Pukewarm Bathwater.
This train of thought is a bit of a rabbit hole journey, so I trust you’ll stick with the ramble and find something of interest or point of connection. It started a few months ago when someone said to me for the n’th time, ‘don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.’ This has always been a phrase that has grated with me because I know what this person is really trying to tell me. ‘Don’t throw anything away’. ‘Keep everything the same’. ‘Hoard up everything even if it has no use.’ What these people end up doing, and they want you to do it as well, is to keep hold of not just the baby but the bathwater as well. These people end up throwing nothing away. The bathwater has long gone lukewarm, or pukewarm as the book of Revelation calls it, or even downright freezing, but we cannot throw it out because some bit of magic may happen to rekindle or revive what was. God started it and therefore what He has begun He will complete. Someone at some point in history, could even have been me, has said ‘God wants us to do this’. So if God was the initiator how can we be the one to end it? Why do so many things that start off as being God breathed end up being pukewarm? We just so love to start things off, but we are terrible at closing down. We are terrible at hoarding ‘spiritual’ stuff, activities, meetings, but terrible at getting rid of what has no use, because it may be useful one day. We start, but we have to learn to finish stuff, burn the plough, the bridges, the ministry, the meetings. Time to de-clutter and discover in the space the stuff that is really important. What is the baby that we need to keep hold of? What does that represent? We may be afraid that if we chuck out the bathwater we may throw the baby out as well. It may feel like that for a season, but there comes a time of rediscovering what is important and worth keeping hold of. We need to learn to shut things down before we wear ourselves out doing good.
Hoarding ‘Holy’ Stuff.
I remember when I first turned up in Tonyrefail when I was ‘appointed’ as ‘pastor’ for the first time (all this language that does not sit right with me now). I could not believe what they hoarded in hidden corners of the building, or even in plain site. To get an office in the building I had to take over a small cupboard that was full of junk that would not get 50p at a car boot sale or yard sale. Cheap cups and plates given by dear saints of years gone by thrown out of site, but we could not throw them away because they were ‘holy’ relics of bygone years. So precious no one had seen them for years. They only liked them when I planned to throw them away (and I did). Hymn books that had not been used for 15 years. We’d better keep them just in case, even though the words can be put on the overhead projector. A church organ that was broken sitting to one side at the front of the church, that had a speaker that was bigger than the room where my office was. Got to keep hold of that it was bought/donated by such and such a family. Cannot throw it away or sell it. We allow sentiment to hold us, but is it really sentiment or something else? A family hold over the church? We’ll support you as long as you do not touch this? But it is not just about stuff. All those meetings, things we do. We just have to keep on doing them. We believed God said we need to do it so we have to keep on, keeping on, even though everyone has lost interest, there are no benefits, it wears us out, we have to keep pressing on. So many projects going on that we thought God had initiated, but now the original fervour has gone it becomes like hard work, but we have to be faithful. I remember once a Korean speaker with a passion for early morning prayer came along to Tonyrefail, and with authority and a persuasive nature he told us that we needed to pray every morning as a church at 6am to see break through, including Christmas day I remember him saying. This became a thus saith the Lord and the next morning we all gathered. It was like revival as over 20 of us gathered and prayed. This momentum and excitement went on for about 6 months through rain, shine and even snow we would be there. And yes Christmas morning. We were such good Christians, now revival would surely come. What we could not see was the creation of an us and them, the holy, obedient one’s that did it, and the half-hearted that didn’t. How proud. (I remember when the Sowing Seeds team came with Martin they became a part of this for a week too. After about 8 to 10 months people lost interest. It came down in the end to three of us. We were knackered. I came to a decision to close it down. The guys still there thought I missed the boat as God told us to do this. But God never asked me to be tied down to a man’s controlling words, even if he told me God said it. I finished it. Loads of us are doing stuff that we need to learn to finish. If we feel compelled to do it out of necessity or pleasing people or through a Word of the Lord, and there is a weight to doing it around our necks, this is not a yoke from the Lord. So many of us fill the diary’s with stuff that needs to be de-cluttered.
Living Life to the Full.
Living life to the full is not the same as having a full life. So often with God less is more. How many of us are dictated to with control and manipulation when we do not realise that those things have taken place? I should go and show my face, show my support. Must go to the such and such a meeting because there will not be many there. God wants us to gather and pray and hear the Word, because I need these things to grow. We have to fellowship together in church. Those dreaded words, ‘missed you on Sunday’, the kindest words of interrogation you will ever hear. Translated really as, where were you when you should have been here. Commitment is key. We often think it is hard to start something, but in the Christian world it is so easy to start something, the problem is finishing something. Getting rid of the religious stuff from the past, the relics from a bygone age. Yes God may have at one time blessed these things, but His blessing in the past or even the present is not a sign that God wants us to do these things. He came in his glory to Solomon’s Temple but He never wanted it built in the first place. He just cannot help blessing us. Just because ‘God turns up’ in our meetings and gatherings, it is not God’s sign of approval to what is going on, it is just a sign of His character. We should not measure stuff by apparent blessing. It is time to throw out that pukewarm bathwater. Time to free ourselves into a life that is lived to the full. Time to rediscover what the baby really is, the important stuff that we have lost in all that murky water. I’ve started, now I need to learn to finish, to close, to fold some stuff. I will not live life to the full until I have given away my full life.
With you all the way Paul!
That is a great word brother. The Lord bless you for sharing.
So, a couple of random thoughts back at you. . .
