Author Archives: Tobi Goff

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About Tobi Goff

I am a writer, impertinent Christian, and recovering perfectionist. I (mostly) enjoy life in the Pacific Northwest with my husband and two daughters. Sleep is my drug of choice, and I like books, hugs, and piña colada milkshakes.

God Is Not in Control, Epilogue

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I never intended to write four posts about how God is not in control. What began as one question has evolved into piles of questions, most of which remain unanswered. But today I really am going to wrap up with a final post on the topic (at least for a while).

As I’ve reflected on what it looks like to move away from “God has a plan” and “God is in control,” I’ve found those sentiments everywhere—in books, emails, prayers, small group conversation. We are so desperate for control that we have assigned it to God with certainty and force.

Dare I say evangelism springs from a desire to control? We want people to be on our side. We want them to be “saved”—from what? Eternal burning? I don’t believe in that. Pain? We’re all on the pain train. A meaningless life? Okay, but fitness or family or any number of things can provide meaning in life. Are we proving we’re right by convincing other people to think the way we think? Are we earning God’s favor? Trying to avoid eternal separation from people we love?

Doggedly we seek to control how our lives turn out, how other people’s lives turn out, how the world and eternity turn out. We want to do our part. We want God to do His part.

Jesus wasn’t big on asking people to agree with Him before they followed Him. What if we invited people to follow us, to see what life is like for a human well-loved by God, taught by Jesus, and emotionally intimate with the Spirit? What would it look like if evangelism focused on showing what a messy life looks like with God, rather than on cleaning up the mess?

Church people like to talk about being “in” or “out” of the church. “Our neighbors aren’t in church any more.” “Her oldest boy stopped going to church.” When a kid is “out” of church, the parent doesn’t rejoice and say, “I’m so happy I have no control, and so grateful that God gives the power of choice. I can see the spiritual freedom in my daughter’s choice to not believe in God. It illustrates God’s character beautifully.” Nope. We go to battle, employing rigorous prayer and subtle (or not-so-subtle) manipulation; we adjust our theology; we feel sad and helpless; we obsess about it or refuse to think about it at all.

While eager to praise God for free will and the power of choice, we simultaneously do everything possible to control the people She puts in our lives. Is that because we’d rather trust Her control than Her goodness? Would we rather eradicate addition than accept discomfort? “Better safe than sorry,” we say, not realizing that our version of safety insulates us from God. Am I willing to trust in God rather than trust in the safety She provides? Harry Shaumburg put it like this, and it gives me pause:

As I learn to trust God, I acknowledge how little I really know of what it means to rely on God and demand nothing. I’ve seen only a glimpse of what it means to put my confidence in God in a way that goes beyond a demand for safety and comfort. Yes, I have tasted what it means to have faith in God … but I’ve only begun to trust … [T]rust is a decision to enter the reality of a fallen world that is at best disturbing.

– False Intimacy, by Harry Schaumburg, page 87

I used to think trust ought to take me out of reality. Schaumburg suggests the opposite—that trusting God will immerse me in the reality of our disturbing, broken world. Do I really want that? On the other hand, do I want God to control this spastic world into submission? I don’t respond well to the people in my life who control. I move away from them, subvert their efforts, focus on our differences, and even flaunt my choice to not do what they want. That’s not the response I hope to evoke in friends, or strangers. Am I willing to trust God while feeling the discomfort of humanity? Willing to not know what He’s going to do about this mess?

God invites me to exhale the need for life—mine and everyone else’s—to turn out well, then inhale love. Love is spontaneous, annoying kindness; food and forgiveness; boundaries and truth—in all places at all times. When control dies, an unexpected stream of creativity emerges and confirms my identity: made in the image of God who creates.

Rich Notes

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Rich Notes

Blessed are You,
Lord our God,
Queen of the Universe,
for music—
the sound of feelings;
the sound of deep knowledge
too meaty, or mystical,
for words.

Blessed are You
for my favorite song,
captivating me still,
aural delight,
richer even than I remembered.

