A Follow-Up

I received this message from someone concerning my last post, and thought it might be helpful to share it, along with my response.

The original message (edited for anonymity):
just read part of your blog and was struck by something the Lord taught me a few years ago.................He taught me that his conviction is always a gentle reminder or prodding that I have done wrong and that what you have described as "A sledgehammer of conviction" is really Satan talking. God taught me that he does not resort to 2x4s to get his message across but instead his message is always delivered with a gentle reminder sent with love.
God taught me that the devil loves to condemn us but that God just wants to help us. In other words, condemnation and conviction are 2 very different things. The first is Satan screwing with our heads, the second is God's loving guidance.

My response:
I think that's a good point actually. Like my RA told me a few years ago, "Satan is the first one to tempt us to sin, and the first one to turn around and point the finger." Or, in the lyrics of a good worship song
"When Satan tempts me to despair
And tells me of the guilt within,
Upward I look and see Him there,
Who made an end to all my sin."

So I definitely think that there is a inordinate amount of guilt that Satan can make one feel, to the point of despair (although there is guilt we should feel - remorse over sin).

But I still think there are 2x4's in God's arsenal. And I am driven to think this based on what I've read in the Bible.
For instance, Psalm 51 is David's psalm of repentance concerning his adultery with Bathsheba. David is definitely aware of his sin, and definitely feeling convicted (as well as convictions intended end, which is repentance)
v. 1 - "have mercy on me...blot out my transgressions."
v. 2 - "Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity"
v. 3 - "For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me."

So David is definitely convicted, and he describes how God convicted him in verse 8. David is addressing God with a prayer, and asking that he might "hear joy and gladness" and then
"let the bones that you have broken rejoice."

God convicted David so heavily that he described it as his bones being broken. A sledgehammer, if you will.

I see the same thing in Psalm 32, where David again describes God's conviction of his sin as
"when I kept silent [that is about not confessing], my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy upon me"

God's conviction with David was heavy. It made his bones rot and then broke them.

What you have pointed out about Satan's accusations are true, yet what I have shown about conviction being heavy is also true. So what's the balance? I think it can be found in 2 Cor. 7:5-12. There Paul is speaking about a severe letter that he wrote to the Corinthians, confronting them on their sin, and their response in chapter 7 is grief. But they have "godly grief" (v. 10, i.e. right conviction) which "produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret." He then lists the attributes of godly grief, including "eagerness to clear yourselves," "indignation," and "longing."

So then, right conviction (which can be a sledgehammer) is characterized by repentance from the sin, as well as eagerness to not sin in that same way again. Wrong conviction (Satan's accusations) would be feelings of regret over consequences of sin, or despair over sin that focuses on self and not on forgiveness offered by God if you repent and stop sinning (1 John 3:6).

So I think that's at least part of the difference between the two, and I thank you for bringing up that point.

This Is One Of Those Posts That Starts By Talking About One Thing...

...and ends talking about another.

I need a top ten list entitled "Things I Wish Jesus Had Never Said." I think that part about radical amputation would be on it, as well as that one bit about the rich kid where Jesus told him to sell everything and give to the poor (and in case you think that was only for the rich kid, He repeats it to us in Luke 12:33).

But one definitely near the top of said hypothetical list would be this whopper from John 15.
Every time someone talks about loving God or loving people, this little guy comes to mind and all I can think is "Man, I screwed up."

I keep coming back to this passage in the 3 a.m.s of life - where self-reflection replaces sleep and I become an evaluative insomniac. It's a bit masochistic to keep thinking about since it always reminds me how much I suck. And if you know me, you know I don't like to think about how much I suck. Which is why I need to think about it. I need to think about love and all the ways I fail and all the grace that God gives anyway.

Everyone knows Jesus wants people to love one another. Most over-emphasize it into bobble-head Jesus buddy that you stick on your dashboard and He gives you a tolerant thumbs-up to whatever lifestyle you live. But love does not equal tolerance, and that is a topic for another post.

I still haven't even told you which part of John 15 yet.

John 14-16 is Jesus' last words to His disciples before one of them disguised his knife-to-the-back with a kiss. And John 17 is His High Priestly Prayer for all the church. So these words are uber-important.

And it's just these two verses juxtaposed together that are the heavy sledgehammer driving the nail of conviction into my brain.
John 15:9 - "As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you."
John 15:12 - "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you."

