The Dividing Line

For the last few decades, but especially the last four-plus years, I've watched it with growing alarm. Otherwise wonderful people, committed Christians, good-living, God-fearing individuals, are fighting and losing friendships and even relationships with family members - now even in public fora like social media - about things that (to my way of thinking) should not even be an issue.  Politics.  Doctrine.  Human rights. 

Seriously?  When Jesus said that He came to bring division in Luke 12:51, He wasn't talking about these kinds of obsessions. He was talking about the simplicity of the Good News.  He was talking about Himself, about the Scandalon (the stumbling stone) of the Gospel. He was predicting family members turning each other in (in other words, turning in believing family members), ratting on them to the authorities because of their own lack of belief in Him. 

As for those who are fellow-believers, Jesus prayed in John 17 that they would be united - that they would be as united with each other and with Him as He was with the other members of the Trinity. Not in the sense that we all believe the same way about the same things, but in the sense of loving and accepting each other the way we are, in spite of our differences in thought or method. 

He said nothing of external politics. He said nothing of believers hating and bullying one another over piffling little details that mean nothing. 

Photo "Girls Looking At Each Other" courtesy of Stuart Miles
at www.freedigitalphotos.net

The dividing lines that I've noticed lately have been whether this or that leader is the right one for our respective countries. Or whether women should or should not preach. Or whether someone is white or a person of colour and whether that matters. Or whether certain people should be allowed to fall in love with each other and get married. Or whether people do or do not have the right to identify as male or female, or other. Or whether climate change does or does not exist. Each side -by and large - uses scripture as a weapon against the other.

Again I say, SERIOUSLY??

Ever since the dawn of humanity, there have been differences of opinion. And there will continue to be differences of opinion. Trump, Trudeau, democracy, socialism, feminism, etc., etc. Pick a topic, and someone has at least one opinion about it.  I even know someone who has three opinions on just about everything, and who will argue with herself without even anyone there in the room with her! 

But all these differences of opinion -- especially if we are believers -- are opportunities to show love to each other rather than excuses to fight one another. Otherwise, we poison our own testimony. And the cause of Christ suffers.

The world sees us fighting one another, putting one another down publicly, making fun of each other, and so forth, and what is the first thing they think? "If that's what being a 'Christian' is, I want no part of it."  And they are perfectly justified in saying so. Some believers, wanting no part of what passes for Christianity today, have decided that even though they believe in Jesus, they no longer want to be considered Christian because of the negative image it conjures up.

ENOUGH!! 

I submit another, more deserving, dividing line: a line in the changing sand of the times, so to speak. And I dare each of us to cross it, and to pay attention to the changing times while we do it. That dividing line is LOVE.

Enough with beating each other up over things that won't matter in a hundred years. Enough with trying to look good by making other people look bad. Enough with the martyr mentality (oh look at me, I'm the only one who has it right and you're just making me suffer...). Enough with the siege mentality where it's 'them against us'. Or 'us against them' more accurately....whoever "them" is! Most likely, it's usually the current villain in the crusader-mindset of religious folks: anyone that doesn't look like, act like, or think like we do. 

Come on, admit it - we've all done it in one way or another. We find a way to set ourselves apart from other folks. This kind of practice has earned itself the term of "othering" - treating another group of people as "less than" us because of some sort of difference we feel uncomfortable with. So let's step over that line from "othering" to "ANothering" where we love one ANother, bear one ANother's burdens, meet one ANother's needs. It doesn't mean we have to be doormats, but it does mean that we need to accept one ANother the way each of us is. 

And I think that Jesus would do the same. I know He did with me.

Forget it.

There is an expression and a teaching in most Christian circles which, I believe, has caused a lot more harm than the good that it tries to do. It is also based on a misunderstanding of human nature and of the omnipotence and divinity of God. 

That saying is, "Forgive and forget."

I'm all for forgiving, when forgiveness isn't a substitute for the real thing. It isn't excusing the person because he was mad or she was having a rough time. It isn't saying it was nothing. It isn't saying that what the person did was okay. And it is definitely NOT forgetting.

I was in my forties before I learned what forgiveness was. When I was growing up, nobody apologized for anything ... and if someone did, the one receiving the apology was expected to pooh-pooh it and make the one apologizing feel better by saying it wasn't anything. Plus, in our family, apologies didn't say, "I hurt you. That was wrong. I'm sorry, and I'll try not to do that again," and leave it at that. No, the apology started with the I'm sorry part, skipped the hurting and the wrong part, and then included an explanation of why the person did whatever it was that hurt them. Or (which often happened) the person didn't say anything at all and just did something nice for the person they hurt.

Photo from Pexels at
https://www.pexels.com/photo/baby-child-close-up-crying-47090/

Only recently have I learned that neither of these is the way to apologize. This is a way to justify the original hurtful action and sometimes even make it the other person's fault. Or in not apologizing, the "good deed" is a thinly disguised bribe, which looking back, seems like the ultimate in avoidance. That realization was hard to accept. Very hard. 

Just as hard to accept for some is that when the Bible talks about forgetting sins, it's not talking about US forgetting them, but it's talking about GOD forgetting them when He forgives. This is not because He is forgetful but because He chooses not to remember them. Let me repeat this for emphasis: forgetting sins is something that ONLY GOD can do. Expecting humans to do it is unfair because it is beyond our capability to remove a memory once it's been made, especially a traumatic one. It might be possible with a mild infraction, I'll grant that. But trauma? Nope. Not happening, because trauma hard-wires itself into our brains; it is a survival instinct to remember in great detail something that will hurt us in the future. 

I have talked before in this blog about what forgiveness actually is: a process that starts with feeling and admitting the hurt, calling it wrong, and choosing not to make the person pay for what he or she did. And sometimes it needs to be repeated (especially in cases of trauma / long-term abuse). Often. Healing is possible. It is. But remembering serves the purpose of being able, once we are healed from the hurt, of being able to walk someone else through that process of healing.

That being said, never has human forgiveness been about forgetting. It is literally physically and emotionally impossible for us to forget being traumatized, unless we lose that part of our brain by accident or disease. And neither of those options is anything we would want... neither brain injury nor dementia is pleasant. "God understands our frame. He remembers that we are only dust."

We can be grateful that God is not like us, and that He chooses not to remember our sins for the sake of close relationship with us. In fact, our sins were ALL forgiven AND forgotten (past, present, and future) thousands of years ago, as all of eternity hinges on the sacrifice of Jesus, which in the spiritual realm sent tsunamis of forgiveness in every direction and in every possible timeline from the moment of the Rebellion in Heaven onward. Not convinced? How about "... chosen in Him before the foundation of the world...."? How about "It is finished!" 

But even though we as humans cannot forgive AND forget, we can be free of the nasty side-effects of holding a grudge... as hard as that is sometimes and as good as holding a grudge can feel (it feeds our pride and justifies our behavior toward that person or people who are LIKE that person). We can be free, I say. We can choose to begin to forgive. Let me explain what I mean.

