An Open Letter to the Church Today

By: JANA GREENE

Dear Church,

You’re the one who got me in this pickle. You started it.

You said to love your neighbor. But it turns out there seems to be disclaimers to this most important of all commandments, and it’s very confusing to keep the rules straight.

Then you told me to witness to the world, make disciples of men, when what they really need is a template for what love looks like; not just what it sounds like.

So, I did that too.

You told me to pray God would break my heart for what breaks his heart, and that is the prayer that did me in. I hope you’re happy.

This was the knottiest kink in the whole chain. Because listen...

HE DID IT. I had a supernatural experience. The veil didn’t tear open but it did have a loose thread. And I did what people do, which is to pick at it until it unraveled.

And it was VERY upending and not entirely pleasant.

People were hungry. People were lonely. People had had scripture lobbed at them at every turn but were empty. I did a lot of that lobbing in the day. They were all hurting, because we are all hurting. Presence does what words can never do.

The whole, wide hurting world is looking at Christ-followers to see if they are made of the same stuff they preach. And woefully, too much of it perpetuates the separation between us and God (in reality, there is none.)

And you never told me to love myself, as one who could also benefit from that top-tier commandment. And I didn’t know how, as you taught me the human heart is deceitful above all things and not to trust it. Not to trust the voice of the God particle we all carry, that divine spark.

Church, God is within you, you told me. But he’s not the icky parts. No, he cannot be in the presence if ick. It’s too icky and you’re too human. As if Christ didn’t pick his nose or wipe his butt. As if he didn’t wail and cry, and ask the cup to be taken from him.

It’s my desire to see the Church repent for making love about doctrine and law.

Please don’t discount revival because it looks nothing like you thought it would. God is crafty that way. He isn’t bound to do it your way (or mine.)

As it turns out, I don’t mind being in this pickle anymore. Because it’s fundamentally changed me to consider the suffering of others. It should change all of us.

I fell in love with you a long time ago, Church. There is so much to love. Good news! Community! You reared our whole generation, and I’m so grateful for all the wonderful experiences I’ve had in your space. It felt like a safe space for a long time.

But perhaps it’s time for a shift?

I will always love you, but sanctuaries should not be proving grounds.

And as we all experience this great winding-up to sharing the mind of God in total, let’s remember people over policies. Politics have no place in religion, and frankly, we cannot afford the hatred that comes part and parcel with politics. Please keep it out of the pulpit. You alienate more people than you help.

So, actually, thank you for starting this, I think.

Warm Regards,

April 24, 2024 6

Celebrations, Pity Parties, and a God who Attends Both

How often do I feel like I’m spiritually “getting things right”? About as often as we see an eclipse. So let’s not lean on on our “understanding” of God and lean instead into Love (which is really just another name God goes by.) And yes, this is my lame attempt at photographing the eclipse.

By: JANA GREENE

If it’s God’s will, it will come easily. That’s how you know you’re operating in the Spirit. Things will click. Things will flow. His yoke is light, etc and so on.

But also, if you are in God’s will, it will be hard.

You’ll know you have holy favor when you’re downtrodden and at the end of your rope. That’s the ol’ devil, don’t you know. And he wouldn’t mess with you if you weren’t doing God’s work.

Well, which is it? Do you see the conundrum?

This is life, and it’s both and neither. It is, so far as I can tell, it’s ALLTHETHINGS, dammit.

I can’t trust a God whose mind I have to pick apart to get it “right.”

I don’t tell my adult children, “Okay, I’m feeling some type of way about you…but WHICH way? Let’s see if you can correctly guess based on interpretation of an ancient text and my jealous, vengeful nature. May the odds be ever in your favor!”

I learn alongside my children, you see. For everything I learn about them, they learn about me. And in the process, and I feel like we are all learning alongside God, with curiosity and wonder and grieving and suffering.

It will be easy, there will be times of flow.

It will be brutally difficult.

It’s all holy favor, you see, and that’s the confounding part.

God only feels ONE type of way about you.

We need not wring our hands in an attempt to earn love, because that’s the way we have been taught to please a world of broken people and an unpleasable diety.

In actuality, the odds are always, always in your favor, Beloved. Even (especially?) when you’re most hurt, downtrodden, and at the end of your rope.

Whether you invite God to a celebration of the soul or an old-fashioned pity party, just invite him. The Spirit shows up for both.

How to be in the will of God? Just be.

Blessings, friends.

April 16, 2024 7

Room Enough for Love

Ahhhh, you have to admit this is HEAVENLY!

By: JANA GREENE

When I thought I understood the hereafter in my evangelical days, I used to talk about the mansions we will all have in heaven, and looked forward to laying down this mortal burden and enjoying my “just reward” after fighting the good fight.

“Mansions!” all us Christians would insist. “We are all gonna have MANSIONS!”

In seems a strange form of idolatry now in hindsight. Entitlement, even. After all, it’s our birthright! In the end, it’s ego wanting what ego feels justified in wanting.

The way we all carried on about the specs for our abode in Heaven, missing the point and slipping into a prosperity gospel mindset.

So, God? You can give my heavenly “mansion” to someone else who struggled with homelessness while Earthside. Transfer the deed, and let it be so. Basking in the undiluted consciousness of the Universe is enough for me.

Perhaps God, you can see fit to let my address be YOU. Peace, not riches, in communion with the holiness we only get to see glimpses of here.

Although I surely won’t mind if you place me near water – perhaps a sea or a stream. I want to be cozy forever and ever, amen – safe finally and well. Whole and free in my little heavenly abode.

And I will invite all of my friends to my little UN-mansion; and that will be enough. A true just reward, eternally.

In my Father’s house, there are said to be many rooms, but I just need room enough for love.

March 28, 2024 2