Get real!

My daughter Beth and her friend Sally were highly enthusiastic about Newton Faulkner when I collected them from his gig at the Ironworks last Thursday.

What attracted them was the authenticity of the singer-songwriter’s performance. They contrasted his down-to-earth reality with the artificiality of some other singers, whose performances they feel have been manufactured by the music industry. Their singing lacks conviction, because the songs they have been given to perform don’t spring from personal experience.

In contrast, the girls tell me, Newton Faulkner performs material which comes from the heart. They loved the way he chatted to the audience between songs, explaining how they came to be written.

Those lines in People should smile more which he has been criticised for, for instance - I can't change the world, Cos tryin' to make a difference makes things worse – apparently refer to an occasion when he went to help an elderly, bag-laden lady on an escalator at Gatwick only to be slapped in the face because she thought the dread-locked musician was about to rob her!

It’s not just singers who careers are controlled by pop music entrepreneurs who find it hard to be authentic. Many of us in fact need to do a Newton Faulkner and get real.

Some of us are inauthentic simply because we have never found out who we are. Since childhood, our way of living has been shaped by the expectations of others. We’ve lacked the confidence necessary to explore and lay claim to our true selves.

Some of us are inauthentic because being real would cost us too much. The teenager who wants to be part of the group and so does as the others do even when it’s against her better judgement. The young adult who isn’t brave enough to challenge her family’s views and say what she really thinks. The Christian who fears misunderstanding and rejection if he voices his doubts and questions.

Some of us are inauthentic because we’re trying so hard to be the people we think we ought to be. Someone continues in a career, ignoring the discontent simmering below the surface. Someone continues caring single-handedly for an aged parent without complaint, refusing to acknowledge the rising surge of despair.

Some of us are scared of what we might see if we allow ourselves to be authentic – scared of the thoughts and impulses which haunt us, scared to acknowledge they might be telling us something about ourselves which we need to hear.

Christian faith challenges us to get real. To acknowledge that we are who we are, dark stuff and all, and take ourselves to the God who forgives our failure, and sets us free to live the life he has for us. We will embrace God’s values not because we’re told to, but because we’ve learned that it is in embracing those values that we are freed to be our true selves.

A powerful phrase I came across recently is ‘the unlived life’ – that’s the life we were born to live, God’s dream for us, which we leave unlived if we live inauthentically, not accepting who we truly are. An unlived life is an unspeakable tragedy. And so wearisome. For if we are living inauthentically, we are drawing on our own depleting resources to get through each day; whereas if we embrace reality, we open ourselves to the creative energies of God.

If as Christians we are not making the impact we’d like in sharing our convictions with others, perhaps it’s because though our faith is sincere, we are not yet wholly real, we have not yet made our faith wholly our own. The message of Beth and Sally’s experience last Thursday night is that where there is reality, people notice.

Newton, the girls tell me, has no backing group, and takes the stage alone with just his guitar for company. As authentic Christians living out our faith we know our strengths and our weaknesses: we realise that we need the help of others in singing God’s song. But we can learn from Newton Faulkner’s style – not lording it over his audience, but almost serving them, ensuring they leave with a smile on their faces.

It’s when authenticity is matched by humility and a willingness to serve others that our lives as Christians will have maximum impact. We will discover that (most of the time) trying to make a difference makes things better rather than worse.  We can change the world.

But it’s vital to be real if we are to fulfil our mission as followers of the most authentic man who ever lived, the servant of all. We are overjoyed to be members of his backing group, once twelve strong, now billions strong, as he draws the whole world towards authenticity.

(Christian Viewpoint column from the Highland News, 11th October 2012)