December 10, 2009
Worldly Conduct
Worldly Conduct
The other day a friend critiqued the actions of another fellow saying, “And he calls himself a Christian...” Apparently my friend has a mental check-off list for Christians and in his evaluation, this fellow came up short. There wasn’t any point in trying to defend this guy, or to tell my friend that he misjudged. I did however find consolation from Paul, “Our conscience testifies that we have conducted ourselves in the world… in the holiness and sincerity that are from God. We have done so not according to worldly wisdom but according to God’s grace.” (2 Cor 1:12 NIV)
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Gail;
-----Unfortunately, we Christians also assemble check-off lists. We boldly assemble lists that assure ourselves we indeed belong to Him, and we assemble lists to concern us that others do not. And it is good that we seek assurance for ourselves and concern for others, but the reference to lists is the error. For in as much as we have not been removed from this twisted existence, our human nature of sin and frailty supply our trails with behavioral taint. It is not enough that we can not escape ongoing mistakes, but moreover, we fail in our ability to refine the line between right and wrong to its most intricate detail. And no detail is too intricate to escape God’s attention. So how can we possibly think any list to be useful?
-----God does not even draw up a list for those of us who follow Christ. All of our sins He forgets in His forgiveness. And since those who do not follow Christ have not turned to His forgiveness, He must maintain the list on them, but only by their choice. Yet that is no call for us to maintain lists too, because we have not the ability.
-----Therefore all matters come to rest upon forgiveness, not lists. That is why Jesus was so adamant that we must forgive to be forgiven. Our forgiving attitude is our testimony towards God, and it is the verification that we are His. Maybe that tends to make forgiveness a short list in itself, but its cousin, forbearance, tends to stamp that short list “PENDING”. Even it, then, can be somewhat taken with a grain of salt. Forgiveness is actually a gateway to love, not a list. In fact, to keep a list at all is an effort to validate hanging and locking the unforgiving gate of hatred, which is separation.
-----The Christian must remember this, because we are called to walk in love. The non-Christian can not remember it, because he has not known it. That is why he still holds a list up for the Christian to follow.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
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