I'm going to start off this entry with a quote from J.I. Packer's book, Rediscovering Holiness. In one of the chapters, Packer presents a paradox of the Christian faith. Essentially, he says that a growing despair and awareness of one's sin and rebellion against God marks a growing attribute of holiness in the believer's life. Here is the quote...
"Intense distress at one's continuing imperfection, in the context of an intense love of goodness as God defines it and an intense zeal to practice it, is the clearest possible sign of the holiness of heart that is central to spiritual health. The paradox--to hard a nut, it seems, for some to crack--is that increase of real holiness always brings increase of real discontent."
"What?!?" I thought when I first read this chapter. "I thought that becoming more holy means an increasing awareness of one's victories over sin. A holy person is always happy and joyful because he or she is closer to God, and thus, not as captive to sin. The only person who is discontent is the one who is not following God on a daily basis and living in unrepentant sin." While there are truths in this, I think perhaps that there are also some grave misconceptions that can dangerously give us a wrong picture of ourselves, and a blasphemous view of the greatness of God. Bear with me for a moment.
Are there moments in your walk with the Lord that you suddenly feel an overwhelming disgust with your struggles, your thorns, your sinful heart, and your motives? When do these moments come? Do they come when you have neglected your time with the Lord for a week, or when you have discovered him in a new and exciting way? In my experience, when I meet with God in a new way, and He reveals a new part of Himself to me, I end up becoming more aware of my ugly sin, especially in contrast to His pure holiness. At first, I became very confused and angry. I wondered, why does it seem as if I am becoming increasingly more and more sinful if I am being consistent in my walk with the Lord? However, the Lord has now shown me that the closer I get to Him, the more and more He will reveal to me my sinful ways, causing me to run all the harder towards His saving grace that alone can rescue from the bondage of sin.
A disclaimer is in order here. I am not saying by any means that as one increases in holiness, one increases in GUILT. Guilt is a tactic of Satan used to place our righteousness on ourself and cause us to believe the grand lie that we must earn our own grace. Guilt tells us that failure to earn our righteousness makes us awful human beings. No, what I am saying is that an increase in holiness makes us sprint to the cross all the quicker, humbly throw ourselves before the throne of our loving and redemptive God, and through tears that flow on a daily basis, repent of our ways, begging that His righteousness continue to manifest itself in our lives. In the flesh, we are inadequate, dirty, rotten, and repulsive to a holy God. In Christ, (Gal. 2:20), we are new creatures, holy, redeemed, and pure. Never forget this truth and the absolute glory of the Gospel and the Incarnation. An increased awareness of the Incarnation and the beauty of the Gospel ought to daily show us what wretched, filthy, and ragged creatures we would be apart from Christ. So, in short, growing in holiness involves growing despair at one's flesh apart from Christ. We should all pray, with Paul...
"What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? THANKS BE TO GOD, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord." Romans 7:24-25.
Father, may we ever long for the day when we will be fully new creatures, enjoying sweet and untainted fellowship with you in your Kingdom. Sustain us until then, and affirm us of your salvation as we see our filthy rags become yet filthier.
Saturday, January 28, 2012
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Story Time.
I hope I do not make a habit of doing this, but I am going to tell a story...about myself. This story takes place on a recent train ride I took on my way back to Chicago for school. I hope it offers a glimpse into the depths of my sinfulness as well as my great need for the Lord. I also hope that God uses my experience to challenge others should they find themselves in a similar situation, and with similar struggles as myself. Here it is.
I was thoroughly enjoying my peaceful train ride with my earphones in. The little toddler in front of me was my entertainment as he played with his toy train and stared wide-eyed out the window, exclaiming to his dad, "a weal twain daddy!" The empty seat next to me was filled with my purse. Just the way I like it: my own personal space, my music, my time.
As I spent some time in prayer, I found myself being convicted. There are few people I am actively evangelizing to. I asked the Lord to make my eyes more open to those around me, and give me people who I can share His truth with. I wanted to learn how to show His love to those hard to love. Then I said Amen. And forgot the prayer.