Blessed are You,
Lord our God,
Queen of the Universe,
for music—
a pile of invitations,
to laugh, weep, dance,
sing in the kitchen,
turn up the radio,
raise our hands, as if reaching
to toast Heaven with a glass
of our best and richest creation,
notes and words,
instruments and voices,
breaking us wide open,
intimacy with You,
our divine Mother.

God Is Not in Control, Part 3

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When one person wants good things for another person, does that lead to a desire for control? In my relationships with my children, my parents, and my spouse, I’d say Yes. I have felt controlled by every family member, and in my turn I have tried to control them—often because I want good things for them. I want my kids to develop skills that will help them thrive as adults. I don’t want anyone to hurt them. I want them to be kind and confident and responsible. I want my spouse to get plenty of sleep and maintain a healthy weight. I want my parents to enjoy life.

But is the basis of all these good desires the fear of what may come if these things don’t happen—if things aren’t this way? Do I want a better marriage for my friend because I fear the marriage she’s in? Do I want better health for my spouse because I fear what poor health would do to our lives? Do I want my friend Alana to have better mental health because I fear her depression will affect the atmosphere of our small group? When life goes off the rails it may cost time, money, reputation, quality of life. Isn’t it better to stay on the rails?

I used to think so, but now I’m not sure. At what cost does a person stay on the rails? What is lost to the god of control? I don’t want to admit it, but likely what is lost is what I was trying to protect—peace, safety, belonging.

God’s way of moving in the world hardly resembles mine. He wants good things for us but has no desire to control. He is not fearful, because He is love. He is not trying to guard His resources or His reputation—He already gave both to us. God’s love is a love intertwined with loss and longing. It’s a love that accepts pain, and repeats the same loving action a 100th time even though there was no response the first 99 times. It is a voracious love, eager for more encounters.

Stacey Bess spent seven years teaching transient or homeless children, grades K-12, in a homeless shelter. Many of these children attended The School With No Name for only 90 days, the typical length of stay at the shelter. In her memoir, Nobody Don’t Love Nobody, Bess introduces Karen, a woman she connected with at the shelter through conversation and nights out. Later, when Karen had a baby, she moved in with Bess’s mom, who helped care for baby Liza. Bess and her mother provided safety, midnight taxi service, food and clothing. They did everything they knew to do to help Karen create a healthy life. But things didn’t turn out how they hoped. In Bess’s words:

Karen brought us to feel and know about tragedy in a completely new way. We wanted desperately to fix her. I picker her up every time she called, day or night, and my mother put up with her tantrums and drug use, both of us full of hope and confident in the power of love alone to heal all wounds. But what we learned from Karen was that sometimes the giving has to be enough.

Nobody Don’t Love Nobody, page 42

Karen didn’t lean in to a healthy life. Love didn’t “do the trick.” My immediate response is that Bess and her mom were overly optimistic. They needed better boundaries and a reality check.

But Bess’s conclusion was, “sometimes the giving has to be enough.” In other words, what they did was enough. Nothing was lost.

C. S. Lewis wrote, “Love is never wasted, for its value does not rest upon reciprocity.” This feels right and true to me, but … isn’t the value of God’s love that it saves us? What is the point if no one responds? Bess and her mother loved Karen and Liza, but it sure looks like the saving part didn’t happen. It is often said that Jesus would have died to save only one. What about none?

After “God so loved the world that He gave His only Son,” we have, “so that whoever believes in Him will not perish but have everlasting life.” Everlasting life—even if interpreted as fullness of life rather than living for billions of years and then more—is an outcome. Love does something. What happens if there is no “so that”? Could it be that God’s love affects us even if it doesn’t save us? Is that effect worthwhile?

I have no record of Karen’s inner world, but I’d bet she knew those women loved her. She certainly trusted them. Does God covet our trust more than a change in our behavior? More than a longterm relationship? Does He want us to know He loves us, more than He wants to save us? That could change everything.

