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The young adult conference in Denmark had just ended. I was now in Odense, walking around the city with my hosts. At the risk of triggering your inner Lewis Black, eager to keep you from enjoying something innocent and sincere, I’ll say this: it was Life. The weather, the conversations, getting beat by Jasmin in card games, the encounters I had in parks and restaurants, all of it…

Life. Rich, delicious Life.

But there’s a problem with using that word. It doesn’t mean anything to you anymore. It’s possible it never did.

—

When I try to tell you about the morning I walked around Denmark, eating the most fresh, delicious Danish of my life, I have a problem conveying it correctly. If you’ve lived your life grabbing a “Danish” from gas stations, the kind that come wrapped in plastic with orange stickers on them telling you it’s best you eat them before June of 2021, you’ll fluctuate back and forth between self-doubt and disgust when I say this Danish was to die for.

I say Danish. But you’re thinking, Gross gas station snacks?

You’ll think two things, one after the other.

1. Something is wrong with me. I don’t enjoy gross gas station snacks like Arvin, Sara, Segun, Mohammad, etc. I need to try harder.

Then, when trying harder only makes you sick—

2. Something is wrong with Arvin. He’s not being honest. I need to bail.

—

When I describe to you the feeling I had walking around Paris at sunset, the streets full of people and the Eiffel tower lighting up the horizon in front of me—you’ll have trouble sincerely agreeing with me if you’ve only been to Paris, Texas.

I’ve seen it, Arvin. It’s not that great.

I say, “Wow! Paris had me speechless.” But you’re thinking of paris.

You’ll think two things, one after the other.

1. Something is wrong with me. I hate paris. I couldn’t wait to get out of there.
2. Something is wrong with Arvin. His appetite for excitement must be more easily satisfied than mine.

—

“I have come that you may have life.”

Oh Jesus, Did you really?

Because T-shirts that rip-off real brands to celebrate Christian puns and music limited to a tired vernacular with forever-predictable chord progressions and awful movies guaranteed to disappoint due to their blatant dishonesty and disregard for basic principles of Story and communities of people who’re just “doin’ life together” do not taste at all like Life. They taste like Diet Life. “All the taste with none of the guilt…” until we find out the chemical secretly being put in this stuff is actually much worse for us…so we bail.

I’ve grown up thinking these two thoughts, one after the other:

1. I’m not enjoying the life Jesus has for me. There must be something wrong with me.
2. I’m not enjoying the life Jesus has for me. There must be something wrong with Jesus.

—

I can count on one hand the number of Christian kids I grew up with that still consider themselves Christians today. They landed on the second thought, deconstructed their childhood faith…and never moved on. They’re still discussing what’s wrong with the Church or short term missions or “Insert Your Personal Beef with Christianity Here” while drinking the $7 cup of coffee, the details of which they can religiously explain to you.

But there is a third thought—

What if your Danish, your Paris, your Jesus, your Christian Life—are all Diet versions?

I shared drinks with a friend who informed me she was no longer a Christian. But as she described her reasons for departure, they sounded precisely like my reasons for diving deeper and figuring things out. To this day, her and her boyfriend are some of the most Christlike people I know.

We’d both left the diet versions behind…but she didn’t know what she’d been encountering wasn’t the real thing. Those church people who rejected her weren’t wearing the belt of truth, they were beating her with it. The truth can either set you free or be your weapon in enslaving others; and you must pick—you cannot have both.

—

Growing up, I was always perplexed when I’d vent my frustrations about Diet Jesus and Diet Life to my Dad, and he simply couldn’t understand.

He’d been rescued from several suicide attempts and ideologies that forced him to hate anyone who wasn’t like him. Jesus didn’t just “save” him, Jesus got him out of his execution date. He got him through heavy interrogations and whatever else they did to him in that Iranian prison where his friends had been murdered. My Dad was delivered from prison to Paris, and he never fails to enjoy the scent of fresh baguettes.

I, on the other hand, found western Christendom to be a different sort of prison—one where Jesus is either my favorite pimp or porn star, depending on how I’m feeling that day. I didn’t need to be delivered from suicide attempts or interrogation rooms, I needed help getting out of paris, Texas.

Dad couldn’t talk about Jesus without crying.

