In my late highschool through college I was trying to make sense of why I was such a pathetic Christian. There wasn’t a hoop I’d not jumped through trying to get rid of that ol’boy Adam buried somewhere in the dna of my desires.
College was no respite but allowed new frames of reference; psychological theory—“I’m OK, You’re OK”. ‘Why?’ I wondered, ‘was everyone ok save me, at least in the deepest and secret spaces of my soul?’ Sociology, political science seemed to offer new horizons, few answers.
It was in my late twenties I discovered CS Lewis and for two years consumed him, together with some Catholic theologians. “Augustine’s Confessions” told me I was not alone. But it was Thomas Merton and another Catholic priest whose name I‘ve forgotten that brought me home to hungering anew for the “entire” inside my search for the holy; this time—thank God for Wynkoop‘s “Theology of Love”—understanding that it was not “the holy” (sanctification) that would need to be ‘entire’, but me—entirely given over to the Sanctifying Presence of The Spirit.
In these writers I began to see that if love is to be real in me, then integrity (the Holy) had to fill both my heart and behaviors. That meant love apart from grace was truly impossible. It also meant that works were “holy making” and like faith and heart needed God’s ever present enabling or gracious Presence.
Then, God did a stupid thing. Instead of letting me take the first senior pastoral assignment offered me, in Elko Nevada, God sent me home; to family, to another vocation, to face anew that ol’boy Adam and to an Episcopalian Priest who taught at Western Evangelical Seminary In Portland. And there i discovered what I now could accept: I was Christian precisely because of the ancient Christian Church, the Roman Catholic faith. Without God’s faithfullness right up to this day, under good Popes and horrific, God was always nurturing a reformation, a renewal.
I never thought about leaving my Naz faith as God, in college, made it clear through Dr. Greathouse (kinda like a Naz Pope—we have six) …that I was to “bloom where I was planted.” (Thank God for the Jesus people, right? 😊🙆♂️ Im guessing that some reading this story wish, for the sake of our faith tradition, God had just kept God’s mouth shut and make of me somebody else‘s problem. What can I say? 🤷🏼♂️.)
Anyway in that awareness, in the writings of Catholic mystics, an introduction to Eastern Orthodox teachings focused on salvation as restorative rather than a penal thing I began to see salvation as not only personal, but Supra-personal, communal and ultimately inclusive of everyone—save those who finally will not come home. “May they in the end be few.”
What I could not then know but do now, is that this journey was God’s way of revealing the very center of my Wesleyan faith—of bringing me home to myself. For John Wesley, an Anglican priest, understood salvation in primarily restorative terms, had been greatly influenced by the Eastern Church and emphasized God’s gracious Presence as the only hope of our salvation.
One such moment was when I knelt at an altar of prayer. God spoke by intuition within me. “Terry, in all those hundreds of trips to an altar of prayer seeking to simply love me, you’ve never been alone. Behind you, kneeling with you, are thousands upon thousands of Adam’s daughters and sons, each with their own struggles, temptations, mental health concerns. I’ve heard every prayer and will not let you fail in coming all the way home, to the place where you love me first, as no other and your neighbor as yourself.”
Am I there Yet? No. “It’s not that I have already reached this goal or have already been perfected, but I pursue it, so that I may grab hold of it because Christ grabbed hold of me for just this purpose”(Philippians 3:12 CEB).
Blessings! Terry:)
For more on my personal journey in loving God and my neighbors read my book, “Confessional Holiness—the Missing Piece of the Puzzle“
Purchase at: https://www.amazon.com/Confessional-Holiness-Missing-Puzzle-Century/dp/1520489501/ref=sr_1_11?crid=1
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