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Mike Yaconelli Dies in Truck Accident
The cofounder of Youth Specialties and The Door embodied Messy Spirituality

The Dick Staub Interview: Mike Yaconelli
The author of Messy Spirituality discusses God's "annoying love."

So the theology that you were raised in was not messy. It was the idea that now you've met Jesus, things are going to be straight.

They're going to be great, you're going to get fixed, you're going to be perfect.

What was the point at which you realized that this was not going to work for Mike Yaconelli?

Well, the beginnings of it happened when my daughter got cancer. She was 18 months old. And at that point, I had all these Christian people who were wonderful people come to me and tell me why God was doing it and that even if she died she'd be with God and "isn't that better?" And I'm thinking, no, not really.

That was the beginning of the sort of crack in my faith where I realized there's more to God than just fixing people....

You have some dramatic statements in this book including, "I don't believe in spiritual growth."

Well, that's because we've made spiritual growth measurable. We've actually communicated to people that there are steps to spiritual growth and that you can know how you're growing. And so I try to write a chapter about the whole fact that spiritual growth takes time. It's tiny little steps. It's lots of decisions, not just one decision. And I think that's helpful to people. Frankly, I used to think, oh well, gosh, I'm not praying everyday.

And the reality is that every tiny step I take towards God is a huge, huge thing. And the other part that bothers me is that when the church talks about spirituality and spiritual growth, it has all these rules.

The church is not about pointing the finger at people and tell them what they're doing wrong. Our goal is to show them this incredible lavish love of God and the result will be, "Yeah, I'll be a mess, but I'm so attracted to this God."

And I'll be honest with you, there have been times when I haven't been attracted to Jesus. And it's kind of like when my grandson sees me. He grabs onto my shirt and he won't let go. I go around and he's just hanging on and I go, you know, Noah, let go. And he goes, okay. And he doesn't let go. To be honest with you, that's the way Jesus has been in my life. There have been times where I've said, Jesus, I don't believe in you anymore, get out of here. I don't know. I don't even trust you. And it's like, okay. And he's still hanging on.

That's why I'm a Christian today....