Volume 7, January 24, 2005

In Praise of the Rut

We all know what a rut is, I don’t have to haul out Webster’s; it’s a place where things have become rote, where the more positive emotions have left us high and dry, and are off flitting on Mount Olympus with the equally elusive Muses. Yep, our happy emotions, the energizing ones, our very joies de vivre are having a dandy of a time while we’re stuck with four walls, wondering how we got here in the first place and where is the nearest exit—and maybe we’re not even motivated to find the exit. A rut is dull, drab, loathsome, and depressing. Things have become routine and tedious.

Ruts are considered bad things by Christians, especially Western Christians. Hopefully I’ll have you walk away from this newsletter thinking the rut is an enviable place to be.

Have our emotions taken a hike, or has God? That’s the real issue, the question of His presence in the rut. Have I grieved the Holy Spirit enough that He’s left me for a time until I get my act together and He comes again to grace me with strength? What do I have to do to pull myself out of the doldrums? Will another exercise or weight-loss program do it for me? Should I step up the Bible reading, or check out the latest purpose-driven program to get myself back on track?

If you’re in a rut, like I am, first ask yourself the big fat ugly S word: have I engaged or committed a sin that has God yanking out the carpet to get my attention, so that I can come clean with Him (or with someone else)? An encouraging verse in this respect is found in Acts 3—“Repent therefore, and return, that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord.” Consider yourself lucky if this is your kind of rut; ask God to show you where you screwed up, tell Him you’re sorry (or the person to whom you owe an apology), and God’s presence will again refresh you.

However…if no particular neon-pulsing sin comes to mind, your rut may be like my own; the rut we fear the most; the one hardest to come out of, and potentially most denigrating to our spirits. The classic rut we mean when we consider the word. Life has gained the shade-tones of Blah-Zay, and optimists are beginning to irritate you. It’s definitely greener on the other side of the fence, you’d like to be there, but you don’t know how the heck to do it.

The person who can cheerfully admit he or she is in a rut may have found the secret of being there, and the secret of surviving in it. In my current rut, I fear no person challenging my faith; I fear no accuser who would say to me, ‘You’re a Christian—you’re not supposed to be in a rut.’ On the contrary, I think of John the Baptist, Rut Survivor Extraordinaire, and I think I’m in darn good company.

Consider: in his heyday, John the Baptist came like a meteor and showered the world with his message; he announced Christ, had a chance to revile sleazy ‘churchgoers’, (ain’t no better line than his thunderous ‘Bring forth fruits in keeping with repentance!’) and not only did he baptized the Ultimate, but audibly heard heaven words, from God the Father Himself. John was a Player, and by gum, I’ll bet he enjoyed it. Why shouldn’t he? He was doing God’s will, doing what he was born to do.

Then one day, a year or two after his star-studded ministry, John sends a message to Jesus from 4963 Rut Avenue—“Are you really the One, or should we look for another?”

John was in Herod’s prison, and I’d have to say a prison is good definition of a rut. John looked at four walls day in and day out, and likely got to feeling ornery about all the free-birds out there, enjoying sunshine and fresh air, able to languidly stretch out with a picnic and enjoy a party atmosphere while they listened to Jesus give his talks. John got to feeling sorry for himself, and after a long period of living in less-than-optimal conditions, got angry enough to send a message to Jesus. Did John really doubt if Jesus was the One? I’m not so sure: I think he was merely jealous that he wasn’t a part of it anymore, and his question was not to question, but to lash out against his circumstances. His time was over, and the glow was fading. He’d handed off the baton, and missed the feel of it in his palm. He felt lonely, discouraged, and would have likely tossed down some Prozac, had it been handy.

Did Jesus rail on John for his state of seeming unbelief? Did He question John’s faith? Did He shake His head in great disappointment, like maybe the crowd expected him to? No, I think Jesus got a little angry at the crowds who dared and expected Him to tear John apart. I imagine he felt a flush of it, as he considered the eyes upon him while they waited for his response to John’s followers—the crowd’s unspoken accusations went something like this: We always thought John was a little nutty, and look at him now: he’s in prison, he must have done something to deserve it. They salivated for Jesus to knock John down a few pegs, especially the religious ones; no good law-abiding citizen lands himself in jail. They wanted Jesus to blame John for his circumstance.