Forgiveness is a choice, but it is also a process. We needn't beat ourselves up for not being able to let go of the hurt the first time we make that choice. It might take many times, depending on the depth of the hurt and how long it lasted. But forgiveness works best by going through the process I mentioned earlier: (1) not denying that you were hurt, (2) allowing yourself to feel that hurt, and exploring how it has affected you in the present day, (3) placing the blame on the person or people who hurt you and not on yourself, and (4) [and this could take some time], realizing that the person can never repay you what they took from you (for example, your innocence or your sense of safety), so it is time to not try to make them pay, time to stop wishing that they'd apologize or change.  THAT is forgiveness. It doesn't make what the person did all right (because it was wrong), but it does free you to move on with your life. 

And never mind that you can't forget. That's not your job anyway. It's God's.

The Key of Knowledge

I was reading in the Word trying to find something specific earlier today (isn't this how God sometimes grabs our attention? well, He does it to me sometimes), when I stumbled on a rather vitriolic passage in Luke where Jesus was lambasting the Pharisees and the 'lawyers' (i.e., the experts in Mosaic law). It was the climax of His diatribe against (or warning to) these people.

"Woe to you lawyers (* = teachers of the law)!  For you have taken away the key of knowledge; you yourselves did not enter, and you hindered those who were entering.”
  - Luke 11:59

Now, I've grown up in the organized church, and spent all of my life in that milieu. That expression, 'the key of knowledge' had always been preached to mean knowledge in the sense of accumulating knowledge about, or studying, or possibly moral wisdom. It's why we went to Sunday school, to learn 'about God.' It's why we were encouraged to memorize scriptures, to increase our knowledge, to know right from wrong and choose the right. It carries with it the feeling of following the rules in order to keep from being punished. 

But that is not what this word is talking about. I went to Strong's Concordance and discovered that this knowledge - the key to which the teachers of the law, the clergy of Jesus' day, had "taken away" - is translated from the Greek word gnosis or 'deeper or more perfect knowledge'... which is derived from another Greek root word  ginosko  ... common language for the ultimate act of intimacy within a marriage. 

Photo "Couple At Sunset"
courtesy of piyaphantawong at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

Oh my. 

That brings a whole new meaning to this passage, doesn't it?  

Jesus was angry and so very saddened by how the religious teachers of His day didn't "get" the intended message of knowing God intimately, and not only did they not "get" it, they made it impossible for people to access that kind of information so that THEY could have any kind of relationship with God. 

Basically their lives sucked, and they wanted everyone else's lives to suck as much as theirs. And because they were in a position of leadership, and people looked to them for guidance, they succeeded in laying so much bondage on people, and making what should have been a free and beautiful relationship into a loveless, lifeless contract marked by a whole laundry list of dos and don'ts, with threats of punishment if they did not toe the line. 

I'm not pointing fingers.  The point here is not who is a Pharisee and who isn't. The point is not whether this or that pastor, this or that denomination is misguided at best.  No ... the point is that God wants to have a gloriously intimate, personal relationship with each of us. Jesus was all about that... because He knew that there was joy in it for us - and for Him. He knew that us living in fear was no way to live at all. He came to bring freedom so that people could actually BE FREE. 

And the key to that freedom is a growing intimacy with God. 

It isn't about whether we eat this or that, or drink this or that, or go here or there, or sing this or that, or say this or that. It is about allowing God into the deepest parts of us, those places nobody else is allowed to (or has a right to) go, letting Him express His delight in us, letting Him "know" us - in the most intimate way. Only in that deep knowledge, that total acceptance of His lavish love, that realization that He is for us and wants to pour out His love into and upon us, is there real peace and purpose and passion and power. That is true living. That is the moment-by-moment adventure.

That knowing (ginosko - or intimate knowing) is what Jesus was referring to when He said that in that 'day' of reckoning He would say (to those calling out "Lord, Lord...."), .... "I never knew you. Depart from Me..." (Mt 7:23)  He meant that two-becoming-one union, the kind that is only possible when we open up the most private parts of our selves to His love. He meant, in essence, "You never let Me intimately know you." 

What a sad indictment! How much we have missed!! How small and puny our conception of God has become because we (in our arrogant insistence upon our own unworthiness and fearing His vengeance) dare not entertain the thought of the exceeding greatness of His love and grace! That love is the starting place of the journey; that is the pinnacle.

We are already there, if we but knew (accepted, opened ourselves to) it. He has already made a place for us in His lap - His arms are open wide and that spot, that special spot on His shoulder is aching for us to nestle in there and hear His heart beat for - and with - ours. 

Can we not hear His call? It is sweet, sad, yearning. It echoes in our own hearts and resonates in our own longing for something "more."  Let's press in. 

I dare you. Let's open ourselves to Him. Let's let Him in.

The Sky is Falling

I saw something recently that made me do some thinking about an old fable I grew up with. What I saw doesn't matter, but the thinking I was doing started to turn into a blog post (as often happens) .... so here I am.

The tale of Chicken Little is the story of an alarmist young hen who one sunny day, got bopped on the head by a falling acorn and thought that the world was coming to an end: "The sky is falling! The sky is falling!" She told everyone she knew about it (Hmmm. Some people would call that "witnessing" - but I digress). Her alarm caused mass hysteria among all the fowl (duck, goose, turkey), and they all ended up being part of a smorgasbord menu for a fox who took advantage of their desire to go tell the king something they'd convinced themselves was something to be afraid of. 

Photo "Chestnut" courtesy of olovedog at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

This kind of thing happens all the time in denominations. Some perceptive (if unenlightened) person gets it into his or her head that such-and-such a belief is something to be focusing on. The word spreads like wildfire, and soon everyone is all in a dither about it, leaving us vulnerable to be the victims of deception - possibly even harming our spiritual lives in the process. We get our eyes off how the Son shines and gives everything life not only around us, but in us. We focus on the circumstances and base our belief on them instead of what we know to be true. We gad about and spread panic and havoc in our own lives and in the lives of others, over things that really just don't matter at all. 


And we put ourselves in danger. We add to what God says by creating rules and restrictions ... and then judge those who don't do the same. We feel threatened by someone who lives his or her life in liberty without feeling the need to toe the party line.  We judge that person: we like knowing what the rules are and that we're following them, so we limit our own freedom and aren't satisfied until everyone else is as uptight as we are. If they refuse to get uptight, we judge them because we feel threatened by a lack of structure, a lack of control. 

And control is key...  because we like to be in control, to have a say, to not feel at the mercy of something that is bigger and more generous and more powerful than we can imagine. We like to either put limits on it, or put requirements on ourselves to access it.

