The Whole Thing Is My Teacher

The other night I had the opportunity to listen in on a conversation between my friend Alexander John Shaia and his friend, Rob Bell.  They were doing a Zoom chat with about 150 people listening in and they were talking about Rob's new book, " Everything is Spiritual ".  

A few things:

ONE - I am the biggest Rob Bell fan.  

And when I say "fan", I don't mean that I'm like a teenage girl who is obsessed with a boy band, but that Rob's writings and teachings and journey over the years have helped "fan" the embers of a slowly dying evangelical faith into a raging and roaring fire that has renewed and restored and reconstructed a faith that, for a while, felt as if it would never be anything more than a pile or rubble.  

TWO - I have all of Rob's books.  

Velvet Elvis, Love Wins, the Love Wins Companion Guide - I have them all, have read them all, and each has spoken to me in a unique way.  I was telling a friend this past week that "Everything is Spiritual" spoke so deeply to me that I think I might go back and re-read all of his books before the end of the year to see what might speak to me differently in this crazy season of life that I'm in.

THREE - Alexander John Shaia really is my friend.

I'm in a Facebook chat with Alexander and my other friend Seth Price who hosts the Can I Say This At Church podcast and we message each other daily, talk on the phone occasionally, and encourage each other minute by minute throughout the day.  It's a bond and friendship that I'll forever cherish and am unsure what I would do without it.  

That said, the conversation between Alexander and Rob was around 90 minutes long and although I could never summarize all of what was shared here in this small space, I do want to share one idea that has been stuck to my heart ever since I logged off of Zoom that night.  Rob was talking about some of the ups and downs of his own journey and he commented that, "the whole thing is our teacher."

The.

Whole.

Thing.

Is.

Our.

Teacher.

… Think about that.  I'm not 100% sure what that thought means to Rob (because I’m not Rob!), but to me it means that not only are the good times our teacher, but so are the not-so-good times.  And not only can we learn from those who we like, but also from those we dislike. 

It's easy for me to learn from someone like Alexander:

I like him.

I respect him.

I want to spend time with him.

And so it's easy for me to look at him and see him as my teacher.

BUT.

What about the person who hates me?

The person who calls me a heretic?

The person who talks crap about me behind my back?

The person who mocks me, thinks that I, this podcast, and my whole life is a joke?

It's hard for me to like that person much less learn from that person and look to that person as a teacher, but WHAT IF … WHAT IF that person really does have something to teach me?  And what if instead of doing everything I can to avoid that person, what if I embrace my interaction with them and ask the Spirit, "what is here for me to learn?"

Perhaps there is something in that person that disgusts me so much because that same thing is somewhere in myself?  

Does their judgement bother me because I'm also judgmental?  Does their exclusion of others bother me because I'm also exclusive of people who are different than me?  Perhaps at some deep or subconscious level the very thing that I loathe about them is the very thing I loathe about myself?

OR.

Maybe there is something in that person that is a larger issue in the world that I'm wired to bring healing to in the universe.  

Like, if that person is exclusionary of people who are different than him or her, maybe it bothers me not so much because there is an exclusionary issue in me, but because my place in the world or my purpose in the universe is to speak out against exclusion of all forms?

OR.

Maybe that person bothers me because Spirit is calling me to have a difficult conversation with the person that will not only make him or her better, but will also make me better and more courageous to not shy away from hard things.

If the whole thing is my teacher that means that I can embrace each moment of each day without hesitation, it means that I can look at each person in the eyes …

My friends.

My family.

People I like.

People I dislike.

People who consider me an enemy.

… And I can know that Spirit is working between us to teach us both something so that we can learn from one another and become an even truer version of ourselves.

It also means that I can know that each moment of each day is present to teach me something too.  There are moments in the day and in life that make me want to run back to bed and hide under the sheets until they're over.  

You too?

Especially in 2020, right?

BUT.

If the whole thing is my teacher, then I can even approach the bad times that make me want to run away knowing full well that Spirit is in the midst of it to walk with me and make sure I come out the other end a more complete version of myself than when that moment began.

Pandemics.

Sickness.

Death.

Losing a job.

Bankruptcy.

Divorce.

Being turned down.

Screaming toddlers.

Fill in your own blank - __________________.

I wonder what might change for you and me today if we started to see every moment and every day and every good thing and every bad thing and every new thing and every death of an old thing as a TEACHER, as something that Spirit can move within and around to make us a more complete human being?

Onward, friends.  

OH.

PS - Rob and Alexander, if either of you ever read this - thank you. For everything.