They all wonder what is going to happen to them.

What they don’t understand is it’s not about what someone will do to them. It’s about what they’ll do. It’s the moment when you see yourself at your worst, are clear about your fault, and are completely hopeless.

The question that comes next: “Do I have to sin to really see God?” But, that’s only dating the false assumption that they don’t sin.

If you think that you are without sin or have the ability to be strong enough to avoid it, then you do not know God. It is impossible to receive a gift if you think you don’t need it. Grace is not yours if you spend your life running from it.

What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? -Romans 6:1

If that is what you took from this, then you’re not getting it.

By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it? -Romans 6:2

Grace is not yours if you spend your life running from it. That means that you can live the most pristine moral life and still not have a relationship with God. Squeaky cups and dirty guts. The best wine could be poured into your glass and come out with rehydrated bits of yesterday’s gross.

You can hear the best delivered truths and your preconceived agenda twists the meaning right out of them.

Those who have been saved by grace in the moment of complete terror and spiritual despair know that their salvation cannot be messed with. They know this because it came to them at their worst. They’re not living in fear, they’re living their new life knowing that sin can never, ever destroy them.

What then? Are we to sin because we are not under law but under grace? -Romans 6:15

From the moment the Gospel has been preached, the same questions come up. They still come up. Nobody is saying anything new, it’s just that the more explicit the message, the more intense the challenge to the pious. People fight the Gospel like they’re fighting for their life. It’s just that they’re fighting for a life they’re supposed to die to.

Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? -Romans 6:16

You’re obeying sin when you’re living in fear of it. That’s how you become a slave to sin.

For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. -Romans 6:20

Sin is a micromanaging slave owner welding a whip of guilt and threats of condemnation. The overweight bully picks on you because a sense of entitlement demands that everyone else satisfies him while he gorges himself on making you feel like you’re nothing but a failure.

You know you have to be righteous, nobody lied to you regarding that, but if you actually think you have the ability to satisfy the demand, then you are a slave under a master who will never tell you that the war is over and freedom has been won.

It’s time to abandon your little slave shack of faith and run. Yeah, your oppressor will come after you, but by the time you get a chance to glance over your shoulder, you’ll be able to see him swallowed up by the Sea of Truth.

Even better? If sin believes you’re dead, then he no longer has the power to kill you and won’t come looking for you.

Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. -Romans 6:3-4

No amount of reasoning can take what Jesus did away from you.  Grace wins every single time.

How often have you had to hide the unfinished edges of your attempt to make something good out of your life with lies and fake smiles? Do you not know that what you hope for is actually real and it’s not your responsibility to think it up, get it started, or to maintain it?

But what fruit were you getting at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. -Romans 6:21

It doesn’t matter how dressed up you can get. You can’t blur out the fact that inside your heart you know that you haven’t had a good meal in a long time and you’re starving. Maybe you shouldn’t sit at the table full of spiritual anorexics. They’ve lied to themselves for so long, solid truth makes them sick.

Sin is a master who cannot be satisfied. No matter how good you are, you know you’re not good enough and it makes you die a little inside. That’s the other side of why the ‘wages of sin is death’.

But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. -Romans 6:22-23

Jesus said to him, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.” –Luke 9:62 ESV

For someone trying to let go of their past, this is a crushing scripture. It’s another thing on the pile of wrongs under which they are already suffocating. Jesus says that if we cannot let go of our past, we are not fit for His kingdom.

When you sin and are fully aware that you cannot do, pay, or apologize enough to make up for it, you feel condemned. Hopeless. To add this scripture to it, it seems to condemn you even further.

When your sin changes the way your life looks, changes who you are, it feels impossible to walk in grace. Every step you take has been molded by your sin. How can you let it go when every aspect of your life is a glaring reminder that nothing is or will ever be the same?

This is a very big concept to grasp, so I want you to really think about everything that I am about to show you. This is the moment-of-salvation under a microscope.