I couldn’t talk about Jesus without sighing.

—

As I sat back from the greatest meal I ever had in Odense, Denmark,

or observed the beauty of a cities both ancient and modern around the world,

or encountered the Mountains I’m looking at in Denver where I’m currently writing this,

I begin to understand.

Jesus did not come to provide Diet Life, he came to get rid of it. He came to rescue us from it. The enemy of an Abundant Life is not death, it’s fake life…Diet Life.

As I let that settle in my heart, I realize what my Dad was crying about this whole time— and I think it’s time I joined him.

Sometimes I join the Pharisees— “Teacher, rebuke your disciples!”

I have my reasons. Based on the conversations I’ve had with you, you have yours.

I overheard two pastors obnoxiously going on about themselves. Even with headphones, I couldn’t get any work done. The guy sitting next to me was also annoyed.

“I think they were religious,” David said once they’d left.

Oh God, I hope he didn’t hear that they were Christians.

The whole thing happened at the best time for me. Approaching peak cynicism, I was ready for a break. Not from the Christian faith, but from Christendom—the collection of fame-mongers using rubrics they invented in schools of thought they alone deemed wise.

—

“I tell you,” Jesus replied, “If they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.”

But Jesus, they won’t keep quiet. If only they’d keep quiet for once.

Half of them are obnoxiously talking about how well they’ve served you while the other half rolls their eyes at the first half. I’m tired of both.

Like Moses striking the rock instead of speaking to it, the first half will honor their traditions instead of what you’re saying now.

Annoyed by the sound of rock-bashing, the other half will quit believing you speak to us at all. They’ll keep trolling and posting and “Actually, I read an article”-ing their way into an oblivion they’ll ultimately blame on you for not existing.

Sometimes, I wish both halves would shut up about shutting hell down or salivating at the concerned attention they get when they no longer believe in hell.

I found it hard to know if Jesus was right about what happens when Christians keep quiet…so I stepped away from them.

—

David became my friend. He was part of neither group. David was the rock I needed to hear. Christians weren’t going to keep quiet, so I walked far enough away to listen to the rocks for once.

This is what the rocks said over dinner:

• The Busboy was a Bus-man. He was married and barely spoke English. I sat back in my chair as he felt safe enough to ask David for advice on buying a house. I watched David counsel him through the whole process and ensure that Bus-man knew David was in his corner. I watched a “heathen” navigate an immigrant’s journey to home ownership and was reminded of the folks who helped my parents do the same thing after we got to the States and all they knew to say was, “Yes” and “Coca-Cola.”

“Arvin, If I were in human form on the earth right now, this is exactly what I’d be doing.”

This is what the rocks said when my heart got broken:

• On the day his longtime beloved dog died, David got a hold of me to see how I was doing. He’d found out I’d recently gone through a breakup and wanted to make sure I was okay. He was dealing with loss, yet able to offer himself to those he loved.

“Arvin, if I were in human form on the earth right now, this is exactly what I’d be doing.”

And this is what the rocks said after a fire:

• Several people had just lost everything they’d owned. David stood next to a young orphan whose young life had just been reduced to a check from the Red Cross.

“Did you have a bunch of stuff up there?” David asked him.

“I had my Dad’s ashes in an urn in the closet.” the young man said.

I then heard David say, “Oh good! It’s not like they could get more burned!” before hearing the heartiest laugh from the young man.

“Arvin, If I were in human form on the earth right now, this is exactly what I’d be doing.”

—

While we walk around, spending that delicious mental health God gave us on doubting his existence or faithfulness or debating whether or not we can hear his voice, God’s speaking to the busboys and the brokenhearted and victims of loss through the lips of people who don’t even believe in him.

The rocks are crying out.

And if you’re one of his disciples, I hope you’ll consider keeping quiet for long enough to listen. You’ll accidentally hear the gospel. You’ll see the Saul-soon-to-be-Pauls of our time. You’ll hear the rocks cry out.

And let me tell you, their alabaster smells better than your filthy rags.

I was 12 when 2 childhood bullies forced me to watch porn. I had to pretend to masturbate just to get them to stop making fun of me. I was as uncomfortable while it was happening as you are right now while you read this.

