Nick Arnold

I was always one for pranks. I remember the last night of high school summer camp in 2005, in the hot night of Leakey, Texas, the guys and I (as an intern) decided to seek a bit of revenge on the girls. The pranks went back and forth for the entire week, and the girls thought they had the last laugh.

At about 11 pm, the girls attacked our cabin with rolls of toilet paper and silly-string. It was a pretty massive blow and our cabin was trashed. We knew we needed to seek revenge. It was the last night of camp and we would not let them have the last laugh. By now it was passed curfew and staff would be out on golf carts patrolling the grounds. It was spontaneous and foolish. But we had to do it. We were called to it.

The plan was simple:  we were going to Axe bomb the girls’ cabin to lure them outside, then we were going to hose them down with a water hose.

The Axe was easy to find; all us guys had it. The hose was a different story.

Only a few of us remembered seeing any hoses throughout the entire campsite, save one that the camp used to water their water slide. So our first mission was to steal the hose from the slide and relocate it to the girls’ cabin (and use their water spout).

A few of us ventured out first. We dodged the golf carts from building to building until we finally made it to the water slide. Getting the hose off was hard enough and we made quite a ruckus doing so. We had a few close calls, but we finally made it with the hose over to the girls’ cabin. We hooked up the hose and ran the water to make sure we had it working. Then we sent for the rest of the boys who were still hanging out, waiting anxiously for us to call for them. By now it was well passed 2 am.

We poked a hole in a couple of Axe sprays and tossed them in the girls cabin and readied ourselves for the ensuing escape.

The plan didn’t exactly go according to plan.

Instead of twenty-something girls fleeing from the rancid spray, only two emerged: the adults. They looked at us kind of funny, then told us to go back to sleep. We didn’t spray them. We walked back to our cabin, a bit downcast, but knowing we had the last laugh on the last night of camp.

It was my boss that summer that taught me,

If you’re not getting into trouble, then you’re not having any fun.
-Scott Brewer

Daring Playfulness.

Perhaps my favorite chapter so far, Mike Yaconelli paints a picture of a playful Jesus; a Jesus full of adventure and daunting; a Jesus that whispers in your ear, “Let’s go build a sand castle.”

I wonder if the church has lost something in its relentless attempts to be religious. I think we we forgotten how to play. We try so hard to prove ourselves to God we’ve forgotten the reckless abandon we can experience when we know that we are already loved.

What if our strategy to win the world was to “play” people into the kingdom of God? (page 79)

And who says we can’t? I have been guilty of wanting to see God work in my students through somber and serious moments. Maybe I’ve forgotten how to play.

One of my favorite movies is Finding Neverland. Yes, I know, that probably knocks me down a couple of levels on the manliness scale, but something about the story of J.M. Barrie getting inspiration for his next play from a group of children is powerful to me. He tries to teach them how to have an imagination in the face of reality, and I wonder if maybe that is similar to my call: teaching students about a God they cannot see who wants to teach them how to fly.

Below is a video with clips from both Finding Neverland and Peter Pan mixed together to a song called Fly by Blind Guardian. It speaks volumes, I think. (plus I enjoy the work that went into putting this together.)

No one ever dares to speak
It’s nothing else but fantasy
It’s make believe
Make believe

No one ever dares to speak
It’s nothing else but fantasy
But one day
It all will come to life

Step out of line
And I’ll teach you how to fly
Then away we’ll go
Leave your mark land of mine
-Fly, Blind Guardian

C.S. Lewis describes Aslan, the Christ figured in the Chronicles of Narnia, as a ‘not so tame lion.’ The reason so many of us have lost our childhood curiosity is that we’ve been tamed. Our world is populated with domesticated grownups who would rather settle for safe, predictable answers  instead of wild, unpredictable mystery. Faith has been reduced to a comfortable system of beliefs about God instead of an uncomfortable encounter with God. Childlike faith understands that God is as capable of destroying us as He is of saving us. Risky curiosity breaks us from the safety and comfort of a tame faith and ventures into the terrifying presence of a ‘not so tame’ God. (page 40)

Some of the most recent conclusions from research going on at FYI suggests that students are more likely to keep their faith in college when they are given opportunities to ask questions and are given permission to experience doubt in high school.

This idea seems entirely contradictory to the idea that we are trying to raise up young lovers of Jesus. Any expression of doubt is usually viewed as spiritual immaturity or weakness. Question are seen as a lack of trust in the cheap answers this world often provides; or worse yet: the cheap answers the church provides.

I wonder if our fear of mystery has led us to create cheap, shallow, and artificial answers to cover up the deeper questions our souls long to ask.

In chapter 2 of Dangerous Wonder, Mike Yaconelli proposes four assumptions that the world makes regarding questions:

1. Questions can be embarrassing. (they show a lack of knowledge)
2. Questions can make people uncomfortable. (they force us to reevaluate our faith)
3. Questions can be dangerous. (they have overturned kingdoms)
4. Questions can be “right” or “wrong.” (there are some questions that are not appropriate)

But questions can also be liberating. Questions can lead us to new discoveries and deeper understanding. Doubt is the shadow cast by faith (Hans Küng). Questions lead us into the darkness in hopes of finding the light.

Sometimes the only answer is, “I don’t know.”

I think God has purposely allowed us to ask questions that science, philosophy, not even religion or the church can answer. I think He has done so because it requires us to trust in Him, and in Him alone.

Childlike faith and a faith that longs for God and seeks Him wherever he may be–even in the place of no answers. (page 48)

In the end, isn’t that what faith is about anyway?

I picked this book up in the Fuller bookstore just Monday as a recommendation from a list that the Life Hurts. God Heals. program suggested. I have another Yaconelli book sitting conveniently on my shelf at home (Messy Spiritually). But perhaps this time I’ll crack it open and read through it.

The introduction is a bit depressing:  Mike talks about how everyone reaches a point in life where we lose our childlikeness; we lose our ability to hear God clearly. But the book promises to lead the reader to discover the “dangerous wonder” of a life that follows Jesus. I pray I might live such a life.

Chapter one jumps right into the thick of obstacles that prevent us from experience dangerous wonder:  dullness, dream stealers, predictability, and the banal. Mike argues we’ve been inundated with media that even the simple act of watching the sun set is drowned out by noise. Then there are those who try to prevent dreamers from reaching their dreams. Or we get stuck in the “same old same old” routine. Lastly, we might find more security in our financial stability rather than in the arms of God.

Christ is the Dream Giver who wants us to listen to His dream for us so we can run like children in the fields of His grace. (page 28)

I hope that I might be able to see God even in the mundane, daily tasks. I pray that God would help me to run with arms high and heart abandoned to the One who gave it all. (Hah, yes, that’s a line from a Hillsong United song.) I want to see my life as an adventure and I think God is calling me to leave my comfort zone and pursue Him into enemy territory where His heart for the lost bleeds.

Give me courage, give me strength.