Archive for The Gospel
Accepted in the Beloved
Posted by: | Comments(Any terms I use in this blog are for explanatory purposes only. If any have fallen into disuse or are now “politically incorrect”, I apologize and assure you I intend nothing derogatory.)
A few weeks ago my daughter and I stumbled upon the movie “Freaks”, new to us, but evidently something of a cult classic. Made in 1932, the actors were people with anomalies who made up the circus sideshows of the time. By using the real circus performers, the movie caused an uproar. It was removed from the market, and Britain banned it outright. Ironically these actors were not being used as “freaks” but were being themselves with a dignity and normalcy the viewing public of the time probably never dreamed they had.
I’m telling you all this because I just can’t get the story out of my mind. Generally movies explain to you who the characters are. This one keeps asking me who I am.
Where I picked up the story, Hans, a young man who is a midget, is infatuated with Cleopatra, one of the normal size circus performers. She is amused and plays along as if Hans were a toy with no real feelings. When she accidentally finds out that Hans is heir to a great fortune, her game begins in earnest. She agrees to marry her unwitting suitor.
At the marriage feast, it is primarily the sideshow folk who come and sit together at one great, long table. The bride behaves abominably, getting very drunk, putting a drug in Hans’ drink (the first step toward killing him and taking his fortune) and kissing her real love interest in front of everyone, humiliating Hans. Apparently not everyone sees, because a dwarf begins a special ceremony at the far end of the table. (This you may already know because it is the most famous scene of the movie.) He gets on the table with an immense goblet of wine and walks to each guest, giving him or her a sip in turn. In your mind’s eye I want you to see these people. There are the bearded lady and the skeleton man; a woman with no arms and a man with no legs, and a man with neither arms nor legs; other little people; conjoined twins; persons they called pinheads who had tiny skulls that caused both physical deformity and mental retardation. As the cup is offered, the dwarf takes up a strange chant: “Gobble, gobble, we accept you, you are one of us.” Obviously, as Hans’ wife, Cleopatra is being accorded the honor of being embraced by the people of the sideshow, people so few understand. But when the goblet arrives, she pushes it away, screaming that she wants no part of them. “You’re all freaks!” she cries, betraying her true feelings.
The scene won’t leave my mind, but I am now in Cleopatra’s seat. I watch these unusual wedding guests, looking with some discomfort at their missing limbs and other unusual deformities. I think of how some of them cannot care for all their own basic needs and will always need caregivers. And then the cup comes to me. Will I take the cup? Will I identify with these people as ones like me?
I thought I wasn’t prejudiced. Or at least I wasn’t that prejudiced. I’m not prejudiced against blacks, and that’s the big one in the United States, so I’m okay, right? I have a dislike of some people groups, but if I met someone from one of those, I prided myself on putting that aside and concentrating on loving the person in front of me. But if I’m priding myself for coming halfway (or less), what am I really doing? Suddenly I wasn’t feeling so proud anymore.
What happened to the Scriptures I claimed I believed? Jesus prayed,
I have given [believers] the glory that You gave Me, that they may be one as We are one: I in them and You in Me. – John 17:22 & 23a
And Paul tells us:
To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law…so as to win those under the law. To those not having the law I became like one not having the law…so as to win those not having the law. To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some. I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings. 1 Cor. 24 – 27
But the truth is, when I think of being one with certain people, because of their culture or behavior, I recoil.
Author Steve Brown often writes of his conversations with the Lord. I sense something akin to that as I think of my reaction to the “freaks”:
“So it’s okay for you to look at them just to see what they look like but not accept them?”
Shame on me.
“I came down from heaven to live with humanity. What do you think that was like?”
I imagined myself looking down from a bright and perfect heaven onto the masses of humanity on earth: The smells. The crowds. The soiled clothing. The cacophony. And, as each night falls, the darkness.
More than that, there was the condition of our hearts, every last heart leaving something to be desired. You might say we all had something missing or misshapen there.
“I once shared bread and a cup of wine around a table and accepted every one of you – in your sin.”