Such was the case with Eve (yes, Adam's wife.)  She wasn't aware of all the reasons God said not to eat of that fruit. She didn't think about how marvelous was His wonderful love toward her. She just knew the one rule of the Garden: don't eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Eating it would make her "die" - whatever that was - and that didn't sound good. So she felt that she had to add to that rule - and adding to it was her downfall. She figured that in order to not eat the fruit, it would be best not to touch it or to even go near the tree. Eventually she came to believe that even those things were forbidden and carried the same punishment. Along comes Foxy Loxy (the serpent) and says (in essence), "Look. I'm on the tree. I'm touching the fruit. Am I dead?" He planted that seed of doubt - and then came the clincher - "Maybe God's been lying to you all this time. Maybe He's holding out on you." It wasn't so much that Eve was convinced by the serpent; it was that she had allowed herself to get caught up in the trap of swallowing tradition as gospel, and made herself easy pickings for the deceiver.

It's no different today.  Just like the Pharisees of Jesus' day whom we all-too-quickly condemn, we add burdens and place restrictions on ourselves and on other believers... and even on unbelievers! I remember hearing one well-seasoned (pickled? stagnated?) believer express amusement at the zeal of a new convert, commenting (in an "isn't that cute" tone) "That's okay, this will pass." (Really?!)  Yet that same believer will be one of the first to sign a petition and/or carry placards when some politician tries to grant equality to all people (even the ones with whose lifestyles we don't agree) calling it an "attack on the sanctity of marriage."  Or object when there are too many "street people" in the church (whatever that means).  Or some such thing.

Seriously? 

I was brought up in the church from my infancy. And I've closely and seriously examined the teachings of Jesus ever since I was sixteen years old - nearly forty years ago now. Nowhere, and I mean NOWHERE, did He ever judge or condemn anyone who wasn't religious. Over and over again, He ate with and enjoyed the company of the dregs of society: tax-collectors, prostitutes, even non-Jews (Samaritans, Romans!) and never once did He condemn. He saved His scathing condemnation for those (like the Pharisees and Saducees) who used their religion like a weapon instead of a magnet, or for those who used their power to oppress (like Herod, and even then, only once!) instead of to protect the innocent. His teachings were more about living a quiet life in faith and love, rather than brandishing a spear and shield and tackling political and societal ills like some holier-than-thou Don Quixote. 

I've also examined our modern society at some length. We can say all we like about how it is broken and so forth, but it's pretty accepting of most types of people.  However, among the things it can't abide are dogmatism, hypocrisy and elitism - three things the church has historically been famous for, ever since 300 AD. It's one of the top criticisms that unbelievers have about the church. It's probably the main thing that keeps them away by the hundreds.

Photo "Sun In The Sky" by
graur razvan ionut at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

We're too busy yelling "The sky is falling!" in their faces ... and - unfortunately - in each other's faces as well. We run all over the place trying to get each other to be concerned and passionate over the same things we are, when God has clearly created each of us different from the other. And we burn ourselves out in the process of our search for sameness. 

We wear ourselves down and worry about keeping hold of things He's already bought and paid for. His yoke is easy and His burden is light - but you'd never know it to look at us. 

Maybe, just maybe, He allowed the acorn to fall from the tree, not to alarm us into trying to convince each other that we're right, or to warn us that we're doing something wrong, but so that we'd think to look up to the Giver of all things, realize that He is right here with us and loving us. Maybe we'd figure out that the Son is still shining, and just say "Thank You."

Through the Grapevine

Today I thought I'd take a well-known passage of Scripture, a passage which has been misinterpreted and warped into a club to keep people in line, and debunk the fear-based myth surrounding it. I am using the NASB which most scholars agree is the closest readable translation of the original Greek. 

John 15 || 1I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. ² Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit. ³ You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. ⁴ Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. ⁵ I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing. ⁶ If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they are burned. ⁷ If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.

The very first thing that must be clear is that there is a divine order in this analogy. We are branches. We have NO life in ourselves. He is the Vine; He has life in Himself and we have grown out of Him. He has begotten us (birthed us). We are (in this analogy) grape branches. If separated from the Vine, we do not become apple branches. Or weeds. We only become useless. Our life source is Him. We are part of Him.

Second, He says that the vinedresser (gardener, husbandman) is God the Father (remember this for later), and that "every branch in Me that does not bear fruit He takes away." Hmmm. Every branch IN ME, He says, that doesn't bear fruit... so it IS possible to be IN HIM and not "bear fruit." (More about what that fruit is later.) And if that is the case, "He takes it away." God removes people who are born-again and who are not producing any fruit in their lives. The meaning is clear. He moves them to a place where they will abide in Him and bear fruit - or He takes them to Heaven. 

If our lives produce any of His fruit at all, He prunes us (the Greek word - and you can see this because it's used interchangeably - is one of "cleaning.") And He tells the eleven that "you are already cleaned (pruned) by the Word i have spoken to you." (vs 3) The pruning is hardly comfortable. God removes things from our lives that are hampering our growth in Him. He looks after us, and His desire is that we receive life from Him unhindered. Not so He can punish us for our sin (He has already redeemed us from that curse!) Not even so He can keep score of how much fruit we produce, but simply this: because He knows that this kind of life will bring joy to us (vs 11). 

That is abiding. That resting in His life, that utter and total dependence on Him ... that is life, that is living. That's why He said "Abide in Me, and I in you." It's a total intimacy, one that cannot escape the fact that He is the life source and we are His well-beloved offspring, continually dependent on Him. It isn't a conditional statement. It's a love-statement: a mutual resting, a mutual staying. We are one with Him: us in Him,  He in us. We have been forever changed because of having been born into His family through Him rescuing us. 

Here is where the misconceptions start. We read, "Abide in Me ... As the branch cannot bear fruit unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in Me." And we think - foolish humans stuck in religious thinking - that it is up to us to stay connected to Him. We are already connected to Him!! He has given birth to us! We are His!! What Jesus is warning us about is thinking that we have to "stay saved" in order to maintain that life-connection to Him. Nothing could be further from the truth. 

Here's where the error creeps in: we think that once He saves us, we need to "keep ourselves in Him" so (not wanting to "fall away") we "do" things to ensure that we don't find ourselves in the fire: we pray, we read the Word, we go to church, we tell others about Him (whether that is a co-worker or someone in another land). I'm not saying that those things are wrong in themselves. I AM saying that if we are operating out of fear (a fear of being separated from Him) then we are trying to do these things in our own strength in order to stay in the position that He has bought and paid for us to be in!! Can we not see the futility of this? He has said, in concluding this thought, "...because without Me you can do nothing." (vs 5b) 

Photo "Ripening Grape Clusters On The Vine"
courtesy of satit_srihin at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

We need Him to abide in Him and to produce fruit (vs 5). WE don't do it. HE does through us! Does the branch TRY to produce fruit? Does it TRY to stay in the Vine ... or does it just rest and draw life and strength from the Vine and the fruit just grows naturally, automatically?

