September 2006

Out with the Old

            We’ve been cleaning out things.  When we moved we gave away and threw away a lot of stuff.  We had a yard sale this Spring.  But the storage area in the house is still overflowing.  We have been systematically going through boxes and throwing away a lot more.  I decided to get rid of an entire filing cabinet of material, and even give away the filing cabinet.  It was full of things I have collected for forty years.  There were even notes I had saved from Seminary classes I had taken.  But I haven’t looked in that filing cabinet for years.  Most of what I do now is on the computer.  All the files I save are in electronic format.  And if there is something I want to look up I go to the Internet rather than old files.  Nevertheless, I had to force myself not to look at what I was throwing out.  I didn’t go through the files or re-read articles I had saved.  They served a purpose at one time, but that time is basically over.  Old pictures and mementoes have been tossed.  Things that we have saved for years thinking we might find a use for them some day are now gone.  I should have given the refuse guy a tip. 

            But that is how life goes isn’t it?  Life keeps changing.  Things that served a purpose at one time are no longer useful.  In fact, they are in the way.  It is hard to part with them because they were useful at one time, I liked many of those things and there is a certain sentimentality that surrounds them. 

            Spiritually I find the same is true.  What worked for me at one time is no longer helping me to grow.  I need a new challenge, new thoughts and new ways of living for God.  It is not that the old things were bad, they served an important purpose, and I will always be grateful for them.  They brought me to this place.  And it is not that these things were wrong or bad, or that I have discarded them as untrue.  It is that I now see deeper meanings to what I believed and thought before. 

            It is sort of like the difference between dating and marriage.  Your ideas change about a lot of things — they deepen.  In marriage you become more secure in your relationship.  You have a deeper understanding of your spouse than when you first married.  You grow in your understanding of the person to the point that you can almost read their thoughts and predict their actions.  Your relationship becomes more comfortable and real.  

            My understanding of God has grown over the years.  A lot of the guilt-based teaching that I learned has had to be discarded.  The more I read the Gospels the more I understand this man Jesus the more interesting he becomes to me, and the more I understand just how radical his message is.  This is not just some tacked-on religious habit — that has had to be discarded — it is a way of life that changes who I am and how I relate to other people. 

            Seeking to grow in the new,

                        Rod