The Lord is (Not) My Carnival Operator

Far and away the most significant passage of the Bible for me over the last several years has been Psalm 23, the well-known song of David that begins “The Lord is my Shepherd, I lack nothing.” Particularly the bit about “he guides my steps along the paths for his name’s sake.” For most of my life, I haven’t carried around that picture of God. If I’m honest, my view of God was less like a shepherd was more like a carnival game operator.
Growing up around charismatics, I grew up hearing people saying things like “God gave me a prophetic word…God spoke to me this week…God gave me a vision.” The problem was, I never really won that game. I never got any guidance from God. Oh, I always got excited thinking I might win something; I could walk around the carnival and see that other people with their giant stuffed animal trophies, but somehow I always walked away empty-handed. I would try and try to play the game, but somehow I always left with empty pockets and a sad, gnawing envy. Not that I didn’t want to win: every time the carnival came to town, every time I saw all the lights and music I thought maybe this is my big day, maybe today I’m gonna win. But somehow I was always came up short…just short. Maybe I didn’t have what it takes, I didn’t have the money to play long enough to actually win. Maybe I just needed to try harder. Maybe I just needed to believe harder! Maybe I shouldn’t have been so irresponsible and spent all my money at the fun house. I don’t know! Maybe the carnival operators just didn’t think I looked like a good kid. Whatever the reason, I never won the big stuffed animal from God.
And eventually I just didn’t like carnivals anymore. I started to get cynical: I realized this whole business of ‘hearing God’s voice’—it was RIGGED! With some people the Great Carnival Operator just flicks a switch and jackpot—answer to all of life’s deepest worries, answers to life’s biggest questions! With other sad suckers like me, the whole thing was like a torturous carnival trick. God probably wasn’t gonna give me any guidance. He wasn’t gonna do me any favors. I was probably just a little too sinful, a little too doubting, a little too lazy, too undisciplined. And my only hope was to get lucky or to outsmart the game.
God was not my shepherd. I did not believe he was guiding my feet along the right paths for his name sake. This all came rushing home to me when I faced the really big decision of my life: where to go to college. Up until then it was all planned out. And to be honest, I really just winged it with that decision. I didn’t have any sense that God was guiding me.
A few years later I faced an even bigger decision. Whether to ask my girlfriend to make this thing permanent—to get married. The decision sent me into full-blown crisis mode. I loved her, but I was desperate to hear something from God. I needed to know, “am I screwing my life up? Is this your “will for my life?” That was always the riddle. And deep down I realized I don’t deserve to win the prize of God’s revelation. There’s no reason for God to answer my big, fuzzy, over-sized, emergency orange colored-question. Why would he? I hadn’t been a very good kid. I hadn’t managed to figure out his riddles. I asked some people that were more spiritual than I was (some of the people that always seemed to be winning with God), but they just looked at me and said, “have you prayed about it?”
The answer, as usual was “no.” No, I hadn’t managed to get my act together and wake up every morning to pray about it.
So I begged God and ask him please give me a sign. And I assumed that God was reluctant: he knows just how sinful and hormonal I was as a young person and he couldn’t possibly want to give me his guidance and blessing. If only I could get my act together and clean up my life then I would know I was doing God‘s will. Weeks passed, months passed, and eventually I assumed I was going to have to solve the biggest riddle of my life on my own. But then it happened. I won the jackpot. God spoke.
Someone else was praying for me. This question of getting engaged was the ONLY thing on my mind. And then I saw a vision. It wasn’t a grand, prophetic, celestial vision of profound wonders, it was simply an image of me riding a bicycle. But then I saw a hand on the back of the seat. Next, I saw the hand let go: I wobbled off, nearly crashing, but all the while learning to ride a bike. Then I thought I actually heard something. A still small voice: “I will be with you.” And just like that it was over. I was ‘hearing’ from God! The only problem…it wasn’t the answer I wanted to hear. It was like winning the grand prize only to realize its stuffed with sawdust!
“I will be with you.” No promise of a happily-ever-after marriage. No promise of fairy-tale wedding. No word from God about his “will for my life.” Just the affirmation that he will be with me, like—well—a shepherd! And the sense that he really didn’t have one right “will for my life” but instead was like the good father letting his child learn to ride the bike on his own.

Comments are closed.