More than a fish? (J2: Self-Hearted to Soft-Hearted)

This week I begin blogging about Journey 2: Self-Hearted to Soft-Hearted. You can watch yesterdays message on J2 at www.meaningfulchurch.com.

Yesterday, Roy Moran (or as I look to call him, the Good, Right Reverend Roy Moran of the Pleasant Valley Parish) spoke about fish. That's right fish; those things that fish sticks, fish tacos, and fish fillet sandwiches come from (Who knew?).

Roy posed the question: "How does a fish know it's wet?" How would a fish know how to even describe "wet." The fish was born in and lived its whole life in water. And even if by chance, some child caught that fish one day, judged it as being too small, and threw it back into the water--that fish would be able to tell you what "dry" felt like, but he still wouldn't be able to tell you about "wet."

That fish would say all sorts of things about how his 2 minutes in the air, above the water were scary and strange, but all the fish could really tell you is that it was different and that he probably didn't like it. It may never have even crossed his mind that what he felt as "dry" was the complete opposite of what he feels every day.

So how does a fish know it's wet? Well, I think first off, a fish needs somebody to tell him. Like maybe a bird. A fish and a bird have similar but different lives. They both eat and reproduce. They both have families and they both have seen danger. They both are able to move freely in their respective atmospheres (as the fish swims anywhere through water and the bird flies anywhere through the air).

The fish doesn't know that there's anything special or wrong about what it does because of who it hangs out with. A fish probably hangs out with other fish or at least with other marine life. So of course none of them are going to tell the fish he's wet because they are wet too and they probably don't know it.

(Now the bird may have some advantage at this point because while the bird flies, the bird probably has more interaction with things that don't fly.)

I hate confrontation. I hate friction. I'm a typical hermit crab. I enjoy staying inside where it's safe until I know things will be OK. And then, at that point, I will slowly crawl out where I can be exposed by the world.

For the longest time I didn't know there was anything wrong with that. I didn't think there was anything wrong with not creating friction and not facing confrontation. And because I generally hung out with other hermit crabs, I didn't have anybody to point out that maybe there was a different--and more fulfilling--way of living.

And then at different points in my life, I met different creatures; badgers, birds, leopards, and even some fish. And those creatures helped point out that I was a hermit crab and that I was very attached to my safe, cozy shell. Now, they never said, "You need to become a badger or a bird or a leopard or a fish". They just said, "You area hermit crab. But what if you could be more than just a hermit crab?"

And likewise, what if a fish could become more than just a fish? He may still do fish things and will still be wet, but what if he could become the kind of fish God wanted him to be? That could be miraculous.

I think that when we only hang out with people who are just like us--or worse, don't engage in real community at all--we lose the gift of having somebody tell us something possibly uncomfortable about ourselves.

I had an experience like that (many times, in fact) when somebody told me, "Ben, do you realize that you deflect alot of questions with humor?" That was some wetness of mine. I didn't realize until, people who weren't like me pointed it out, that when somebody tries to dig into my soul and really get to know me, I have a cruel habit of deflecting them with a joke or with just foolishness.

It's OK to have friends who are like you. That's usually why they are your friends to begin with. But if your friends aren't able to tell you things about you that maybe God wants to point out, then what's the point? Fish are good, and if you just want to be a regular fish, then that's OK, but what if God dreams for you to become more than just a fish? What if God dreams of you becoming more than just a man or a woman?

But in order to become something more, you must become less--you must be willing to drop ego and pride and fear for the sake of seeing the real you as you truly are. That's going to involve some major dignities and depravities of your life being revealed; and at times, both can be scary.

But with God's help and with the help of a community that is both honest and diverse, I think we each have a chance to see real transformation.