Did you catch that? Jesus commands us to love each other the way he loves us. He loves us with the same love that God the Father has for Him. So we are to love each other with the kind of love that makes Jupiter seem like a marble. We are to love one another with the same love that God the Father has for God the Son.



Yeah, that sinking feeling of disappointment in your gut? I get that all the time.

That's because this verse reminds what all our self-flattery and layers of self-admiration try to keep us from remembering - that we really do fail. That no matter how much we think about how good we are, at the end of the day, we are pretty crappy. That all that talk about loving God and loving others are just words hanging limp and lifeless in the air. They have no action to back them up, because no action we could ever do could ever come close to the standard demanded.

It's ironic; you have to see that you really can't do anything before you'll ever get anywhere. Locomotion through surrender. You don't get to be anything until you see that you're nothing. You don't have any merit in you, although you may think you've got at least an ounce. But you're wrong (and so am I), we've got as much weight as a feather in space. And, mathematically, zero is infinitely less than one, so you are infinitely worse than you think you are.

And I'm in that same boat. I can exert all the Pharisee strength I want against the door of reward, but I don't have the right muscles to break it down.

I was going to write some about how much God the Father delights in Jesus, but I can't seem to get up the courage to write down that standard. More judgment on my head, if I did. I'd rather just revel in the grace given to me, for I am the failure at love, the disobedient and unholy child, unable to love the Father or the other children.

And so I repent. Dust and Ashes my close companions. The sackcloth my fashion statement. I can't do it Father, do it for me. Lift me from these shattered idea of myself, you're rod is too strong for my pride to withstand. I can't do it - I can do all things through God who strengthens me. I have no power - except that of God working in me. Lord help me.

Like I said, I started talking about love, and somehow moved to repentance. Maybe that's the way most topics should end - on our knees.

August Is For Linking

I meant to link to this article earlier. It's brings some insight to a very very very very very prominent problem among young couples and men in particular (if you don't think it's that bad, you have either been unobservant, or lied to.)

Anyway, check it out. It's called The Case for Early Marriage.

A few quotes to whet your appetite.

"Most young Americans no longer think of marriage as a formative institution, but rather as the institution they enter once they think they are fully formed."

"successful marriages are less about the right personalities than about the right practices, like persistent communication and conflict resolution"

Check it out, yo.

On Being A Hypocrite

"Worthy"
A word I whisper through quivering lips. A word I hope to shout into the dust one day, my head bowed low before a bloody Lamb (and an untamed Lion).

"the twenty-four elders fall down before him who is seated on the throne and worship him who lives forever and ever, saying, "Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created."

But right now, I can only whisper and tremble. A hope on the edge of caught breath. A hope that I'm not instantly judged for hypocrisy. The word represents a life lived in honor of that cry. If He is worthy of glory and honor and power, then by extension, I am not. And somehow in the path from head to hands, the signals get mixed in misfiring synapses and I live the opposite of what I say. (I am the one that they warned me about).

It's so odd. I know I'm marching steadily towards a judgment day, but it seems I can't help but veer off onto side streets and meander back alleys where I would be ashamed to finally meet my Maker.

I'm quite winded from the running. Every time I catch myself in a neighborhood dimly lit by red lights, and I sprint to the narrow road I was on. Yet I seem drunken with irrationality, and with staggering steps, my feet find the deadly descending path again. My heart beats hard as I fight my way back to the finish line few find - I'd like a rest. I'd like the Rest. I want to exercise my lungs, not by panting, but by shouting and singing.

But I need help, because when I add up all the good things that make me righteous, the sum total comes to Pharisee. And Jesus words keep ringing in my ears like the funeral dirge of church bells:
"For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven."

I'm a damnable hypocrite (but not a damned one). You see, somewhere along this vapor line called life, I had Jesus knock at my heart's door. I didn't answer - so He kicked it in, grabbed me and pulled me into His kingdom, all without my permission, I might add. And somewhere in that tussle, we switched clothes. I took on white, Downy-fresh linens, and He donned my putrid, mud-caked rags (that reek of the dump).

There's no way to be more righteous than the Pharisees. Except to be perfect. And nobody's perfect.
Oh wait, there is one other way. If for some reason, God somehow decided to give you the righteousness of somebody who was perfect. But why would He do that?

Sidenote: the moon is full tonight. It's dangerous for me to drive because that same gravity that lifts the oceans keeps lifting my eyes. She will never stop wooing me.