“Now the Spirit explicitly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons,” 1 Timothy 4:1

It is 9:30 on a Thursday morning in Salem and Alcoholics Anonymous is beginning its morning meeting. Ken H. arrives early so that he can claim his favorite seat. This will be Ken’s second week of meetings, but today may be his last in his hometown. “I need to be with my own people,” Ken shares with me. “I need to communicate my present difficulties with someone of my religion.” Ken tells me he is a Muslim. He is planning to travel to Portland to seek help at the Masjed As-Saber center on SW 43rd in Portland. His thoughts are about his conversion from Catholicism to the Muslim faith 15 years ago. “If I did in Indonesia what I’m doing here in Salem, it would not be pretty.” Ken is talking about the Sharia Law of the Muslim faith. Kevin is seeking help, not punishment. “Maybe I’ll bow out of religion all together until I’m clean and can make some serious decisions.” Not too long ago I caught up with him downtown Salem. Gone was the Muslim conversion and there was no mention of religion at all. “I’m living with my daughter and her husband now. It’s not the best arrangement, but the environment is clean and peaceful.” He then smiled and said “I have not completely forgotten the Bible you gave me; but now is not the time.”

Anyone who has needed assistance while traveling in a foreign country will tell you it can be an onerous affair. Language, culture and finances can all collide at once; help becomes a rumor. Eventually, help does arrive and provides the victim comfort and clarity to repair the situation. What if however, the unthinkable grasp of gambling, alcoholism or drug addiction enters someone you know and they ‘no longer’ are rooted in any religious affiliation and distant from family. Where does one go living in Salem? Over the years I have met young and old alike who were in need of recovery from their addictive lifestyle and had a desire to return to the grace of God. Yet, there is a population departing from their faith in growing numbers and taking their problems with them.

The ‘Nones’

Within the growing population in Salem and the Willamette Valley, a new segment of the population can no longer be classified as “religious fringe.” A classification called the ‘Nones’ has now become part of the population. You probably have taken a survey that asks your religious belief. More and more people are checking off ‘None.’ The definition of a ‘None’ for this discussion is one who has no stated religious preference, atheist, or agnostic.

With Ken, there was a ‘thought’ of returning to God via the “Big Book” at AA meetings and atone himself with God. What about the ‘Nones’; who are they “atoning” themselves to? This past March, I did some research concerning the ‘Nones’ and met with clergy of different faiths who meet with people who are crippled by addictions and other ‘life’ issues and are not of strong faith in God or, no faith at all.

Some interesting facts concerning the ‘Nones’ was published in a report titled The American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) published in 2008 written by Barry A. Kosmin and Ariela Keysar of Trinity College, located in Hartford, CT. According to this report, “the American population self-identifies as predominantly Christian but Americans are slowly becoming less Christian.” Here are some results of their investigation:

• 86% of American adults identified as Christians in 1990 and 76% in 2008.
• The historic Mainline churches and denominations have experienced the steepest declines while the non-denominational Christian identity has been trending upward particularly since 2001.
• The challenge to Christianity in the U.S. does not come from other religions but rather from a rejection of all forms of organized religion.
• 34% of American adults considered themselves “Born Again or Evangelical Christians” in 2008.
• The “Nones” continue to grow, though at a much slower rate than in the 1990s; from 8.2% in 1990 to 15.0% in 2008.

In this report the most striking change among the racial and ethnic groups is among Hispanics. In 1990 they comprised 6% of U.S. adults and 4% of adult ‘Nones.’ In 2008 Hispanics doubled their percentage of the U.S. adult population to 13% and tripled their proportion among adult America in general, but are the fastest-growing minority group among ‘Nones.’ This too is a noteworthy finding considering the stereotype of Latinos as a deeply religious population.

According to this same report, 27% of the population of Oregon does not affiliate themselves with any religion or belief system.