“…you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” –Jesus; John 8:31 ESV

The reason you are not experiencing freedom is because you either have not heard or do not believe the simplicity of the truth. The truth is very simple, but it has a very sharp way of shocking our sensibilities. It can be offensive to the core of ‘self’, if it is ‘self’ that you intend to keep in tact. (For the sake of a case study, I’ll leave the comments open. If you want to see the desperate fight of ‘self’ play out, just watch the comments. They may show up there.)

Here we go….

In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory. In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory. – Ephesians 1:11-14 ESV

I am going to be explicit even though I do not have the space in this blog to write a book. I know you will have a million questions and I might even be making you angry, but I will not back down from the Truth. Study the scriptures yourself. Think critically. Part of thinking critically is to examine the implications of what this blog is saying and determine what that means. Compare your determinations with scripture and let the thought process roll around in your brain for as long as it takes. I am about six years into this thought process and I am still processing.

With that said…

(Compare the following paragraph with the scripture above [Eph 1:11-14])

You have a pre-determined purpose that God gave you. He works out everything according to that purpose. Because of the nature of free-will and the mistakes we make with it, we have Jesus to make sure that our free-will never has the power to trump God’s will. When you believe the Truth, the Holy Spirit seals it within you. It is a guarantee, an absolute, and the sealed Truth within you is what you can chew on until the end when all of the missing puzzle pieces come together and answer the missing questions.

This leaves you completely dependant on Jesus and completely safe in the purpose of God. You do not have to fear, you do not have to worry. You do not have to stay down when you fall. You do not have to kick yourself for your failure or kick someone else out of panic or fear for their eternal future.

I will say, there are people who use the Truth as an excuse to sin and I am not talking about those people. The Truth sends you running in worship to the feet of your Creator. It does not equip you with the ability to live in the smoky side-streets of selfishness and decay. I can speak the Truth without dumbing it down for those who use it as a means for selfishness. That would be me letting the sin of others determine how I spin the Truth. That’s not something I will ever do. Besides, when God decides that their time with the pigs is finished, He’ll open their eyes and show them their filth and they’ll need a home to come running to. Wash the sheet in your guest rooms. Stock up on the Truth to wash their stench and make sure you have a warm robe to cover their shame. The Truth calls people home. Church, be ready to be that home.

I’m going to let you watch a conversation, based on the words I shared above, play out. I know this blog is long, but I’m on a roll….

The following is a conversation between a reader and me:

Reader: There are times in my life that SATAN gets in my head and tells me….”Your sins are too great!”

I get so caught up in MY SINS (past) reliving the shame, reliving the sorrow, reliving the anger, reliving the SIN…. and can’t seem to move forward.

Even with repentance, even with PRAYERS, and meditation and Bible study, my SINs haunts me………

and I feel insecure about EVERYTHING.

Satan is cunning and I know that HE is lurking there…. in my mind…. I know that in those DARK places….growth, real growth happens………. but I am growing tired of the battle.

I surrender……….ALL.

(You think that is what God is waiting on…..my TRUE surrender?)”

Me: I hear what you’re saying. I’ve been there…

For the purpose of leading you to a thought process, I have a question for you:

• What have you learned from your failure?

Reader: What have I learned? That I stand in judgment of NO ONE…because I am as much a sinner as anyone else.

I learned that God’s love is the greatest HIGH ever. I felt it once so strong in me…surrounding me, that I felt “in HIS arms!” PURE LOVE! and I want that feeling every single day!

I learned that this life is full of stress, disappointments and at the end of the day, I know NOTHING! My hope rests in GOD taking over my life…

therefore, it all comes down to TRUST. Am I trusting enough the words that flow from my fingers……right here…right now… to KNOW that GOD HAS ALREADY GOT THIS! I just have to let go.

Me: What you have learned, through your failure, lines you up with scripture better than any Sunday school class could have. These scriptures have become a part of you. They are no longer something you try to do. See?…..

