A confession

In my previous writing I was guilty of projecting my own feelings onto my generation. It was ill-disguised in unnecessary hyperbole and the odd mixed metaphor, and framed with the self-righteous question, but in its essentials it was my cry out into the wilderness. I don't know how to answer the questions it raises, but I do know fom observation that there are a lot of people who think like me.

I left the church for a few years because I didn't know how to face these issues. I still don't. The contradictions, the void within, the sense of purposelessness, the inability to say confidently to myself, "I Know". These things still haunt me, and sometimes, like last night, they flare up into outright depression. I was afraid, and so I hid my personal feelings in a general diatribe.

I do think that these are pressing issues for the church, because I don't think that I am alone (or rather I do feel like I'm alone, but at least I'm not the only one) in this pattern of thinking. I think that it is a product of our time. I left the church because I found it was easier to avoid these questions than to seek their answers. I came back at least in part because I found that even when unsuccessful, the search for answers was more rewarding.

I don't know why the world is the way it is. I don't know where God is, or how to know if he is. I don't know where God wants me, or what he wants me to do. And so I struggle forward, or backward as the case may be, and seek God.

I really feel like the church needs to figure out how to reach individuals who feel this way. The church tends to project a very confident aura, but I think sometimes people need to hear that its okay to not know. They need to hear that I feel the same way, not that I have all the answers they seek.

I don't know. This post doesn't make any sense to me so you should probably just ignore it.

Who are we?

What happens when the weight of the world collapses on your shoulders? What happens when the hidden contradictions that sustain your sanity crash together? What happens when you know to much, and can't make sense of any of it?

This is the state of my generation--at least of those who face themselves. Mystery and certainty ebb and flow in the history of the church at different times in different places. Our culture has explored the limits of technological progress. We have seen how far knowledge and certainty can take us. And now as we look around we wonder--what's it all worth? How has "progress" helped us?

We feel guilt. Why was I born amidst plenty that I do not deserve, while others were born into penury they did not deserve? We are the generation of the social gospel.

We sense contradiction. We know more about the way the world works han any generation in history, but we still don't understand it. We see a certainty in many parts of the church which we long for, yet abhor. How do you know? How can I know? How can you presume to know?

We are stranded in a spiritual desert. Many of us have no knowledge of even the basic facts of the gospel; others are rooted in the sandy soil of dumbed down Christianity. We don't read the Bible because we don't read; we watch TV and blog about our existential despair. Where is the beauty of the gospel?

We have left the church or never belonged to it. Why? The contradictions are too great and weigh upon us. We belive in our parents without believing in God, and when the dust settles we are left with an unsettling question, Who is God really? A fable? An invention? A soothing balm? We don't want these things. We want reality, harsh and unforgiving. We want relationship. We want to revel in the void of our existence. In the end, Pascals wager is too great for us. We are the generation of the world.

We don't really believe in reason. Logic is a quaint notion. We seek emotional experiences, bright lights, voices from heaven. We have abandoned the life of the mind in favor of experiential learning. If you haven't felt it, is it real? If you have felt it, is it real? Reality and nonreality have become confused in our minds. Is there truth?

We feel empty, devoid of purpose. We have no desire to carry on the exploits of previous generations. Their value is questionable at best. And so we live with the void and accept that it is unfillable. We don't even want to fill it, so wrapped up is it in our identity. We are the empty generation.

We are the generation of Kierkegaard's leap. We just don't know it. We want to know without being able to know, to believe without understanding belief, to be saved without comprehending what we are saved from.

And so, how will you minister to us, who have grown up, aChristian, areligious, empty, experiential, questioning? How will you show us the gospel of Christ? How will you bring us into the church and show us what true relationship can be? How will you help us, the wanderlust generation, to put down roots in the soil of the gospel? How will you show the love of Christ to us, who are not concerned with rational arguments and theology, but with relationships, experience and emotion? We are different. How are you going to react?