I don’t mean to play the victim. I watched it plenty of times after that and I didn’t need any help from bullies. I start with that atrocious event so you can do the math when I tell you that I spent the entirety of my teenage years and early twenties attempting to get rid of it.

There are rubber bands, web browser filters, and accountability partner programs that promise progress when it comes to lust. If those have worked for you, congratulations.

Let me tell you what works for me.

Pornography’s promise to a young boy is that it’ll show him everything. He’s a few key strokes away from seeing something he’s never seen and hearing noises he’s only heard in those strange shampoo commercials his mom would overhear before making him change the channel.

What that young boy will go on to hear over and over again throughout his life is that what he sees in those videos isn’t real. But let’s be honest— gushers and fruit roll ups and fruit-by-the-foot aren’t real either…who cares? It tastes good, he’ll think to himself.

He’ll feel guilty as soon as he’s done, but he’ll go back. He’ll go back for years. He’ll move from shampoo commercials to middle-of-the-night pornfomercials to drunken spring breaks to other categories that’ll make reading this even more uncomfortable.

He’ll try to stop. He’ll contemplate the intricacies of the feminine heart and he’ll suffer the pain of not being to make eye contact with women or men in public for several days after he’s “messed up.” He’ll read books about it. He’ll sign up for software that can help. He’ll give up and accept that he’ll never get over it.

And then, seemingly out of nowhere, he’ll walk into a coffee shop where his friends are playing music for the evening. He’ll sit down to hear the guest vocalist, a beautiful, kind, 100% married young woman. A real one, not the fruit roll up version.

She’ll start singing a love song…and he’ll immediately glue his eyes to the floor. He can’t stand to look at her while hearing her sing because all of a sudden, he’s realized that pornography misinformed him in ways for which he was thoroughly unprepared.

Porn lied. Porn didn’t show him everything. He’s watched dozens of hours of intercourse and heard thousands of orgasmic noises. But he’s never seen this and he’s never heard this.

Her voice. The lyrics. The fact that a real woman is demonstrating her love for her husband in a love song and none of it is inappropriate or faked or monetized or fostering sex-slavery is far more overwhelming than a few key strokes.

What works for me is remembering that the real thing is less about what I see and hear, and more about what I feel. It’s in that stream of thought that I’m offended by any dishonest or distorted portrayal of a human body, male or female. Impressing Christians with my stroke-less streak isn’t appealing to me. And for some reason, after I heard this bride sing to her husband, I couldn’t bring myself to pretend that skin was enough. It felt offensive, like being forced to act out a scene from a play written by someone you don’t respect.

Rather than developing enough self-discipline or downloading the right software, I’m instead frozen into reverence by the sound of real love being sung, even slightly hinted at, in metaphors and stories far more enticing than sub-par actors with career and financial motivations.

That’s something I can wait for…something no one has to force me to watch.

He’s never thought about the future. He does whatever feels good, hoping his dreams show up for free. He goes from job to job begrudgingly because he doesn’t understand hard work because no one ever taught him how to catch things (a job, a ball, a joke).

He makes little amounts of money and lives in shoddy apartments and goes to dirty bars full of sad, unintelligent conversations with sad, unintelligent people.

He’s a fish, unaware of the omnipresence of shame in which he lives.

He’s the amalgamation of the misinformed choices he did make and the way life appeared after he failed to catch it and watched it shatter on the ground.

Like everyone, he suffers loss. But he’s less equipped than other people. He was never taught internal resilience. Rejection was the one thing he did learn to catch. It taught him to enjoy getting offended because bitterness justifies entitlement.

On the balcony of his motel, millimeters away from homelessness, he smokes yet another cigarette because I ain’t gettin anyunger. He stares at a highway where Baby Boomers fail to notice him in their rearview mirrors and Millennials don’t realize how close they are to ending up on his balcony.

His pleasure comes from porn, beer, and sugar. He’s divorced. His kids don’t talk to him because they’re too busy not learning how to play catch. He didn’t know how to raise them. He left.

Silence offended him by filling the spaces where his Dad’s example should’ve been, so he dragged his needs and tattoos where he didn’t feel pressured to emulate a man he never met.