1) That I stand in judgment of NO ONE

• Luke 6:37

2) I learned that God’s love is the greatest HIGH ever.

• 1 John 4:8 & 16

3) I know NOTHING!

• 1 Corinthians 13:9

4) My hope rests in GOD taking over my life…

• Psalm 25:5 & Psalm 39:7

5) it all comes down to TRUST

• 2 Corinthians 1:9

6) to KNOW that GOD HAS ALREADY GOT THIS!

• Job 42:2

7) I just have to let go.

• Luke 9:62; Philippians 3:12-13

The key to understanding the magnitude of grace and the key to being able to let go of your past is to see that God is using your life experiences to mold you into who He created you to be. Your failures no longer have the power over you, they are used by God to teach you the things you need to know and equip you with the tools that you need for your God designed purpose. See your failure as a teaching tool, not as a flaw. Grace gives Life where there was supposed to be death. Grace gives failure a purpose. When you ask ‘why’, answer your own question with what you’ve learned.

The proof for what I am saying is in your own words/experience and it is backed by scripture:

Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. -2 Corinthians 1:9

Remind yourself of this every time you try to look back over your shoulder to determine your future…..

Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead… Philippians 3:12-13

Reader: Thank you for showing me HIS truth through the WORD. Your blog is a must read for me! Thank you for this ministry.

**********************************************************************

Don’t look back. It will only turn you into a ‘pillar of salt.’ Gather your lessons and move forward into the wide open spaces of freedom in grace.

They’re listing her sins. They’re reciting her selfish internal thoughts. The weight of her mistakes splinters her bones. Her excuses give them more ammunition. More territory.

She’s writhing. She’s not like what they’re saying. She’s not that bad, she just made a mistake. Why won’t someone save her?

With the turning of the tide, comes the call of death to pride. And through the waters glide, no more will I hide.
Do what you will, My Father. My cry. Under your wings I commit my spirit, so by your grace I may fly.

If she isn’t that bad, then she will always be in that place of talking her way out of the accusations as though there were an excuse big enough to save her.

What if she were to stop dog-paddling? If she let herself sink in the sea of her mistakes and offered no fight against her accusers. If she pleads guilty, then the accusations can’t hurt her anymore.

The way out is to stop fighting for yourself. You’ll never catch up to the rumors. You’ll never be able to clear your name. Excuses can only get you in to sin, but they can never get you out. Abandon yourself. It’s the only way to find that God will never abandon you. You find Him when you’re broken. His strength in your weakness. The eternal embrace at the end of you.

Entering into death-to-self by admitting guilt and letting the punishment commence is met with a decree signed by God that the punishment has been paid and the sin has been wiped clean. The only way you can know that kind of freedom is to stop dog paddling. Have faith that after the death-to-self comes the resurrection. You may never recover your good name from your old life, but if you’re dead to it you won’t know and if you do then you won’t care.

If we get included in Christ’s sin-conquering death, we also get included in his life-saving resurrection. We know that when Jesus was raised from the dead it was a signal of the end of death-as-the-end. Never again will death have the last word. When Jesus died, he took sin down with him, but alive he brings God down to us. From now on, think of it this way: Sin speaks a dead language that means nothing to you; God speaks your mother tongue, and you hang on every word. You are dead to sin and alive to God. That’s what Jesus did. -Romans 6:6-11

Only let each person lead the life that the Lord has assigned to him, and to which God has called him. This is my rule in all the churches. -1 Corinthians 7:17 ESV

God has assigned a life to you. You don’t get to pick it any more than you get to pick the color of your eyes or who your parents are.

God has assigned a spiritual life to you. You don’t get to pick it any more than you get to pick how God reveals Himself to you or what you learn on the journey.

Everyone is looking for meaning. A world full of people who want to be part of a club that is too exclusive for them. Once they get in, they change the rules so that it’s harder for the next.