Okay so what IS this fruit anyway? When I was a child, I was taught in Sunday School (and later in church) that the fruit was new Christians. "Producing baby believers" was the work I and every believer was called to do. (What about "No one comes to the Father except by Me"? (Jn 14:6) What about "No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him" (Jn 6:44)?) I later came to understand that the fruit that He was talking about here in John 15 was the fruit of the Spirit. Jesus was providing a final teaching for His loved ones. In chapter 14, He tells them He's going away and not to be sad because He was going to come back. In chapter 15, He tells them that remaining connected to Him in the meantime, would help them to lead a fully joyous life (leading to the question, "HOW?") and in chapter 16, He tells them (and by association, us) how: by His Spirit. By HIS SPIRIT. NOT by our own efforts! ("Without Me, you can do nothing."vs 5b)


Think about this: it does absolutely no good to "go into all the world and preach the gospel" (Mk. 16:15) if the Holy Spirit of God does not lead us. It is actually counterproductive. It does HARM to the cause of Christ to speak of His love and His grace if we ourselves have not experienced that love and that grace so much and on such a continual basis that it can't help but overflow into every facet of our lives. If that is not there, nobody will listen to the message. This is precisely what is happening today, when people in our society listen to Christians talk and can't hear the good of what they are saying ... simply because of the rigid lifestyles of the Christians who are speaking the message. Our unloving and ungracious attitudes, our unhappiness, our intolerance, our joyless spirits, our commitment to duty before love, pervades everything we do when we are so busy trying to keep ourselves in the Vine. It's a religion based on fear and duty, not a relationship based on love and gratitude. If we fear excommunication, we are not operating in love - because there is no fear in love.

THIS is what Jesus warned about when He said, "If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away ... and withers..." (vs 6) Thinking that we can produce fruit in our own strength is as ludicrous a ventriloquist's dummy (if it could think) thinking that it can move its mouth without the ventriloquist's hand inside, and insisting that it can talk and make people laugh without its owner. It can't be done. Abiding isn't straining and grunting and striving to keep God from casting us out. THAT'S NOT ABIDING. THAT IS SEPARATING OURSELVES FROM THE VINE, trying to do it on our own. We abide in the Vine when we realize that there is absolutely NOTHING we can do to keep ourselves there. We are totally dependent on Him. TOTALLY. Remember He said that GOD is the Vine-dresser - it is God who looks after our spiritual life; all we need do is rest in Him, receive life from Him. The fruit will take care of itself. It just will.

And this is how: The fruit of the Spirit (that fruit that we bear when we abide in Him) is love, first and foremost. The rest of the fruit (joy, peace, patience, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness and self-control) are the different facets or expressions of that love. Pure and simple. Nothing complicated about it.

If you think that isn't enough - that we have to get out there and fulfill the Great Commission - let me tell you that unless and until we abide in Him (i.e., let His life infuse us, empower us, love us with an inexhaustible Love), the fruit of the Spirit will not be showing in our lives. Therefore, all that will manifest to the very ones we are trying to reach is how rules-based, how full of fear we are. They will prefer their own lifestyle to a life lived from a place of fear and duty.  NOBODY will be attracted to that. NOBODY. Not only that, but we will approach mental and spiritual exhaustion, and crash and burn in disillusionment and bitterness. How many people I have heard say (referring to what passes for Christianity in our society), "I tried that, and it didn't work." When I questioned them, I found out that they were desperately trying to do-do-do and didn't understand or experience the grace and love that is the motivation and the strength for all the doing.

Once we depend on Him and draw our life-source from Him, those fruit will automatically appear in our lives. We won't have to work our tails off to keep from falling in the mud or falling off the Vine; we will be happy and free and energized, and people will WANT to know what's different when tumultuous things happen to us and we face them with faith and peace and yes, even joy (recognize the fruit of the Spirit?) in the midst of circumstances that would just make them shut down. 

I can still hear some objections. I can still hear you say, "But what about the burning? doesn't it say that we'll be cast into the fire and burned?" 

Okay, let's look at that. "If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch, and they gather them up and cast them into the fire, and they are burned." First, if we interpret "not abiding in Me" the way that I have mentioned above, that means He was talking about those who are trying to live the Christian life in their own strength, trying to follow all the rules so that God will be pleased with them. These are the ones who are [already] cast away, "fallen from grace". (Read the book of Galatians for more information on that, especially chapter 3:1.) But look. Even though they are cast away, "They are 'cast away as a branch'..." Those who are cast away don't stop being branches. NOT ONCE. And then look at who gathers the branches for burning. "THEY." The KJV says, "men." The implication here is that these are people who are not part of the Vine (otherwise they'd be branches.) The world will destroy you and rip you apart IF you are fear-based and rules-based. Your 'great' testimony, your brilliant words will fall to the ground and the ones you want to reach the most will not respond to you, starting with your children. You'll be treated like firewood ... useless twigs fit only for fueling their rejection of the Message. 

Then He makes the most amazing promise. This goes over and above what anyone could expect. "If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you." (v. 7) So, if we let ourselves be loved by Him, if we let ourselves experience the wonder of His grace, we will want to know what He has to say to us because we love Him in return (not because we are commanded to do it, but because He rescued us from certain death!) ... From such a grateful heart, can any request that is out of His will and contrary to His heart be possible? Of COURSE the request will be granted, because we would not ask for something that was selfish after He gave up all that He had and all that He was just to be near us! 

Can we get our hearts and minds around that kind of unconditional love? Can we?

Can we grasp the supreme fulness of His grace, the awesomeness of His care of us, and let Him flow in and through us unhindered by our own efforts, dependent on Him for everything? Can we begin to lay hold of that simple truth that He has done it all? that nothing we can do can make Him love and accept us more than He already has?

I often wonder what would happen, how our world (both inside of us and the world with which we come in contact) would be transformed, if we really could "get that."

Sacred Cows

It's really easy as humans to compartmentalize. What I mean is that we tend to file portions or aspects of our lives into comfortable little boxes that we take out and play with (or use, if you like) according to the label that's on them. 

We have a box we label 'work'. We have another one named 'church' and another called 'home.' But we have so many more. There's what we like to do in our leisure time, there's our political involvement or beliefs, there's what TV programs we watch, what music we listen to, what our lifestyle is, what loyalties we hold to any kind of sports or pop idol, and the list is endless. 

And these boxes have very little (if any) overlap. 
And this can be a problem. 

If we are believers, there's an important box called our relationship with God. Within it, there are a number of other boxes: the church part including doctrines we hold, people we associate with, styles of music and preaching, programs we espouse, and ministries we support. Then there's the devotional/relationship part which might include prayer and reading the Word. We like to keep things in their proper place ... and it's all usually very tidy .... until it's not. Until God starts doing something radical and taking those little religious boxes out and destroying them, and tearing down the walls between the relationship with God box and the other boxes in our lives. 

Photo "Big Brahman Bull Isolated On A
White Background" courtesy
of Gualberto107 at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

I've watched people who love God actually destroy their testimony, ruin their Christian reputation, fighting and treating one another shamefully over which football team will win the Superbowl. Or what hockey team will win the Stanley cup. I've seen people irreparably damaged by political party affiliation, fighting over whether to vote this way or that way, trying to Christianize their reasons and causing deep wounds that are impossible to heal - over something as not-worth-arguing-about as politics. Or property. Or what foods to eat or not eat. Or whether to home-school, Christian-school, or public school their children.

