I can't shake the sadness of iMonk's illness

Word came today in the blogosphere that Michael Spencer, alias iMonk, has chosen to no longer be treated for cancer but to commit himself to the Lord for the perfect end we have in the Savior.

I have never met Michael but have depended upon his honest and sane blogging for several years. He, like me, is an evangelical who feels restless with what our movement has bequeathed to us but remains an evangelical still, again like me. He has been able to express my frustration and even my pain in moving through the post-evangelical wilderness but at the same time has helped me to focus on Jesus and the gospel essentials.

Unlike many, iMonk did not cross the Tiber to the Roman Catholic church nor to Orthodoxy. He maintains his commitment to an evangelical church that has often buried its head in the sand with its fixation on just one more program that will save us all. He has been able to point out that the emperor has no clothes without rejoicing in the nakedness but seeking to clothe it with Christ.

I have particularly appreciated iMonk’s take on Christine Wicker’s The Fall of Evangelical Nation, a determinative book for me. It is a significant part of the explanation of why evangelicalism has so little transformational presence.

Michael is 53 and is just publishing his first book. He was taking wings and making a difference in a generous way. I am just bummed. But bummed “in the Lord.” I have not found anyone like iMonk in the blogosphere who pops open a lot of the stuff I have in me and helps me to see it and deal with it.

I need friends like this man. Saying goodbye seems so unreal.

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