It’s A Pain That Will Not Go Away

I recently had coffee with a ‘None’ in downtown Salem. Rubbing his hands as if he was washing them, Peter F. told me, “I needed to stop drinking: period. I tried everything to rid myself of this constant emptiness inside of me; it would not go away.” He shared that when he drank alcohol, he usually ended up in jail, court, or just recently, in prison serving 2 years for assault. He hit his “relative” so hard that hospitalization was required. Peter only remembers waking up in ‘county’ and a court appointed lawyer telling him prison probably was the next event in his life. While in prison, it was the first time he had “really read” the Bible; but nothing grew out of it. In Peter’s words; “talking about things with people and not being talked at resulted me doing better at AA meetings than church meetings. I’m better off not being a church member.”

No Better Calling

If, as mentioned before, organized religion is being rejected altogether by the ‘Nones’; what roads are available for those who are in need of help and counsel? Years ago I spoke with a pastor and we were discussing “lost souls.” He told me that “there are no lost souls in God’s eyes. They are in the waiting room waiting to be seen. And, there are many specialists God has placed to help all of His people; and there is no better calling than to help others.” Considering the fact that the ‘Nones’ are more populous, there is more of an opportunity for each of us to attach ourselves to those who are in the waiting room.

One sign of the lack of attachment of Americans to religion is that 27% do not expect a religious funeral at their death.

When I lived in New York, the pastor of the church I was attending, challenged the congregation by instructing us to bring someone to church who: (a) had never been to church or (b) had not been to church in 5 years. He gave us 3 weeks to bring a “guest.” When that Sunday service arrived, the church was full; overfull to be exact. Interestingly enough, over 65% of the “guests” who came that Sunday had not attended a church service in over 10 years. The good news is that over 50% returned the next Sunday. The eye opener to the pastoral staff was clear; outreach, outreach and outreach were to be the focus of the ministry.

Outreach from Outside the Christian Community: A Door Wide Open

Rabbi Jameson (Rabbi James) Greene, a Nebraska transplant, works in tandem with agencies here in Salem. He supports and encourages his counselees to attend AL-ANON and AA. He has seen the “small miracles of each day” by those of his congregation who knew they needed help and sought to return to “spiritual advisement.” Not all who come to Rabbi James are Jewish. His desire as other shepherds of Salem is help the person to sobriety or whatever their needs may be. “I want to instill to create a sense of mindfulness” to each person that trusts his counsel. Although the Jewish population of Oregon is a minority (1%) (2), Rabbi James does see himself as being involved with people from other faith’s and of ‘none’ religious beliefs suffering from addictions and needing counsel for other social problems.

“And if you greet your friends only, what do you do more than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? Mathew 5:47

When the Lord brought me to His saving grace, I was always amazed that the people he placed me with always had time for me. A Time to listen, a time to teach the Gospel, and most importantly, time to pray with me. I never had time for them, but they always had all the time in the world for me. Now I have the same blessing bestowed on me as was given to those who God placed in my life. I have time for the ‘None’ that our Lord may send my way, though they may not have time for me.

I remember visiting a man in the hospital. His liver was failing, and he was about to die. He had been an alcoholic his entire adult life, and now that he was dying, he had begun to blame God for his condition. On one visit I couldn’t stand his ranting any longer, so I stood up in the hospital room and yelled, “You know what? I’ve been coming here every day for two weeks, listening to you moan about how God did this to you. Well, you know what? You were the one who went to the bar night after night for the last thirty-five years. You shoved whiskey, vodka, and beer down your throat, not God! So give me a break and quit your whining. God didn’t do this to you. You did this to yourself.”

Actually, I didn’t say that. I was too chicken. But the thought did cross my mind.

I believe God takes even our bad decisions and works to help us overcome their negative consequences. Thank goodness. I’ve done things unbecoming of a Christian, let alone a pastor, things that would have shocked my friend in the hospital. And those actions have created painful consequences in my life. But I don’t usually blame God for those consequences. Deep down inside I know I did those things. In my experience, what usually causes people to struggle with their faith is the kind of events the Bible discusses in James 1:2-4:

Consider it pure joy, … whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.

