Unprocessed: Trust in You

Kanye recently did an interview with Big Boy and the topic of Christianity came up. Watch from 9:53-11:57 (I am not responsible for anything you hear before or after that!). 

Generally speaking, I prefer to spend my time on something other than whether or not Kanye is a Christian, however, he does present a good object lesson on giving too much too soon. A few years ago, he was running around talking about loving Jesus, and Jesus being King, and the first thing we did was throw a mic at him and give his voice more weight than it should have had. 

I’m not trying to yuck anybody's yum. We rejoice over each one saved but can we stop chasing celebrities like the Kingdom of God needs influencers to expand? Anyway, let’s pray for the brother like we do everyone else. 

In those short two minutes, he said a lot but there are two pieces in particular that I want to hone in on. 

First is his declaration of trust in himself. As Christians, we should know the answers to life’s questions are not found deep within. We aren’t like the stoics walking through life with a sense of equanimity, searching the depths of our souls for the answer to the ills of life. For them and every major Hollywood story, we can find what we’re looking for by trusting our strengths, skills, and wisdom. 

A little more interesting to me is the why. The temptation to trust ourselves when the job hunt isn’t going well or the diagnosis comes in, or life is just crashing down, isn’t new. Neither is his reason for doing so. 

Ye says he had to put his trust in himself because God wasn’t working. He followed the formula that so many of us do: I prayed, I asked, God didn’t show up and so now ima go get it. 

This isn’t a rare position. Too often, it’s what we all do. We find God too slow in his movement or not providing our expected answers, so we take matters into our own hands. Abraham did it, David did it, I do it. 

No is a Full Sentence

On some level, we’ve been conditioned to think and believe that the answer to our prayers can’t be no. 

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard preachers say that God’s answer to your prayers is either yes, not yet, or I’ve got something better for you. For some reason, No isn’t an option. 

Even if our theology is good and we would never sign on to that, we live like it. 

However, no is a full sentence and if anyone has the right to give that, it’s God. 

A few weeks ago, I wrote about the sufficient grace of God. Paul prayed for relief and begged for it, and the answer was no. 

There’s not always something better waiting for us, it’s not always later, sometimes, it is just denial. If the answer is no, we have to still believe and see that God is good. Do you know how hard that is? Speaking for myself, I’ve had one of those lives that has felt like a long series of “Nos” and in many ways, I’m searching for a yes. I would hope God is the one to give me that yes. 

I was reflecting on this idea with some friends a few days ago. Some of us just need a yes and if God isn’t going to give it, then we gotta go get it ourselves. 

This is one of the reasons I stress the importance of community. Specifically intergenerational community. Because me and my friends might be kinda smart but we’re all in the same place with the same struggles and are just an echo chamber. It’s my older friends who pull me back from the edge. 

My friends in their forties, fifties, and sixties who have walked the path I’m walking, have seen what I am seeing now and can speak wisdom into my life that keeps me from pursuing my ends rather than what God would have for me. 

We’ve Failed

What led Kanye to this place of trust in himself is how we’ve failed each other. He’s looking at the tragedy around him and asking “How are you just gonna offer thoughts and prayers when you can fix this?” That’s right out of James 2:

 If a brother or sister is without clothes and lacks daily food 16 and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, stay warm, and be well fed,” but you don’t give them what the body needs, what good is it? In the same way faith, if it does not have works, is dead by itself.

The “thoughts and prayers” religion that characterizes so much of our Christianity is worthless. Our main witness is found in how we live. That is never about perfection. God has not placed that burden on expectation on us but he is asking that we obediently grow in the fruit of the Spirit and into the image and likeness of Jesus. 

In John 13:35, Jesus says it is by our love for one another the world will know that we are his. That should have massive implications on how we live. If the world looks at the Church and sees we can’t even take care of our own, that makes Jesus wildly unattractive to them. 

Further, it misses the whole point of the Gospel. There is one who gave up everything and emptied himself so that we might have life. The lives we live upon recognizing that, reflect that same sense of radical generosity to the world. 

Matt Chandler often talks about the least compelling version of Christianity as one that is turned in on itself. A religion where we spend all of our time naval-gazing and never looking up long enough to see what Christ might have for us. 

That is the logical conclusion of trusting yourself. If life is about you and getting it yourself then the natural endpoint is to neglect those around you. 

In this dog-eat-dog world, we think to ourselves “I have to secure me and mine first.” The sad reality is that in this world, we are never secure enough. 

I’m going to be honest with you, writing this is incredibly easy. Living it though? Mad hard. 

I’ve got three kids. Every act of generosity could mean I’m taking something from them. I have my eyes on retirement, taking care of you right now might mean I may not be taken care of later. 

My deep sneaker collection and fancy food addiction mean I give less than I can. I’m not calling us to a poverty theology but is generosity generosity if it doesn’t require sacrifice? 

In the end, every decision we make is indicative of where we’ve placed our trust. Ultimate what is in us is what comes out of us. Typically, that is whatever sits on the thrones of our hearts. We were never meant to occupy that space for ourselves. Stuff was never meant to occupy that space. There is only one capable of taking the sit and truly living up to the expectations that come with it. Jesus. 

He calls us to follow him. That’s an all-or-nothing proposition. Ain’t no half stepping, you’re either with him or against him. 

Jesus recognizes that for all of us, there are going to be spaces in which unconditional surrender is easier than others. There are going to be parts of our lives we will struggle to surrender until the very end. 

Thank God we are saved by grace and grace alone, not our ability to get it together because if that were the case, the Lord knows we would all be lost. 

Final Word 

Life gets very real when “don’t want” becomes “can’t have.” -Hasan Minhaj