Olaf was wrong.

 

This week marks a milestone for the Constructing Christian.  I am turning 40 years old.

As a child I distinctly remember when my father turned 40 years old.  I remember thinking of how old he was and how grown up.  I remember a cake design that was less than tasteful but well received in our group and looked upon fondly by a 9-year-old boy. 

While I don’t remember feeling any sense of not knowing what’s going on, I do remember looking to the adults in my life and thinking that they knew everything.  They had it all under control and I didn’t have to worry.  As Olaf tells us, “when you’re older, absolutely everything makes sense!”

Can I let you in on a secret though?  It’s not true.  As I now knock on the door of the same age that that giant of a man in my life was turning, I don’t have it all together and it doesn’t all makes sense. 

In fact, the older I get, the less things are seeming cut and dried and easy to understand.  At 20, I was a second-year university student and I knew just about everything there was to know.  In what seemed like a blink of an eye, I had the 3 M’s (Marriage, Mortgage, & Minivan) and I was turning 30.  I had a toddler at home and a baby on the way.  I had a good job and a nice house and nothing major to complain about. 

Now another decade later and I am still blessed as I ever was.  Loving wife, two great kids, cars and job and a nice house.  I’ve had many trials over the years but no more than anyone else.  I still have nothing to complain about and I try not to, but everything does not make sense.

I’ve always considered myself a thinker but as a young man my mind was more focused on sports and work all the time.  If you had asked me about social justice issues back then, I may have defaulted back to some old clichés about LGBTQ and minority folks but it certainly wasn’t something I had thought about because I had a black and white, binary mind and actively chose to never make time for the grey areas. 

If you had asked me about matters of faith, I am quite positive that I would have given you either something from my Catholic upbringing or something more in the Deist mentality.  I was pretty sure we should stick to what the bible teaches though I had never taken the time to read much of it.  I was sure that there was a creator but I was pretty sure he didn’t care what I did.  I prayed when I needed help but never prayed to thank. 

Looking back, it seems like I was conflicted between two possible views of God.  One that was judging me and wanted me to confess my every sin to a priest (something I rarely did) and another who took a Ron Popiel “Set it and forget it” approach to creation.

I didn’t feel conflicted though because I didn’t take the time to think about it.  I didn’t listen to lectures or sermons and I certainly didn’t bother to ready any of those boring Jesus books.

Now as I round the corner to start my fifth decade on this rock, I have more questions than answers and things don’t make sense.  The world my kids are facing doesn’t make sense.  The contrast between the richest the rich and the poverty I see on the street doesn’t make sense.  The discrimination and racism that exists in every western society whether they want to admit it or not, doesn’t make sense.  The fact that my daughters are going to have to work twice as hard as I did to get to the same spot in life as I am simply based on their gender, doesn’t make sense.  The fact that Christian’s are telling people they’re going to burn in hell and revelling in delivering that news, doesn’t make sense. 

The world feels in more disarray than it ever has been but maybe that’s just because I see it now.  Maybe when my father had it all together 30 years ago, he had just as many doubts and questions as I do today.  He turned 70 this year just before the world stopped.  Fully digesting and coming to grips with that that is another writing in an of itself but I do have to take some time to sit with him soon to ask:

Hey Dad, when you’re older, does absolutely everything make sense?

 

 

Note: if you’re confused by the Olaf reference, you should check out Frozen 2; Great Movie.  If you’re short on time, just check out the song here: https://youtu.be/l5d67j3CAWE