I was sitting in a small group meeting. Fifteen guys sat in a circle, discussing what it looked like to follow and Jesus and what that looks like in our life.

“I realized I don’t have to worry because God has it under control,” said one. “God just wants to spend time with us,” reaffirmed another.

With almost each self-focused statement, my heart pounded in my chest.

“It’s not about you!” my heart pressed but properly failed to have the audacity to say.

As Christians, we’ve started missing what’s important. We discover it’s so easy to point fingers and so easy to make ourselves feel better, but is it really about either? We look in the mirror declaring all the ways we’ve done right and denouncing the places where we’re just a little off.

Proud we reprimanded him,

Ecstatic we defended Genesis 1,

And thrilled we can honestly say we’ve never had a sip of alcohol.

We’re told to be humble, but we develop this pride as though we have the answers to all of life’s questions. Instead, we just end up pointing fingers at those who have yet to realize that Christianity is the antithesis of discrimination. Once we stop judging others, stop praising ourselves, and start stepping back, we realize what we missed before and see all that’s wrong with the world.

That we should not have a faucet in the kitchen, the bathroom, and the other bathroom, along with a hose protruding from the side of the house; and they should not need to walk five miles to find clean water.

That she should not complain about a soft overripe apple, and he should not be living underneath that bridge, hoping tomorrow brings a meal.

That I should not worry if he will text me back, and she should not sit in the comforting darkness of her own room, wondering about the best way to take her own life.

In neglecting something greater than ourselves, we make Christianity to be about morals and God to be our therapist. We forget the portion of our spirituality that is an invitation to be a vessel of God and a tool for God’s work among humanity. We think we have this whole Christianity thing figured out but forget the part where we’re saying we know the will of God:

Why she has cancer,

Why he had to die,

Or why I’m gay.

We were placed in a unique relationship to God, a relation that says, “I am God. You are human. I know. You don’t.” The words come back, and we are humbled and left with an invitation to work within community, seeing to it that this invitation does not end with me and reaches beyond you.

This invitation to participate goes to my uncle who denounces religion, to that guy I almost dated who called me ignorant for being a Christian, and to each individual who told us that we had to change in order to be accepted in this community. The invitation is a beautiful gift that catches us off guard when our heart breaks for them and melts for him, reminding us with the words, “You are well, but remember, they need you. Love them for Me.”

Fundamentals

My small private Christian high school could be described as decently conservative, maybe overwhelmingly conservative, practicing some of the you-say-a-swear-word-you’re-going-to-hell Christianity and turn-or-burn religion.

Detentions were handed out for saying the word “fart” and don’t even thing about saying “c-r-a-p.”

The Bible was taught as a science book, the key to all knowledge, and evolution was that bad “e”-word.

Bad things don’t just happen because adversity is God’s judgment and punishment for all the times you don’t follow the commandments.

Blessings are handed out to good people, but don’t worry, grace still exists… somewhere.

My sophomore year of high school, I was dating this guy. I would hardly call it dating, but at the time, we labeled it, so I’ll label it now. He went to a different school, but we would see each other at track meets. Between events, we’d leave the track, talk for several minutes, kiss goodbye, and walk back to the track.

Some of my good friends heard what had been going on, and news began to travel. Eventually, it made it to my track coach… some other parents… and some teachers. Sure enough, I became a big target.

Warming up for my district meet, a parent pulls me aside and asks me if we can talk in the bleachers. We sit down, and our conversation begins: “Sean, if you were driving a car, and I knew the bridge ahead of you was out, I would be a fool to not warn you.”

Not exactly what I was expecting, but she continued, “Other parents and teachers are giving me a hard time because they know what you have been doing...”

Caught, and my eyes began to water as I became more disconnected from the conversation, or lack there of. Amongst my anxious staring, foggy eyes, and sorrowful sniffles, I made out, “Sean, God has no reason to bless you.”