“Trials of many kinds.” That’s specifically what we’re talking about. Events allowed or orchestrated by God. That’s what God uses to shape us into the image of Jesus. In fact, James says, those things “complete” us.

Now James says something else in those verses that, at first glance, seems quite odd. He tells us to consider such trials “pure joy.” Does that sound unrealistic or awkward to you? It does to me. I can think of a lot of things that bring me pure joy, and “trials of many kinds” don’t make the list.

Peanut butter milkshakes. Pure joy.

Fishing for rainbow trout on a mountain stream. Pure joy.

Hitting a golf ball three hundred yards. Pure joy.

Playing soccer with my kids in the backyard. Pure joy.

My wife picking out a Victoria’s Secret outfit. Definitely pure joy.

Finding out my father has kidney cancer. Definitely not pure joy.

Why do we react so negatively to God’s strategy of using trials to help “complete” us in our spiritual lives? Why is this idea so foreign to us? Most of the time, it has to do with conflicting agendas.

In 1902 William James published his landmark book The Varieties of Religious Experience. It was the first exhaustive study ever performed on the psychology of religious behavior. His goal was simple: to share what he thought were the inner psychological motivations for why religious people act the way they do. In that study James observed:

If we were to ask the question: “What is human life’s chief concern?” one of the answers we should receive would be: “It is happiness.” How to gain, how to keep, how to recover happiness, is in fact for most men at all times the secret motive of all they do, and of all they are willing to endure.

Later in the passage he concluded:

With such relations between religion and happiness, it is perhaps not surprising that men come to regard the happiness which a religious belief affords as a proof of its truth. If a creed makes a man feel happy, he almost inevitably adopts it.

That’s the root issue. I don’t understand the “trials of many kinds” agenda because I have a different one: I want to be happy. It’s that simple. And pain doesn’t make me happy. Trials hurt. Trials outstay their welcome. I want to be happy today, right now, this minute.

A few years ago our church staff went on a retreat to a lake house in the Catskills of New York. One afternoon our student ministries pastor, Matt, and I had the bright idea to paddle out to the middle of the lake in a canoe, in the forty-degree water, to fish. As we left the dock, another staff member laughed, “You’re going to flip that thing.”

We laughed and said, “No way.”

Twenty minutes later we stopped paddling and let the canoe come to a rest in the middle of the lake. Then, as Matt turned around to face me, the canoe quickly moved to the right. I overcompensated by leaning to the left, and within seconds we were both underwater.

The first thing I heard was Matt coming up from under the water and gasping for air. We treaded water for a moment, assessed the situation, and knew we were in trouble. We tried to flip the canoe over but it was full of water. I said, “Matt, we’ve got to swim for it.” So we grabbed our floatable seat cushions, which were of little help, and took off. As we swam, I wondered at one point if we’d make it-the water was freezing and choppy, the shore seemed too far away, and no other boats were near us to help. I remember praying, “Jesus, don’t let us die in this lake.” Finally, after praying and swimming for what seemed to be an eternity, we reached the shore. We struggled to stand up, hugged each other, and thanked God for sparing our lives.

Whenever I think back to that day in the water, I feel a twinge of anxiety in the pit of my stomach, but I’ve come to realize that this feeling is not necessarily a bad thing. That memory, along with dozens like it, serves a purpose in my life-to remind me that there are no guarantees. I don’t walk this earth with a document signed by God in my back pocket, promising me a certain number of days on this earth. Each moment is a precious gift. Sometimes we forget this and race through life under the assumption that we or the ones we love will be sitting at the dinner table when we get home, which may not be the case.

The Bible says in James 4:14, “What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.” If this is the case, then we ought to be thankful for the trials God sends us. Hardship shakes us out of our routines. It makes us stop and reflect. Pain reminds us of our mortality, causing us to become more deliberate about the way we spend our time here on earth. As Thomas à Kempis said in his spiritual classic The Imitation of Christ, “It is good for us to encounter troubles and adversities from time to time, for trouble often compels a man to search his own heart. It reminds him that he is an exile here.”