Don’t let the self-important religious designers make you feel like God is only with you as long as you are with them. They craft a life they think best represents God, but their representation is catered to who they are. Then they push that on you and pressure you to measure up. They only do this so that they can feel okay with themselves. They let you in one way, then require you to be another way in order to remain.

Was anyone at the time of his call already circumcised? Let him not seek to remove the marks of circumcision. Was anyone at the time of his call uncircumcised? Let him not seek circumcision. -1 Corinthians 7:18 ESV

You are where you’re supposed to be. You are who you were created to be. Everything happens for a reason and lessons are catered to who you are, not who you think you’re supposed to be. If you continually feel like you need to be somewhere else so that God can find you, then you’ll never know the peace of just being. He is. You are.

Each one should remain in the condition in which he was called. -1 Corinthians 7:20 ESV

God is big enough to be wherever you are. He doesn’t weigh you down with a list of criteria, thereby putting the responsibility of being blameless on you. If you could get the hang of that, then you don’t need Jesus.

God doesn’t wait for you to come to Him. He doesn’t wait for you to get it right. He’s not a reward. Grace is not earned. You are accepted exactly where you are, so much to the point that He’s not asking you to change after you’ve found Him. He wants you. He takes pride in you. You’re not an accident or a project. You’re not a step-child, a foster child or an obligation. You are specifically crafted, intricately designed, and purposefully formed out of complete knowledge of anything and everything you were, are, and will be. Including whatever and wherever you happen to be in this exact moment.

If you’re a slave to something other than freedom, then position yourself for the out. There is an out. The out is grace and it’s enough. Stop fighting your perceived inadequacies while you try to prove yourself to the bystanders. You act as though they hold power over you.

Just be.

You were bought with a price; do not become slaves of men. So, brothers, in whatever condition each was called, there let him remain with God. -1 Corinthians 7:23 ESV

it’s another look at considering who you’re dancing for. maybe you can get people to support you, but at what cost?

refuse the fig leaf and run around naked. you won’t fit in. you’ll make some people uncomfortable, but there are others who will see the shamelessness and envy your freedom. Jesus covers your shame with Himself.

your not exposed, He is.

“But because God was so gracious, so very generous, here I am. And I’m not about to let his grace go to waste.” -1 Corinthians 15:10

There comes a point when it’s time to move on. Everybody gets to start again. You don’t have to apologize anymore. You don’t have to carry the weight of being the criminal any longer.

We tend to set the people, who we disappointed, over us. We wait for their approval to move on. People are not in the position to be able to judge your heart. They don’t understand their own heart, much less yours. Save that kind of authority for God. If He requires something from you, He’ll bring it to your attention.

“This is how I want you to conduct yourself in these matters. If you enter your place of worship and, about to make an offering, you suddenly remember a grudge a friend has against you, abandon your offering, leave immediately, go to this friend and make things right. Then and only then, come back and work things out with God.” -Matthew 5:23-24

God has not set people up to have authority over your eternal life. When you hang on to your mistakes, thinking you’re being humble and submissive, you’re actually shaming the cross. You’ve been forgiven and set free. God’s grace is not contingent on the forgiveness of others forgiving you. That is between them and God.

Grace is immediate. It’s not up to you or anyone else, it’s just a fact. You may never catch up to God on this one, but don’t purposely stay in the crap because you think you owe that much.

It’s time to move on. Make today a day when you don’t berate yourself or stand down because you’re not good enough. You may be trying to send a message of humility to the people watching you, but it ends up being a message of defiance to Jesus who makes up for your lack. If you can’t move on into the wide open space of possibility and hope, it’s because you don’t believe Jesus was enough for you. Be free. If someone has a problem, let the story of Jesus answer for you.

…not about to let His grace go to waste.

Let the balls drop and get off the unicycle. It’s time to go home and wash off the makeup. Leave the circus to the bearded ladies.

