Today we spoke with Daniel Ryan Day. Daniel started 10 Days Without in September of 2011. He was tired of just saying he was a Christian and wanted to live it out with his life. His book Ten Days Without: Daring Adventures in Discomfort That Will Change Your World and You chronicles his experience pursuing living as an intentional Christian.
1.What prompted you to go on this radical experiment in "going without?"
My story is similar to many others in that I grew up in a Christian home, school and church. In many ways, I was the epitome of a “good” Christian kid. Yet the more I read about Jesus, the more I saw a disconnect between the faith I professed and the way I lived my life. Specifically, I felt like a Pharisee—giving voice to my beliefs all day long in the synagogue, and yet, on my way home, walking around the beaten and bloodied man on the road from Jerusalem to Jericho. I was completely absorbed by “growing” in my faith. I was internally focused on “feeling” God’s presence. Sadly, my Christianity was all about me.
One day I read in Matthew, where Jesus specifically described the people who get it—the people who understand and have been transformed by the gospel. They are those who give food to the hungry, water to the thirsty, clothes to the naked, help to the sick, and friendship to the stranger and those in prison. That passage hit me like a freight train, and I realized that I wasn’t doing anything on that list. Not only was I not participating in the gospel, I didn’t even know anyone who was hungry, thirsty, naked, sick, a stranger, or in prison!
That day I prayed and asked the Lord to help me apply this passage, but I didn’t know where to start. There were a few things that I knew about myself, that I liked to write, that I was serious enough about this passage to do something radical, and that whatever I did it needed to make an actual impact. In other words, I didn’t want to become another “awareness” campaign, I wanted to do something that made a difference. I got an idea: what if I started a blog (writing); went 10 days without a ‘necessity’ that I take for granted and that relates to a real need in the world; and then donated, raised money, or recruited volunteers for an organization that makes a real different in those issues? I didn’t really think about it more than that—I simply went for it.
2. It seems this generation is interested in activism, but has often received criticism for a kind of "hashtag activism" or "slactivism." What is your response to that?
I completely agree on both generalizations. I think it’s exciting to see how passionate this generation is to “make a difference in the world”, but unfortunately a lot of the campaigns we join only make us feel like we’re making a difference. I was even concerned that my own experiment would end up becoming another “slacktivism” campaign. The truth is that awareness by itself means nothing. Awareness is important, but it must lead to an idea of how to help, and that idea must lead to practical action. It’s not enough to sit at home watching a TV show and texting to give $5 to the Red Cross. It’s not enough to like a page on Facebook, or retweet something from a ministry. We have to actively participate.
Not only was I not participating in the gospel, I didn’t even know anyone who was hungry, thirsty, naked, sick, a stranger, or in prison!
3. Of all the comforts you gave up, which one as the most difficult?
I’m an extrovert and a talker—10 days without speech was incredibly difficult and frustrating! Have you ever tried to argue with someone via a whiteboard? By the time I got my point of contention written down, the conversation had already moved on!
4. What surprised you the most about this radical experiment?
The transformational power of giving up something that I saw as a necessity. We live in a culture that says bigger is better, more is merrier, and wealthiness is next to godliness. A culture that says happiness is directly connected to how much stuff we have, and our capacity to collect more. Going without is transformational in a culture like the one in which we live. It’s so important. Not only does it wake us up to the distractions around us, but it also opens us up to change. A good example would be giving up media for 10 days. I had no idea how much time I spent watching movies, listening to music, surfing the internet, etc. When media was removed for 10 days, I had a lot more time on my hands! I spent time with my family inventing games with my kids. Instead of listening to music, I created music. Instead of surfing the internet, I read the only book that I made an exception for—the Bible.
Going without is transformational in a culture like the one in which we live. Not only does it wake us up to the distractions around us, but it also opens us up to change.
5. If you could speak to pastors and church leaders about what you learned in this process, what would you say?
The biggest lesson learned during this process was how to define the terms of making a difference. I don’t know about you, but I feel a lot of pressure to make a significant difference in “the world”—to make a huge impact that affects a huge number of people. This pressure became very clear during 10 days without a coat.
The reason I went without a coat, was because I found out that my local community needed 5,000 coats for single moms and their kids. We live in Colorado, and it gets really cold during the winter. It gets so cold that homeless people often pass away from the frigid temperatures. At the time, single moms and their kids was the fastest growing population of homeless people in our community, yet the rescue mission projected that they only needed 5,000 coats.
I decided to go 10 days without a coat to see if I could make a significant dent on the need (part of me naively thought that I may collect all 5,000). From a P.R. perspective, the challenge went amazing! I ended up on two local news programs, a Sunday school class in a different state participated, and a lady I didn’t know brought a bag of kids’ coats to my office. Yet at the end of the 10 days, I had only collected 100 coats! I felt like such a failure. I came up 4,900 coats shy of the mark!
Yet the Lord encouraged me with the following thought process: “Daniel, if you were able to go to the rescue mission, find one of the ladies who received a coat for her son or daughter, and ask her, ‘What did it mean to you to have a coat for your 5-year-old little girl for the winter?’ How do you think she will respond? Do you think she might say, ‘It meant the world to me?’” There’s that “the world” phrase again. The message I think the Lord was communicating to me was this: instead of trying to change the world, make it your daily goal to change someone’s world.
All of us can get so caught up in trying to change the world, make a huge impact, and reach the biggest number of people possible, that we forget the call God placed on our lives. He didn’t call us to save the world, he sent his son to do that. Instead, he has put us in a place to give food to the hungry, water to the thirsty, clothes to the naked, help to the sick, and friendship to the stranger and those in prison.
Daniel Darling is vice-president of communications for the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission. He is the author of several books, including his latest, Activist Faith.
