Recapturing the Useful -or- I thought the Lotus was a car

I can cover my day 2 surprise experience in a few words... I forgot about it most of the day. It broke my heart to get in my car at the end of the day and go... Holy crap, I forgot about the surprise. There was more to it than that, but I want to talk about something else. That's the beauty of it being my blog. I'm the boss of it, and I can do what I want.

Matt Singleton made mention of yesterday's comment about me being a buddhist, and he commented on how much of the practice and even philosophy of eastern mystics can be useful for Christians. When I first started following God, for the 3 to 4 years prior to that I had been a practicing buddhist. It all started with a book (The Tao of Pooh) and led to a much deeper and fuller practice of Taoism, Buddhism, Zen, and a whole smattering of them all (eastern folks generally seem much less interested in categorizing which practice you fall into. They all inform and relate to one another anyway). So for several years I would sit and meditate. They call it "practice," but the word is different from the way we might expect it to be. For the buddhist, practice is just being or sitting. I don't know that they'd be so interested in "practice makes perfect." They would even say that if you're thinking about progressing, or getting there, you're missing the point all together. The point isn't to get there. The point is always to be here. As soon as you truly learn to be here, then you will have gotten there. It can all sound very confusing, but the reality of it is that a GREAT DEAL of my experience of faith with Christ finds parallels in eastern practices and faiths. Read the Tao te Ching and tell me which parts of it don't sound like they could be teachings of Christ (disclaimer for those who need one... the reason I eventually got away from buddhism etc is because I felt and experienced that the primary premise is faulty. Their goal is to strip away all desires so that what's inherently good in me can come out. My frustration came because as long and as much as I tried, there weren't many things that were truly good or noble. Call it depravity or whatever, I just found myself ACTING better or more calm and centered, but the same old things were raging in me. See Romans 7 for a better explanation). So the allure for me to eastern philosophy was how RIGHT most of it sounded. Ultimately however, I found that buddhism and it's most noble family of traditions fell short. For me it didn't go far enough.

So, when I started following Christ, all of a sudden I've got a problem... what do I do with the last 3 years of my life? What about all those moments that were real? What about all the things that I had read and practiced and experienced that were true and real? There were times when I would sit and meditate that lifted me. There were times that I got it. Did I now have to dismiss all of those things and call them all bad and start all over? I couldn't do that. The same way that I left the Church in the first place... because I didn't see enough of the stuff they were talking about, I couldn't with integrity dismiss the things that seemed real.

That's where one of the teachings of Rob Bell hit me square in the face. He said, "All truth is God's truth, no matter where you find it." It was like a light went on in my head. Of course there are large and freeing portions of truth in buddhism. Truth is truth, no matter where it may hide. When I wrestled with that and came to terms with it, I was so relieved to find that I didn't have to hide or cover up my past experiences. On the contrary, they became something beautiful and formative and rich that God used to woo me back to Himself. I regularly say (and several people in my church family aren't quite sure what to make of it) that my years as a buddhist have made me a much better Christian.

To take the practice of meditation by itself... it's something that the scripture all but pleads with us to do... and every time I even say the word in Christian contexts, it demands explanation. People want me to assure them that we're not becoming buddhist or new age. But my time as a buddhist gave me practice with just sitting and paying attention to what I'm thinking. Buddhist meditation taught me that just because a thought pops into my head doesn't mean it has to come out of my mouth... if I "watch" a thought long enough, don't label it or call it my own, just watch it... eventually it will pass away and another one will come. You want to see the fruit of the spirit called self-control? Sit down for one hour (self-control in and of itself) and every time a thought passes into your head, refuse to label or even identify it. Just watch it. Don't act on it or even claim it as your own. Then watch how your ideas about ideas change over time. You're free from being a slave to the things in your head! It's amazing.

So, that's the long way of saying that if we ignore the things from other parts of the world, or the things that other traditions can teach us, we're missing it. Truth isn't a commodity. Truth is a person, and He's the one that I want to follow, no matter where He goes. I'm grateful for my years as a buddhist. I learned a lot, I grew a lot, and I still try to employ much of what I discovered along that path. I'm also grateful for the chance to remember that today. That's a good surprise. Thanks God. Thanks Matt.