This summer I gave into my flesh much more than I should have, but here's the thing, through my sinful summer, I really got to thinking about why we sin, what freedom in Christ is, and what is black and white vs grey areas in our lives and whether or not those grey areas are really, in fact, grey.
For whatever dumb reason, I decided this would be my summer to do "whatever the hell I wanted." What's that mean exactly? Well...it means I wasn't just "talk" about things but I wanted to live an adventurous summer of love, beauty, fun, and (more or less) of the world. Basically, I wanted a chick flick summer. Some how, as I began my dance of summer time follies -- because I can assure you, the dance was dumb and reckless --
I began to release my inhibitions and my insecurities, something I've never been able to do through prayer or meditation of the heart. People began to notice and comment on how I seemed "different," that I looked "better, vibrant, happier."
Can you imagine how annoyed I was by this? Perhaps annoyed isn't really even the word. Maybe it's more...frustrated. As a woman of God who loves the Lord, people are supposed to comment on how you're different than others and how you just have "something" about you.
I had been told that I was "different" as a Christian and the whole "there's just something special about you" only a handful of times and mostly by Christians. My best friend was told it on a daily basis and I couldn't figure out why. What was I doing wrong?
Then people started speaking those vague but beautiful compliments to me and it felt good and bad. Good because I've always wanted to be told I'm vibrant and different and they can't say why, but bad because it felt like it wasn't because of Christ's example in my life. I had been blatantly disobeying God and not spending that time with Him that is so necessary to a Christian lifestyle, yet I was.."better."
Usually when I get this way (sinful in a knowing way, because yes, it has happened before because I'm a nimcompoop), I block out God. I can't/refuse think about Him, I feel guilty, and I think that as soon as I open my heart up for conversation with Him, he's just going to call me out on my sins and I'm going to have this massive break down where I confess my sins to my dearest friends and aim for a most consistent and intentional relationship with Christ where I will pray more and read my bible more and do this and this and this more and more in a dramatic attempt to regain my faith...and no. That never works. It doesn't stick. Promises, in my case, made at the height of emotion and spirituality don't ever really pan out the way they're meant to. I have all the right intentions, but never have the follow through.
This time, I didn't block out God. How can you live in blatant disobedience and not block him out? Psshh....I don't know! But that's what I did. I stood confident in my sinful self. I knew what God thought of my sin, felt the pangs of convictions, but continued forward anyway. That was when God spoke the strange revelation about freedom to me.
He said to me that I was experiencing freedom.
Now wait, don't get your panties in a twist. God was not saying, "Because you are a pompous, arrogant fool that has given herself to her flesh and has turned from me you have experienced freedom and this is good."
He was saying to me, as He revealed more later in the summer, that I had never experienced true freedom in Christ, but that I was experiencing what it could be like to be free in Christ. It was at this point I really knew I had no idea what freedom in Christ really even looks like.
Even after 7 years of following His teachings and ways and love, I had never been set free.
I had always been told freedom in Christ was the freedom "not to sin." Oh, yeah, that makes sense to a sinful person. Cool I have a choice not to sin, but that doesn't mean you have freedom. That means you have choice. During my revelation of experiencing freedom, though I was in fact sinning, God helped me understand that freedom comes from the release of inhibitions and insecurities and giving them to something that you can rest assured they are safe in.
I wasn't experiencing freedom in Christ, but I was experiencing freedom in (let's give my sin a name to make it easier, shall we?) Bobert. I had relished in Bobert and had given him my identity: my insecurities, my inhibitions, my habits, my desires, my cares, my heart.
None of that is okay to do for any of your Boberts, btw. Our identity comes from Christ as Christians, but sometimes we like to hold on to parts of it--to parts of our hearts-- and give it to all our Boberts out there.
Now as my summer dance comes to it's crucial finale, I have some choices to make. Do I continue to give in to my flesh and let Bobert(aka sin) be my identity? Or...do I give my Bobert--my identity, my heart-- to Christ as He has asked me to do fully time and time again? And not just give it to Him, but leave it with Him?
Even as I sit here typing, that's a hard decision for me. All of my Christian friends are probably appalled that this is even a consideration and a difficult decision for me. But, it is.
"Dying to self" has a whole new meaning for me this time 'round. I WANT to give my heart to God fully (I have given Him so much of it, but there are those parts that remain with me that keep me of the world and not just in it). I desire it. But, it's scary.
[Please don't misunderstand and think that I haven't even become a Christian yet. Trust me. I have. I have experienced the fullness of God's love and have accepted Him into my hard. But...there's a reason this is a race. Life has obstacles. This is one of mine.]
So here I go, stepping back onto the straight and narrow, learning the difference between conviction and condemnation, guilt and freedom.
I leave with this last thought,
Freedom in sin and freedom in Christ aren't all that different. One just has an outcome that is beyond disastorous and full of pain whereas the other has an outcome that is eternally beautiful and full of life.
No comments:
Post a Comment