I am not a Facebook note writer. I am not a blogger.
I am adamant about this.
I don’t write for my own cheesy little website. That’s not the kind of person I am. I have always considered things like that to
be just a little bit…dumb. I’m not sure
why, I suppose it’s just because I want to look like I don’t have the time to
write for a blog. I want to look like I
have ‘better’ things to do. I am a
little nervous about letting people read my thoughts. I don’t want to be that blogger person.
I couldn’t sleep this morning: I’d been awake since 2:00
a.m. and then my clock was reading 4:30 a.m.
I was staring at the ceiling thinking and wondering what I was going to
do with my thoughts.
“Well, certainly not post them online,” I said to myself.
Almost before that thought was even complete I had another…
I realized that I was being prideful, arrogant, and selfish.
I am a bit of an arrogant person. I’ve spent 20 years living and learning this
about myself, and 20 years learning about what pride looks like in my
life. It wears a lot of different looks,
sometimes even disguises (many of which I have yet to unmask).
One of the most common looks is the “I’m not like that” one
style. Pride spends an awful long time
being concerned with what it is not; with looking down on other people and
separating itself from certain groups.
Perhaps it’s time for me to be humble enough to stop talking
about what I am not and brave enough to try and admit what I am.
I am young. I am
learning. I am astonished and
overwhelmed by the world. I am
inexperienced. I am muddled and dazed by
all the ideas and facts and debates in my head.
I am a writer by nature, it’s how I think and express myself best. I am passionate. I am foolish.
I look around me and I see that the world is very big. I am amazed by how quickly things change, how
vibrant life is and how fast it moves. I
feel small. Like a leaf in a flash
flood. I love it. I love that the world is so huge and so fast.
As a Christian, I believe that this is all part of a
plan. I believe that this huge,
wonderful, messy, fast-paced earth was created by a powerful God. I believe that He has a plan for this earth: that He would be made known. Made known, introduced to the world as its
God. That His name would be renowned and
that people would want to turn to Him and obey Him. I believe He wants that because He wants
relationship with us. This true God is
the God who wants to free us from Godless living, but also from religiosity. Christianity is the religion that has
something to say to both the person who loves rules and religion and the person
that wants nothing to do with both of those things: It’s not about rules and it’s not about
breaking them. I believe God send His
Son to die and be a fulfillment of the rules.
We are all rulebreakers, no matter how hard we try to live up to the
law. We are in debt to justice. Christ died as an atonement for our sin, our
law-breaking. He died so that there
could be both justice and relationship with God. So we don’t have to try our whole lives to
measure up and never make it, and we don’t have to give up and break the rules
knowingly. Christ’s death on the cross
is an invitation to everyone to be a part of something that is more important
than rules.
Believing this changes everything. I don’t have to worry about what I am not. I can focus on what I am. I am a child of God. I was broken, I am being made whole.
This plan I’m babbling about, it’s about making whole. Tim Keller explained it well in one of his
lectures. God created a world meant for
shalom. Shalom means peace,
harmony. Right now, that’s not how
things are. For example, our bodies were
made so that all the organs and parts would work together so that we can be
strong, agile and healthy: we were made for physical shalom. Yet we break down, we get sick, we tire, we
die. Our intellect, soul, and emotions
were made to work together with a common passion and goal: psychological
shalom. Yet we are torn, we want what we
know we shouldn’t have, we are too afraid to do what we know we should, we get
depressed, and our minds break down. We
were made for community and unity, people working together, sharing what we
have and meeting each other’s needs: social shalom. Yet we get annoyed, we argue, we compete, we
go to war, we kill each other.
The Christian’s duty and delight is to change that, to break
the cycle of unrest. True relationship
with God results in lives devoted to restoring shalom. Peace from God, harmony, wholeness. That is what I ache to be a part of
daily. It blows my mind to think that as
a child of God I get the opportunity to devote my life to something so
meaningful. I am thrilled that I have
been invited by God to be a part of His peace when I am so small and silly and
arrogant. Because Christ died in our
place and our debts to the rules are paid by His blood, we can all be a part of
the peace if we choose to follow Him.
This gets me more excited than anything else.
It is humbling for me to post this note. I don’t want to. I dislike blogging and I dislike posting
notes on Facebook. I am not a
blogger. But I want to stop focusing on
what I am not. I want to cut out the
pride that can tear my life apart.
I want shalom.