A quick look in my Strong’s concordance reveals that the word “plan” isn’t in the Bible. I’m not by any means an advocate of returning to the King James Version of the Bible, but I find it intriguing that much-beloved Jeremiah 29:11, usually quoted as, “I know the plans I have for you,” reads this way in the KJV: “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil.” Maybe God’s will isn’t a plan, so much as it is His thoughts toward us. Maybe Jesus showed us what God’s will looked like, more than what God’s plan entailed. Maybe love, the absence of control, leads directly to spontaneous liking, which is the soil of belonging.

Spontaneity is the antithesis of control. It requires presence more than planning, and curiosity more than control. As humans we often forgo belonging in pursuit of acceptance, “the action or process of being received as adequate or suitable, typically to be admitted into a group.” Pursuit of acceptance gives us control. If I can perform or conform my way into a group—if I can make myself suitable—I have some control. Belonging cannot be wrangled, and has a rather slippery definition: “an affinity for a place or situation.” I looked up the word “affinity” to put some flesh on that very short definition of belonging. Affinity is, “a spontaneous or natural liking for something or someone.” So, belonging is spontaneous or natural liking for a place or situation—or, I would add, for a person.

“Spontaneous liking” sounds terribly out of control. But it leaves room for imperfection and it embodies joy. If love is the pain of not being in control, is belonging the joy of embracing imperfection? Maybe I can want good things for a person—work for them, even—but ultimately allow the giving to be enough, and allow trust and belonging to matter more than saving.

Evolution of Joy

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Evolution of Joy

Blessed are You,
Lord our God,
King of the Universe,
for happiness, unexpected.
I feel buoyant, excited even.
How did this happen?

For more than twenty-five years
I thought my life
was a job well done.
For ten more years
I served my life
as a sentence.
Today? Life is
an invitation.
Blessed are You, Lord,
for this evolution.

Blessed are You,
Lord our God,
King of the Universe,
for inviting me
to a preexisting fullness
and a predetermined wealth,
the pleasure of being me.

Imagine it—joy,
not because I earned it,
but rather,
here it is in front of me—
the sky at dawn,
fleece leggings and slippers,
London fog to warm my hands and belly,
Phiona-cat’s antics,
pomegranates divided into bumpy wedges,
JJ Heller Christmas songs,
the smell of gingerbread in the oven.
Blessed are You, Lord,
for this revolution.

God Is Not in Control, Part 2

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“God is not in control” opens a can of worms. Worms don’t line up neatly or make a sharp illustration, but they are certainly alive. Over the last few weeks I’ve jotted down a number of quotes, and perhaps each one is a worm in the can. In this post I’ll pick them up one at a time to observe and question, before putting them back.
Next week I’ll wrap up with Part 3 of “God Is Not in Control.”

“The God we’ve settled for is red in the face and pretends he doesn’t know us at parties. But the God we actually have is never embarrassed by us.”1

Beginning with my parents, and right on down the line, no human has exactly wanted me to be me. I don’t even want me to be me. But God is cool with me being me, despite the fact that on some level it costs us both. God would rather know me than control me.

“It seems clear there’s no way to manipulate God with how we pray or what we say.”2

This statement feels obvious, but when I came across it in the book I was reading last week, it stopped me. Somehow it doesn’t match what I’ve learned in church and Scripture. Doesn’t God respond to prayer based on our persistence, faith, and asking according to Her will? The Bible tells us to pray in these ways—for what, if not for results? Yet anyone who prays with regularity finds out there is no formula and God is unpredictable.

Do I really want a formulaic God? Although the unpredictability irritates me at times, manipulating or controlling God would put our relationship in a tenuous position. Once I’ve manipulated someone, I no longer know if they’re doing what they’re doing because it matters to them—or because I whined or threatened. I want to know that God does what matters to Her, and I suspect she, too, values authenticity from me. He is willing to accept some amount of pain and chaos as the cost of not manipulating or controlling. He actually wants me to be me.

“… love is wild territory. It’s where people who don’t have control go and linger … Finding the self inside the skin.”

How does a person love when they are alone? What does love look like when I’m awake in the middle of the night? Did the saints in solitude—whether by their will or against it—love while they were alone? Did they love anyone other than God?

