Grow Up! part 1
I try to keep my words soft an sweet, in case I ever have to eat them. Now... having said that, I know there are some people out there who will think, "That guy is hard and sharp, what's he talking about?!!" Well, first of all, I said I TRY. And second of all, different people and different situations call for different tactics. I remember once upon a time I heard a sermon called "Paul was a junkyard dog." Talking about how Paul--who wrote the majority of the New Testament in his letters to various churches--didn't pull any punches. He just put it all out there. Let the chips fall where they may. It is in this spirit that I've titled this Rant series, and it is in this spirit that I have chosen my key verse. Matthew 5:48 (which is Jesus, not Paul, but hopefully you'll see where I'm going with this). In the KJV it is, "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect." Which, by the way, kind of does away with the idea that we are less than in any way. Jesus wouldn't tell us to be perfect if we couldn't, you know, be perfect. He would never give us an impossible mission. Where we seem to get stuck, or get lost, or get it twisted, is in our definition of perfection. Now, I've spoken many times of my love of the old professional wrestler Mr. Perfect. Because he was so cool. He did everything, well, perfectly. Bowling--he rolled a strike every time. Diving--double triple backward gainer (or whatever a perfect dive is). Golf--you know he'd sink that putt every time. But that's not real. That's not what God expects from us. Perfection, Spiritually speaking, is about maturity. It's about growing up in the strength and knowledge of who we are. Which, of course, is who God is in us. Christ in you, the hope of glory. That's your true identity. And I think the Message Bible version of our memory verse really says what I'm trying to say: "In a word, what I'm saying is, Grow up. You're kingdom subjects. Now live like it. Live out your God-created identity. Live generously and graciously toward others, the way God lives toward you." Sounds a little harsh, maybe, on the surface. But when you know better, you can do better. When you know who you are, and where you are, and why you're here (which, by the way, is why I wrote the Answer Trilogy, to answer those three vitally important questions), you can stop trying to be someone you're not and you can embrace who you are. You can mature into who you really are. "When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things" (1 Corinthians 13:11). There's our buddy Paul. Talking about how, after a while, you really do need to grow up. You don't have to be stuck where you are. And you don't have to let things that have happened in your life hold you down. It comes down to receiving and releasing. God lives toward us graciously and generously. When we receive His love, we can release His love. We can be mature. We can live toward God (by living toward each other)... graciously and generously. We can give everything we have and everything we are. We can lay our lives down for our friends. That's what it means to be perfect, as our Father is perfect. Generosity, grace, forgiveness, mercy... love. Those are the things we have. Those are the things we are. Those are the things we can give to each other!