1. I find the issue of hoarding, of having to hold onto stuff interesting, mainly because, while I am a total non-clutter person, I know people who must obtain things and hold on to them, even when it threatens the house and household. Interesting that this, now designated mental illness, has risen up so recently. Of course, people did not have the money even 50 years ago to hoard, even if they wanted to. Any hoarding was small scale. Now hoarding can be done on a huge and grand scale, whole households and when space runs out, storage facilities. Those independent storage facilities where you rent space have been growing at a fast and large rate over the past few years because people cannot give up stuff, even stuff of no value. This at a time when consumerism, the extreme use of resources, and the incredible amounts of waste generated are killing the planet and us. Fascinating eh? It is certainly a sickness and one that is destroying us.
2. Know when to fold them. . . . funny how we get all excited when God has us start something and can’t figure out when it is time to stop something. I suspect it has to do with a sense of loss and possibly of failure, especially if we are not sure where we go next. However, I think God often leads us, if we are willing, to end things. I was part of an interdenominational day of prayer and fasting in the early nineties. We met, across denominational lines, 4 times per year, to seek God together. A group of 4 of us led it. And we decided at a certain point that God was bringing it to a close. And lo and behold, a few months later, the Toronto Blessing broke out. Did we prepare the way? Was that our job? Maybe. I do know we were to do what we did for a time and when the time ended we needed the courage to stop it. And we did. Sometimes good things have to end for other things to begin. We all have different roles – sowing seeds so others can reap them. If we insist on owning the field and continually sowing the seeds there will be no harvest. We have to get out of the way and let the other workers onto the ground so that they can tend and weed, and then others need to come into harvest. Giving up ground is critical when it is in God’s timing. And yet, we also need to know when to stand our ground when under attack. I am in such a situation now and for the project I am currently involved in to end rightly there is a demand to stand my ground for a time, for a bit longer. It all requires discernment and a willingness to move when called to and to stand when called to. In short, it requires obedience.
3. It is long past time to shut down lots of old projects in and out of the church. These things, from an outdated fossil fuel economy to church programs are just obstacles now to where we need, urgently, to be moving. How lovely it would be if we had the faith in God and the courage required to just let the old things go so that we could welcome in new blessings.
c.
Thanks for your brilliant random thoughts Cheryl. Love reading what you have shared. Thank you.
Love this “We were Knackared!” LOL, Some just push through and keep going to the point of mental and physical breakdown, other’s just wise up and learn to rely rather than try!
Definitely agree with you here Paul, although I do confess to using that phrase “don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater” I don’t mean it as keeping something you shouldn’t. It means I respect some of the traditions and history but I am also likely to take the baby out of the bathwater first. Save what is good and definitely chuck the rest.
Cheryl I also have to confess to being a hoarder and come from a family of hoarders, but I do reuse a lot of stuff. That stash of material gets reused to make pictures, repair other items etc. but yes I do feel I am wallowing in stuff sometimes. If only we could learn to let go what we need to let go of.
Having just relocated from he mountains to the desert again, I have tried to maintain my connections in the fellowship where I was Worship Pastor/”House Prophet” for 14 years…(I wince a little at those evolved titles, because honestly I always just wanted to be a rock star and make music : )…
Anyway the response I get back from the team, close friends and covenant relationships of over 21 years is they are all “numb” at my departure…
Numb…I simply have no point of reference for that response right now…there is no way in the fatal fires I could have stayed I was feeling atrophied as it were to begin with and in order to stay my soul would have been required to drink the putrid bath water in order to feel any kind of life…
But I do understand some of the reaction…we had a great thing going there…at least for the few at the top…and the energy to prop up hope each week fell primarily on me since I carried so much of the “program”…I opened the service, I led into the Presence, I recited the declarations at the offering and brought the hope of blessing each week as we passed the plate, i closed the service wrapping up the lecture with a benediction and more music, I wrote most of our anthems, and helped in everything from nursery to painting the eaves…but I was dying for life and warned my friends consistently for 3 years I could not do ” normal” anymore and it wasn’t working….
So now I sit in the desert with no baby, no bath water and an ache for disjointed visions…
Martin said its time for the God of the desert to rise…I am watching…looking for spontaneous combustion of bushes…oddly enough the first Sunday I was here my oldest daughter and I as well as her oldest were baptized at the same time …3 generations in the water at once…in a desert town…go figure…
Mark I love what you have shared. That uncertain certainty. The place of the disjointed visions. I have sat there myself in that place, many times. Alone and yet joined to something far bigger than you can appreciate right now. A dot that remains in the picture, and is forming a picture at present unseen. You were dying for life, now you just may feel as if you are dying. Normal is being buried, the detox takes time (probably the rest of our lives) but the discoveries in time are so rich. Will be praying for you mate. Bless you loads. If you ever want to touch base further just to talk or unload please e-mail me.
Good one mate!! The other thing people say is ‘Don’t rock the boat’. I don’t want to rock the boat – I wanna tip it over!!! Be blessed. x
Love it Paul, my first thoughts , as I read your ramble, ….why don’t we just let the Baby grow up , instead of keeping it in the bath, with cold water…….
maybe just playing around with words……Lets move on.
Just keep on with the rambling mate you’re coming across some inspirational stuff, and being a constant reminder of what some of us have tried to leave behind.
Last Sunday I visited a good friend in the north of England and agreed to go to her church. Before the service started, I wandered of round the city and got into a conversation with a lovely couple in a coffee shop. I am afraid to say I did not have the courage to throw out the bathwater and stay.
am very inclined to agree with fiona there ! well said
they feel numb – they were comfortable; but they cant move on till you did. very brave move. hope it shakes them into action, and not just looking for a substitute.
odd and interesting time for you. a little like someone coming out of a co-dependent relationship maybe ?