Could I give another person my attention when I’m not with them?

Perhaps loving when I am alone is a practice, a lingering in love’s wild territory. Rehearse forgiveness. Remember my favorite things about my husband. Release control of situations I want to fix. Would loving someone while I’m not with them have an impact on them? On me?

If love is attention, could I gift myself my attention? Find “the self inside [my] skin”? Can I love when I’m brushing my teeth and notice my mind overheating, trying to make everything logical? Receive God’s love when I’m alone? This might look like peace or enjoyment—knowing I am centered, enough, delighted in, and aware more of who I am than what I am doing.

That love gets me every time / My heart changed my mind / And I gol’ darn gone and done it.4

Does a heart change a mind, or does a mind change a heart? I suppose it doesn’t matter. God is active in my mind to change my heart, in my heart to change my mind, in my body to mold my spirit, and in my spirit to touch my body. He may not be in control, but He makes up for it by being the thing that wouldn’t quit. What doesn’t yield to control may yield to loving persistence. Like the woman in Jesus’ parable who kept after the unjust judge, God keeps after us. She persuades us, not because of our morals, but in spite of them. He connects to our center, from which everything else grows. She is with us to be with us, not to control the future.

“Then he said to the woman, ‘I will sharpen the pain of your pregnancy, and in pain you will give birth. And you will desire to control your husband, but he will rule over you.’”5

I’m not sure I believe in the devil, but let’s assume for a moment that s/he does exist. Is the devil in control? Certainly his character doesn’t preclude control. And if love is not control, I’d say the devil is controlling—the opposite of love. From the Serpent’s first appearance in the garden, she has been suggesting that God controls us—“Don’t eat that.” “Don’t go there.” I can believe the lie and slip into a life attempting to manipulate God and hoping He’ll control me into salvation. Or I can say, “Love’s not like that. Love moves toward me with goodwill, not to force my hand, but to hold it.”

I’m made in God’s image, with agency and love. This leaves the devil in a difficult position. The thing she wants most is out of her grasp. It is only in deception that he has power. And what better way to deceive than to promote the message that God is in control?

“The one thing all of us—gay, straight, male, female, conservative, liberal, and on the continuum between the absolutes—have in common is the fear that we won’t be accepted, the fear of what we’ll lose if we are ‘known.’… being known is worth fighting for. It’s worth betting everything on. It’s risky. It’s terrifying. But it’s the only thing that matters.”6

God knows this, and it’s why He won’t control. He’d rather know me than control me, and He’d rather be known by me than controlled by me. God is not in control. She’s in something much better. She’s in love.

Endnotes:
1Boyle, Gregory. The Whole Language (page 7)
2Hill, Jeffrey D. Seeking the Triune Image of God in You (page 144)
3Raybon, Patricia. My First White Friend (page 12)
4lyric from Shania Twain’s song, Love Gets Me Every Time, https://www.musixmatch.com/
5Genesis 3:16, NLT
6Davis, Cynthia Vacca. Intersexion (pages 223, 232)

Twilight

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Twilight

Blessed are You,
Lord our God,
King of the Universe,
for evening.
Trees slip into black pajamas
as color drains from the sky,
pooling at the edges,
vivid feather boas draping the sun.

Blessed are You
for slowness of twilight,
a dissolving that escapes notice
until I get distracted,
and looking back to the sky,
find it changed.

Blessed are You,
Lord our God,
King of the Universe,
for those things that spark alive
even as I dim.
Owls and mice open their eyes,
stars twinkle, dew forms,
and streams gurgle night music.
My ears attune as my eyes rest,
kissed to sleep by the softness of twilight.

Get To Know the Couple

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November 20 marked 30 years since Pastor Bryson baptized me at the Milo Adventist Academy Seventh-Day Adventist Church—my home church. I attended that church, beginning in utero, until I moved away for college at the age of 18. An evangelistic series in the school gymnasium pulled me to baptism in an emotional rush. Less emotional were the pre-baptismal Bible lessons. On a cold day in November, my older sister and I donned baptismal robes and took the plunge in a warm baptistry.

