Formation and the Wall

The resurrected Jesus and our spiritual struggles

What do we do when we hit the wall of our faith? 

Any relationship of love goes through different stages. Take a marriage. There is the friendship stage, the infatuation stage, the honeymoon stage, the parenting stage, and the slowing down stage. No stage is ever the exact same. The sign that a relationship is vibrant, of course, is that it matures. As many experience in their journey of discipleship to Jesus, there all too soon arrives a perplexing season of faith when the very structure and means by which one has pursued God no longer seems to work as it used to. While we may have begun our journey of seeking God out of a deep desire and hunger, a season can soon arise when those initial desires begin to wane. This can leave us wondering: do we truly love God anymore?

These difficulties are some of the most critical moments in our love for God. This has been dubbed by some as ‘the wall.’ This developmental concept—popularized by Janet Hagberg and Robert Guelich in their 2005 book entitled The Critical Journey—has become a standard talking point in many theological discussions about how Christ’s followers learn to love God when their initial desires no longer seem to remain.¹ While our journeys of faith may be marked by initial seasons of desire for God, there comes a moment when, as they say, “things aren’t working anymore...[and] there’s got to be more.”²

We hit a wall.

Photo by Yiqun Tang on Unsplash

The wall can manifest itself in many ways, including, but not limited to:

When we expected that our life with God would end our patterns of addiction to sin—but it hasn’t.

When our pursuit of Jesus initially promised to bring us happiness and increased blessing—but it seems like the opposite has happened.

When we believed in healing and then watched a friend die—and we are now left wondering if God really can heal. 

When we followed God’s call into a vocation of ministry—but it has left us beat up and questioning our love for the church.

When we used to have such a deep passion to do whatever God said—but now we struggle even to want to read our Bibles or talk to God.

The wall looks different to different people. 

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to preach a sermon at my University’s mandatory 11 am Thursday chapel—something I do once or twice a year. One of my most beloved students made a B-line to me after the gathering had finished and shared with me that she has recently been exploring some of the ways in which her Christian family of origin did great harm to her. And how, in working through these experiences, she almost felt as though she was denying God and betraying her faith and family for getting into this pain and heartache. “By even exploring these crippling pains from my past, am I walking away from God? Am I betraying Jesus?”

In a very real way, my student feels like she is hitting a wall in her journey with God.

Walls are potent realities. And, more often than not, they cannot be walked through. So often in Christian circles, we can easily offer trite and pithy advice about ways that we can recapture old passions and desires. But these nostalgic attempts at recapturing the past only seem to create a bigger problem. Part of our heart knows that the goal of following Jesus is not (and cannot be) going back to the old ways we may have followed Jesus in the past—as sacred as those journeys may have been. Jesus isn’t calling us in that direction. The call is to return to our first love (Jesus). Not just to return to our first experiences (of seeking Jesus). I think we intuitively know this. Jesus is calling us forward to follow Jesus today, in the here and the now. “Whoever wants to be my disciple,” Jesus taught, “must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.” (Lk 9.23) Today. Not yesterday. Today. Here. Now.

None of us can follow Jesus yesterday. That day has come and gone. There is one day that one can take up this task—today. Facing the wall inevitably invites us to come face-to-face with the very thing keeping us from what we believe is on the other side. There’s only one problem: you can’t walk through walls. 

To be deeply formed into the image of Christ begins with the acceptance that it is God forming us. God is the main actor. Yes, we play a role. An important role. But God is the initiator and the finisher of our formation in Christ. What if we have gotten so much of our understanding of formation wrong? What if we’ve been teaching people that the goal of the journey of formation and discipleship is that we have to find a way to make it through or around or under the wall. Having hit the wall myself, at multiple points in my journey with Jesus, I’ve grown weary of the snake oil salesmen who sell what they believe are tricks and tips to get through the wall to the blessing on the other side.

What if the goal isn’t to get on the other side of the wall?

Be open to surprises. Because, in reality, the wall can have profound blessings on our lives. By hitting this wall, we are actually coming to the end of ourselves. We cannot conjure up the strength and wherewithal to move forward. Like an addict, we should recognize in these moments that we are ‘powerless.’ We cannot make our hearts desire awaken. We cannot overcome our disdain, frustration, sadness, and disappointment. We cannot overcome the wall by sheer force. Just as Lazarus couldn’t wake himself up from being dead. 

There is only one thing we can do with the wall. In the resurrection stories of Jesus, the resurrected Messiah appears to his disciples on multiple occasions. The most repeated activity, in fact, that Jesus is reported to have undertaken in these forty days between resurrection and ascension is to have eaten food with his disciples. Jesus is recorded as eating more than any other activity in the forty days before the ascension. Luke picks up on this in the first chapter of Acts:

After his suffering, he presented himself to them and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive. He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God. On one occasion, while he was eating with them... (Acts 1.3-4)

Notice how luke says that Jesus gave ‘convincing proofs’? Yet, there is not one healing or supernatural miracle described during that forty days. What was ‘convincing’ in Luke’s mind? It was simple. Jesus ate food with them. This was what changed their minds and was so convincing. Ghosts don’t eat sushi—and they knew it. The fact that Jesus was eating with them was enough for them to know that death had been conquered.

One other thing would have stood out to these early disciples. In one of the resurrection appearances, something odd transpires. John tells us:

A week later his disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with them. Though the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” (Jn 20.26)

From the looks of it—given the intentional detail that the ‘doors were locked’—Jesus has just done something of the supernatural. Although it’s easy to overlook. Jesus, in that resurrection body, has somehow managed to walk through a wall to make his way into the room where the disciples had locked inside inside. They don’t come out. He comes in. In their own proverbial cave of death and fear, they have yet to come out themselves. And the only way they could, was by the resurrected one to come in to bring them out. This becomes the story of so many of us.

Only one character in the Bible is described as having the ability to walk through walls. 

The resurrected Jesus.

This gives us a sacred treasure. The goal of Christian spirituality and formation is actually the art of admitting one’s inability to walk through walls. We have to start right there. We don’t have power to do these things. And as my student who spoke to me after chapel hits her own wall—as tempted to offer the tricks and tips—I must relent of my worship of human effort. She doesn’t need to walk through the wall. Rather, she literally can’t walk through the wall. The blessedness of her life is not making it to the other side to get what she thinks is somewhere else. The blessedness of her life is found in seeing how Christ has made his way to her side. And whispers to her “peace be with you.”

You may be standing at the wall. And if you are, well, take a deep breath. Stare at it. Don’t ignore it. But don’t forget to look at the resurrection and the life who stands right next to you who has no problem walking through them. And wants to show you how to unlock the door to come out.

1. Janet O. Hagberg and Robert A. Guelich, The Critical Journey: Stages in the Life of Faith (Salem, WI: Sheffield Publishing Company, 2005), chap. 7.

2. Hagberg and Guelich, 18.