Author: Rob

… Listening to this fantastic Neko Case concert on NPR’s new music site. You’ll be glad for it.

I’ve continued to kick around the ideas I put down in this post about the use of the phrase “spiritual journey,” and the journey metaphor as a way of understanding our lives as people of faith: It seems to me that the idea of a journey isn’t really a bad one–there’s enough mention in scripture of similar terms–but it’s the idea of my spiritual journey that really messes things up. God is certainly taking us somewhere–as he took the Israelites out of bondage, etc.–but it’s us, not me.

Spiritual growth (sanctification) is never an independent project. All of scripture’s sanctification language is inclusive, rather than exclusive: People of God, the church as body of Christ, the vine/branches metaphor, the list goes on.

Scripture’s sanctification language is also relational. This is fitting for a religion that worships a God-in-three-Persons; God-in-Communion. The Church is called the bride of Christ, we are called sons and daughters of God. Indeed, we cannot come to know Christ apart from the work of the Church, and knowing Christ means union with Christ.

Lutherans talk about the church as the “priesthood of all believers”. As Dr. Wollenburg has written:

Individual members of the priesthood receive their identity when the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is put upon them. The nature and character of the royal priesthood is that of a community or society. The identity of each member of the priesthood is determined by his or her relationship to the community in which God lives with his Spirit (Eph. 2:22). In contrast to idolatrous baalism, paganism, animistic religions, and gnosticism, both ancient and modern, no one can know or belong to God as an isolated individual. The worship of the community of the priesthood is not a crowd of individuals coming together, each to have his own religious experience.

In this light, the language of “personal spiritual growth plans” to help on “your spiritual journey,” is really counter-Christian, regardless of the appeal to a culture defined by its icons of segmentation. If I want my family to participate in music together, I give them all instruments, not iPods.

Our sanctification is in communion with Christ and His Church. This doesn’t mean that individuals can’t each be at different places in a life of sanctification. Quite the opposite–the diversity-within-unity of the church is what makes it a community, and the blood of Christ for all is what makes it His bride and body.

In the comments to this recent post, Mike made some great remarks (emphasis mine):

For American Evangelicals, it seems that the journey metaphor is dominant, though not in as much in the sense of an ascent. I don’t know how to articulate this entirely, but it seems as if there is a sense in which people expect “growth” and “sanctification” to include, perhaps not secret knowledge, but maybe, secret feelings or secret insight. People expect change in their spiritual lives. Granted that change is inevitable, but I’m wondering if this has anything to do with the willingness of people to follow fads and change church bodies so readily.

I know exactly what Mike means about “secret feelings or secret insight.” In a lot of ways, throughout my teen years in nondenominational megachurches, this is what it meant for me to be faithful. It was very important that I always be learning something new–without those flashes of light, I felt like I was losing all vitality as a Christian.

I’m glad I don’t see things this way any longer. Learning new stuff is certainly not a bad thing. But keeping a list of our theological insights as a barometer for the work of the Holy Spirit just doesn’t work. In fact, scripture emphasizes time and again that we ought to be fools for Christ. I don’t know all that phrase entails, but I can bet it’s not code for “becoming more insightful.”