Seriously.

In India, you can't go very far without seeing - or almost bumping into - cows. They're everywhere. The Indian people don't believe in harming the animals, and so cows are allowed to go anywhere they want, lie down anywhere they feel like it, and the Indians just go around them. The cow is a source of milk, butter, cheese, fuel (yes, they burn cow manure as fuel!), and some religious rituals or cultural customs in India, but they are not killed. Take away an Indian's civil rights but no, don't touch the cows. 

And in many ways, I see some believers acting that way about their own sacred cows: Yes God, I'll go to church but not during Downtown Abbey (or whatever the name of it is). Sure, Lord, I'll give my ten percent but don't ask me to not watch the playoffs (I'll just watch the game on my phone while I'm at church, how's that?) I'll even go to the church potluck but for goodness' sake, don't expect me to eat bread ... as a matter of fact, I'll go and I will try to convince people how unhealthy all this food they're eating is for them. WHILE they're eating it.

That defensiveness can even affect the things we do that we consider "of God." Once, when I remarked to someone that a certain popular book, used as a devotional aid at the time, was teaching heresy, that person pouted and asked me not to take that away from her. Not, "What things specifically don't line up with the scriptures?" but just a "Don't touch my sacred cow." 

Jesus came to make us free, to deliver us from bondage to our sacred cows. 

He came to take a sledgehammer to those boxes, those compartments in our lives that I spoke about earlier. His design for our lives is "open concept" - because to Him, all of life is sacred: whether it's home life or school life or work life or church life or hobby life or sports life or music life or fashion life or food life.... you get the idea. And if what He has done does not reach into that little corner we've been keeping just for ourselves, then it is not so much a reflection on His power as it is a commentary on how very little we appreciate all that He has freely given to us out of the abundance of His love!

I've heard it said that if Jesus is not Lord OF ALL then He is not Lord AT ALL. There is a sense in which this may well be true. However, I'm more inclined to believe that our entire Christian existence is a journey ... a journey toward trust... based on His love for us. The more we realize how real and deep that love is, the more we trust Him. The more we trust Him, the more we relinquish to Him; the more we relinquish to Him, the more He looks after our needs and we realize the depth of His love and care for us; the more He lovingly looks after our needs, the more we trust Him.

It doesn't have to get more complicated than that.

Narnia in winter

I'm not sure if you've read the Narnia books by C.S. Lewis, a series of seven novelettes written for children, but completely compelling for adults. These are allegories, meant to picture the story of man's paradise lost, the Saviour's redemptive work, stories of faith and perseverance, and the final triumph of the kingdom of Heaven. 

In his most well-known book of the series, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, Narnia (the kingdom, of which Aslan the lion is the king) starts out buried in snow - a concept I can easily understand because I live in one of the Canadian Maritime provinces!! 

In the story, it has been winter for many years in Narnia. Hope has all but died out that there will ever be any change. The white witch has ruled for many years, enslaving the creatures who live there, turning those who defied her to stone, and ruling the rest through fear. Her informants are everywhere; she sends patrols out to keep the residents in line, and to make sure that there are no humans in Narnia because she has heard the prophecy. The prophecy is that when the humans become involved in Narnia, winter will end and so - eventually - will she. Then - Lucy Pevensy steps through the portal into Narnia, and tells her siblings, and they too cross the threshold into another world.

One of the great things about allegory is that there are so many different applications to the truth it can represent. 

Photo "Kingdom Of Cold" courtesy of
evgeni dinev at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

I have been acutely feeling the icy cold of the witch's power, and it has been distressing me, making me to want to rise up and rebel, to call out for Aslan to come and rescue us, to break the witch's power. 

To me, the witch and her icy kingdom represent the frozen grip of religion and all the bondage that it brings. "Touch not, taste not, handle not..." Rules, regulations, exceptions, limitations and especially additions. Additions of conditions, the gospel of "Jesus AND." The "Jesus AND" doctrine has been around the church almost since its inception. People who believed like this were called "Judaizers" - those who believed that you had to be saved AND follow the law of Moses. The whole book of Galatians was written to counter this lie. 

This is ... the same lie mixed with truth that Eve began to believe even before the serpent deceived her. Surely you must have seen that before - the religion she had begun to create in her own mind, the one that added to what God had told her husband Adam. God had told Adam not to eat the fruit of the tree in the middle of the garden, that in the day that he or his wife ate the fruit, they would die.  One simple commandment and the truth about the death they would die even while still physically alive.

But that one commandment wasn't good enough for Eve. No, she had to be religious about it. She had to create rules around how to act around the tree. She began to believe that the tree with its fruit was dangerous in itself, that God's commandment included not even touching the fruit, not even touching the tree. This was the enemy's tool to deceive her. For, you see, he was crawling all over that tree - and he was still alive. 

And that happened in a place that was perfect. Perfect. Don't think it isn't happening in the church. As a matter of fact, it's RAMPANT in the church. It panders to the tendency that humans have to want to control their own destiny; we don't like being powerless. However, without Jesus, that's exactly what we are. Going back to trying to hold up the weight of the world and fend off the devil by ourselves is not the kind of abundant life that Jesus talked about. It's bondage. It's dead and cold, stiff and uninviting, full of fear and dread and depression. The snow might be pretty - but a pretty prison is still a prison.

THAT is the winter I have been feeling - the icy tendrils of religion all around me, blinding people with how "beautiful" it is - because, don't you know, we humans love liturgy. We love structure. We love being able to slot this into this hole and that into that hole. Living life by rules (though it may be difficult at times) seems easier - more predictable, and sadly, more preferable - than living life the way Jesus intended: under the perfect liberty of His Love.

It's easier to live life with a playbook - but it's a living death. It's duty, dread, and depression - every day. And living in that kind of fear, we die a little more inside every day - and not in a good way.

It's HIS grace, HIS love that makes it possible for us to be in relationship with Him. ALL our sin is dealt with (past, present, future) and all He wants is for us to let Him know us - a progressive intimacy. Love bubbles up and melts the ice.

How tragic is it to miss the mark, to fall from Grace so far that we would willingly trade our God-given freedom for the rituals and rigors of regimented living? 

Come rescue us, Aslan. (Save us from ourselves, Jesus.) End the white witch's reign. (Put the spirit of Jezebel to death.) Melt the ice and make the flowers bloom again.

Soon. Very, VERY soon.

The Relatable Jesus

You know, I've seen so much in my lifetime that passes for the way Christians think they are supposed to act and speak. This has produced a subculture where a certain lingo or jargon starts to overtake the person's interactions with people. I've seen them tilt at windmills and go on crusades to try to make other people behave according to Christian principles when quite frankly, it's only an illusion that we live in a "Christian society." All the while, some Christians will hang out together and shut out the world, developing a "siege mentality" (us vs them) and reject anything and anyone that doesn't look like them.  

