Into the deepest depths of hell, in fact. Not just the surface level, but down into the white hot flames, the most painful, excruciating places.

Where the suffering is intense. Where people come to curse the Lord with as much fervor that could otherwise be mistaken for worship.

Where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Where death is reality. Where darkness rules.

Church: one of the few entities on earth that has a core message potentially worth living and dying for. Light of the world. Salt of the earth. Unconditional love.  That is when it doesn’t get bogged down with selfishness, superiority, or cynicism.

We should be convinced that life is not about acquisition – that living generously is a better way to live. Giving food to the hungry or resourcing the poor is not an obligation or a chore or a bullet point on a job description. Our intended trajectory away from greed and self-centeredness is counter-cultural and inspiring.

Rob Bell, in Velvet Elvis, says that one of the worst things to have happened to the Christian faith is the movement towards heaven and hell being some distant places – separated from our day to day experience.  It leads to us wanting to escape this planet that must be void of God, in this scenario.  Our trajectory becomes about saving our souls from eventual damnations and more about ME spending forever in bliss and satisfaction.

Instead, heaven and hell are present realities.  Eternity started on day one. Hell is right here right now.  It’s the mother who can’t feed her children.  It’s the pain of loss.  It’s disease.  It’s ridicule and bullying and genocide.

You want to get to heaven…. bring it.

Jesus didn’t leave some mystical land to come to our neutral ground to persuade people to be good so they can ride the salvation express to heaven.  He came, himself, and brought heaven with him – by healing and feeding, by turning people’s hearts in a different direction, and by turning water into wine.

I want the church to go to hell, too.  I want people to see the comparison – to consider the alternative.

I want people to understand that heaven isn’t about walking streets of gold and wearing sparkling white robes.

Heaven is about the tears and pain and the bruises that come before restoration.  It’s about hard-core, unabashed love that doesn’t ask questions or require any thing besides your being.  It’s about getting rid of the darkness by shining in s spark of light – not about pointing out how dark hell is.

Heaven is what moves in when hell is pushed out.

But you can’t push hell out of the picture from the sidelines.  You can’t feed hungry people if you don’t go where the hungry people are.  You can’t build relationships by sitting on your couch.

What a hellish perspective then to celebrate “some glad morning” when we all will “fly away.”  For those who think that trying to live like Jesus is the best way to live, it seems counter intuitive that God would have his people fleeing the scene.  Who’s left to advocate for those with no voice?  To feed those with no food?  To visit those with no friends?  To give hope to those who have nothing to look forward to?

So, I’m done with the halo envy.

I’m done with looking forward to my mansion and streets of gold and diamond harp.

If there’s no more hope or love or happiness today than there was yesterday then we’re all missing something.  If we’re living as if this place is doomed, then we’ve screwed up big time.  If you’re not concerned about replacing hell here and now with heaven here and now, then we are diluting the redemptive message that Jesus was supposed to be all about.

Jesus example, if we believe it, says that being concerned that someone’s stomach isn’t full is at least as important as the state of their soul.  It shows that aiming towards emotional maturity is at least as important as aiming towards spiritual maturity.  He tries to convince us tax collectors, and prostitutes aren’t the wrong crowd.

Jesus didn’t seem to think that going to hell was such a bad idea.

In fact, it was probably the most important thing He ever did.

“I want to expose the wound to as many people as possible because there may be someone who could help the healing” :: Jeremy Current, Watershed Charlotte

There are moments of artistic openness that as a listener you absolutely have to seize, to grab ahold of knowing that you’re likely to learn something incredible. This was made true for me this past Sunday at Watershed when Jeremy Current, a guest vocal artist, began telling some of his story. While exposing some of the wounds that birthed one of his tunes he shared the quote above.

I was absolutely captivated, evidenced by my leaning forward in my chair and widening eyes. What I felt was a combination of a deep connection with this truth and yet an amazement at the succinctness with which he was able to verbalize truths that have taken me 30 years to even acknowledge. There are still chasms to cross before I begin to understand it.

It is not that I was unwilling to be vulnerable for fear of showing weakness. There are not enough über-masculine bones in my body to justify this. Essentially vulnerability required me to be satisfied with being embarrassed about the nature of my wound and required others to be at all interested in my being wounded and needing healing. Neither were realities that I could comprehend.

