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| This would be so cool! |
I have heard for years that when you become a Christian things
come naturally. Naturally, huh? Really?
I’ve heard that obedience comes without effort from this faith; at
minimum it is implied. But it doesn’t
happen this way. We are not powerfully
impacting the world around us because of this natural perspective. I believe this may account for some of the deficit
of repentance to obedience and our subsequent lack of fruit.
This is an especially strange point of view. Against nature they pose a model of the so
called natural. Did you ever make dinner
without purpose or go to work on accident?
Did anyone ever get in shape by thinking about it or by simply reading
an Arnold Schwarzenegger book? They think a person makes a profession and then
progressively and selectively does the will of God, almost oblivious to what they are doing; by an enchantment. These actions would be as if God were running
us on a remote control until we became fully obedient, of course if that were
true wouldn’t you consider Him doing a better job; forgive my digression. It is a mess of confusion for some in the
Church on this issue. But it is so
simple.
Obedience is grabbing the call of God and performing it. Perfection follows through a developing
understanding of the perfect will of God and the practice there of, under the
pressure of difficulty. A simple example
is a new baseball player compliant to the coach and rules but not very good;
Yet!
I was reading a favorite Christian theologian trying to get
support for this blog. I now call him
the Zen Master of Christian Theology.
Sometimes a contradiction from one respected will be seen as profound however
it is simply ambiguous non-sense. In a
movie the Mystery Men a character led the team of superheroes through a string
of formulaic platitudes meant to inspire.
But to those not under his spell, that of his charismatic persona, he
appeared as he truly was; witless. You
know “Master your pride or your pride will master you.” kind of thing. Or on the level of “One hand clapping” defying
the borders of definition. People are reading
these guys and after their pontification are more confused.
Simply put: A natural
desire drives me to self-pleasure and protection. This can manifest in gross and destructive
ways or build computer chips. This
natural can materialize as a middle class man, middle class family, a mid-sized
car and a happy Labrador, 401K and summer vacations at the lake or Moa Tse Tung.
It is unnatural to be selfless; not easy. We feel pain, yes even us sanctified,
justified and indwelt Christians. In
pain we are tempted. We want peace and
repose; very natural. But it is supernatural
to overcome and continue. This
supernatural impetus is trusting Jesus to reward us, to console us, help us, and
love us through it all. We trust Him and
are thus empowered by this knowledge of who Jesus is and what He wants and what
He’ll do.
My favorite martyr, Richard Wurmbrand, suffered horribly. He never claimed some magical power to overcome
other than the power of trusting in the knowledge of Jesus. He sweat, he cried, he bled! Richard persevered, obeyed and he did this
because he knew Jesus. He trusted Jesus
for eternal life. This is the power that
is possessed in the Gospel.
There is now magic.
You are sanctified by continuing in the faith under duress. This continuing through disappointment and
suffering proves your salvation and justification, are from trusting Jesus; otherwise
you would quit. Continuing or quitting
defines us and the truthfulness of our profession.
When this magical, mystical transformation is believed some may
eventually conclude we are really not a Christian. If you believe it as something he does by the
waving of His powerful hand and find yourself struggling against sin you can quit;
thinking “Maybe I am not chosen after all.”
“You see,” you deduce “it isn’t happening naturally so either Jesus isn’t
true because it isn’t happening as they said or your destined for damnation
because you believe them as they explained, that it comes naturally.”
I’ve found it not natural.
I’ve found the struggle with sin is real and formidable. We have all discovered ambiguities in our
life after Christ. We have to know this
all required us to “cut off our hands, love our enemies, and forgive.” We know we must. None feels justified by these, we just tap-out
realizing that it is now who we are and the way of the Kingdom. Knowing more and more; through all of these
trials, we acquiesce “By the Grace of God we enter in.”
It is a destructive and misleading idea of it being natural. Natural implies it all happens without effort,
contemplation, or without putting aside the natural. The supernatural is the putting off of the
natural to operate in an unnatural way, a Kingdom way.
Without this faith, without Him in this way, without
complete confidence, we cannot and will not continue. We at best will walk like the world avoiding
the cross. By the way this “take up your
cross and follow me.” is one of the biggest conundrums for our modern American faith.
We may claim “I’m the expressed will of God, good or bad.” like a Muslim under
the law of fatalism “It is the will of Allah.
Concluding that if God wanted me to do such-in-such I would have done it
but since I didn’t He must not have wanted me to. With this fatalism I operate knowing, “If I
didn’t feel it in my bosom then it wasn’t the will of Allah.” If I’m walking in a particular sin I’ll
conclude “He isn’t ready to set me free yet.” Blasphemy! It is simple, not easy, but simple to do what
Jesus says and prove you really trust Him.
Anything else is blasphemy:
Religious, natural, self-preserving mysticism.
It is all Him but not how the magicians of the faith would explain. They mystify the subject to our corporate destruction.
“There is no justification without
sanctification, no forgiveness without renewal of life, no real faith from
which
the fruits of new obedience do not grow." Martin Luther
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