The “Being a pillow for pillow” position!
It’s so hard to resist. You put your child to bed…then after a few hours you tiptoe back into his room. Why? Well, because you love him and really do kinda miss him, despite the chaos he spent the last 12 hours creating. But really you go in there because 1) there could be anything happening behind that door and 2) you could do anything you want to them in response to the aforementioned chaos! Not to mention all those embarrassing pics you can take to bust out for a graduation party or blog post!
So here’s what I’ve found on various nights. Sleeping while kneeling at bedside (no, he wasn’t praying). Or feet on the pillow and head at the bottom. Or on his knees, with his butt straight in the air. Or out like a light nowhere near his bed. Or my personal favorite – lying perpendicular to the mattress in blatant non-conformity. Are kids totally awake one moment and go all narcoleptic the next? It’s one of the great mysteries of life that I refuse to solve with a hidden camera. But his apparent determination to sleep “against the grain” is something we can all benefit from.
Of course, we celebrate such non-conformity when it leads us away from obviously all-advised ventures. But sometimes it’s not always easy to identify which ideas are backed with good evidence or advice. Sometimes ideas that aren’t very well though-out become “the flow”, either because they are easy to remember or emotionally satisfying. This actually occurs fairly frequently in the beliefs of Christians, for two reasons. First, there are many emotionally-charged concepts in any worldview – Christianity is no exception – so there is often bias toward beliefs that feel better to us. Second, as unfamiliarity with God’s words becomes more and more common, Christianity is perceived more as what each individual wants it to be instead of what God says it is. That sounds kinda nice until you realize that without a constant standard to define it, Christianity becomes at best meaningless – the ever-changing whims of ever-changing people. Or at worst, a cacophonous misrepresentation of God to anyone seeking him. You don’t get to know people best – God or you – by seeking every source or opinion except their autobiography, right (Click to tweet)?
So whenever the current flow of Christianity ignores or rejects the comprehensive picture God paints of it in his words, it’s time to go against the flow. Not because you want to, not because everyone else is, but because God is God. I’m not, my loved ones are not, and society certainly isn’t. God created humans, has observed every human experience and outcome, and knows every circumstance surrounding your life (which even you don’t). Who could possibly be better qualified to say what’s best and right for us (Click to tweet)? What could possibly be a better way to understand God’s plan than his own book about it? Yet a surprising number of commonly and strongly-held beliefs Christians have – and pastors and professors teach – have little to no basis in God’s word. And usually not because of intentional misleading; rather, “the flow” over time becomes something other than the Bible, and we all occasionally get swept away.
The “Smushed to side of couch fort” position! This is sounding like bad yoga.
I wrote the Healing Hereafter book and ebook series by comprehensively using God’s whole narrative. Over 1400 biblical references help us find where God is running with the current flow of Christianity and where we must run against it. Check out whatever topics you want (here for free) to piece together so many of his direct words on your questions. And his rational and refreshing answers have given me the same perfect peace he intends for all his children when they go against the flow to run with him. Come explore with me; richer fuller answers are so much more helpful than shortcut summaries. But first let me go check on my boys…just one more time.
