Most people do not know that I am a black belt in three different forms of karate, and spent twenty years teaching Kung Fu to monks in the desolate mountains of China. Most people do not know that because it's not true. But if it were, that would be awesome.
Truth is, I took a little karate when I was a kid, and for about a year in college. What I gained from it was something more than the ability to shatter your collar bone with my index finger. What I gained is what most gain: Respect. Respect for others. Respect for discipline and hard work. Respect for the virtue of patience, and how long it actually takes to get good at something.
Joe Hyams in his book, Zen in the Martial Arts, quotes the first thing his first karate teacher said to him:
"I am not going to show you my art. I am going to share it with you. If I show it to you it becomes an exhibition, and in time it will be pushed so far into the back of your mind that it will be lost. But by sharing it with you, you will not only retain it forever, but I, too, will improve."
About twenty years ago, when I encountered some of the philosophies of Asian thinkers through the centuries, I read things that surprised me. And it got me to thinking: What if Christians spent more time truly sharing the gospel with people instead of trying to sell it like a magazine subscription? What if by sharing our faith with those who do not know Scripture well, we might learn something in the process?
Okay. So we are in the middle of the Advent season practicing what it is to wait upon the Lord. That's a tough sell to church-types who think we have it all figured out, and that the goal of church is to keep doing the same things the same way over and over and over. But according to the Word of the Lord, so much is yet to come.
So much is yet to come.
We still have so much worth waiting for. We are works in progress.
For instance, today the blind and the deaf are all around us. We isolate them from regular society for some strange reason. In so doing, we are robbing ourselves from learning what it really means to see, and what it really means to hear. But one of these days, the blind will receive their sight, and the deaf will listen to the sweet sounds of voices without fear.
So much is yet to come.
On one of the walls in my office, amongst my degrees and academic awards and credentials and the hand-carved wooden plaque the monks made for me during my two decades in China where they mastered Kung Fu under my tutelage--(You know I'm embellishing the story for poetic comedy, right? I can just picture people at church saying, "Did you know Jeff is a Kung Fu master?")--
And now, back to our show--
Among the degrees on the wall is a small cross-stich from my childhood. It reads quite plainly, "Please be patient... God isn't finished with me yet..."
It has taken me a long time to realize that the little plaque that hangs just beneath my doctoral degree is actually the most important thing on the wall. For years I operated in ministry under the illusion that my task as the überchurchman was to be the smartest guy in the room whose job included showing people how to be educated, proper-thinking Christians. I thought my job was to get you to think like me. "Trust me, I'm a doctor." Sheesh. I wish so badly that I could go back and take that daft prick of a preacher I was in my twenties and tell him to just calm down.
Truth is, when it comes to being followers of Jesus, we have very little figured out. We still have so much to learn. We still have so much that's worth waiting for.
So much is yet to come.
During this Advent season, instead of showing each other how to wait upon the Lord and learning it like a little girl would learn how to tie her shoes, what if we simply practice waiting together? What if we practice listening to one another? What if we just share together in trusting that the God who brought us thus far is still in the process of making all things new, even us?
