Questions inspired by our conversation so far.
Are we ever excused from being Christ-like because we are human?
Is there support for that in the Bible?
Do you usually excuse your fallen state instead of confess and repent of it?
Is there a happy medium between understanding our fallen state and yet rejecting it by accepting the higher calling of holiness?
Can we accept the call of holiness upon our redeemed lives and still hang out with without looking down upon the unholy people?
What would it look like?
See: http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2007/may/22.39.html before replying to this. Apologies to DH and Emily for not lending them this crutch beforehand.
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Meant to say Emily and DH are NOT wrong necessarily…
The first question is interesting to me. If I want to take the approach to the question that Jesus was “fully man” and “fully God” then it doesn’t make sense to ask if we are excused from being like Jesus for being exactly like him. Does that make sense? If Jesus himself was human, then how could we be excused from (I don’t like that term by the way) being like him for being the same as he was in one respect? If I take the stance that Jesus was a man like I am a man then I have to use his example as the standard for excellence and I must strive for it.
Then again, I don’t think Jesus was a man in the same sense that I am a man, and I do not think I can be perfect all of the time. Let me rephrase, I don think I can be perfect like Jesus was because I don’t want to be perfect all of the time. That covers the counter argument that nothing is impossible with God and if I say that then I must believe that he could make me perfect if he wanted to. That being said I hate that Jesus told us to be perfect and I hope that you don’t have to be perfect to embody God’s love here on earth. I hope that my love for others so blinds God that he can’t see how much I suck at being a Christian.
That ties into question two. I don’t think the fact that we are fallen is an excuse for us acting however we want—we have to understand that we must repent. But, I have to agree with Thomas Merton when he says, “I believe the desire to please you, does in fact, please you.” God is concerned and pleased when he knows I am struggling and trying to find out how to follow him and create his love here on earth, even if I am messing up along the way.
Looking at our lives like this I think it is possible to strive to be holy and still understand that we are fallen. I love how Will Campbell sums up our relationship to God with the simple phrase, “We are all bastards, but God still loves us.” I understand that my actions do not all the time please God, but I also know that I want to follow him. I think God is ok with the fact that I don’t have it all figured out, and that in all honesty I am looking to figure it out right now.
The last part is what gets the most excited, and I’m sure with provoking, the most worked up. Of course we can accept the call and still hang out without looking down on unholy people. I don’t understand how we as followers of Jesus can look down on anyone who isn’t a follower. How can we hold others accountable to a law and a lifestyle that they know nothing about, and never submitted to?
The great thing about our holiness is that it isn’t contingent on others. Albeit difficult, it would be possible to remain holy surrounded by unholy people; it’s been done before! Our holiness comes from our devotion to God, and our commitment to his ideas. I don’t think I am holy for going to church or giving my money or not drinking or having sex or reading the Bible or any of that. I think our holiness comes from our ‘buying in’ to what God is talking about in the big picture of his Kingdom and what we are doing to join him in creating that Kingdom here. Now, I understand that the little things we do can make it easier for us to see God at work, and make it easier for others to follow our Christ like example of love without getting hung up on obvious faults in our personal lives.
We must be involved with the ‘unholy’ (I don’t like that word either, because I think I fall into that category more often than not) to be followers of Jesus. We have to be getting our hands dirty with them as well—the time has passed for the church to simply donate money and canned goods to the poor, it will no longer work to send one mission team to ‘the field’ every summer, and we cannot sit in our churches and pray for others around the world. We must be actively trying to create the Kingdom here—If I live my entire life striving for heaven as my reward I think I missed something major about what God is trying to do here and now. It is essential that I become more involved with the unholy and those not following, for that is where the love that I have for My God becomes real.
sorry my responses are so long…. i think it’s because most of my friends down here are all still in high school and i get excited about getting to have a conversation that goes this deep.
i always thought that it’s ok to mess up because everybody’s human, but then i read in Matthew about how Jesus tells his disciples “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” honestly, i’m not sure what to do with that. i don’t think Jesus would tell us to do something that we weren’t capable of doing- with his help of course. but then there’s that tricky part in Romans 7 about wanting to do good but not doing it and sin living in us. so…who knows.
i wonder if part of being holy is hanging our with “unholy” people. after all, Jesus was pretty holy, i’d say, and he thought it was pretty important to hang out with some unholy fishermen.
i’ve had the privilege and pleasure of hearing Donald Miller speak a few times. the last time i heard him he was talking about how the Bible is always looking to nature and farming to give us metaphors for God but most people in America today don’t know crap about farming or nature. growing up at 287 pokeberry gave me and daniel some good advantages i guess. anyway, Don (yeah, i wish we were on a first name basis. he totally reminds me of Bobbit by the way…) was saying how the Bible describes Christians as trees by the water. of course i forget the reference, but i trust Don that it’s in there. and trees don’t grow overnight. it takes years for trees to grow. here in Long Beach there is a live oak tree that is supposedly 400 years old. that sucker is huge, ask my mom and dad. and it is so strong it didn’t move or break even though it ended up underwater during hurricane katrina two years ago. our journey as Christians doesn’t happen overnight. it will probably take our whole lives to figure it out.
i’m not trying to use that as a cop-out. i’m just wondering if God knows we’re slow about getting it all together and we should realize we’re in a continual process and journey and a christian life isn’t an overnight success story.