The little boy in front of me pressed his nose against the glass and rested his chubby fingers on the windowsill as he watched the train come to its first stop. He loved watching the conductor stand at the doorway to welcome new passengers. I made it a point to keep my head down and my earphones turned up, so as to not welcome anyone into the empty seat next to me. It was then that I saw a man stumble on board who appeared to be drunk. I held my breath as he passed me, hoping he would have his eye on a different seat further back in the train. When he passed, I took a breath, and caught the remnants of his scent. It was not pleasant. I sighed in guilty relief that he had not chosen my empty seat. As soon as that thought crossed my mind, I realized how quickly I had forgotten my recent prayer. How hypocritical of me to pray a prayer such as the one I had, and then when God perhaps provides an opportunity to evangelize, I run in the other direction.
As I was enduring this battle in my mind, the man stumbled back up to my portion of the train and stood right in front of my seat. To my further shame, I purposefully did not catch his eye to ask him to sit next to me. God intervened instead. The conductor looked at the man, called him by name, and told him he could "sit next to that lady right there." That "lady" was me.
My actions get even worse. Instead of talking to him, I choose instead to start talking to the toddler in front of me about his toy train. As he babbled on about how fast it went, and the fact that it held 1,000 passengers, I listened with ease, grateful that I was successfully avoiding a conversation with the man next to me. The man, Barney, did try to strike up a conversation with me, and his voice was so loud that I am pretty sure the entire train heard what he was saying. For somebody like me, who likes to stay in the background in public places, this was very embarrassing. I am not proud of this.
To make an already long story a little less long, I will say that Barney and I did end up talking for quite a long time. I found out that his stumbling was not due to drunkenness; the man is blind. The conductors know him because he has to ride the train often, and needs their assistance with finding a seat. If only I had been friendly and told him there was an empty seat right next to where he was standing, I could have shown him the love of Christ in a very tangible way. God started softening my heart towards this hurting man. He shared with me a lot of things about his life, and I was able to talk about the Gospel with him. He told me he had only read the book of Revelation and was very confused. We laughed as I told him I am equally confused with Revelation. I was able to tell him, however, that all of those confusing things are signs of a greater God, and the confusing parts remind us of our inability to fully grasp the greatness of the one true God. We talked for a long while, and God gave me the words to speak.
I will not go into great detail about how much God taught me through this. I hope the story speaks for itself. God chose to use my stubborn, sinful heart to give truth to a man who needed it. God even chose to add blessings along with the whole encounter, despite my sin. For example: the fact that Barney talked really loud? The entire train was able to hear bits and pieces of our conversation about Scripture and the Gospel. Even more, God provided a person who was sitting behind me to encourage me after our conversation and tell me that it is so important to share the Truth with all people.
Thank you Lord for using my filthy rags. May I love better next time, and may my eyes be opened to the circumstances around me, and the blessings you bring with those circumstances.
I was thoroughly enjoying my peaceful train ride with my earphones in. The little toddler in front of me was my entertainment as he played with his toy train and stared wide-eyed out the window, exclaiming to his dad, "a weal twain daddy!" The empty seat next to me was filled with my purse. Just the way I like it: my own personal space, my music, my time.
As I spent some time in prayer, I found myself being convicted. There are few people I am actively evangelizing to. I asked the Lord to make my eyes more open to those around me, and give me people who I can share His truth with. I wanted to learn how to show His love to those hard to love. Then I said Amen. And forgot the prayer.
The little boy in front of me pressed his nose against the glass and rested his chubby fingers on the windowsill as he watched the train come to its first stop. He loved watching the conductor stand at the doorway to welcome new passengers. I made it a point to keep my head down and my earphones turned up, so as to not welcome anyone into the empty seat next to me. It was then that I saw a man stumble on board who appeared to be drunk. I held my breath as he passed me, hoping he would have his eye on a different seat further back in the train. When he passed, I took a breath, and caught the remnants of his scent. It was not pleasant. I sighed in guilty relief that he had not chosen my empty seat. As soon as that thought crossed my mind, I realized how quickly I had forgotten my recent prayer. How hypocritical of me to pray a prayer such as the one I had, and then when God perhaps provides an opportunity to evangelize, I run in the other direction.
