Snot begets snot

I've found myself surprisingly impacted by the news of not receiving tenure. It's become a fissure from which unresolved frustration and inadequacy has flowed. The isolation and loneliness, prospect of hope unfulfilled, thought of a wasted life and of a life of which little difference was made because of my contribution, become a litany that raises in its volume as there is tacit pain in my chest. It's not the full story, but it's many of the pieces that I pretend don't exist and somehow see the process of pretending as a more Christian approach.

I've lashed out at those who are unkind or arrogant in order to inflict pain on them. Consultants and accountants look out. Somehow their suffering is thought to subdue mine. And they have struck back. Usually this is their game and I've just entered it somewhat naively. Perhaps this exchange is like an infant who knowingly goes beyond accepted behavior to see the boundary anew? Or perhaps it's like intoxication where what is real is intensified and caricatured precisely to get away from the bounds? No one's innocent, everyone's the victim, and somehow God is to sort it all out on judgment day. Good luck.

My response is so silly. It's so poisonous. You've met people who take these thoughts and build upon them. They have premature wrinkles. They are unpleasant and wholly unattractive. They have a momentum of death and want to inflict it upon all around. One should get it together.

But my sleep fails, my health is minimally tested, my ground of being is moved for a moment. That which ulimately concerns me shifts from God and his manifestation in the Kingdom to my desire to be contemplation- and pain-free. Numb it up, baby! I become the man that was originally judged inaccurately through the tenure process. Sometimes the Christian message of your identity having nothing to do with your context, the culture at-large, the world is crap. How can God expect us to pretend not to live here? I can't think a thought that hasn't been influenced by millions of thoughts before me; the Greeks, contemporary Christian music scene, academia, Bono, the Bible as seen through evangelicalism, the Bible as seen through liberals, crazy Dutch cleanliness notions, nationalism that somehow is identical to biblical Christianity, ... Is this an indictment or just the messiness that God comes to expect and love-through in our frailness?

All that being said, the path isn't elusive, just a bit hazy, and the emotion is catching up to the desire to do good. This morning I didn't want to do the Daily Office, I wanted to stay in the distance between God and me. I wanted to be justified outside of the liturgy of God's ancient ways. Tillich talks about the Abysmal part of God. The God that was comfortable with chaos prior to creation. The God who is relentless and offers mirrors within moments to see our mortality, sin, and darkness. In the scheme of things this mini-season is a molehill, not a mountain. And in some ways that adds to the pain - how stupid to have such emotion when you know it's not worth the energy exerted.

Even so, the correction, consequences, and hope will take traction. I don't want premature wrinkles.