At the same time, I've watched unbelievers laugh up their sleeves at such believers for years and years, (and learn to discount everything that every Christian tells them). And I've watched those same believers be mystified by that reaction (or worse yet, chalk the reaction up to 'persecution' and keep behaving in the same way). 

And even the term "unbelievers" is so ... prejudiced, isn't it? It panders to the myth that there are only two types of people in the world - people who are 'believers' (i.e., fundamentalist Christians) and people who aren't. 

Which brings me to the topic of this post. 

"White Mask" photo by podpad at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

I don't remember ever reading about Jesus turning anyone away because that person was a drunk, a prostitute, a Roman collaborator (i.e., tax-collector), or non-Jewish, or who had hair that was too long (or short) or body odour. I don't recall Him leading protest marches, burning Roman bath-houses, heading up petitions, or insisting on a dress code. People who were looking for something more in their lives flocked to Him, and He loved them all. True, He didn't participate in their dysfunction, but He also didn't shut Himself away from them and reject them just because they didn't act or think like Him. He spoke the language of the common people. He told stories that people [and not just the elite few] could relate to; He didn't (although He could have) expound at length about the ills of His society. 

He accepted people. He really cared about them. About the only thing that He came out against was the very kind of thing that I was describing in the first couple of paragraphs of this post: hypocrisy, and cruelty in the name of God. 

He didn't come to change society. He didn't come to change systems. He came to love people, to show them what God was really like. You see, people in His day had gotten it into their heads that God was all about following rules and pounding you on the head if you didn't follow them. Jesus came to change all that. He came to make a way for people to have a relationship with God. Pure and simple. Not to solve the age-old question of how many angels can dance on the head of a pin (and why would they want to?) ... and not to exclude people on the basis of their differences. He came to demonstrate to the world what they never knew before He came: that God is love. He's not about punishment; He doesn't need to be appeased. Jesus appeased Him. Jesus took the punishment for us. Period. And that is the Good News.

Maybe it's time that Christians remembered that, because it seems that a lot of us have forgotten. We put on masks. We hide behind the denominational label, behind the church pews, and we take pot shots in frustration at the world and the people in it. We make ourselves unapproachable by the very things that we do that we think show others that we are dedicated followers of Jesus. 

Yet Jesus was the most relatable human being ever. 

If we are un-relatable, if people can't relate to us or don't want to be around us, it doesn't mean that we're "doing something right." It means that we are doing something wrong. We are (in our efforts to show the world that we're His) excluding them and pushing them away from our lives, ruining every opportunity to be the salt and light that Jesus said we already are just because we hang around Him. 

What I'm suggesting is not that we stop standing for what is right. What I AM suggesting is that we take a good, long, hard look at ourselves, that we open our hearts and ask God to show us how we are keeping or driving people away from Him by the way we act, the people we hang around with (and don't hang around with) and the language that we use without even being aware of it. If we ask Him to show us those blind spots and to make us more like He is, I think He will be delighted to show us - and love through us, mask-free - without us getting in the way.

Harmful things many Christians believe

I was having a conversation with a friend yesterday about how people have certain beliefs that are so destructive for their personal and/or spiritual growth. These attitudes are pervasive; that is, they are everywhere. However, I've noticed them most (and perhaps it's because I get around most in these circles) in the church. The list below is not exhaustive by any means, but I have put together a few of the most harmful-to-the-spirit things that believers believe ... and all of them are myths, yet taught as truth.

1. It's all about the outside. Yeah, that old myth is still kicking around. I'm not so much talking about physical appearance here (although that can be included) as I am about the penchant believers have to lay down rules and regulations, obligations and expectations of themselves, and then expect others to follow them. And when others don't follow them, they judge these people and call into question their commitment or their dedication.
   
   This myth is born from fear: if I don't measure up, if I don't do enough, God won't love me. Or my prayers won't get answered. Or I won't have a nice car. Oh please. God's love and God's grace don't work that way. Get a grip on even a corner of the lavish love that God has for you, and that myth will vanish like fog on your glasses when you enter a warm house after being outside in the cold. Understand the grace of God and you will live in gratitude and not in fear.
   
   
2. Self-denial and self-love are mutually exclusive.  Yikes! This is a variation of the first one!! The belief is that one is a good person if one is self-sacrificing and never looks after oneself. In fact, this belief is the fast track to burnout! Jesus knew this; He often took time away from the crowds to be alone and spend time with His Dad. He recharged His spiritual batteries and was ABLE to give Himself fully to others BECAUSE He spent that time looking after His own spiritual health. That "J-O-Y" that we learned in Sunday School (Jesus-others-you spells Joy)? Yeah THAT's a myth. It's more accurate to say, "Jesus pours into you and fills you up, so that you can pour into others."
   
   A healthy self-love is crucial to the ability to lay aside what we prefer at times, in order to meet another's need. When we don't care about ourselves, we will not care about others; remember, the 2nd greatest commandment is to love our neighbor as ourselves. Not instead of ourselves or before ourselves.
   
   I'm not talking about narcissism here. I'm talking about knowing yourself, knowing your limits, and looking after your own spiritual condition first. In that regard, I'm a big believer in the saying, "You can't give away what you don't have."
    
3. I need to defend God. Hmmm, here's a sticky one. The idea here is that any time anyone says something that we don't believe, or expresses an opinion that casts a shadow on the Bible, or espouses a cause that is not "scriptural" ... we feel we have the right - indeed the obligation - to point that out.
   
   This is probably the one thing above all other things that gives Christians a bad reputation, because "pointing that out" causes others - and so many more than we can even imagine - to dismiss us as judgmental hypocrites, having no compassion or tolerance for other people.
   
   I had quite a problem getting this myth expunged from my psyche. Finally, it dawned on me. Freedom of speech and freedom of religion means that everyone has the right to say or to believe what he or she wishes, within certain legal boundaries. That a person - or a government - or a social group - says or believes something that I don't believe is actually a good thing. If that person or that entity loses the right to say or believe that thing that I don't like, freedom of speech and freedom of religion don't exist. And if they don't exist, then I lose the right to say or believe what I want. It goes both ways, you see. The golden rule is still golden.
   
   One of the things we have lost - I believe - in the last few hundred years since the Reformation, is the wonderful and nearly lost art of acceptance. Accepting people and situations the way they are can go a lot farther than placards and petitions, protests and punishment. Jesus operated like that. He wasn't a pushover and He did not join in others' evil deeds. But He ate with tax-collectors and prostitutes. He accepted everyone the way they were, and loved them. Their own gratitude for that love transformed them. The only ones He had judgmental words for were the people who were so tightly bound up in how everyone else was doing it wrong (and how much better they were than everyone else) that they couldn't accept that He might be who He said He was. Even those among that 'elite' group who were willing to listen to Him, He accepted and loved just as much as the fishermen and farmers who flocked to the hillsides to hear Him and to watch Him love people.
   
   God is a big boy. He can look after Himself. He doesn't need me to run roughshod over other people to prove a point defending His honor. I can trust Him to do that... and He does it far better than I ever could, and with far more compassion and mercy.
   