Images of my track career going down the drain began flooding my mind, and my please-God-to-get-good-things background began to solidify. Grace had no place because of course, I had to earn grace. I had to work hard enough, and then I would gain God’s favor because God only gives things to the righteous.

I put my shades on to cover my watery, bloodshot eyes and finished my warm-ups. I won four events that day, and I didn’t leave the track with my boyfriend at all.

God blessed me with a place that taught me the key to success: please God and gain the desires of your heart. Why offer your life as it is and allow God’s will to work in your life when you can work to please God yourself and gain self-righteousness?

Grace never really made sense to me there, but that’s all right. One extreme showed me the other extreme, and indecisiveness taught me to look for the median.

Sometimes God meets us where we are, where Christians are too afraid to go, working in the lives of the undeserving:

Saving an adulteress from being stoned,

Embracing a bewildered lost son,

And kickin’ it with the outcasts.

Jesus taught the futility of all people, the lack of ability to do it oneself. Sin is best manifested in the idea of thinking that one can live this life on their own, thinking that everyday can be handled without the presence of God, without the Spirit.

The debt has been paid, and we have been taught to love God and to love others. Too many times have I tried to understand God and save others. I don’t know why it didn’t make sense earlier: love others, embrace them as they are, and let the Spirit take care of the rest. It’s all I can do.

Relentless

I never really understood how I broke his heart, crushed as some would say. He knew my priorities from the beginning: “roommates, friends, then whatever else.” Despite my loneliness, I knew I did not want to find my comfort in a relationship.

He could always see that I was struggling, though. He could see I had feelings for him but could not abandon my beliefs. He could see that I was lost, not knowing between right and wrong, failing to just give up. This made some of our conversations heated.

We were in his car overlooking downtown San Diego – from where some would say “make-out point” – when the words “I envy you” slipped from his mouth.

“Why?” I said, sitting up straight, slightly raising my voice, and feeling him dig a little deeper into who I am.

“Because you’re a Christian...”

The shock eased me back into the seat of his car because there, at that moment, I remembered my beliefs are so deeply integrated into my being that to be apart from them is to be apart from myself.


---
Café Bassam is by far one of the best coffee shops to have a conversation in San Diego. Antique trinkets populate the shelves, and painted portraits decorate the walls. Dozens of round two person tables provide “spots on spots” for seating, and of course, the chai is choice.

A friend and I exchanged moments from the past few weeks with our mugs half-filled with Bassam’s regular chai. We hadn’t carried a long conversation for a little over a month, and much had happened.

After remembering claim after claim from smitten friends emerging from broken relationships, I complained, “I don’t get love. I don’t think it exists.”

“Of course you do!” His tone speaking to my doubt, and instantly, stories of his past relationship filled my mind.

“Oh yeah,” I mumbled. “You’ve seen it...”

“You know it exists,” he quickly interjected, and I had no choice but to confess,

“Yeah, I know it does. I just don’t get it so I’ll go with ‘I don’t think it exists.’”


---
The spring of 2011 was a rough time for me and my spirituality.

My philosophy class tinkered with my thought, and my friend – a philosophy and theology major – kept the questions rolling. Weeks passed, and the questions grew along with my lack of peace. One day, my confidence in God held strong, but the next morning, I would wake up doubting God’s existence.

As much as I tried to abandon God, I couldn’t escape. No matter what, I couldn’t escape the idea of God and my belief in God’s existence. Call it my background, what I was taught, or whatever. But as much I said, “I don’t think God exists,” somehow, I believed God was there. Somehow, I believed God was present.

Then, I encountered love. All the times I’ve been shown love are the times, I’ve been shown God. All the times I ran from the love of my family, the love of my friends, the love of others, are the times I have been running from God and God’s presence in love.

---
I had this dream once, one of those dreams where I was being chased – not by a dog, not by a bear, not by an alligator, and not by another person, but a dinosaur. A big-ass tyrannosaurus obliterated each of my footsteps behind me, ready to dismember my body bite by bite.

