A few reflections on what God is showing me these days.
Weights
Every unconfessed sin is like a little extra weight that we carry around. Those unconfessed sins have a cumulative effect--they weigh us down emotionally and intellectually and spiritually.
C.S Lewis said, "We have a strange illusion that mere time cancels sin." Butif time healed all wounds all we'd need would be doctor's waiting rooms!
I was racing Parker on the beach last week, but I was carrying Josiah. I wasn't used to running with that extra weight and I actually injured my ankle. I wasn't fully functional because of the extra weight. That is what sin does. It weighs us down, slows us down. We aren't fully functional.
The only way to get rid of the weight is to take Christ's yoke. He says it is light and easy.
I think eventually we've just got to arrive at the end of ourselves! I think I'm close to the knot in the rope. My problems are bigger than me. My sins are stronger than me. My calling is larger than me. I try to measure up, but God wants me to see that I don't measure up. I feel like Belshazzar in Daniel 5:27. "Tekel means 'weighed'--you have been weighed on the balances and have failed the test."
This forty days has had an interesting effect on me. As I grow in righteousness I'm more aware of my sinfulness. C.S. Lewis says, "When a man is getting better he understands more and more clearly the evil that is still left in him. When a man is getting worse he understands his own badness less and less." So if you think you're ok you're not ok. And if you think you're not ok you're ok. Lewis says, "Good people know about both good and evil: bad people do not know about either."
I think the process of seeing some of the "holes in my heart" began last October at the Catalyst conference. I think sometimes you have to get worse to get better. And that is really the process I've been going through. I'm more and more convinced that if I'm ok inside then everything is alright, but if I'm not ok inside them nothing is ok outside.
I think I feel spiritually just like I felt spiritually after my knee surgeries. I knew I was through the worst part but I had lots of healing to do.
Too often we deal with sinful issues by getting rid of the weeds, but what we need to do is pull out the root. I feel like God is uprooting some things in my life. We need to do what Galatians 5:24 says. "Those who belong to Christ have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nture to the his cross and crucified them there."
I keep coming back to this simple fact: Christianity is not about what I can do for God. It's about what God has done for me. That is the issue in Galatians. I'm becoming more and more aware of my sinful nature. We underestimate our sinfulness. And we underestimate the mercy of God. I think we've got to come to Galatians 6:14. "As for me, God forbid that I should boast about anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ."
I think Galatians is descriptive of the American church. We are so performance based. We're too self-sufficient. We're like the Laodicean church, "I have everything I want. I don't need a thing."
I find myself feeling sorry for myself much less these days. I think too often we feel sorry for ourselves and blame God when we should feel sorry for God and blame ourselves. But sin has this strange effect upon us where we get everything backwards.
Relief
In September of 2003 I bought a carpet and returned it, but our credit card never got credited. For the last ten months I've made dozens of phone calls and visits trying to resolve the issue to no avail. It was frustrating! It was hardly worth all the effort, but a sense of justice kept me going. It has been a cloud hanging over our heads.
I went in today to discover that they were under new management and I thought I'd have to start the process all over again, but I walked out with a "full refund." It's tough to describe the feeling, but it was such a huge relief. It was like a weight was removed.
There is a rest and relief when we bring closure to things that like--whether it's a ten month old issue or ten days or ten years. I think that feeling is similar to what we feel when we finally bring closure to sin via repentance. There is a rest and relief that is tough to put into words.
Weights
Every unconfessed sin is like a little extra weight that we carry around. Those unconfessed sins have a cumulative effect--they weigh us down emotionally and intellectually and spiritually.
C.S Lewis said, "We have a strange illusion that mere time cancels sin." Butif time healed all wounds all we'd need would be doctor's waiting rooms!
I was racing Parker on the beach last week, but I was carrying Josiah. I wasn't used to running with that extra weight and I actually injured my ankle. I wasn't fully functional because of the extra weight. That is what sin does. It weighs us down, slows us down. We aren't fully functional.
The only way to get rid of the weight is to take Christ's yoke. He says it is light and easy.
I think eventually we've just got to arrive at the end of ourselves! I think I'm close to the knot in the rope. My problems are bigger than me. My sins are stronger than me. My calling is larger than me. I try to measure up, but God wants me to see that I don't measure up. I feel like Belshazzar in Daniel 5:27. "Tekel means 'weighed'--you have been weighed on the balances and have failed the test."
This forty days has had an interesting effect on me. As I grow in righteousness I'm more aware of my sinfulness. C.S. Lewis says, "When a man is getting better he understands more and more clearly the evil that is still left in him. When a man is getting worse he understands his own badness less and less." So if you think you're ok you're not ok. And if you think you're not ok you're ok. Lewis says, "Good people know about both good and evil: bad people do not know about either."
I think the process of seeing some of the "holes in my heart" began last October at the Catalyst conference. I think sometimes you have to get worse to get better. And that is really the process I've been going through. I'm more and more convinced that if I'm ok inside then everything is alright, but if I'm not ok inside them nothing is ok outside.
I think I feel spiritually just like I felt spiritually after my knee surgeries. I knew I was through the worst part but I had lots of healing to do.
Too often we deal with sinful issues by getting rid of the weeds, but what we need to do is pull out the root. I feel like God is uprooting some things in my life. We need to do what Galatians 5:24 says. "Those who belong to Christ have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nture to the his cross and crucified them there."
I keep coming back to this simple fact: Christianity is not about what I can do for God. It's about what God has done for me. That is the issue in Galatians. I'm becoming more and more aware of my sinful nature. We underestimate our sinfulness. And we underestimate the mercy of God. I think we've got to come to Galatians 6:14. "As for me, God forbid that I should boast about anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ."
I think Galatians is descriptive of the American church. We are so performance based. We're too self-sufficient. We're like the Laodicean church, "I have everything I want. I don't need a thing."
I find myself feeling sorry for myself much less these days. I think too often we feel sorry for ourselves and blame God when we should feel sorry for God and blame ourselves. But sin has this strange effect upon us where we get everything backwards.
Relief
In September of 2003 I bought a carpet and returned it, but our credit card never got credited. For the last ten months I've made dozens of phone calls and visits trying to resolve the issue to no avail. It was frustrating! It was hardly worth all the effort, but a sense of justice kept me going. It has been a cloud hanging over our heads.
I went in today to discover that they were under new management and I thought I'd have to start the process all over again, but I walked out with a "full refund." It's tough to describe the feeling, but it was such a huge relief. It was like a weight was removed.
There is a rest and relief when we bring closure to things that like--whether it's a ten month old issue or ten days or ten years. I think that feeling is similar to what we feel when we finally bring closure to sin via repentance. There is a rest and relief that is tough to put into words.
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