The imminent revival, part 13 — the 'awakening'

Back in the early 1980s Pat Robertson, host of The 700 Club, was prophesying a “spiritual awakening” in this country. I quickly dismissed it as so much hooey.
 

This month, I’ve learned just why I was correct back then.
 

See, when such folks make noise about an “awakening” they have this idea that God will come down and simply turn others’ hearts toward Him, which in practice means that people will adopt their political and cultural values and “clean out” their enemies by destroying or at least ridiculing them.
 

But after reading the article “Real Awakenings are Not Elegant — [They] are Messy, Ugly, Shattered & Raw” by Elizabeth Gordon in ElephantJournal.com, I was reminded that I’ve been going through my own “awakening” since August 2017, though I’m not at liberty to discuss the details. They refer to inner, not societal, transformation.

One thing that Gordon mentions, and which has been my experience, is that “With real-world awakenings, there is a lot of crying. There is a ton of confusion and doubt and questions and shock. There is deep-seated socialization and conditioning that gets unearthed, leaving us wondering what … we believe/want/know/feel now.” I can imagine that such happened to many of the Biblical characters — Jacob, Paul, the Apostle John and even Jesus, when He was tempted in the desert for 40 days.

Reason: “They expose all the yucky stuff, the shameful stuff, the secrets, the dreams that were never given a voice, the relationships that imprison us, the words left unsaid. Awakenings are a mirror we can’t turn away from, even in our ugliest, most tattered gown. They force us to get real, to get honest, to get transparent. They ask us to [uplevel].”

That is what began to happen to me nearly two years ago, when I realized that much of my life at the time turned out to be a lie or, at best, a sham. Without realizing it, I had been selling myself short, perhaps because I felt I didn’t deserve better.

But there is a reward for going through the process — “And when we do arrive, we realize we have been cleansed, blessed, and prepared. We understand that those dark nights of the soul were an opening for our raw truth to claw its way out. We are humbled that our greatest pain has now become our biggest teacher.”

I had an inkling of that reward last year.

This is why such talk of “awakening” is just that — talk, with no substance. There’s no reference to personal repentance or engaging the inner, deeper life, causing folks to “arrive at our deepest place of love and compassion ... [and] to arrive at the tender crossroads of accepting ourselves and loving others.”

That’s what real revival will produce — tenderness, which I have come to crave.

Of late I’ve been listening to “Awakening,” a beautiful Spyro Gyra tune from 1980 which is in the key of F-sharp but, interestingly, doesn’t resolve until the very end. And today I know why — it also represents an arrival.

Anyway, true revival will lead to kindness, gentleness, goodness and self-control, among other things, with the focus on what God wants to do. May that happen to and through me and us.

Bringing joy

Three years ago, inspired by a dance partner whom I'd met four months previously, I composed a tune that I wanted to arrange for the 16-piece swing band that plays for that dance. I also wanted her permission to put her name to it.

After I showed her the lead sheet to ask for it, her eyes began to water. "Can I keep it?" she asked shyly, to which I said, "Sure." (I'd written it on the computer, so it was stored.)

Only recently, however, did it hit me: I wasn't simply making her happy. I was bringing her joy, which, as David Brooks wrote two weeks ago in The New York Times, "comes when your heart is in another [and] is the present that life gives you as you give away your gifts."

You see, she and I have become part of an informal dance group that makes the rounds of partner dances several times a week. Over the past couple of years we have become a family of sorts, holding an informal birthday party each month honoring those celebrating; consoling people who had lost loved ones; recognizing the birth of grandchildren (most of us are empty-nesters); and, more recently, rejoicing in the recent wedding of two of our members. Indeed, for a time, I was giving flowers to women in it.

As Brooks writes, "Lovers stand face to face staring into each other’s eyes. But friends stand side by side, staring at the things they both care about. Friendship is about doing things together. So people build their friendships by organizing activities that are repeated weekly, monthly or annually: picnics, fantasy leagues, book clubs, etc."

That has shown me just what our relationships should be about, especially in the church. We can talk about "the joy of the LORD" all we want, but that can happen only with a certain amount of bonding. As Hebrews 10:25 reads, "Let us not neglect meeting together, as some have made a habit, but let us encourage one another, and all the more as you see the Day approaching."

Anyway, the tune ended up being finished at the end of that year, and I was privileged to dance with her at its premiere early the next; it ended up being a hit with not only our fellow dancers but also the band, which today plays it in regular rotation and thus has taken on a life of its own. In addition, it's also being played by two other bands, one of them my own.

One other point: When you try to spread joy, it often comes back to you.

My partner turned 60 in November, so I requested that the band play the tune in her honor, which it did. Feeling humbled, I confessed to her later, "I didn't appreciate just how much it meant to you"; to that, she responded, "I can't begin to tell you."

You could say that, in exercising my creative gifts, I've done my job.

Overturning Roe: Some unintended consequences

Let me first say that I have always opposed abortion on demand at any time for virtually any reason and disagreed with Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court decision that removed most state restrictions on abortion in 1973, when it happened. Some of you thus might believe that if it were overturned by a subsequent decision legal abortion would end and, suddenly, all these positive consequences would result.

I’m not convinced of that; to me, it comes down to the old line “Be careful what you wish for — you just might get it.” I see much anti-abortion activism as just so much bullying and not really focusing upon the babies whose lives the activists say they're trying to save.

Some fallacies about the potential overturning of Roe:

If abortion weren't so readily available, women wouldn't be having sex and getting pregnant in the first place.

Naïve as all get out.