Jesus first answered the question with calm practicality: “Tell John this: the lame are walking. The blind are seeing. The poor, having the gospel preached to them.” He didn’t give a protestation of his status as Son of God; he merely told him the facts, which is what John sorely needed—a visualization, a mind-picture of deeds in action, not mere assurances that John indeed placed his bets on the winning horse. John needed more than that—he needed to see that his current misery was somehow connected to the Lamb of God, that all his pain was worth it. And if what he saw in his mind was the poor having the gospel preached to them, I imagine it comforted him indeed.

Then, once Jesus took care of John, he turned on the crowd, likely with a deep glint in his eye: “Let me tell you about John. He didn’t wear fancy clothes—that sort sits in palaces. He stood like a fool in the wilderness, and you all went out to see him because you knew he had something to say, something to pierce you through and through, something you were desperate to hear. You want me to say something about John? It’s already been said: ‘Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way before you.’ My messenger! Stick that in your pipe and stoke on it.”

Did Jesus even once upbraid John for his lack of faith in the rut? On the contrary, Jesus bragged him up and down to the crowd. Jesus knew the whole picture—Herod’s four miserable walls didn’t change who John was.

God does the same thing with you that Jesus did with John—just when you’re feeling pretty sorry for yourself, just when your sigh reaches heaven, the sigh saying, ‘What’s this Christianity gig all about, anyway? I had a whole lot of steam, and I don’t feel it anymore.”…just when He hears that sigh, don’t you know what He’s doing? He’s elbowing one of the angels, saying, “Let me tell you about Tracy. Let me tell you about Maurice. Let me tell you about Bob. Bob, sure, he has this sigh that says ‘Must be I’m not good enough, because I’m in a rut—must be I did something wrong, must be God doesn’t care about me because I sure don’t feel Him here’, boy, Michael, let Me tell you…Bob has this quality about him that makes people feel comfortable, and they’re able to talk with him like they wouldn’t anybody else, and he listens, and people need that. That’s My boy, Michael—Bob, right there…that’s My boy.”

Your rut, however deep or shallow it is, has not changed who you are. It has not changed the fact that God busts His buttons over you, and brags you up to angels. Your rut has not diminished God’s own faith and trust in you, not anymore than it did for Jesus regarding John.

One of my favorite lines in the book The Fellowship of the Ring came when Boromir, the Man from Gondor, commented on a precarious situation the Fellowship was in: they were stranded in a snow storm on the side of the Caradhras mountain, arguing about the best way out of the enormous drifts. While the brains of the outfit tried to think their way out, Boromir said, “Well, when heads are at a loss bodies must serve, as they say in my country…” He proceeded to dig with his arms, all he had. Then Aragorn joined in. Eventually, they were out of their pickle.

You will be out of that place eventually, where grass is greener and you can breathe again. Let form and convention carry you for now, there’s nothing wrong with that. Yes, ruts can actually serve you. Maybe you carved out a scheduled path for your family or household or your own personal journey that seemed right. You made a plan, you forged a way of doing things that would change things for the better, but somehow it lost its initial fervor. Well, if it’s a good plan, don’t grow weary in following it…in due time you’ll get something out of it, if you don’t give up. Ruts can be solid and secure. They can hold you on track when you don’t really feel like it anymore. They can keep things stable, help you stay organized. Kids need stability. Households need stability. Even our spirituality can benefit from a rut—scheduled Bible reading can get a little rutty…but haven’t there been times when, in the middle of plowing through a chapter in Leviticus, you’ve actually noticed something of interest? Maybe the thousand and first time you read 1 Corinthians 13 will be the time, the time the words slam you over the head and you GET IT. Make no mistake—ruts are not bad things. They will work for you when you least expect it.

If things feel a little empty, think on the past times you bona-fide-for-sure knew God used you as His vessel to help someone out. The four walls are not you…just a place you’re passing through. God has a lot more faith in us than we do ourselves, and if we just get an inkling of that, of how much He trusts us, how much He loves us…well, then, it might be the gospel all over again for us. And I reckon that might be the beginning to end of the rut.

Groot—out.

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