Approaching a cliff, the consciousness of the dream became aware to me, and I realized, “This is a dream, and once I hit the ground at the bottom of that cliff, I’ll wake up and be away from this monster.”

Flying off the edge of the cliff, I watched the ground from limbo. As the ground got closer, I anticipated the jolt that would bring me back to reality, and I hit the ground.

I didn’t wake up, and seeing the carnivore tumbling in the sky above me got me running once again.

Even when I thought I knew a means to slip away, my attempt failed, and I continued to be pursued.

Love is the relentless force out there chasing after me, and there is nothing I can do to escape from it. The more I pull away, the more it surprises me. It’s revealed moment after moment. It’s prolific. It’s everywhere. It’s God, God sweeping me off my feet and showing me there is something more, something better.

Walls (Part 3)

<-- Walls 1
   <-- Walls 2

The wind had a slight chill to it, but luckily, there were few clouds in the sky, making the sun shimmer off the ocean and into my eyes, making me squint as I looked at the San Diego skyline just across the bay. His luster-filled blonde hair didn’t help too much either.

A few months beforehand, he and I sat on the cliffs where we finally reconciled the moments that went unaddressed: the reason why he had so little to say, the reason he waited so long to call, and the reason why he became so distant.

Denying my tears, I kept listening as my abandonment – birthed at that cafeteria table – cleared the air tainted by months of passive aggressive bitterness. I always found comfort in his voice, and the more he spoke, the more I could see the guilt I imposed start leaving his heart.

There, we were restored. There, we were made new.

---
He was biting into his burrito when he looked up at me asked to hear more of a story I told him earlier: “So what happened with those two guys?”

“Oh yeah! I forgot about that!” I muffled with a mouth full with bacon burrito, thinking back and remembering a conversation we had a few week ago.

We sat in his room, rallying a tennis ball around his room, trying to keep it off the floor. As we bounced the ball off the walls, bunk beds, and mirrors, we kept our conversation just as alive. We were killing time until his laundry finished and could walk back to our friends’ condo just down the road.

The laundry finished, he loaded it into the dryer, and we left. We walked silent until I asked him, “Did I tell you about what happened with these two guys?”

“No, you didn’t! What happened?” he replied, eager as a kid in a candy store.

“Oh man, we have a lot to catch up on…” I smiled, searching for a starting point to my soon long story. “Well, back in the beginning of last semester, there was this guy…” I started.

Strolling down the street, jaywalking to the other side, and entering into our friends’ neighborhood, I constructed the groundwork for my story.

As we climbed the massive flight of stairs to our friends’ condo, we approached the condo’s doorstep.

“Should we stay out here and keep talking or should we go inside?” He stated, subtly implying the awkwardness if I continued to talk.

“This is a good point to stop,” I insisted with a cool smile on my face. “But the crazy part comes next,” assuring him that what he knew was unsatisfactory in the grand scheme.

---
“So I left off at…” I continued, sharing the heartbreak, the kissing, and the confusion, more than what I have dealt with personally in a while.

He engaged with me as I told my story, not just letting me tell it but also letting me immerse him into it.

After I finished, our conversation continued to flow, and we caught up on life: our goals, our aspirations, our struggles, some stupid decisions, and the list goes on.

I revealed to him how in the months following that conversation on the cliffs, one by one, I started opening up to my friends and, brick by brick, I tore down my walls.

My fellow Oregonian and closest friend my first two years of college found out after I told her, and she finally realized that I never actually did have that crush on her.

That friend I made the beginning of this semester tugged it out of me that night I sat, for hours, slouched in the passenger seat of her car, head pounding.

My tenderhearted roommate called me an idiot and embraced me after I hinted, “I understand if you don’t want to live with me anymore.”

Lastly, that friend, who despite his misunderstanding, said those powerful words, “You’re my friend, and I still love you.” Providing me the opportunity to finally see the Love of God, and changed it all.