According to the book "Blinded by Might: Can the Religious Right Save America?", at the turn of the last century, a time before abortion was banned, a lot of men did the "use 'em and lose 'em" thing, leaving women destitute and vulnerable to abortion. And now that we know today that, especially with the #metoo movement, many girls often undergoing sexual abuse, including rape, much sexual contact that results in pregnancy isn't even welcomed, blowing to smithereens the implication that little vixens are out to seduce men and escape consequence in the process.

Adoptions would increase.

Not today, they wouldn't.

Having a child out of wedlock is far, far less a stigma, if any at all, than two generations ago; as a result, the vast majority of women actually keep their babies with little if any tut-tutting. And part of that is the deep hole that exists in the hearts of many mothers who actually did give up their children, not to mention that in the children themselves once they learn that they were adopted.

Revival would result.

I don't see how.

When abortion was banned during the turn of the last century religion had little, if anything, to do with that. Indeed, you never had any consistent anti-abortion theology until the late 1970s, and such theology is in fact inconsistent in its own right because it focuses on only the unborn.

And when it's shown to be unproductive — then what? We're seeing religious faith expanded to support a viewpoint beyond its actual scope.

Anyway, supporting cultural change primarily through legal means virtually never works. Proper relating needs to be modeled, not simply forced through.

Dancin’ the blues

Over the past 10 years since I got more seriously into social dance I’ve learned quite a myriad of styles, primarily swing and ballroom. One night at a “fusion” dance about three years back, I learned yet another style — blues. (I’ve played that music as well, so I get the feeling.)

I bring that up because blues dancing can at times be quite sensual (and I for one enjoy the often-close physical contact with a partner). So how can I do that and still maintain integrity?

One word: Boundaries.

I always allow my partner to decide just how close she gets to me, and thus it’s up to me to control myself because she’s in effect expecting to trust me; most dance groups maintain a code of conduct anyway, so if I did anything uncouth I could be run out. An actual dance can be smoldering, the truth be told, but I just let that wash over me while we execute those moves.

Last night at a dance in a city park adjacent to the university district I engaged in two close dances with a woman young enough to be my daughter if I had children and whom do I find physically attractive. However, she was for a brief period a worship leader at my church and I’ve been a part of that ministry for two decades, so she probably suspected, correctly, that I wasn’t about to “do anything” precisely because of our association.

Some months ago during a blues festival fundraiser — here in Pittsburgh, we have quite a number of those — I engaged in a dance with one of my regular swing partners. Recently I told her, “I remember that dance.” And I’m leaving it at that.

'Heartbeat bills' and a culture of life

A number of states, most recently Georgia, have passed so-called heartbeat laws, banning abortion if a heartbeat in a fetus can be detected. It doesn’t take a genius to see what’s really going on here — such laws would be fought in court in the hope that the U.S. Supreme Court would overturn Roe v. Wade. 

I’ve opposed legal abortion as long as I can remember, but as things stand now you’ll have to excuse me if I see such bills as promoting bullying, not “life.”

I say that for two reasons. One, back in the late 1970s the issue of abortion was deliberately sheared off from other issues having to do with Joseph Cardinal Bernerdin referred to decades ago as a “seamless garment of life.” That is to say, such things as racism, environmental degradation (today, referred to as “climate change”) and immigration have been at best placed on the back burner for the sake of building a movement which does effectively nothing but push people around. Indeed, the idea that the state would support such consistently pro-life efforts has already been denounced as “socialism.”

Two, the political right, especially the religious right, has this mistaken notion that simply asserting its authority will turn this nation around morally, subscribing to the delusion that once it pushes its agenda through force of law that people will simply obey it. (Never mind that the idea is theologically nonsensical because people still have a core of evil.) Even were Roe overturned I see organized resistance — not to mention that enforcement of such laws will be spotty at best.

Sorry, but simply banning abortion won’t even begin to cultivate a new “culture of life.” My own pastor, who shares my view, put it best when he said sarcastically in a message nearly 20 years ago, “Oh, save them babies, but don’t expect me to pay for feeding them — and don’t bring them into my neighborhood. But save them babies … ”

You may ask, “How do we then promote life?” By asking the deeper questions — even though the answers might inconvenience you.

If Trump were actually removed ...

It’s still a long shot due to his popularity with the Republican base, but — what would be the possible spiritual ramifications were President Donald Trump actually thrown out of office? I don’t broach the subject lightly, especially when you consider the two schools of thought, that’s he’s either a messiah or a disgrace to the Christian faith (and, of course, I lean heavily toward the latter). But here’s something to think about:

It will likely result in the revival that his supporters say that they want.

I say that for this reason: The reason that his Christian supporters love him because they’re convinced that he has the power to, so to speak, beat back the barbarians from the gates and make this country safe for them to operate. The trouble with such a mindset is that the evangelical fervor under which they operate is inherently lost when you spend most of your time defending your own power, with Jesus Himself going on the back burner.

This is precisely why the “religious right,” especially during its heyday in the 1980s, proved horribly ineffective despite its money and influence. Sadly, it still hasn’t learned that lesson especially with the scope of scandalous behavior in its own ranks, naïvely believing only when its views achieve primacy would things turn around morally.

In effect, the Christian faith would be subject to a do-over, returning to the underground movement that it started out as with few friends and experiencing persecution from all sides. I have no doubt that Trump would persecute Christians for not demonstrating fealty toward him (I suspect that because even people, churches and organizations that are theologically strong but not willing to do so receive condemnation from Trump supporters).

And if you know where to look, that’s what you’ll see today.

You see, when a church or organization takes a side politically, especially for the sake of political or cultural influence, it inherently loses its spiritual authority even with the issue of abortion (in my view, an idol in its own right at this point).

Given this reality, Trump being removed might be the best thing to happen in the Christian faith in America. Then the remnant — and certainly many would fall away — would be forced to place its trust in God. Which He demands anyway.