I’ve never looked back. Although today I’m less certain about the words on the baptismal certificate I signed, I’m more certain about the relationship.

To celebrate thirty years with a little fun, I’ve compiled questions from “Get To Know the Couple” games and answered them for God and myself.

Where did they work when they met?
Tobi was a full-time child and God was a full-time lover

How long have they been together?
Pretty much forever

Where did they get engaged?
In the Milo Adventist Academy gymnasium

What did they do on their first date?
Go to church (sorry it’s not more glamorous)

Are they cat or dog people?
Tobi is a cat person, God can’t decide

Who said “I love you” first?
God

What is something they have in common?
A desire to create safe spaces where people can share their inner world, their stories

Who is more high maintenance?
Tobi

Are they morning people or night people?
Morning people, although they can have a good time at night too

Who is the most patient?
God

What is the bride’s middle name?
Danielle

What is the groom’s middle name?
He has too many to list. One of the bride’s favorites is El Roi

What is their favorite type of food?
Fruit

What are their pet names for each other?
Tobi’s current pet name for God is Love, and his current pet name for her is Meadow.

What is their favorite place?
Anywhere still and quiet—especially a chair by the window

How old is the groom?
Nobody really knows, but he still looks good

What is their favorite thing to do together?
Write

Who is the better cook?
Tobi

Who is more stubborn?
Tobi, she hates changing direction

Who takes longer to get ready?
God, he has no idea how to hurry

Who spends more money?
God

Where was the bride born?
Canyonville, Oregon

What does the groom do for work?
Still a full-time lover.

What was their wedding date?
November 20, 1993

What is one thing they want to do together in the next 30 years?
Start a nonprofit writing group

As I mentioned, God has lots of names. Also—and this may seem weird—he doesn’t always look the same. So if you see me out with someone you don’t recognize, or hear me talking about a guy with a different name, text me before you freak out. It’s probably God in one of his other bodies or using one of his other names. He’s a dynamic fellow. I’m honored to be his bride of 30 years.

November

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I’m trying a different poem style this week. It’s challenging to rhyme after writing so much free verse poetry! It’s a different kind of week, kids home from school, extra time in the kitchen, gatherings with extended family. I’m grateful for each of you in the @jesusmyfavoritesubject family. Thank you for seeing me, and allowing me to see you.

November

In this month of gratitude
I struggle with a bad-itude.
I do not love this ugly mood
Or how my heart feels misconstrued.

My kids are not a quiet brood.
Today their antics light my fuse.
My inner peace they now intrude
Until I beg for solitude.

I am allowed disquietude,
But I’m not victim of my mood.
It’s likely this month will include
Both thoughtless acts and moments shrewd.

So I will eat Thanksgiving food,
Refrain from being trite or rude;
When we give thanks I will include
Some words of sincere gratitude.

Grace is not a platitude
And Love is wide in magnitude.
Here I belong, so I conclude
There’s latitude for attitude.

God Is Not in Control, Part 1

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“God is in control.” Words meant to comfort. Words spoken when I lose control—whether through error in judgement, the economy, the uncensored hand of death, actions of those I love, or the wildness of the elements. Is it because I cannot bear to lose control that I grab God by the shoulders and shove Him into the driver’s seat? “Jesus, take the wheel!”

“God is in control,” country singers sing and preachers preach and friends placate.

“God is in control.”

Some can’t quite get those words out of their mouth because they have looked around. If God were in control, wouldn’t She do something about the multi-billion-dollar porn industry in the West, and war in the Middle East? What about starvation? “Well, God is ultimately in control,” we say, as if God has a free pass to wait to use His control for our good until later.

It’s later.

“God is in control, but He gives us the power of choice.” This I have believed my whole life, but I don’t know what it means. Ministers explain it with scripture and compelling illustrations, but I’m lost. So, God can send an angel down here to save someone’s life (control), but She can’t tell me what to do (choice)? Wait, but She does tell me what to do and I’m supposed to obey Her. So She does control me, but only with my consent? Is that consent once-and-for-all, like a blank check for God to sign my destiny, or does my consent essentially stay in my bank account, spent only as I respond to God?