He defines happiness to be the overlap between “something you didn’t have to work for” and “something that feels good.” Life shattered as it bounced off his unprepared hands, so he sprinkled heroine on the shards and found a tiny room where he could bleed in private.

His life will be considered a waste. Not publicly and certainly not by me—I’m too busy saying “God can use anyone” loud enough to convince myself I can earn the life I want. I’m not proud—but rather embarrassed—by this. And the next time you make sure people hear you when you cover up your fragility and fear with one of Christendom’s cliches, you should be, too.

He’s laying in bed, a few minutes away from pressing the button that brings him into my life. The sting of shame is still warm enough for him to see the steam coming off himself like a new cup of coffee that smells like sorrow.

He grabs his phone to look for things he can buy for cheap. What’s left of his money is spent on stuff because “New” things hint at a new man without demanding he behave like one.

The old, rented pornography is still playing on his old, rented television. He doesn’t need to turn it off because no one is going to come bursting through the door to catch him. Not his ex-wife, not his kids, and certainly not his dad.

A new iPhone. It’s the same iPhone he’s holding, but he’s too busy being distracted by “New.” I’ll pass for now.

An old Dr. Pepper sign. He likes those signs. They remind him of those moments in his childhood before he was thrown into the ocean of shame. $45! For a Dr. Pepper sign? I can’t be doin that. He keeps scrolling. It’s 4:53 am.

A guitar. Blue. Like New. Sold by a kid whose only venture into the ocean of shame was for sermon research. The description— “This Cosmic Blue Stratocaster will remind you of when you were young.” How would he know it’d do that?

“$150,” the kid says.

“75 — I can get it brand new for $150.” There are a lot of things he doesn’t know how to do, but haggle over meaningless junk is something he could teach a room full of scholars if he could make peace with standing before them.

“75 it is. Where should I meet you?” The question reminds him that he lives in an extended-stay motel next to the highway (*The same one you drove past at 81 mph with your friends while dreaming of the glamorous life to which you’ve spiritually entitled yourself, remember? You were rapping Kanye’s “Fade”).

“I’ll text you or call when I get to the house or the hotel however you want to look at it I’ve been here for 7 months so it’s home for right now.” However the kid wants to look at it? He’s selling a $60 guitar for $75! Who cares how the kid wants to look at it!?

The kid grew up in a different ocean— “Fathers And Kids Everywhere Always Forever.” He spends his youth being lauded for having the wisdom of old men. He spends God’s gift of mental health on the luxury of atheism. He spends his privilege on privatizing the recognition meant for those who overcome unprivileged childhoods.

On second thought, “kets just do this in the morning ran in some friends”

The phone rings. He musters up enough courage to answer it and hear another man’s voice.

“Hello, Mr. Jerry? Yes, this is Arvin Sepehr. I’m actually just outside and won’t be able to come back tomorrow. I have a pretty busy day tomorrow actually.”

“Uhh…well, uhh…you see, like I said, I have some friends here and uhh…”

There are no friends. There is no one. The kid can hear the absence of friends making noise in the background in the empty parking lot next to the balcony where he stands and stares at the highways while he smokes his cigarettes.

The kid hangs up. He’s not used to being inconvenienced. He’s upset. He drives to a hotel downtown where he’ll sit with his expensive laptop and journal about what happened to him that night. My gas! My time! The nerve of that guy, cancelling on me like that!

The kid is wrong. He’s ignorant.

He’s mistaken a scheduling issue for a life event.

He comes back the next day in his new blue car with a “new” blue guitar and makes his sale.

And while the old, unfathered father returns to living alone in his ocean of shame in an extended-stay motel, drinking/shopping his way to sleep, the kid drives away, quick to turn his music back on.

“Your love is fadin,

Your love is fadin,

Your love is fadin,

I feel it’s fadin.”

Kanye’s “Fade” begins to blare while he wonders what he’ll do with the money.

Maybe I’ll give it away. Yeah, that’ll make me feel good.

“Your love is fadin,

I feel it.”

Maybe I’ll donate to a lost, lonely and marginalized orphan…great idea.

“You better act like you know better.”

Now I just need to find one.

Every church has at least one “bad kid.” Raj was ours. He used words I wasn’t allowed to say. He’d listen to music and watch movies I wasn’t allowed to hear or watch. He was one of the older kids from whom I learned the strategic art of sarcastically trolling your way out of conflicts.