With each of them, nothing changed. They were willing to walk through it with me and be present. The greatest relief overcame me because I had been exposed but for once, not disowned. I could be honest and no longer pretend.

---
As time passed, our conversation approached a timely end, and we got up from the picnic table. Getting closer to his car, he fired me one shocking question, “So, what does your ideal guy look like?”

“Are you serious?” I chuckled, failing to think of another straight friend that had asked me that question before.

“Of course, it’s no different than you asking me what do I look for in a girl,” he laughed, as we both got into the car.

Driving away, we started talking about boys, and I realized I was no longer trying to impress him. I wasn’t trying to hide myself. I was just being, myself. Nothing more, nothing less. Just Sean.

Walls (Part 2)

<-- Walls (Part 1)

Inside our cafeteria, we have short tables each accompanied by two chairs sitting on both sides, "date tables" as we call them, ideal for a laid-back and highly unromantic date in the university cafeteria. That’s not why we are here though.

---
Sometimes, outstanding individuals catch you off-guard. I met this guy who was a character of love, or so I thought at the time. Whether it was random road trips, artistic bouts, studying, or philosophical discussion, much of our time was spent together. He became the friend I had continually asked for. He seemed to be one that was on my side and could something was wrong, but I still could not tear down the walls.

Two years beforehand when I initially built these walls, they held firm, but the autumn following their construction, I left for school in sunny San Diego: "This is staying in Portland. There is no way this coming to San Diego." I would tell myself that eventually, it would go away. I was wrong. It followed me.

---
We sat at one of these date tables when I prepared for one of the most difficult conversations I would have in over two years.

Suppressing my feelings for so long only made them stronger. Closing myself off only made me more insecure. I longed to be known, but I failed to let them in.

"Oh, Sean, the track guy," people would say. I cringe and anxiety builds when I become associated with track. To me, it holds only a small portion of my life. I like music. I like art. I like feeling my heart melt as I sit at Filter Coffee House, listening to Bon Iver and pouring my life out into a red, Bible-sized notebook filled with graph paper.

Embarrassed, I thought if only they knew me, they would want nothing to do with me as I replayed the toxic tape once more: "I don't like the way you live and don’t feel like associating with you. I was just blind to the way you are I guess. Sorry man."

To liberate myself, I had to be there. I had to be sitting with my friend staring at him in silence, scrambling for the words I wanted to say. I had to release those tears that I kept tucked away.

Finally, I said it, chiseling at my walls: "I have this gay struggle." Seeing a perplexed look on his face, I continued, "It plays into so many areas of my life, and I don’t know what to do. You have no idea." I vented about past problems with my father and betrayals by friends, the reasons I had these walls.

Time finally started to pass, and we glanced at the clock. It was two minutes past 1:30pm, and we were late to class already. We parted ways, and there it stopped.

We didn’t talk for a while. I’ll blame it on busyness, but I still take it personally. The next week was finals week, loaded with studying. After that, school was out, and he was gone. Our conversation was never finished, and I almost felt it again, abandoned. The walls still remained, and I continued with my normal pattern, reservation.

A month and a half later, my phone rings. He called, and we caught up, on the surface level, getting nowhere, but at least I knew he didn’t completely leave me, shutting me out. At least, he contained an ounce of compassion, but hollow words only last so long.

Walls (Part 3) -->

Walls (Part 1)

The rain splattered across my windshield as my wipers raced to remove the thousands of droplets so that I could see. Portland, Oregon tends to get a little wet. My hi-beams guided me through the old country roads; so far out they lacked streetlights. The night felt sinister.

I was on my drive home from my high school small group when I decided to text a good friend of mine. For about a week and a half, this friend had been treating me very differently.

---
I did my devotions before school everyday at the coffee shop just down the road from our high school. Around the time I would finish up, my friends would come and sit with me. He would arrive later, order his quad-shot caramel latte, and sit with us. He stopped.

During lunch, we and a few of our other friends would go off-campus, grab some food, and bring it back to the school’s parking lot. My friends and I would sit in the back of his lifted Ford Ranger, eat our lunches, and have a good time. These days, they left without me.