   
4. I need to understand everything. Wow. The older I get the more I realize how silly and potentially dangerous this myth is. It's important to know what we believe and why we believe it. But there are things about what we believe that just don't cut it. They can't even come close to explaining all there is to know about God and about how He works. And I don't need to comprehend it. If I do, or if I think I do, then somehow God becomes just a ho-hum part of my existence instead of an all-consuming passion. And if I feel as though I need to control everything, then I make myself something I was never meant to be. Only God has the right and the power to control it all.
   
   Mystery makes our lives interesting. It also keeps us humble. When we admit that we don't know it all, that God might be a smidgen more vast than we can conceive, or work in ways other than what we might have thought ... our world expands. It's like standing at the foot of a mountain we've only read about. There is nothing like that feeling of being so small, such a speck on the sands of time, to give us perspective and to make us grateful beyond imagination for the love and the mercy and the grace of our great God toward us.
    
5. Bad things come from the devil. The problem of evil is a huge one. It is true that much of the evil in the world happens as a result of the influence of the father of lies.
   
   But not all of it does. A lot of times, bad things happen as a result of a choice ... ours or someone else's ... that sets a series of consequences in motion. And in a lot of cases, even those bad things can be turned for good because (get this) God is never surprised by the bad things that happen. He works it into His plan to transform His children into His image.
   
   He doesn't cause them to happen. He weaves them into a tapestry. Sometimes we can get a glimpse of what He is doing ... but most of the time we see that tapestry from underneath, and it appears so jumbled and tangled that it doesn't make sense to us (see myth # 4). That's where faith comes in. Faith (whatever form that takes for us) is based on what we believe the character of God is. If we believe Him to be harsh and vindictive, we will see Him as cruel and punitive. If, on the other hand, we believe Him to be loving and pure, we will see Him as having our best interest in mind, and we will better be able to trust His heart even when the storm is raging.
    

"Happy Family" image courtesy of
photostock at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

These are only a few of the myths that plague us as believers. I'm sure you can think of more. 

We put a lot of stress on ourselves by trying to do what we were never meant to do. A lot of us (and I have done this) try to be the Holy Spirit - to bring someone to our way of thinking. It's true that we can participate in doing God's work. But let's remember ... it's GOD's work. So let's let Him. 

My prayer is that we will all grow up into Him and learn to love as He did as we begin to understand how very deeply and passionately He loves us ... to love God (in return) first and foremost, to love ourselves, and then to love others as ourselves. It really is the only way to be happy.

Happy New Year!

Spiritual Superstars

I have what I call spidey-senses.  I don't know if anyone else does - probably so, although they'd call it something different - but when my mind tells me that I'm in danger, I feel a tingling, a prickling inside, something that tells me things are not right, that there's something to be avoided or stopped, that I need to watch it or I'll get hurt.  Or that something is just plain wrong with the whole situation. 

I get it when I feel like I'm being watched.  Or when I walk into a crowd of people (I have demophobia) - or when I hear some dude on the TV talking about the end of the world and starting to set specific dates and knowing that people are going to actually believe that nonsense and send the guy money!! 

My spidey-senses also tingle when I hear people talk about this or that spiritual leader as if there is some sort of special, one-of-a-kind gift this person has.  The statement, "We need to have this person come here or we need to go where he or she is, in order for God to work in our lives (or in our church)," makes my skin crawl.  It implies that the person talking thinks that this 'gifted' person has some kind of corner on God's presence, that ordinary people like us can't get in touch with Him.  

I remember our pastor warning us about this mentality a couple of years back - this "clergy vs laity" idea that is insidious in our religion (and by religion I mean man-made rules)-based church culture.  This is the idea that the clergy (or those 'gifted' people) have the call and the anointing of God on their lives and that the laity (or the rest of us) don't.  The outflow of such a belief is that the laity sits back and lets the clergy do the work of preaching, visiting the sick, and so forth (thus leading to high levels of burnout in the ministry) - all the while thinking only the clergy is qualified to do what God wants done. It also tends to arrogance in the clergy and in laziness (starting to believe the accolades of men), and to subservience and the "herd mentality" in the laity - which inevitably leads to disillusionment when the leader or the "gifted one" inevitably falls into scandal.

Got this picture HERE

I've been speculating about the source of this mentality.  I believe it's a basic insecurity about some folks' ability to have a vital relationship with God that is what's behind this tendency they have to think that this or that person has a "revival anointing" or "prophetic ministry" or "healing ministry."  Or whatever.  

Perhaps it's "Old Testament" thinking - where God's presence seemed to rest on one particular person for a specific period of time for a certain task.  

But when the New Testament came along - that is, when Jesus brought in the New Way and the Holy Spirit became accessible to all believers... every believer not only has the potential but actually IS a priest.  IS a saint.  IS a child of God - not just in the generic sense but in the adoptive sense (the adoption papers signed in blood at Calvary and sealed at the bodily resurrection of Jesus!) 

It is part of human nature to want to fixate on something we can see, on someone we can see, rather than to have a relationship with Someone we can't see.  That's why the human race, in the journey of faith, has always had its superstars: Moses, Joshua, Gideon, David, Elijah, the apostles, and so forth - but these people would have been the first to admit that it had nothing to do with their abilities or their "giftedness" that they were instruments in God's hand to accomplish His work.  No, they'd more likely say that it was God's choice, and God's initiative, not theirs.  That they were just ordinary people and the real extraordinary Person was God Himself.  That anyone could have that relationship with God - and be just as much an instrument in His hand, and that it doesn't take greatness to do that. 

It takes a realization of HIS greatness.  An understanding that HE is the only True Superstar.  That people are merely people, and as such, fallible.  I can respect the office someone holds, yes.  I can recognize that ministers or church leaders have a responsibility before God to watch over me and to give account of their own actions concerning me.  But it doesn't mean that I put them up on pedestals and assume that they have "the goods" and I don't.  Or that I can only fly with the assistance of their spiritual superstar cape. 

From the very beginning of human history, God has invited humans into relationship with Him - even in the time of Moses, that was His original plan.  But the people didn't want that.  They wanted God to speak to Moses and MOSES to speak to them.  They were afraid of that kind of all-pervasive intimacy.  

Am I?  Am I afraid that if I were to embrace God the way He so desires, that I would be consumed? Do I believe it's safer to ride someone else's coattails into His presence?  

Am I willing to worship and to serve only the True Superstar?

Sinless Perfection

Perfection?  One word and one word only.  Jesus.

Period.

There is a doctrine that has been going around for decades, perhaps even centuries, that has set people up to beat themselves to a pulp when they fail... which they always do.

It's called the doctrine of sinless perfection.

Basically this doctrine says that if we are in Christ and filled with the Spirit, it's possible to live as sinless a life as Jesus did. The basis for this argument is that Jesus laid aside His God-hood, His divine attributes, in order to be fully human, and that He therefore had no advantage over us in fighting temptation, did it by the power of the Holy Spirit, just the same way He got the power to do all those miracles.  

