Jeremy L. Berg

The Danger of the Day to Day

Paul had direct orders to bring the gospel to the Gentile world. Aside from a short period of preparation in Arabia, Paul didn’t waste time in getting at it.

I, on the other hand, had absolutely no direction for my future.  Sure, I was investing years of study and thousands of dollars into my theological education and ministry training.  But for what?  I hadn’t a clue.

What I did have was a desire to be part of something faith-stretching and Kingdom-impacting.  I wanted to be part of an adventure as unpredictable and exciting as the apostolic ministry of Peter and Paul. But seminary seemed to leave me in an uncomfortable tension.

On the one hand, I loved classes that allowed me to study and explore the ancient New Testament church — especially Acts and Pauline Epistles. But these classes tended to treat the engagement of these ancient narratives and letters as a dry, detached academic exercise void of any real application to ministry today.

On the other hand, all of the classes I took related to practical church ministry, leadership, discipleship and evangelism for today seemed to be void of the reckless and unpredictable spirit of Paul’s apostolic all-or-nothing ministry approach.

I had little patience for the church-as-usual, the domesticated brand of ‘churchianity’ that spent most of its time and resources on marriage and parenting seminars, inspirational book clubs, worship concerts, and leadership conventions that brought in corporate executives to train us into better CEO pastors.

For better or worse, I kept my distance from any leadership roles in the church during seminary studies.  I had no stomach for the church based on corporate business structures and slick, efficient programs.  I preferred to take refuge in the safer, theoretical world of academia.  (I believe this was a mistake, by the way, and I would eventually need to grow up and face the fact that ministry is about people, that people are broken, and, therefore, ministry is always messier than the world of academia.)

These were lonely times.  I longed for a church that didn’t exist, and was running away from the only church that did. I felt most at home in the world of the biblical text and by reading books that further illuminated that world.  I found every possible way to get closer to that world of the past.

My roommates of this period can attest to my binge diet of Bible movies every Friday night.  While they all played network computer games in their bedrooms, I was curled up on the couch alone watching Zeffirelli’s 1977 film Jesus of Nazareth for the fifth time or my all-time favorite Peter & Paul (1981) starring Sir Anthony Hopkins as the Apostle Paul.

I had to find away to keep that fire burning in my heart as my day to day life grew ever more monotonous.  C. S. Lewis describes how the vibrancy of life is often smothered as one becomes victim to the monotony of a humdrum, day-to-day existence.  He argues that the way to avoid this pitfall and keep the story alive is to keep oneself moving towards a desired goal. Lack of movement births lack of purpose, and a lack of purpose yields a lack of motivation. As Lewis describes it:

“In real life, as in a story, something must happen.  That is just the trouble.  We grasp at a state and find only a succession of events in which the state is never quite embodied.  The grand idea of finding Atlantis which stirs us in the first chapter of the adventure story is apt to be frittered away in mere excitement when the journey has once been begun.  But so, in real life, the idea of adventure fades when the day-to-day details begin to happen” (C.S. Lewis, “On Stories,” 1966).

Lewis mentions the importance of preserving “the grand idea of finding Atlantis which stirs us” at the beginning of our journey.  As we lose sight of the goal and purpose, we lose heart and drive.  When we lose sight of the goal, our feet stop in their tracks, and we wander off — confused and in circles.

The Christian life should be a continuous effort to stay afoot, always marching forward in ‘triumphal procession’ ‘toward the goal’, to ‘attain the prize’, and discover and explore the beauty and splendor of Atlantis which is symbolic for our Godward call.  I was determined to not lose sight of Atlantis as my time in my own personal Arabia grew longer than originally expected.

Was there a way I could exercise this gnawing passion for the adventurous Christian life in service to God here and now as Paul did then and there?  Driving from school to school to substitute teach year after year, putting up with the daily dose of class clowns and rogue paper airplanes flying over head seemed as far removed as one could get from the Apostle Paul engaging the stoic philosophers on Mars Hill in ancient Athens.

But were they really that far apart?