Nothing is so humbling as Jesus telling you He already did this very thing for you, and you have been unwilling to do the same. As a believer I share in the new covenant that was made at the Last Supper. In my mind’s eye I see that goblet, Christ’s goblet, making its way around the table that Passover night, a symbol of Jesus saying, “I accept you” when we were filthy in our sin. I would gladly drink that goblet when Jesus is holding it. But I’m only holding it out to select others – not all others – even though He came for every one of them, and I know it.
Seems I have some things to work out with God. And if I ever catch “Freaks” again on TV, you can be sure that’s one movie I will never see the same way again.
The Fruit of the Spirit: The Bigger Picture
Posted by: | CommentsYesterday Michelle was kind enough to post for me on “my” day. I got up this morning and found that she had posted for me in more ways than one. Her message about freedom was very nearly the post I intended to write today. I’m going ahead because I am going to look at it from a slightly different angle, and because when God says something important in Scripture you find He has said it again, even a number of times. Maybe we need to hear this more than once because it’s so important to us right now. I know I do.
I started looking at the whole passage of Galatians where you find the verse about the fruit of the Spirit, Galatians 5:16 – 26. I’ve been blogging about some individual fruits of the Spirit without looking at the bigger picture.
First, Paul has laid out the reason why his instructions are so important: we are fighting a war.
For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want. – Galatians 5:17
"Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves." Where can I turn when what I see in the mirror of God's Word seems to condemn me?
The war is not overseas, it is right here in front of us. Worse, in this conflict between the Spirit and the sin nature, we feel drawn to the enemy side. We find the list of sins nauseating when we read them, but they don’t always seem so bad when the opportunity presents itself.
The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. – Galatians 5:19 – 21a
Sounds awful, doesn’t it, at the moment? Paul even trails off from naming them all. Our enemy has plenty of temptations and enticements. Following along with them brings dire consequences:
I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God. – Galatians 5:21b
Why would anybody who lives like this be interested in inheriting the kingdom of God, I wondered. Then I remembered those many who hear, and like what they hear, and do what they want anyway.
Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. – James 1:22 – 24
Have we walked away from personal inventory and forgotten what our own soul looks like? It is an inward act of the sinful nature that is potentially more dangerous than the ones in the list above. In this war, as a soldier on the Kingdom side, I do have my orders: stay away; flee; cast them off; push them away because they no longer have a part of you.
And we have help: God knows the battle we fight between our spirits and the sinful nature. “They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want.”
Thank God for the hope in these next verses. Paul proclaims decisively,
So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature. – Galatians 5:16
It doesn’t say, “With great and sad longing for your sinful ways, you can just eke out a victory, or a draw.” “You won’t feel freed up, but you can pull it off.” It says, “You will not gratify.” You can step forward and win the battle and be free, and get away from the law. After listing the results of living by the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control, Paul adds, “Against such there is no law.” – see Galatians 5:22 -24
Now both Michelle and I want always to stress that any command to do something outwardly flows from something inward. You can’t just take these lists and say, “Okay, don’t do this, do that, and I’ll go to heaven.” It leaves you still under the law, and you won’t win. Oh, you may think you win, but there will still be sin balanced against the good works, and the good works may not be as pure in motivation as they seemed, and you need to be cleaned from all sin. What will wipe clean the sin side of the scales once and for all?
The thing that has cleansed us, given us a second spiritual birth, and given us the power to do good things and feel free in doing them is our belief in Jesus – a belief that is so strong that we have given our lives over to Him. When we heard His words, when we saw our sinful souls in the mirror, we did not absentmindedly walk away. Inwardly we have made the decision to serve God. Look at the power that God gives us in this next verse:
Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. – Galatians 5:24
We crucify the sinful nature. We admit our sins and call our sins a part of all the sins Christ paid for when He was on the cross. Now, because Jesus Christ is triumphant, we can win our battles.
The last verse in the passage is a warning:
Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each other. – Galatians 5:26
In other words, avoid the trap of now weighing on the scales your success at producing fruit against that of others, or concerning yourself with the size and scope of the work you are called to in comparison to others. You just don’t know the way God is working in someone else’s life. Throw away the scales and let God prune His fruit trees as only He knows best.
