Being Known

There's an older show that occasionally still plays on TV if you can catch it called Diagnosis Murder starring a guy named Dick Van Dyke. Each episode had a unique murder plot that was always resolved (at least in the few episodes that I saw) by the end, and each show seemed to try to humanize the murderers, helping the audience understand the emotions and motives behind the actions of these real people. The willingness, though, of each murderer to always admit their crime before or just as they were being arrested never made sense to me - I don't ever remember seeing an episode where the murderer didn't willingly and often emotionally crack before they were ever brought to trial. I could be inaccurate as to how often this really happened in the show - I don't watch TV that much - and investigators obviously rarely have the convenience of their suspects admitting their crimes when cornered with evidence. But I think it illustrates a desire, if however faint, that we all have to be known. Sure, we are deathly afraid of being known. We think that somehow if people knew who we truly were, how terrible we really are, we'd no longer be loved (not really understanding that what we think is love is really far from it). But I put myself into the position of a criminal sometimes after watching a show like Law and Order or a movie like Shawshank Redemption. I imagine the moments after committing the crime...the terrible realization of my true nature, wishing over and over I could go back in time and run away from my sin before it were ever realized...before I had a chance to act. And then you feel the fear...the fear of being caught or maybe being found out. I couldn't stand the thought of being trapped in a prison for even a few days - I'd go crazy! Rarely does a criminal not run. The fear that would keep me a continual fugitive...running, hiding for days, weeks...maybe even a lifetime. The thing that bothers me the most, though, is the thought of never being able to be honest with anyone even if I could get away with what I had done. I couldn't tell my wife, my best friends, or even admit to my God what I'd done. I so desire to be known - I hate having to hide things - I wish sometimes I could be completely transparent - to scream my burning heart desires or my sins and how Christ has changed me to everyone. I can't bear the thought of being haunted day and night by my crimes and never being able to share my agony with anyone. So I suppose in that sense I'd make a terrible fugitive.

But then again, I am a fugitive - I run from God. Until this past summer, I struggled with eating (something about being on a fire crew and running up and down mountains 16 hours a day for up to two weeks at times with tons of weight on your back at least temporarily cures that - you eat or don't make it). I love climbing and hiking among many other things outdoors and so I desired to have the body to perform well. And, of course, I desire(d) to be attractive to women. And thus I became a slave...obsessed with how much to eat. I'd set stupid, unrealistic goals that basically would starve myself, especially with how much physical stuff I love to do outside. And when I'd eat tons of food when my body was trying to recoup after being underfed, I'd then feel terrible - I felt that I had sinned (which may not have been entirely untrue...we can eat too much with the idea that we'll gain what we truly desire from the comfort of food). And then soon afterwards vow to God not to eat for the next day. I began to realize, though, that this repetitive process was tearing me apart, distracting me, enslaving me. Soon God began to ask me to trust in him. To stop being obsessed with how much I ate. To focus on Him and stop worrying. But I couldn't do it. I couldn't immediately trust. I felt like Indiana Jones in the Last Crusade when he has to walk across the invisible bridge spanning a deep chasm. I knew God was my last option, my only hope to get out, but my fear of the chasm screamed at me, challenging whether my God was really there...or really good. Somehow I believed that God really didn't care. Sure, I've heard over and over that God really loves me. But eventually you have to really begin to question whether God exists - and whether he's really good. And then you ask is good really good - does "good" satisfy this great longing I have in my heart to be fulfilled...to be satisfied. This summer, though, God gracefully guided me through my struggle as I took very small steps of faith...placed my trust in him in very tiny ways. Sure, I often failed along the way. And it took (and still occassionally still takes) time. But I cautiously opened myself up to him - I allowed him to know me and change me in an incredible and intimate way. Sure, I still struggle with this issue every once and a while - transformation is a process - but I am so free. And my fears of not being able to climb or run or hike well or gaining too much weight...well...yeah, those were pretty stupid.

My point is...and I think I'm speaking to myself the most when I say this...is that we do not trust our God. I think the reason we fear being known...being found out, is that we only see the end as catastrophic...as hell. But if we allow ourselves to really be known to God and to the people, albeit sometimes few, that really care; if we begin the scary process of trusting in our God, such good will come. Unfortunately, it'll probably take me a lifetime and I'll always on some issues be so hesitant and scared to follow God. Scared that he'll ask me to live a heartless life or marry a woman who I couldn't live with. Heh...somehow going to China to preach the Gospel never scared me...I think being a pastor of a dead church in the middle of a big city scares me far more...not that I think God is asking me to do that - especially the pastor part. But I hope someday that I'll know and trust my God enough that the struggles are few. That I'll trust in Him so much through the experiences that we've had together that when I'm asked to do something that seems scary - and that no good could seems like it could result - that I'll know so well the goodness of my creator that whether or not to trust won't even be a thought.