What I’m learning about vulnerability, though, is that it is provides the fuel for inspiration, transformation, and even revolution. Consider the concept of famous last words. When faced with challenge, defeat, looming destruction it depths of your soul, your heart, your core desires are the things that come out. The most well-known response when staring down the barrel of a gun is: “Please … I have a wife and family.”

These things come from down deep. It’s unfiltered soul-speak without any pretense or filter.

These are the important things.

The “I don’t want to be here anymore” things.

The “I don’t know what to believe” things.

The “I’m sure we can make it if we just have one more chance” things.

And, it is often in the vulnerable moments when we hear ourselves audibly speak the confessions and fears and troubles and questions that have been floating around in our heads that change can take took.  It’s fertile ground.  It’s shaken.  It’s soft and prepared for new things.

Seize those moments when you or someone close to you is being vulnerable.  Drink in the confession.  Let it stimulate your mind and heart. Let it stir your soul.  Let it connect you to another being.

And while you and I may never stare down the barrel of a literal gun, our hearts will break and our souls will be wrenched. We’ll be disappointed in our self.

Our failure.

Failure, though, and disappointment are the critical components for relationship.  Transparency breeds trust.  It is in the togetherness of life that my vulnerabilities and your concerns become our collective strength.

I see the young girl huddled on the brothel floor
I see the man with a passion come in kicking down the door

This lyric is from a Sara Groves song – When the Saints.  Every time I hear it, it blows my heart to smithereens, and without fail, I’ll get something in my eye.  Without fail.

The song itself, if you’ve not heard it is pretty unassuming – essentially, Sara says she wants to walk in with the Saints, mentions a few Bible characters for comparison and off she goes singing again.

Then this happens:

I see the long quiet walk along the Underground Railroad
I see the slave awakening to the value of her soul

I see the young missionary and the angry spear
I see his family returning with no trace of fear

I see the long hard shadows of Calcutta nights
I see the sister standing by the dying man’s side

I see the young girl huddled on the brothel floor
I see the man with a passion come in kicking down the door

I see the man of sorrows and his long troubled road
I see the world on his shoulders and my easy load

In all seriousness, that one lyric does it for me.  I’m sure there are lots of reasons why but, for whatever reason, I really connect with the spirit of this thought.  I think about being a guy and about all of the baggage that comes along with that – teenage years of hormone-induced lust and the residual hormone-hangover that most of us experience throughout our twenties.  I think of pornography and how what can start as an innocent curiosity and what gets regarded too often as a rite of passage is, in fact, a mind-bogglingly large profit sector with complex revenue streams and profit sharing.  It is big business that, like all big businesses, are about making money.

It makes me wonder what portion of mouse-clicks support things like sexual trafficking. There has to be some fringe sites and systems that take advantage of men’s addictions. It makes me wonder how many of these girls get into the porn industry because they feel like they have no other options. It makes me wonder how many abductions result in forced sexual slavery – I know the numbers are staggering.

And then I think about us men having our lusts transformed into compassion, motivating us to turn off the computer and figuratively or literally busting down doors with an appetite for restoration, an appetite for rescue.

To me, this is incredibly moving imagery that speaks to me more strongly than I could even attempt to write about here. I’ve written before on this blog about how restoration speaks deeply to my soul and this may be, for me, the ultimate display of restoration.

Here’s the song on Lala.com so you can listen for yourself: http://lala.com/zZu8I

We unconsciously use war metaphor to in many different facets of our lives. Already, we’ve said that sports, and science, and conflict are ripe with it. We talk about inner battles, battles of will, waging war against pick-an-injustice. For those of us that are trying to model the way that Jesus lived, is it appropriate to approach the world with this same angst? (I was about to say “spiritual world” here, but I’d rather not divvy it up like that)

“War” and “Battle” are words that are used fairly often throughout scripture. And the old testament is practically crammed with God-ordained conflicts between people that claimed the lives of thousands. But most of these references are literal references – either to actual wars or the prospect of wars if the people don’t respond in a certain way. They’re not figurative – i.e. they’re not metaphor language. The other interesting thing you see in the prophets of the Old Testament are the references to the end of war – to peace. Micah 4:3 as classic example talks about the conversion of weapons of war and destruction into weapons of provision, and that nations “will not train for war anymore.”