It was years before I found out why he was so good at it. I figured it was just another secret talent that came with being the bad kid—they were always the funny ones, weren’t they? You have to risk saying the one thing no one else will say in order to get the best response.

But toeing the line will often backfire. One morning in Sunday School, Raj went too far. Pastor Tom was preaching the typical stuff you hear from children’s ministers. The typical, easy to understand tenets of the Christian faith: God is a good Father, and he loved you enough to send Jesus to die for…you know the rest.

Raj was in the 5th grade and had heard these sermons for years. Week after week, Pastor Tom would say the same stuff while we’d sit there, leaving his words untested and unchecked.

On this particular Sunday, Raj wasn’t interested in pretending he’d experienced the easy to understand tenets of Christianity. When Pastor Tom announced that “God is a good Father” who loves us, Raj shouted the holiest curse I’ve ever heard:

“So what?!”

Those technically aren’t curse words, but they were treated as such when he said them.  To his credit, Raj owned up to it immediately. You could hear the sadness in his voice as he apologized after being immediately reprimanded. His tone was like the one you used when you had an obligatory catch-up lunch with a “friend” you weren’t particularly interested in catching up with and you reached down to realize you’d forgotten your money and needed them to spot you: I didn’t even want to be here. Now I have to apologize.

“Who said that?!” Pastor Tom said, surprised that a child would object to something so easy to understand.

“…me. I’m sorry.”

Knowing what I know now, “Sorry” is the only thing I wish he hadn’t said. It was easy for me to understand the idea of God being a loving father who cared for me because I had a ferocious example preaching in the building next door. Raj’s dad was in the building next door, too.

He was one of the deacons, the kind who considered himself an IRS auditor for pastors. He’d examine sermons like paychecks that needed to be cancelled, investigated, and re-distributed during what would’ve been an otherwise delightful Sunday lunch.

In fact, among his many talents, Raj’s dad also had a knack for beating the mental health out of Raj without anyone being able to see the welts and bruises.

I don’t know where Raj is now. I don’t know what he’s doing and I don’t know how, as a 1st grader, I could’ve done anything to help him at the time.

What I do know is that from now on, whenever someone steps up in defiance of the “easy to understand” tenets of the Christian faith, I won’t feel offended. When someone seems eager to disregard something I’ve been told was elementary since elementary, I won’t get angry.

Instead, when someone musters up the courage to curse at God, pointing at their unnoticed welts and bruises when shown velcro pictures of Jesus’ wounds, I’ll pay attention. I’ll nod at the holiness of a curse like that, and be grateful to learn something from their courage.

And then, all of a sudden…

and then, just like that…

and then, out of nowhere.

I refuse the premise.

Nothing is all of a sudden. Nothing happens “just like that.” And nothing comes out of nowhere.

If it seems to be “all of a sudden” or “just like that,” it’s probably not happening to you. It’s happening around you. A pregnant friend you hardly know may now have a kid “all of a sudden.” Or, “Just like that,” ten years go by…but that’s because they didn’t happen to you, they happened to everyone else around you.

That woman has been carrying that baby for a long time. And even before that, the baby existed in her mind. She knows him or her before him or her even becomes. I feel like even I knew my sister’s daughter before she was even pregnant. I see my niece and I’m reminded of my sister who was in grade school, eager to come home from school and negotiate with her dolls and toys the business idea she’d had that would one day take over the world. Then I watched her conquer the corporate world and elect to take on an even tougher challenge—motherhood.

This. This is the privilege of knowing God intimately— it is the blessing that often feels like a curse– Knowing what’s to come long before anyone else even needs it. It is this motivation and urge that, poorly stewarded, will drive others to consider you crazy and lame and selfish and bogus. And you may be all those things, but they don’t make you wrong.

Gold next to horse poop in a barn doesn’t make the gold less valuable, it just means fewer people are willing to be around it and take it seriously—and God forgive you if you walk around asking them to wear your gold before it’s even begun being refined in the fire.

Before you’re ready, even your glory smells like poop. But once you’re ready, even your crap smells like gold.