If this isn’t about you, then you can do what you want. Have you thought about what you want lately? I bet not. The circus is a time consuming act. Think about it. Sky’s the limit, you can’t mess this up. You’re free to eat what you want, drink what you want, say what you want, touch what you want. No punishment, no death.

What do you want?

Freedom is a purifier. Honesty is a starting point. Being real is the only way to get anywhere real.

Slaves don’t think about what they want because they don’t know what they want. Give them freedom and let them figure it out. Keep them slaves and they remain dehumanized. Fear is the only reason why you wouldn’t set someone free to do as they please. There is this corrosive belief that men, when left to their own devices, will conjure up an insurmountable evil. I have three things to say about that:

1. Fear is the opposite of Love. So, it’s the opposite of God.
2. Men are not left to their own devices. Has it not occurred to you that God is real?
3. You project what is within yourself on to those around you. What you fear and try to control in others is only a reflection of what you see in yourself. You’re the one with the problem. Get the plank out of your own eye so you can see clearly.

…if it comes back it’s yours…

He set us free because He’s not afraid of where we’ll go. He is real. And He has really taken up residence in your heart, so He’s not afraid of an evil He has crowded out. When He projects what is in Him on to us, we glow. He trusts the ‘Him’ in us. This isn’t an arranged marriage and it’s not a duty. He knows that when you give a voice to what you want, you’ll want Him.

Because of that Cross, I have been crucified in relation to the world, set free from the stifling atmosphere of pleasing others and fitting into the little patterns that they dictate. Can’t you see the central issue in all this? It is not what you and I do—submit to …reject… It is what God is doing, and he is creating something totally new, a free life! -Galatians 6:15

He’s not afraid. He can sleep through the chaos of what terrifies you because He knows how this story ends. He had you figured out long before He created Eve’s womb. He’s been carrying you from the beginning and if you’d stop squirming long enough you’d realize that. No matter what you do, you’re still a child on the shoulders of the Father who saves you from drowning in your own flood.

I’ve been carrying you on my back from the day you were born, and I’ll keep on carrying you when you’re old. I’ll be there, bearing you when you’re old and gray. I’ve done it and will keep on doing it, carrying you on my back, saving you. -Isaiah 46:3-4

…if it doesn’t, it never was.’

Every person the Father gives me eventually comes running to me. And once that person is with me, I hold on and don’t let go. -John 6:35

They’ve been harnessed like animals to rules that were designed to benefit them. Instead of religious organizations trusting the individual relationship with God, they create pockets of entrapment for the people who made their mark by the ‘x’.

When anyone complies with any rule-keeping system, they throw away the gift of freedom that Jesus earned for them.

I am emphatic about this. The moment any one of you submits to circumcision or any other rule-keeping system, at that same moment Christ’s hard-won gift of freedom is squandered. -Galatians 5:2

The only reason to submit to a set of rules for moral conduct is because you don’t believe that what Jesus did was enough. That is the small print on the bottom line. You believe that your sin is more powerful than His crucifixion. He’s not enough for you. We are supposed to take a stand against fear driven religious legalism because of our faith in the finished work of Jesus.

Christ has set us free to live a free life. So take your stand! Never again let anyone put a harness of slavery on you. -Galatians 5:1

This should alarm you. If you submit to a set of rules, the rules become your master. You can’t serve two masters. These religious organizations, in trying to do a good thing, are causing you to choose between your job, your church, your education, or Jesus.

No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. -Matthew 6:24 NIV

It’s a wolf who looks like a sheep. It’s a trap.

Choose who you will serve. If choosing Jesus and freedom are not options because you want to work for your denomination, be a member of your church or go to a Christian University, then choose your religion. Choose who your predecessors chose. Choose what tradition tells you to choose…‘but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.’ (Josh24:15) A signed contract trades ownership from Jesus to the rules.

Most people believe that ‘falling from grace’ means ‘to sin.’ However, grace is forgiveness of sins. If you don’t sin, then you don’t need grace. Falling from grace is following a set of rules to keep yourself from sin.

