IT'S ONLY WORDS

The following is a copy of the Thomas Question email devotional. You can subscribe to the email edition from our website and tune into our podcast.

What are the parts of a life that can’t be reduced to words? When you read about powerful experiences, how much of that power travels through words on a page? Robin Williams’ character in Good Will Hunting says it brilliantly, “You're an orphan, right?” He says to Matt Damon’s character, “Do you think I would presume to know the first thing about you because I read 'Oliver Twist'?”

Joe Simpson wrote Touching the Void about his narrow escape from death in the Andes mountains. I even hate how little that sentence conveys about the shocking story he somehow lived through. Just this week a good friend was trying to convey the rush of freefall from his recent skydiving trip. Somehow the phrase, “it was amazing” probably doesn’t convey much of what it actually felt like to fall from the sky at 130 mph for a few thousand feet. And even when it comes to experiences most of us have in common like falling in love – how much of your pain or joy or confusion about such powerful emotions can you squeeze through your mouth and into words and into someone else’s mind?

Our experiences are like a pacific ocean sized amount of stuff we feel on the inside – and words transfer about a thimble full at a time. We’ve all been frustrated at this rate of conversion. Words and thoughts are worth only small fractions of the actual experiences they represent – like trying to move a mountain one teaspoon at a time.

And I wonder in what way might our faith be like that – words only hinting at a huge torrent of meaning which lies underneath? After all, our faith is just a set of ideas, isn’t it? James writes about this same disconnect in James 2:14. When your faith is just a set of ideas – words in your mind – unmingled with actions and experiences and decisions and risks and initiatives, it lacks punch. We reduce a set of possible experiences to some mental affirmations. But we are moved most by the things we’ve lived through, not just thought about.

This Sunday I’d like to explore how we can activate our faith – and have it become more than just a set of nice ideas.

I hope to see you there, and I hope you bring someone with you.

CSW

Need to catch up on missed Sundays? Visit our website and tune into our podcast.

LAST SUNDAY
Have you told yourself the truth? Need to catch up? Visit our website and tune into our podcast.

THIS SUNDAY
Moving beyond just a bunch of good ideas.

COMING SOON
Let’s be a church that understands a method behind the madness. So let’s have dinner and talk about vision. We’ll do it in smaller numbers over lunch after church. More details to follow.

DON'T FORGET
You’re better than a poster, a commercial, or the most expensive marketing initiative. The single most important part of growing a great church is the sentence only you can say: “What are you doing Sunday and can I pick you up at 9?” Try it. You’ll see.