The Killing of Aiyana Jones: Modern Police Tactics & the Demise of the Fourth Amendment

“Soon as they hit the window, I hit the floor and went to reach for my granddaughter. I seen the light leave out her eyes. I knew she was dead. She had blood coming out of her mouth. Lord Jesus, I ain’t never seen nothing like that in my life.” — Mertilla Jones, Aiyana’s grandmother

It was 12:40 am on Sunday, May 16, 2010. Twenty-five-year-old Charles Jones had just gone to bed after covering his 7-year-old daughter Aiyana with her favorite blanket. The little girl was asleep on the living room sofa, which was positioned under a window. Her grandmother was nearby. Suddenly, the silence of the night was shattered by a flash grenade thrown through the living room window, followed by the sounds of police bursting into the apartment and a gun going off. Rushing into the room, Charles found himself tackled by police and forced to lie on the floor, his face in a pool of blood. His daughter Aiyana’s blood.

It would be hours before Charles would be informed that his daughter was dead. According to news reports, the little girl was shot in the neck by the lead officer’s gun after he collided with Aiyana’s grandmother during a police raid gone awry. The 34-year-old suspect the police had been looking for would later be found during a search of the building. Ironically, a camera crew shadowing the police SWAT team for the reality television show “The First 48″ (cop shows are among the most popular of the television reality shows) caught the unfolding tragedy on film.

As far-fetched as what happened to the Joneses may sound, they are not the only American family to suffer the devastating consequences of a police raid gone awry. According to Radley Balko’s Overkill: The Rise of Paramilitary Police Raids in America (2006), over 40,000 SWAT team raids are carried out annually in this country, striking at the very core of our constitutional freedoms. As Balko writes, “There’s an old Cold War saying commonly attributed to Winston Churchill that goes, ‘Democracy means that when there’s a knock on the door at 3 a.m., it’s probably the milkman.’ The idea is that free societies don’t send armed government agents dressed in black to raid the private homes of citizens for political crimes.”

Regrettably, we live in an age where police raids are on the rise, modern police surveillance is more invasive than ever, and the government has unfettered access into the most private matters of our lives. Thus, the reality we must contend with is one in which the Fourth Amendment, which guarantees that we are to be free from unreasonable searches or seizures by the government, is on life support. Yet those who drafted the Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments to the Constitution, considered freedom in one’s home the most essential liberty.

Deeply concerned about preserving personal liberty and property rights, the Framers believed those rights to be of paramount importance—even over public safety. In such an environment, citizens were seen as equals with law enforcement officials, and authorities were almost never permitted to enter one’s home without permission. Modern SWAT team raids where the police crash into the homes of Americans would have been seen as the essence of tyranny. Indeed, it was not uncommon for police officers to be held personally liable for trespass when they wrongfully invaded a citizen’s home. And unlike today, early Americans could resist arrest when a police officer tried to restrain them without a proper justification or warrant—which they had a right to read before being arrested.

This clear demand for a right to privacy stemmed from a deep-seated distrust of those in power and their potential to abuse the authority entrusted to them by the citizenry. Over time, however, that instinctive distrust of government has given way to a false sense of security rooted in the belief that the government is looking out for our best interests. Thus, as our complacency about the need to actively and personally defend our freedoms has increased, the government’s commitment to respecting our Fourth Amendment rights has dissipated.

To our detriment, Americans today seem more attuned to what’s happening on trendy reality TV shows than the goings-on in their federal government. Distracted by their gadgets and caught up in their virtual communities, many Americans have failed to notice what’s happening in their own backyards—with the transformation of law enforcement officials into paramilitary police forces being one of the most alarming developments in recent years. As Balko points out, “Today, every decent-sized city has a SWAT team, and most have several. Even absurdly small towns like Eufaula, Ala., (population 13,463) have them… Where their purpose once was to defuse an already violent situation, today they break into homes to look for illicit drugs, creating violence and confrontation where there was none before.”