The New Testament talks far less frequently about these concepts. Jesus mentions war when outlining the cost of being a disciple as an illustration.

Then there’s the armor of God. Can’t forget this. This is perhaps the most blatant use of war metaphor in the Bible when the author of Ephesians says:

Be strong in the Lord and in this mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.

Perhaps this isn’t as metaphoric as it sounds. I’m not suggesting that there is literal armor – but I am saying that the readers and the author himself were literally being physically attacked and chained for their beliefs. They were, in fact, in a type of war scenario.

One last thing before I attempt to get far more practical with this. In this same passage we read this:

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rules, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world, and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

Growing up, I was very involved in a church that heavily used war metaphor to describe Christians relationship with sin. It was very much a battle, a near-literal altercation with demons and evil. Shouts of praise were often inter-mingled with battle cries. I understood that I was to be engaged in a spiritual war against an axis of evil (made up of beer, drugs, crossing “the line” with the opposite sex, smoking – up for consideration for the axis were cussing, lusting, and gambling). Looking back, it also took on the scope of “if you’re not for us, you’re against us.”

Given the significance of all things spiritual to many people, it’s not hard to understand why the fight becomes so important. All of this is very much in keeping with the use of war metaphor.

I felt as though that those who took part in any of the activities in the axis of evil were not just casualties, but they were brain-washed prisoners of war, recruited to fight the forces of good. On the one hand, I knew that I was called to “Love my neighbor as myself” but at the same time, these were “enemy forces” that had the potential to attack me. It’s shoot-to-kill time.

My biggest hang up with the use of war metaphor is that it promotes a sense of defensiveness. Even if we constantly on the attack, we feel as though at any moment enemy forces can strike. Defensive people and groups act very differently than the rest of us. There is a primal instinct that begins to emerge in even the most well-intentioned people. If at any point we feel threatened, we are liable to act out of desperation. In our figurative war, this could mean something as a comment/accusation that precipitates the alienation of a person or a group of people.

There is nothing as polarizing as war. Being at war means that opposing forces have become as diametrically opposed to one another as possible. It is the ultimate consequence to unmanaged conflict, or tension.

While it leads to alienation and destructive processes, there is a nobility to it all. In war, finding the power to continue the fight is admired. Officers are commended with medals or other awards for exceptional bravery. Conversely, there is shame is surrender, in humbling yourself to the enemy. It is a display of weakness to bow out of battle.

In the church, we have allowed this paradigm to permeate everything that we do. We have battle hymns and fight songs, chants that reinforce the diametric opposition of the forces of good and the forces of evil. And while there may be theological basis for this concept, that good cannot exist where there is evil, we are practically raining terror down on those that need our love the most. We rationalize by saying that we “love the sinner, and hate the sin” which can lead quickly to justifying our force with statements like “there’s gonna be some collateral damage,” or “it’s for your own good,” as if we have the capacity to decide what that should be. The consequences of our bloody battles are years and years of distrust, malice, alienation, and hatred.

We see this over and over. Homosexuals have long been essentially metaphorically labeled as terrorists to modern-day Christianity. We go on the offensive against abortion clinics, perversely assuming that God is smiling as we spew hateful slogans, carry placards plastered with the graphic images of aborted fetuses, or as we literally use lethal force.

Hatred for Christ’s sake is still hatred.

As long as we continue to propagate war metaphor in our churches, we will continue to falsely indoctrinate our people to believe that anyone that is “in” is good and that anyone that is “out” is the enemy.

It continues to be striking to me that Jesus’ harshest words were for the religious. A man marked by unwavering compassion across people groups and ethnicities and situations turned hostile when he looked inward towards those who were thought to be representatives of God on earth.

We could learn a thing or two from this Jesus character.

It’s also striking to me that aside from the disciples, we never hear about what happens with any of the people that Jesus encountered. We know that he was kind and loved regardless of the circumstance and never implied that he was about to bomb the enemy with righteousness and blessed sanctification. It was seldom more than a brief encounter, the beginnings of relationship, filled with understanding, compassion, and grace. If we approach life as though we’re all in this together, that we can learn mutually beneficial things from one another, that we are all part of a well-intended creation perhaps we’ll see the transformation that we’ve been trying to force for so long.

And maybe, the other people will change too.