As I was enduring this battle in my mind, the man stumbled back up to my portion of the train and stood right in front of my seat. To my further shame, I purposefully did not catch his eye to ask him to sit next to me. God intervened instead. The conductor looked at the man, called him by name, and told him he could "sit next to that lady right there." That "lady" was me.
My actions get even worse. Instead of talking to him, I choose instead to start talking to the toddler in front of me about his toy train. As he babbled on about how fast it went, and the fact that it held 1,000 passengers, I listened with ease, grateful that I was successfully avoiding a conversation with the man next to me. The man, Barney, did try to strike up a conversation with me, and his voice was so loud that I am pretty sure the entire train heard what he was saying. For somebody like me, who likes to stay in the background in public places, this was very embarrassing. I am not proud of this.
To make an already long story a little less long, I will say that Barney and I did end up talking for quite a long time. I found out that his stumbling was not due to drunkenness; the man is blind. The conductors know him because he has to ride the train often, and needs their assistance with finding a seat. If only I had been friendly and told him there was an empty seat right next to where he was standing, I could have shown him the love of Christ in a very tangible way. God started softening my heart towards this hurting man. He shared with me a lot of things about his life, and I was able to talk about the Gospel with him. He told me he had only read the book of Revelation and was very confused. We laughed as I told him I am equally confused with Revelation. I was able to tell him, however, that all of those confusing things are signs of a greater God, and the confusing parts remind us of our inability to fully grasp the greatness of the one true God. We talked for a long while, and God gave me the words to speak.
I will not go into great detail about how much God taught me through this. I hope the story speaks for itself. God chose to use my stubborn, sinful heart to give truth to a man who needed it. God even chose to add blessings along with the whole encounter, despite my sin. For example: the fact that Barney talked really loud? The entire train was able to hear bits and pieces of our conversation about Scripture and the Gospel. Even more, God provided a person who was sitting behind me to encourage me after our conversation and tell me that it is so important to share the Truth with all people.
Thank you Lord for using my filthy rags. May I love better next time, and may my eyes be opened to the circumstances around me, and the blessings you bring with those circumstances.
Thursday, January 5, 2012
What really matters.
Ahh, a new year! The time when I am not the only crazy person making new lists. Being a journaler, I usually make lists of things I learned in the previous year, struggles, victories, blessings, etc. I then make a list of goals for the year ahead, what I want to learn, how I want to grow, the challenges and blessings I am expecting.
This year, however, my outlook has somewhat changed. God has asked me to go deeper into questioning what really matters in a new year, or in this life for that matter. Philippians 1:9, says this:
This year, however, my outlook has somewhat changed. God has asked me to go deeper into questioning what really matters in a new year, or in this life for that matter. Philippians 1:9, says this:
And I pray this: that your love will keep on growing in knowledge and every kind of discernment, so that you can determine what really matters and be pure and blameless in the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.
I have been pondering a lot on this verse, and can't help but wonder, "Do I know what really matters?" Do my thoughts, my actions, my goals, reflect that which really matters, or do they reflect worldly things that are of no eternal value. Following the thought process of this verse, it seems that what really matters is being pure and blameless in the day of Christ. What really matters is a pursuit of holiness, an active fight against sin and this world, and an active pursuit of the only One who can rescue us from it. Now that changes some things in my mindset. What if I were to filter my new year list through the words pure and blameless? Would some bullets be crossed off? Would I need to add or modify others? Maybe I need to get rid of the list all together and just write pure and blameless in giant letters over my journal page. You can see I am still Searching in this daily Christian walk.
That being said, my list for this coming year will be a little bit different than previous years. I only hope that I will live it out. It is so easy to just make a list and feel as if I have thus accomplished all of the thoughts and ideas expressed in that list. The truth is, though, that the list means absolutely nothing unless Christ gives me the power and the grace to start living out those goals. I guess I need to go back and review my November blog, Listful Thinking. Who knew...when I write about a topic on a blog, everything in that blog doesn't magically become woven into my heart. This life is a long, hard, beautiful journey of living by grace and falling flat on our face. Praise God that He always picks us up and accepts our filthy rags, making them beautiful.
God, help me determine what really matters, and help me live in a way that matters for you.
Thanks for reading the ramblings of a wordy person :)
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