So we read verses like that and are very convicted by it. "I can't even name the Commandments, let alone KEEP them!" I used to think.
I have been Catholic I have been Protestant. I have seen many sides of many different "flavors" of Christianity.
When I became a follower of Christ 8 years ago I wasn't looking for help or for a crutch. In fact I wasn't even seeking anything. I felt I was a pretty good guy living a pretty good life with my good little family.
It just happened that God drew me toward the scriptures. It seemed right that I should read this Bible if I wanted to be in Heaven one day. After all, if I was going to call myself a Christian I figured I should at least read it ONCE right?
Well, what I read and what happened was life changing.
It was God whose Holy Spirit taught me from the scriptures about who He is, what He is like and what He wants from us. What His holiness DEMANDS from us! Oh how I realized I had created a false god in my mind! I was living according to the god of my own imagination that I had created based on what I heard from others, was taught growing up and what SEEMED right.
But you know what the Bible says about that?
Proverbs 14:12 "There is a way which seems right to a man, But its end is the way of death."
My religious activities from my youth had some heart behind it, but was pretty robotic. It FELT good and it FELT right. When I was taken captive by the Gospel of Christ in the Bible in 2002, I realized that true faith has more to do with God and HIS work than me and MY work.
What JOY that filled my heart with!
Today I heard a woman tell a story of why her son was in heaven. Her little boy died and she said she is confident he is in heaven because of a prayer they prayed together. He had "asked Jesus into his heart".
Our family has also experienced that extreme pain of losing a child.
Our losing baby Emma impacted me pretty deeply in two ways. First, it reminded me of my faith in the work of Christ on the cross for the forgiveness of sins. It reminded me that because Heaven is a free gift, there is nothing we can do to "earn" that gift. If you have "earned" it, then it is not a gift, but what is owed to you. That is SO opposite of the whole teaching of the Bible. God out of His love for us sent His Son to bear our punishment for us and offers eternal life as a FREE gift to us. A gift we receive by faith in Christ's work, not ours.
The second way it impacted me was kind of freeing. Our family endured what I imagine as the worst pain a family can experience. The death of a child. God has lovingly and graciously to this day sustained us. His grace has been more than sufficient.
OK, now let me set this next part up by revealing some of my baggage:
I FLEE from labels.
Other than "Christian" I don't like to be called anything. We have these labels that we use to try to figure out where people stand. Danger in that is we are taking on the properties and beliefs of MEN rather than Christ.
We are called to know and imitate Christ. Not Piper, MacArthur, Spurgeon, Pink, Calvin, Luther or your priest or pastor. I don't want to be an evangelical, reformed, protestant, Calvanist, dispensationalist. I want to be a Christian who follows Christ and reads the Bible.
Today though I see all "flavors" of faith working, trying to do what feels right, leaning on their experience and emotion rather than God.
This really has nothing to do with your "flavor" of faith. This has to do with you before God. This is about me and God. You and I and our personal relationship with an amazingly holy, loving, merciful, gracious, patient and longsuffering God.
If we would spend more time in God's word, our minds would spend more time dwelling on knowing God.
Our thoughts of who God is would be more accurate and pure. Our knowledge of the true state of our own hearts would be more accurate. Our outward actions and living out of our faith would be more faithful to Christ.
I guess my point is this. We not only don't know God very well, we don't know ourselves very well. Since we don't we fake it. We act "Christian" whatever we think that is supposed to look like. We give and serve out of obligation rather than love. We don't give and don't serve out of self love rather than godly care for others.
We either carry out a robotic system of religion hoping the actions will cover the lack of "heart" or we coin phrases like "I let Jesus into my heart" and create a whole culture of sayings and living that is really no different than any other religion on earth. We dress a certain way, talk a certain lingo, go here, don't go there. If you love Jesus you will do this. If you do this, you don't love Jesus. We are so busy measuring the faith of others that we slowly let them become our measure. You are now an "ordinary Christian".
We were called to be disciples of Christ! When people see you do they see a DISCIPLE of Christ? I'll admit it. NO they don't. I am "worldly" and act like I am living for myself and this world MUCH more than I appear to be living for Christ.
I have become the "ordinary Christian" Which is not even Christian.
That does NOT mean that I am NOT a Christian. It means I am a sinner and a hypocrite.
What is a Chrsitian?
Remember, it ONLY means you have put all your trust in Christ's work NOT yours.
It means you acknowledge your sin and realize you NEED His righteousness because you and I have none.
Our struggle in life is our sin. Our hearts, once we realize our need for Christ, will desire to turn from sin. We will desire to follow Him and make Him the Lord of our life.
Our sin on the other hand is SO powerful and strong. Our sin wants us to run FROM God. So a war breaks out between the desires of our body and the desires of our heart. (spirit vs flesh)
My only advice is this. Read God's word daily. Pray daily. Admit your faults to God. Admit your sins to God. Share your desires with Him and pray pray pray to be made more like Christ who lives a life or worship and gratitude as a living sacrifice to the One who paid your sin debt. The One who stood and took the full brunt of Gods wrath that was to be poured out on you.
Let your faith be vertical (between you and God) rather than horizontal (you looking to others in the Church).
Love and encourage one another to do the same. LOVE each other. Seek to know God.
No matter the "flavor" of Christianity
Posts