Perhaps parenting holds a partial answer to these questions. Last I noticed, I am not in control of my kids. I employ emotional manipulation, vocal volume, stonewalling, imposed consequences, removal of privileges, or plain old anger, but my kids do as they choose with their minds, their little arms and legs, their exasperating attention spans. My children did not consent to my control when they were born into our family, nor do they sign over their destiny as they reach a more mature age. They don’t think, Wow. Look at this adult who knows more than I do. I’ll let her make my decisions.

On the contrary, they watch me make my own decisions and think, I want to do that. When do I get to be independent? And they practice independence daily, as they leave food on their plates, sneak candy, take 27 minutes to dress, give spontaneous hugs, and say, “You’re the best Mama in the world.” Those words are meaningful precisely because I am not in control of them.

What if God is not in control? What if He doesn’t choose to comfort us, to save us, by being in control?

A visit to my Strong’s concordance reveals the word “control” is not in the Bible. At least not in the King James Version. More recent versions have a handful of instances. A Google search doesn’t reveal anything about the origins of this saying—that will be a research project for another day. I suspect somewhere along the line we devised “God is in control” to sidestep unanswerable questions. But this leaves us in a precarious position.

Gregory Boyle writes, “God no more has a plan than holds a grudge. There is, of course, a short hop between ‘God had a plan for me to become an orthopedic surgeon’ to ‘My four-year-old son just died of a brain tumor.’ Short hop. You can’t have this both ways. If God ‘plans’ you getting your medical license, God also has orchestrated your son’s demise.”1 I may not share Boyle’s certainty, but it makes me think twice about saying God is in control.

If God is not in control, what is He? In charge? This, too, is a question for another day. Today I want to consider what I gain and what I lose if God is not in control.

First, what do I lose? I lose the comfort of predictability. God is not holding the wheel. The blessings do not rain down as the prayers go up. The miracles don’t happen in proportion to my prayer life. Chaos is actually chaos, not just the appearance of it. Natural disasters are natural. Most disappointing of all is that if God doesn’t get to control me, I don’t get to control Her.

But, I gain intimacy. The word “intimacy” brings up other words, like “close” and “safe,” images of connection. Yet real intimacy is messy. In the book False Intimacy, I was surprised to find this statement: “Within the enjoyment of real intimacy, both partners experience fear of being exposed, fear of abandonment, fear of loss of control, and fear of their respective sexual desires.”2 I had assumed those fears indicated a lack of intimacy, yet when I reflected on this definition and my own experience of intimacy in marriage, the two were a perfect match. It was in encountering fear, speaking it and feeling it, that Michael and I escaped the confines of our good behavior and embraced being broken together. Belonging.

How does this work with God? Does He feel these fears? Is intimacy vulnerable for Her? “Intimate” may be the best word to describe getting stripped naked, beaten, nailed to thick boards, and erected like a monument. Intimacy—releasing control of image, of hateful people, of relationship. Watching those who love you run for cover, and those who loathe you crowd closer. Exposure, abandonment, loss of control—it’s all there. It’s our invitation to reveal our own exposures, abandonment, and inability to control, and in so doing to become one flesh with God.

Endnotes:
1Boyle, Gregory. The Whole Language (page 5)
2Schaumburg, Harry. False Intimacy (page 18)

Whiskers

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Whiskers

Blessed are You,
Lord our God,
King of the Universe,
for whiskers—
wiggly on rabbit cheeks,
dainty on mice,
captivating on a lion yawning,
cute on a kitten.

Blessed are You
for whiskers on my man,
reassuring to my face
as I lie against him,
warm under the comforter.

Blessed are You,
Lord our God,
King of the Universe,
for being my whiskers,
sensing what lies ahead,
informing my movements,
showing what my eyes don’t see,
ever-faithful guardian.