…I’ve decided that if I had my life to live over again, I would not only climb more mountains, swim more rivers, and watch more sunsets; I wouldn’t only jettison my hot water bottle, raincoat, umbrella, parachute, and raft; I would not only go barefoot earlier in the spring and stay out later in the fall; but I would devote not one more minute to monitoring my spiritual growth.  No, not one.

A funny thing happens when you come to know the freedom that being in touch with Jesus offers: you can potentially be overrun with guilt.  There is a checklist that may seem to descend from the sky (though, I now realize this checklist comes from somewhere very different) that outlines each of the many things that you have to do if you are to truly experience and relate to God.  You have to pray, and read your Bible, and confess your transgressions, and do a good deed everyday, and study, and sing, and reflect.

Herein lies one of the problems with Christianity as it is expressed in 2009.  There is so much to do that we miss the great intention behind it all:

Cease striving and know that I am God.
Psalm 46:10 (NASB)

Yes: a life being lived modeled after the way that Jesus lived his will involve self-improvement.  It is a good thing to read scripture in order to understand the way that people thought and processed things in and out of connection with God; to take the good, and the bad, and the confusing and incorporate these things into our own lives.  It is good to spend time in prayer.  Relationships are the means by which real change takes place and a relationship with God is no different.  Doing good is good.  Confession is good.

But when the redeemer becomes taskmaster, when guilt overpowers freedom, a core component of the whole system is jeopardized.  God’s intention has never been “Keep ‘em occupied so they don’t have time to bother me.”  Instead, God’s intention is that as much as is humanly possible we live in a type of union with Him.  Not performing for him.  Not doing his bidding and returning to the bell-tower a la Quasimodo.  Just being confident in His love, in the security of His relationship with you.

Manning finishes up this thought-process with this:

What would I actually do if I had to do it all over again?  Heeding John’s counsel, I would simply do the next thing in love.

As a person of faith, I struggled for a long time with wanting to look the part which involved doing all the things that were expected.  I know I’m not alone in this.  I saw certain things as bad and (*gasp*) unholy.

We can “do” ourselves in.  Don’t misread what I’m saying – I know that “belief” and “action” are as integral to each other as breathing is to life.  But preoccupation with the irrelevant minutiae of our spiritual lives is counterproductive to living like Jesus lived.

So, may you live with the confidence that Jesus is in the processing of reinvigorating your soul with life; that during this process, there are people that He wants you to meet and interact with, things that He wants you to do that bring just a little bit of heaven to earth; that he never intended for you to become preoccupied with the endless pursuit of self-improvement; and that He wants you to stop your striving, and know He is God.

Yes, I’m aware these are philosophical questions that may or may not have an easy answer.

Let me start with the latter.

What does it mean to be human?

I approach this answer following a history in traditional Christian theology and that certainly colors my perspective but not in the scary “turn-or-burn” sort of Christianity.  I know that not everyone will approach this question with any sort of Christian worldview to which I say “Fantastic!”  I think truth can be gathered from a lot of perspectives so please share them with me.

Now, my first notion is that humans exist and have a character modeled after that of God.  Despite what you may have heard, God is more about relationships than stand-off-ishness.  He is more interested in interaction with us than damning us to hell.  The earliest poems (e.g. Genesis) that discuss God’s first interactions with humans also point out that it was not good for humans to be alone.  Relationships are the basis for life.

My slant is that to be human is to be engaged in and value relationships.

Secondly, I would say that the self-actualized human being is also interested in improving humanity.  Part of this can be seen in wanting the best for self.  It is not that far of a jump to go from wanting best for self to wanting best for all.  Christians would say that this involves restoration (putting things back the way they were meant to be) or bringing heaven to earth (by acting how Jesus would act).  But even without a Christian approach to life, this is still true for many people.  Given the question is it “better” to be selfish or to be selfless, most people would likely choose the latter as the most admirable character trait.

Mature human beings are interested in making life better.

Finally, purpose.  Long story short we have purposeful actions often backed up with rationale.  That’s pretty uniquely human.

Obviously there are many other things that we’re not delving into here . . . humans should be logical, self-aware, capable of dreaming dreams, engaged in culture, etc, etc.

Thoughts or philosophies on any part of life must first be framed by these core perceptions about humanity.

So, what about human rights?