While we’re fortunate to have many law enforcement agents who strive to honor and respect the Constitution, to our misfortune, we have failed to raise objections to the mixed messages being sent when those same agents are sent to patrol our communities dressed as storm troopers, equipped with invasive technologies and sophisticated weaponry, and authorized to use military tactics in their efforts to uphold the law. In fact, even the equipment used by police during routine traffic stops, such as sophisticated flashlights containing super-sensitive detectors that sense the contents of your breath, has contributed to the steady erosion of our freedoms. Despite our having a constitutional right to privacy and to not be subjected to unreasonable searches, police conspicuously situate these devices in front of our faces and into our personal space, and we are left with no say in the matter.

Unfortunately, the U.S. Supreme Court has been a willing accomplice in this depreciation of our essential liberties, handing down rulings that provide the government with endless ways to pervert the letter and spirit of the Fourth Amendment. Such rulings, issued in the so-called name of police safety, national security and citizen protection, have given rise to language the Framers never foresaw nor intended, such as protective sweep exception, hot pursuit exception, inevitable discovery exception and good faith exception, to name just a few.

Yet there are some things which no decent human being can remain silent about. Americans should be outraged when police officers use tasers on defenseless children, autistic teenagers, pregnant women and senior citizens—all incidents that have been in the news in recent years. We should be up in arms over what happened to young Aiyana in Detroit. No family should have to suffer the loss of a child because police officers got carried away during a SWAT team raid. And no community should feel threatened by the presence of law enforcement officials patrolling their streets.

Where does this leave us? Having largely relinquished control over our liberties and our lives to the government, we have come to something of an impasse in terms of our freedoms. The only way forward, especially if we are to revive our ailing Fourth Amendment and restore the balance of power between citizen and government, is to reclaim our rightful sovereignty over our possessions and our lives. That is easier said than done, however. As history shows, power, once handed over to the government, is not easily wrested back.

When you read some psalms you’ll notice that interspersed among the kicking, screaming, and pleading is something biblical scholars call “a vow of praise.” We see a perfect example of this in Psalm 43, which begins with a desperate petition:

Vindicate me, O God, and plead my cause against an ungodly nation; rescue me from deceitful and wicked men (v. 1).

But then it ends like this:

Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God (v. 5).

The contrast is so stark, you wonder if the same person is writing the first and the last verses. How can someone go from such desperate circumstances to a position of confidence in God’s goodness?

A vow. In just about every psalm of lament, you’ll find a statement that expresses, “No matter how dark my circumstances get, no matter how much rage I feel toward God or those around me, no matter how much everything I think and feel tells me to give up on God, I will not. I will not give up on God.” Have you ever made a vow like that?

Sister Basilea Schlink, the founder of a Protestant order of nuns in Germany, counsels Christians in the midst of mystery to make a modern day version of a vow of praise:

When you are in suffering say, “Yes, Father” and strength will flow into your heart.

This is a vow of praise. By making such a vow, we’re saying that no matter how alone, abandoned, and betrayed we feel, we will not turn back. By making a vow of praise, we’re not forgetting what has happened to us or letting God off the hook. A vow of praise is a declaration in defiance of despair. It is a proclamation to ourselves and those around us.

One of the only ways the saints of old were able to live through unspeakable valleys of desperation was to make vows of praise to their heavenly Father. I want to encourage you to do the same. Don’t know where to begin? How about:

Yes, Father, I still believe in your goodness, despite what I see with my eyes;

Yes, Father, I still believe you have a plan for my life, despite what I feel in my heart;

Yes, Father, I still believe my best days are ahead of me, despite what my enemies and friends and family and loved ones say to me;

Even if you ask me to live in mystery the rest of my life, I will wake up every day and say yes, Father, I still believe in you.