He distanced himself from me and stopped talking to me. I wished it had been something different, but I knew exactly what it was.

A week and a half prior, after failed attempts of calling my mentors, I felt overwhelmed by shame and said some words to him that I still regret to this day: “Dude, I messed up. I did something with a guy.” He had known that I was gay for about a year, but the whole time, we had been trying to get me a girlfriend. We failed.

He said he was busy, and he quickly finished our conversation. There, I began my descent, and as soon as an earthquake crumbles a bridge, we got to where we were, distanced.

---
A message came back and finally, I understood what he had been trying to do. His words tore me like lion devouring its prey.

"I don't like the way you live and don’t feel like associating with you. I was just blind to the way you are I guess. Sorry man," I read on my dimly lit iPhone screen.

My eyes began to water as I continued my drive back home. That night, I didn’t sleep. The blow to my already flustering guilt drove me into one of the lowest points of life.

“If that is what I’m to expect from my best friend, no one will know this about me. I’ll figure it out on my own,” I would tell myself.

These hurtful words provided the perfect foundation. On this statement, I built my walls. I pulled myself away and removed my loved ones from one of the most vital pieces of my life.

Starting from the ground up, I laid down a brick of rejection, followed by a brick of shame and a brick of depression; and the self-loathing-based cement held them firmly in place. Soon enough, I cut myself out.

Walls (Part 2) -->

Pain In Sincerity

It’s two o’clock in the morning, and pinholes of light pierce the dark night sky. The melodies of Arcade Fire trickle from his speakers, and the sounds of somber crashing waves climb up the cliffs and reverberate throughout his car. From time to time, we have done this. From time to time, we have late night conversations, but the essence was different.

Before, my brokenness bound me with impenetrable grandeur walls, leaving others wandering the deserts of my soul as a thirsty nomad, waiting for a drip of enlightenment. But this night, we talked about how far I had come. Those walls had finally come crashing down, and I finally started making sense of who I am.

The conversation flowed, and I started piecing together more parts to the puzzle and finally made the connection.

“I can’t do this,” I thought to myself. My selfish actions had already hurt him, and I knew hurting him more would be excruciating. After I had already crushed him, I had to destroy his hope.

A lump of anxiety grew in the back of my throat as I scrounged for words, debating my statement’s worth. Absolutely. I pride myself on my honesty. I had to be honest. I grabbed my head, looked down to my feet and, like vomit. Out. It. Came.

“Sorry, I don’t feel the same way anymore. I’ve moved on,” I stated as I slowly looked over at him, knowing the words would not be taken well.

The anguish on his face peered into my eyes as his feelings of rejection washed into my core. My heart grew heavier with each second we held eye contact. His soaking eyes spewed guilt into my being, where it still continues to writhe.

Breaking someone’s heart hurts. It hurt me to have hurt him. It hurt encountering the pain of acknowledging that I am the source of pain for someone I still care about as a human being.

Greater than that pain, though, is realizing that he offered me the most genuine gift he could have, himself, and I denied it. He deliberately and dangerously offered me the gift of his affection, and I had to say, “No, thank you.”

At times, the price of honesty is brokenness. At times, we don’t want to hear it, but at least this conflict is derived from genuineness instead of insincerity. Genuineness presents the situation as it truly exists, independent of blind-hope that wrongly guides a victim to the flourishing of his pseudo-optimism.

The hole that I dug with blind-hope got deeper with each interaction. Every shovel full of dirt and dishonesty piled into one towering mountain on which he stood, making for one flattening fall when I finally realized what I had been doing.

Sincerity inhibits that hole from getting deeper and that mound from getting higher. Sincerity makes that fall slightly less miserable, slightly less traumatic. I would much rather know that I’m pursuing something genuine rather than blindly chasing something that fails to exist because once I reach the mountain’s summit, it is one shredding descent down the abyss to come.