I suspect you would never intend this, but this is what happens. When you attempt to live by your own religious plans and projects, you are cut off from Christ, you fall out of grace. -Galatians 5:4

Ignoring religion and devoting yourself to it are both dead ends. God has set things up to where you can’t win within yourself. You are bound to your need for Jesus.

So, what do we do with our freedom? Obviously we can’t win by doing whatever we want and we can’t win by obeying all the rules. The only way to keep your freedom is to live selflessly. Whatever that means to you. The root of sin is self, so if you live selfless, then you are not looking for your own gain and your not focusing on your rule abiding abilities.

For there is a root of sinful self-interest in us that is at odds with a free spirit, just as the free spirit is incompatible with selfishness. These two ways of life are antithetical, so that you cannot live at times one way and at times another way according to how you feel on any given day. -Galatians 5:17

Selfless people are free to love. That’s why we were set free. To love.

Legalism is helpless in bringing this about; it only gets in the way. -Galatians 5:23

When you actually know what this whole thing is all about, you don’t worry about yourself anymore and you don’t worry about the way others perceive you and your relationship with God. You are not like anyone else, you have your own flavor. As long as you’re not trying to get your own way or trying to keep yourself clean, then you can just be.

When you hear this stuff, you have to let it move beyond sentiment. Feel it change you. Feel the truth set you free.

Since this is the kind of life we have chosen, the life of the Spirit, let us make sure that we do not just hold it as an idea in our heads or a sentiment in our hearts, but work out its implications in every detail of our lives. That means we will not compare ourselves with each other as if one of us were better and another worse. We have far more interesting things to do with our lives. Each of us is an original. -Galatians 5:25-26

inspired by Galatians 5

God sits and watches as this caveman beats his chest and raises his stick. He flexes his muscles and sacrifices his best. He dances around the aromatic smoke and works up a sweat fanning it over to God.

God already gave the sacrifice, but for some reason, the man still wants to contribute. The only problem is, everything the man does pales in comparison to what God accomplished. The man is so busy trying to please God that he’s not even in touch with who God is or what he did.

God sits and watches the little boy tuck in his shirt and wash the dirt off his hands. He sees the little boy comb his hair over from a perfect part and tie his shoes. He waits as the little boy sings songs and keeps his eyes shut during prayer.

God sees the little boy and recognizes his effort, but he doesn’t get to watch him run. He doesn’t get to nurture him when he falls down. The boy will never fully understand who God is because he tries so hard to not need him. If the little boy never abandons fear of failure, he’ll never feel safe enough to run. If he never tries to run, he’ll never find out he was made to fly.

God watches us put in contributions to our salvation and purpose. He tells us to not worry about ourselves, but we still find ways to worry about ourselves. We’re missing out on who God is. God, the indweller and encompassor, is shut out by our moral recital.

The man who continues to live by achievement in the Law with high-minded sweat in light of the Truth is the same freed slave who went back to his old master, the Law, because of the discomfort of freedom.

If the Law were not important, it would not have had to be paid off. However, when you behave as though the sacrifice was not enough, what does that say to the Father?

God sacrificed his son so you wouldn’t have to be a slave to the law anymore. He gave because he wants to free you up to know who he is. Every time we try to earn our keep, we contradict the handout. Really knowing God produces change. Changing ourselves does not bring forth a knowledge of God.

Don’t be afraid, keep your faith simple.

Whoever becomes simple and elemental again, like this child,will rank high in God’s kingdom.  -Matthew 18:3

If your simple faith and disregard for your ‘self’ sends you running off in the wrong direction, he’ll come and get you. 

If someone has a hundred sheep and one of them wanders off, doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine and go after the one? And if he finds it, doesn’t he make far more over it than over the ninety-nine who stay put? Your Father in heaven feels the same way. He doesn’t want to lose even one of these simple believers. -Matthew 18:13-14

God set you free so that you can run without the fear of falling. You can stop worrying about getting it right and stop being afraid of getting it wrong. You can trust him. He’s got you covered.

