Works part 5
The thing I wonder about when "religious folk" talk about works and labor--and of course they don't SAY it in those terms, but they are more like the Pharisee in Luke chapter 18 who is thanking God for how wonderful he is while kicking a publican in order to make one man look smaller and himself look bigger--is that in most cases it is really obvious what (who) is real, and what (who) is fake. Its really obvious what works and what doesn't. Spoiler alert: scaring people straight doesn't work. Works and labor don't work. More rules make more rulebreakers. Strict parents make sneaky kids. So instead of trying to force behavior change on people, what we need to do is inspire people. What we need to do is, instead of telling people what's wrong with them... instead of telling people who they're not... we need to start telling people what's RIGHT with them. We need to start telling people who they ARE. Who they are in Christ. Which is who Christ is in them. Which is Jesus. God in the flesh. Love in a body. God in YOUR flesh. Love in YOUR body. And in knowing and believing that love is IN there, it WILL come out. Naturally. Its too big, and too good, to do anything else. Its too good to keep to yourself. And THAT'S what works. Love works. Love wins, if I can say it that way. If you love the hell out of someone, and show them that they are NOT a low down dirty "sinner" who deserve's to be kicked when they're down, that's when you can start to see a REAL, LASTING change in someone. From the inside out. What's inside COMING out. Because that will happen no matter what. What you believe is inside WILL come out. Right believing produces right behavior. Faith works by love, and faith without works is dead. Because love--believing that you are loved--equips and empowers you to love. You can't give what you don't have. And you can only give what you do have. There is no such thing as a love that says, "I'll scratch your back SO THAT you'll scratch mine." That's not love at all. See, love doesn't HAVE a motive. Love IS the motive. And I think love is the best--the only?--reason to do anything. Do it because its in your heart to do it. Don't do it because you're "supposed to." Because then you'll just be going through the motions. It won't be real. And it won't last. Don't try to be someone you're not. Because at the end of the day you are who you are. The inner man. The hidden man of the heart. And when you look into that mirror with an unveiled face--when you stop trying to climb the sycomore tree, the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and when you let Jesus into your house... into your heart--that's when you see who you REALLY are. And that's when you can stop trying to be someone you're not. That's when you can EMBRACE who you really are. And THAT'S when you can start to embrace others. Which, by the way, is the New Commandment. Love others as Jesus loves you. Receive it and release it. Let Jesus love you so big and so hard that you couldn't keep it in if you wanted to. Which you won't. Because love is giving. And it is experienced when you give it away. That's what works. Not religion, but relationship. Not external rules and laws. But the perfect law of liberty. Love in you, coming out through you. That's what people need. That's what's real. And that's what works.