Hm.  As alluring as that statement might be, I think that a few people might be deceiving themselves. It says in 1 John chapter 1 that if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. And the apostle Paul (arguably one of the holiest men who ever lived except for Jesus) struggled with sin all the time. He said he kept sinning even though he didn't want to, and kept "not doing the right thing" even though he desired it so much! Yet he told the Ephesians to keep on being filled with the Holy Spirit, and told the Corinthians that he spoke in tongues (prayed under the direction of the Holy Spirit) more than all of them. 

The truth is, Jesus did have a slight (okay, a big) advantage over us ... in that He was not born with a "sin nature" - that is, a natural tendency to sin (aka "the curse").  Which is not to say that He wasn't tempted; He was!!! BIG time!!! But He had the same choice Adam did, before the Fall of man.  He didn't understand what it was like TO COMMIT sin - even though (on the cross) He BECAME sin, and felt the guilt and the shame of it down through the ages (every possible sin, past, present and future).  If we believe that Jesus didn't sin because He was filled with the Holy Spirit - then what happened the first 30 years of His life before He was filled at His baptism? Are we then to conclude that He DID sin because He wasn't filled with the Spirit? if so - He was not the perfect sacrifice, and His death was in vain!  

But if He didn't sin during that 30-year period - perhaps it's because ... oh maybe it might have been that (you know) "in Him dwells all the fulness of the Godhead bodily." (Colossians 2:9).  

Now - that said - because of what He did on the cross, if we accept it as being for us personally, we are made just as righteous as Jesus, by God ... POSITIONALLY.  God no longer sees our sin, but chooses to look at Jesus, who is our life, who is our righteousness. 

Being filled with (controlled by) the Holy Spirit is the only way that we could possibly begin to live (as Jesus promised) an abundant life, to be fully alive, in other words.  And included in that is most likely a marked reduction of that S-word because we're listening to His direction on a moment-by-moment basis.  It's marvelous.  It's glorious - if we live in that every single second of our lives.

Yet to believe that we - by being filled with the Spirit on a consistent basis - are capable of never sinning? Not once?  Perfection in the everyday happenings and routines of our lives? In our thoughts? in our MOTIVES?  Seriously?  

I'm not saying we aren't to try; this is not a cop-out to justify not trying!  On the contrary - I'm saying that we so much NEED to be filled with the Spirit, in conscious contact with God.  What I AM saying is that WHEN we sin - and we WILL ... God has made provision for that in our position in Christ as believers and all we need to do is agree with Him that we've messed up - and move on! No self-recriminations, no shame-fests, just "Yeah God, I loused it up this time. What I did was wrong. Please forgive me and re-fill me with Yourself. Thank You so much for Your grace!" And that's ALL.

Mike Warnke said quite a few years back, in one of his performances, something like this:  "I could say it in a really theological, hermeneutic way that would confuse most people and perhaps impress them at the same time - but I won't.  Instead, I'll just say it like this - Minus Crud Is COOL."  

Understanding the depths of grace inspires gratitude, and births a burning desire in us to be filled with God's presence as much and as often as possible (and um, that doesn't have to wait until we get to church to happen - it can be anywhere, anytime! - just saying.) The overflow of that infilling is so incredible - but let's not give ourselves more credit than we deserve, or beat ourselves up when we don't achieve perfection.  The most we can be is honest, open, and willing. The process of 'sanctification' is just that - a process.  We can take absolutely NO credit for any progress we make.

It's all Him.

Lessons from Job

The book of Job is considered by Biblical scholars to be the oldest in the Bible, predating Moses, possibly predating the Great Flood.  In those days, "sin" was seen as overt wickedness; it was what someone did, not why they did it.  God only judges according to our knowledge and understanding of Him and so He said to Satan, "...Job [is] blameless and upright, fearing God and turning away from evil".  The truth of the matter was that God DID see something in Job that - though not defined by Job or anyone else as sin, needed to be repented of.  God knew that the crucible of suffering could - and in Job's case, would - bring that to the surface so that Job would be purified, delivered from a spiritual arrogance that colored everything he did - things which not only others but he himself considered to be upright and blameless. 

Basically put, Job felt that it was up to his own righteous works to keep what he'd been given by God. He lived his whole pre-tragedy life in fear that his wealth, his health, and/or his kids would be removed from him, or that his kids would be punished by God because HE failed to clean up after them. In chapter one, Job DAILY made a sacrifice for each of his kids (that must have taken a while!) just in case they sinned against God and were punished - something which he as their righteous father would not be able to bear!!  He didn't realize that there is no way that any human being can take responsibility for another's actions - and thought that he was the only thing - that his sacrifices were the only restraining force - standing between them and God's wrath.  In chapter 3 verse 25, Job says in his complaint, "That which I feared greatly has come upon me."  In essence, the kids were partying and WHILE THEY WERE DOING THAT, calamity fell on them - before Job could make sacrifice for them.

In one fell swoop, Job lost his possessions, his children, and his health.  He was down for the count.  And then his "friends" showed up.  Some friends.  The final support structure that he had (his brothers and sisters had deserted him, and his wife was absolutely no help!) was GONE.
 
The reality was that Job needed to stop living in fear.  He needed to realize that God was far bigger than he was and that God could speak to others just as well as to him, and that others were responsible to God for their own actions.  He needed to stop taking upon himself the role of savior.  It wasn't his to assume. 

God didn't CAUSE calamity to crash down on Job.  Satan did...and believe me, the slippery old fellow enjoyed (and still enjoys!) his craft.  But God also knew that if He continued to put a hedge of protection around Job, then Job would continue in his delusion that he was more important than he really was, that he could save people.  He couldn't.  It wasn't his function.  It was God's. So God allowed Satan permission - and only within limits - to test Job.  (Interesting that in the Old Testament, to "test" or to "prove" was used as a goldsmith's word, to determine the purity of a particular metal - and that it could only happen by heating it up until the impure portions rose to the surface so they could be skimmed off.)

Through his suffering and his willingness for God to reveal Himself, (which God did when Job was ready to listen!) Job says in chapter 42:2-6 that he knows now that God can do all things, and that nobody can thwart His purposes.  He also states that after seeing (i.e., experiencing) God for himself, "I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes." (KJV)  

Repent? when all along he has maintained his innocence?  Yes - for he has realized that there is nothing he can do to change God's mind - whereas before his personal tragedies, he had the delusional idea that he could. This is a lesson that he could learn in no other way than to be faced with the materialization of all of his fears, as horrible as that was to go through.  So he is actually repenting of his arrogance, and letting go of a lifestyle of fear-based responsibility for the welfare of others, and the belief that he could influence the outcome in other people's lives by what he did or didn't do.  He has learned to let others take responsibility for their own actions, to form their own relationship with God.  He has given up the role of self-appointed savior, and has learned instead to trust. This is a new level of freedom which he has never before known. This was the end result that God foresaw in the beginning when He said to the enemy, "Have you considered My servant Job...?"

And the heat is removed.