And what’s the difference? fire. The horse mess that is your bad attitude and selfishness and godliness nullified in that it’s mixed with the American dream will burn and smell even worse before it goes away forever.

Sure, you’re called and you’re eager to see your destiny take place. It very well might. But if and when it does, it won’t be “all of a sudden.” It’ll take time.

How long?

Until you stop asking how long because you don’t care how long, you may not even care if it ever happens by the time you’ll find yourself being asked to step into the role you grew up dreaming of diving into headfirst. But you’re not putting on your running shoes anymore, you sold those a long time ago to buy a little bit more hope to survive. You will not dive headfirst into God’s destiny, you will crawl and tremble.

And here’s the thing, you won’t even feel embarrassed or upset. You’ll be ever-aware of how close you came every day to giving up and settling. You’ll have several memories of “false-settling,” times when you accepted that your dream was done and you were done and no one would ever hear you sing or preach or look at your art or become your client or pay to taste your cooking.

You’ll crawl because you’ll be grateful your hands and knees still work.

You finally accepted that your schemes and manipulation don’t work anymore. You sold those for hope too.

That’s right, in this pseudo-motivational monologue, hope is the currency by which you purchase your destiny. Hope is the currency by which you purchase your destiny. Hope is the currency by which you purchase your destiny. And hope is the currency by which you purchase your destiny.

And you don’t earn hope, you ask God for it. And he only trades for your cynicism and eagerness to point out everything you disagree with in every conversation. And “just like that,” “all of a sudden,” you find yourself willing to stay quiet while your friend is talking and you actually listen. You look for why they’re saying what they’re saying rather than looking for the pause in their statement when you regurgitate the anecdote that was explained in some poorly-researched news story you only read the first paragraph of.

You give up on yourself, only to discover the version of yourself you gave up was never you. And certain friends reveal themselves to have been free-weights you were made to lift up and down only until you were ready to move to a higher weight class. You do not hate or resent them, but you’ll be wasting your time if you try to lift them up again.

—

And it never would have worked for you to know all this up front. Had they told you when you were 14, “Listen here you self-righteous bully, the next 10 years look like this. That’s the price of the life you’re telling me you want to live.” You would’ve been paralyzed. Not because of fear, but because your existence can’t compute “looking back” on the present moment you’re currently attempting to interpret. Stop that. You won’t find wisdom asking, “In 5 years, what will I look back on this moment and remember.” You have no idea right now, that’s why you need to stop asking that—and start paying attention.

Try this for yourself: you’ll discover that walking through a beautiful garden while telling yourself, Okay, make sure to observe the all-encompassing beauty on a depressing loop will only ensure that you don’t capture anything.

No, you do not get to see the whole picture but only in the rearview mirror. You don’t get to drink the water in the river until it’s drowning you. And you can’t speed it up. You can’t change the current. But you can cooperate. You can get in the right lane and find yourself grateful just to be doggy-paddling into some semblance of the destiny you printed business cards about long before you were actually ready to “network” and “sell yourself.” You can’t sell what you don’t have, homie—calm it down.

And when you do doggy paddle and crawl, trembling with gratitude and the humility that’s eternally misunderstood as it’s happening around you but forever solidified once it gets to you, people will show up to say how proud they are of the changes they’ve seen in you that seemingly took place “all of a sudden.”

You’ll hear it often enough to even repeat it to others, too. I might do that, too. Because when you bump into me at a coffee shop or some bar and ask what I’ve been up to and I tell you I’m flying to Europe to preach at my first young adult conference, I won’t be able to tell you the whole story.

I’ll probably hear you say, “Wow, that’s awesome!” I’ll thank you earnestly, but inside I’ll be remember the 10 years from 14-24 where everything seemed to hit the fan just as I sat down to get some air. I’ll suppose that 10 years ultimately is about 15 minutes of the story I’ll tell in the future, so I won’t make a big deal of the caves in my heart where I’ve been hiding from all of you.

I won’t say anything about all that. I’ll probably smile, nod my head, and answer “How did that happen?” with “Oh, you know…it just happened…all of sudden.”

But those of who you are more mature and dense in your spirits than I am…you’ll know—Nothing happens “all of a sudden.” But if you pay attention and listen, you’ll see that there’s actually a lot happening.

There’s a lot of Good on the way.