Live carefree before God; he is most careful with you. -1 Peter 5:6

The way of a Jesus follower is narrow because we cannot bring our ‘selves’ through the opening. It’s difficult because we are attached to our ‘selves’.

Being a Jesus follower is the most difficult for those who think they are pretty decent human beings. Why would you die to a part of you that has nothing wrong with it? 

It’s tough for those who think they are ‘good’ to understand that ‘good’ isn’t good enough. 

Being a Jesus follower is difficult because you have to learn how to think with a different part of you. You have to learn to see with different eyes.

Scripture says nothing about all of these little addendum’s religion puts on being a Christ follower. Different churches have different visions for what it is to be a Christian. Very little of it has anything to do with what Jesus taught.

What is so frustrating for those who ask questions is that the church members know the right things to say, but are far from practicing what they preach. They’ll tell you that the only way to eternal life is believing in Jesus, but they’ll demand so much more in actuality. If you don’t believe it, then ask anyone who tripped in their walk, needed a miracle that never came or couldn’t conquer a bad habit. You’ll hear that they were never Christians, that they have some recessed sin or that they don’t have enough faith.

Being a Christian has nothing to do with what you don’t do.

I’m convinced—Jesus convinced me!—that everything as it is in itself is holy. We, of course, by the way we treat it or talk about it, can contaminate it. - Romans 14:13

Preachers stand in front of their shiny congregations and tell them they have to walk the walk if they’re going to talk the talk. People with known sin in their lives will squirm in their seats and vow a vow that lasts until Wednesday that they won’t do [insert sin] anymore. That’s fine, I get it, but they are not the only one’s who need to listen to that preacher. 

We should be listening to this stuff as if we had something to learn. The sixty-year-old, white-haired pew veteran needs to be called out in her opaque stockings. The relentless aunt with her dishwater hands and her mousy hair needs to know that the preacher isn’t just talking to the fifteen year old boys, they’re talking to them, too.

The preacher needs to stop trying to pinpoint who God is talking to. Don’t add to scripture when you’re trying to push some unknown listener over the edge. Give the scripture and let it wiggle back in forth as it settles in the dusty hearts. People will assume you’re not talking to them because you didn’t mention their sin while you were stabbing in the dark.

When you say, ‘walk the walk’. We think it means ‘walk like a Christian’ then you’ll give us seven and a half different characteristics and post more on the church blog. We go out and start making t-shirts with puffy paint and baking judgment into our bake-sale brownies. We’re a bunch of monsters because you’ve given fifteen different ways you can tell if someone is a Christian.

It’s disheartening to hear people teaching their own convictions and not teaching the truth. We are humans and we mess it up way too much to not simply stick to the basic teaching of Jesus. If you want to teach someone how to be a Christian, teach them how to love.

The way we know we’ve been transferred from death to life is that we love our brothers and sisters. Anyone who doesn’t love is as good as dead. - 1 John 3:14

All the rest is religious jewelry and pious cologne. 

If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don’t love, I’m nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate. If I speak God’s Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, “Jump,” and it jumps, but I don’t love, I’m nothing. If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love. - 1 Corinthians 13:1-3

Start with Love and all the other things will fall in to place. If we get the other stuff right, but mess up the love part, we’re done-for. The way of love is the only way. Obedience in forgiveness, selflessness, and love are the first steps to the freedom and depth of relationship with Jesus that we beg for. 

Love requires you to lose your ‘self’. And thank God because you can’t fit where you’re called to go. Be warned, losing your ‘self’ is excruciating and crazy liberating. It’s the last thing you think you need to lose and it’s the first step to freedom. What a contradictory and inside-out existence it is to be a follower of Jesus.

Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it. – Matthew 7:13