By Nathan Sytsma

Staff Writer

I used to consider myself a good conversationalist. I fancied myself able to ask intelligent questions, light upon common ground and enjoy some degree of a meaningful communicative event with those I met. Recently, I have found myself to be more apathetic, more inclined to sit at the dinner table and just let the small talk slide by. To press deeper takes too much energy. And ironically, talking about the Word himself seems to require the most conscious effort.

We at Calvin - students, faculty and staff - talk profusely about Christianity. I eagerly debate theology, discuss church traditions and even effuse over liturgy or a moving sermon. But to talk about Jesus' presence in my personal life? To be frank, I find it alarmingly easy in conversation to divorce Christianity from its roots in the person of Christ, and I do not find myself alone in this unfortunate tendency. In a professedly Christian community, why do we not talk more about Jesus?

Before dismissing me as a fundamentalist or yet one more crusading reactionary, please consider my point of reference. A conversation with a friend first made me sensitive to the small degree to which we talk devotionally about Jesus in the course of our daily lives. He longed for a community in which he could ask another person ``What has Jesus been saying to you?'' without being considered intrusive or just a little too pious, thank you very much.

More recently, I received a letter from a friend attending a conservative Bible college in which she asked, quite naturally for that environment, ``What is God teaching you?'' Speaking of God as one speaks of a friend need not be confined to conservative evangelicalism. Many Roman Catholics speak of Jesus with shocking tenderness. Even non-Christian friends with New Age leanings are quite at home with discussing personal encounters with the Divine. A psalm of Asaph gives us a biblical precedent, declaring that the Lord holds him by his right hand and that ``as for me, it is good to be near God'' (Ps. 73:23, NIV). At Calvin, such sharing seems reserved for close friends and Bible studies, provoking me to wonder what it would take for us to verbalize the personal nature of our relationship with Jesus.

Let me pause for a moment. The words ``personal... relationship with Jesus'' probably rung alarm bells among a few readers. Those are conservative evangelical words, one might think. Or, he just exemplifies the already individualistic tendency in much of today's church. For the academics among us, such a way of talking about Jesus might seem limited and subjective. Moreover, I will be the first to admit that ``Christianese'' vocabulary obscures faith's depth of meaning; I grew up hearing my share about ``lost souls'' and ``born-- again'' Christians. Nevertheless, as Christians from a variety of traditions, we need not and should not shy away from speaking of Jesus' involvement in our lives. However we construe such a ``relationship,'' Christians profess to be disciples of One who did not die merely as a historical figure but lives with unfathomable fullness of life. And all traditions have devotional language, ways of expressing intimacy with that living Christ.

What might be preventing such devotional language from pouring over into many of our speech patterns?

Perhaps we are afraid of being trite, of lumping together the Lord of Life with human friends, which I take to be a validly cautious impulse. Yet while the Second Person of the Trinity must remain Other, the wonder of the Incarnation is that He took on humanity to such a degree that He ``has been tempted in every way, just as we are'' (Heb. 4:15). Jesus identified extraordinarily with ordinary people-eating in their houses, spending time at their parties, calling them to be his followers. Also, while according to the Apostle's Creed He is now seated at the right hand of the Father, the writer of Hebrews affirms that we have not come to a terrifying religious experience but to communion with ``Jesus the mediator of a new covenant'' (Heb. 12:24). More tellingly, the New Testament consistently declares that Jesus lives in those who follow Him. No, I do not think it irreverent to speak of Jesus as present in our daily lives.

More so, perhaps, the discomfort that I see associated with talking about Jesus springs from our culture's widespread belief that religion should be individual and private. Popular culture views religion as a personal exercise that becomes potentially offensive if shared. Furthermore, the intangibility of spiritual relationship may offend our rational, materialist cultural sensibilities. Of course, the majority of people on Calvin's campus identify themselves as Christians. I wonder, however, to what extent the mindset of mainstream culture inhabits our own. It is comfortable to talk about church; the general culture can understand social clubs and institutions. By the same token, discussing Christianity as an intellectual commitment, such as a philosophical system or scientific theory, will generally leave our eyebrows in their accustomed place. The culture has no categories, however, for an imminent encounter with a transcendent Person except to say, ``Fine, that's nice as long as it's your business.'' The Bible calls us to make Jesus-speak more than just a matter of private comfort, though. ``Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise - the fruit of lips that confess his name'' (Heb. 13:15). The passage - followed closely by an injunction to act on that conversation by doing good-suggests to me that such verbal praise can flavor not only our worship services but also our daily lives.

We talk incessantly about those we admire, from parents to favorite authors to boyfriends. In the Scriptures, Paul similarly bursts with delight at the doings of Jesus in his and his friends' lives. I am not calling for thinly veneered super-Christians or for thoughtlessly thrown-out language about the Lord Jesus. Instead, may this central relationship with the Lover of our souls find an honest place in our everyday conversations.