Authentic Positivity

Post by
Michelle Dowell, Co-Contributor

Every person has a wealth of stories and details that can be shared in everyday conversation. Some sad, some boring, and some happy or interesting. Too often stories or details are shared without thought being taken to see if the end result of telling a story or details is truly beneficial to anyone.

If you've ever had a conversation and felt exhausted after, it could be that the person--or even yourself--has been talking non-stop about a sad event. To clarify, sharing about needs when asking someone for prayer, or sharing with a trusted friend about something that's bugging you and you think sharing will help is fine and healthy.

But it's the many times when people decide to talk about a sad event just because they find it interesting or they are complaining (often people don't admit to themselves when they are complaining). They don't realize that the people who had been listening walk away tired and sad, possibly without realizing that's why they're sad.

I also want to clarify that I don't mean people should pull out fake smiles and pretend to be happy in what they say when they're not. That is not good. First of all it's creepy: people who aren't doing that feel lonely around people who are doing that--they sense an inauthenticness, the odd wall the faker is putting up so you can't see their true feelings. Another reason it's not good is that people who are following these people faking to be happy may become depressed in thinking that they can never figure out how to be happy like that person (not realizing it's all fake).

The Bible tells us to think on good things. So when we talk, we should try to stick to good things too as much as we can. There are so many bad things in this fallen world. God doesn't want us to be looking down at those or focusing on those. He wants us to look to him and hope and the beautiful gifts he's given us. If we focus on negative things, it's like being given a gift at a birthday party but instead of enjoying it and thanking people and talking about it, right away focusing on how small details in the party are wrong or some person is wrong.

Living in this way of being authentically positive as much as we can helps the person doing it, but it also encourages and helps others. If you want to encourage people, it's much easier to do it when you're in the habit of focusing on good things, compared to focusing on all the sad things.

Forgiving Ourselves and Action

Often in life we need to have an attitude of forgiving ourselves in advance. It is not that we should seek to sin; that would be wrong. But often attempting to avoid sin at all costs leads to debilitating inaction.

Maybe we need to have a conversation with a brother or a sister in Christ about something going on. Maybe we need to confront this or that wrong in the world. You see if we are too concerned about not making a mistake we cannot work out our faith in the world..

The bible calls us to act. Sometime when we act against a wrong in the world things can be strange and at times a bit messy.

We need to allow ourselves the grace to understand that it is better to act out of a sincere heart and enter into a difficult situation than it is to seek purity at all costs. Of course the sincerity is of great importance.

I believe at times our sincerity may be best judged by our reluctance to enter into the situation to fix the wrong. You see we value peace and unity, but we know action is necessary, because peace at all costs is not true peace.

Sometimes we need to act and realize that if we have acted by faith we have done right whatever happens. You see God calls us to act, but success is what he grants.

We can act in great faith pleasing to God and not right a wrong. He calls us to act in faith, but the result is in his hands not ours.

Honest Prayer

One striking feature of prayer in the bible is how honest people are with God. When God spoke to his prophets his prophets said some things that were in the eyes of modern Christians eyes strikingly disrespectful to God.

The men of the bible were often upset with God and argued with him. Were they in the right?

Often there is little commentary on the narrative, but I think they were right in this that they were having a real conversation with God.

Our modern theology often wants to prettify prayer. We should be respectful in the presence of God.

I suppose that is true in its own way but you see I am not sure how coming to God and hiding our feelings is respectful.

There is always a balance: we are coming by prayer to speak to God. But we are coming by prayer to bring our hearts to God.

It is not as if God does not know how we feel. I suppose I sometimes feel that a person might go to a Christian or secular counselor and unload their feelings but they cannot do so to God?

We can tell a counselor we are angry but we must be careful if we tell God this? It does not make sense to me. God is bigger and tougher and had more character than the counselor and he already knows how we feel.

So always prayer needs honesty. Sometimes I have found if I simply tell God how angry I am and also admit I am probably in some sense wrong but angry all the same.

It is helpful sometimes to simply express our feelings. It is as if the expression helps to bring about the resolution by placing perspective.

You see God already knows I am angry about this or that. I can come into his presence and with prayer and try to pretend I am not angry but that is very silly in its own way.

You see prayer is a conversation. It is somewhat one sided since we are doing all the talking to God.

Of course God is also talking as he speaks through his recorded words and through the Holy Spirit in our hearts and through the voices of our brothers and sisters in Christ.

Mindless Repetition in Worship

A great irony of the modern church is the increasing use of mindless repetition. Sometimes we are asked to sing a word such as "holy" 10-15 times in a row. This seems to be either an influx of mysticism or eastern religion into the Christian Church. Worship is base on truth. While there is truth in the words sung the mindless repetition of these words ceases to be content based.

Why do we wish to abandon content in worship? I cannot understand the desire to separate worship from Theology. Seeking to worship the living God with an empty mind makes little sense.

Worship has and always should be based on truth (i.e. facts and statements). The main form of worship is the sermon were statements of truth are hopefully expounded. The Bible itself is a collection of truth: statements about God, statements about man, God's will for the world and true histories of mans activities in the world.

The Lord's Supper is highly filled with content. The scriptures have a great deal of teaching on the Holy Supper and it is not wise to separate the teaching of Scripture from the Sacrament.

The early church primarily sung the Psalms from the Bible. The Psalms are theologically rich and the repetition in the psalm is deeply significant and not mindless. There are many great hymns which are not based on the psalms which I have no issue with if they contain the truth found in scriptures. What I have issue wish is music that does not wish to worship God both in spirit and in truth - mindless repetition is not a faithful attempt to worship the Lord in truth.

Prayer at times is also entering this mindless mode. Many prayers become formulas. We could simply copy the prayer exactly if we knew the template and plug in X, Y, and Z.

The reality is that prayer is a conversation. We are talking to God.

Hopefully we do not talk to people we know according to formulas. We should also ideally not talk to God as if reciting a formula.

A lot of people are afraid to open their hearts to God because they feel they might say something wrong. A better perspective is to simply open ones heart to God.

God knows our heart and we are already forgive. We should simply speak plainly to him and realize we are forgiven and is better to actually speak to God as we feel rather than to recite a formula.