Sex God, Chapter One

I started reading Sex God by Rob Bell (hence the obvious title), and I'm not sure how to determine my current mental state. This is the book that our next big sermon series is based on, and Luke has asked me to preach one of the Sundays, so I felt the right thing to do would be to actually read the whole thing, and not just the specific chapter I'm assigned (see? I would have made an excellent college student...)

I've made it through the introduction and the first chapter, and God has already struck me with a developing revelation about why I am the way I am a lot of times. I know, I've heard some crazy things about Rob Bell, but I have to tell you, from what I've read of his, I'm amazed. God can most definitely use anyone for his purposes, and Rob is most definitely being used. (Yes, we're on a first name basis already...what?) The introduction was simple enough, talking about how any time we start to discuss sexuality, the deeper the discussion goes, the more spiritual it gets. This is something I learned a long time ago, especially when God called me to share my past with people. Needless to say, the intro was not the revelation-inducing part.

It was the first chapter - God Wears Lipstick. Funny title, eh? Yeah, I thought so too. But then he opens the chapter with part of a diary entry from a captain in WW2 assigned to the liberate of one of the concentration camps in Germany. First of all, way to throw a total downer at me right off the bat. Anyone who knows me well enough (or has witnessed my response to certain movies throughout my life...i.e. parts of Schindler's List, Life is Beautiful, etc.) knows that anything having to do with genocide bothers me to the point of literally feeling sick. We had to watch parts of Schindler's List in seventh grade (sooo wrong...am I right?) and I ran out of the room in sobbing uncontrollably. My teacher was tempted to put me in counseling. Ha. (That's a whole other story...) Anyway, Rob continues by talking about how when we disrespect other people (treating them like an object instead of a human) we disrespect God's image - the image that they were created in. So, in turn, we end up slapping God himself in the face. Well, DANG.

"We don't respect the divine image in others just because we want to uphold their humanity. It isn't just about them. It's about us. It's about our humanity as well."

So me being selfish and treating others as if I'm better than them (whether I say anything out loud or not) is actually more if a hindrance to me than it is to them? Once again, DANG.

It's always the simplest of words that cause the greatest revelations for me. I guess it's mostly because I choose to complicate things in my head to the point where I don't actually receive anything from it...I just wear myself out thinking about it. Rob then moves forward, from seeing God's image in people to seeing us in them. He tells a story about a prostitute who came to his church to talk to him. Her intention was to tell him her plan to commit suicide, and to ask whether or not she would go to heaven if she went through with it. In the midst of her story, she mentioned having a daughter from one of her clients, and when Rob asked her about the daughter, she said, "My daughter's name is Faith."

He then says, "There are these moments when the enemy all of a sudden becomes just like me. When a soldier becomes a son. When a prostitute becomes a mother. When they become we. When those become us. When he becomes me."

What a reminder...a reminder that any of us could be in any of the situations we so easily look down upon. I could be that prostitute wanting to end my own life. If God hadn't led certain people to do/say certain things in certain times in my life, I could feasibly be ANYWHERE right now. I struggle with jealously AND pride...not a great combo. But this chapter reminds me specifically WHY that's a killer combo to struggle with...that it doesn't really affect those involved in my jealousy or my judgement. It really only affects me. And God's concern is that I protect His image in me by respecting His image in others.

The lipstick part came at the very end of the chapter (oh so dramatic, Rob...way to go...). It was the end of the same diary entry that he opened the chapter with. The captain spoke about how they were hurting for so many necessities for the people in the camp, but someone (he didn't know who) had sent them an entire shipment of lipstick. He said it was a sheer act of brilliance...one he didn't realize at first. He writes, "I believe nothing did more for these internees than the lipstick... At last someone had done something to make them individuals again, they were someone, no longer merely the number tattooed on the arm. At last they could take an interest in their appearance. That lipstick started to give them back their humanity."

So, I guess God wears lipstick.