The Weeds Within Us

The Weeds Within Us

by | Aug 10, 2023 | Thoughtful Thursdays

In Jesus’s teachings, in many of His parables, He talks a lot about how sin and sinners are mixed into the world among the righteous. We know from the parable of the wheat and the weeds, for instance, that the Lord has said that they’ll continue to grow together until the final judgement, when He separates them.

I’d always read those at face value, let’s call it. That, as Jesus explains, there are the righteous and the sinners.

But there’s another layer of subtlety to it (don’t you just love how Scripture is so rich that it allows for all these layers of meaning??) that our pastor has been drawing out this year.

That it isn’t just THE WORLD that is filled with both righteous and sinners. It’s US too.

Within each of us, there is the goodness of God…and there is sin. Within each of us is corruption and incorruption. Within each of us is the virtue that pulls us closer and closer to the light of the Lord, and the tendency toward evil that’s always trying to drag us back into the darkness of the world.

A couple weeks ago, after a sermon focused on that idea from the parable of the Wheat and the Weeds, my husband pointed out very thoughtfully that sometimes–often?–it isn’t even just that we let those weeds grow among the good stuff. It’s that we tend those weeds with as much care as we do the wheat.

That pierced. Because I know it’s true in me. How often do I cling to–nurture, feed–the bitterness of an old grudge, because it’s strangely satisfying? How often do I cling to a comfortable understanding instead stretching into a new one? How often do I cling to old prejudices? Or embrace new ones? How often do I cling to the thought of me over them?

How often do we tend our weeds so carefully that we soon insist they’re not weeds at all? Look how tall they’ve grown! Look how hardy!

In the P&P group, as we show each other our gardens and favorite plants, we’ve had some moments of laughter as we share yards that are green more from weeds than grass, because that’s what actually grows. And in a lawn, I really don’t care if it’s more clover than grass in some places, because it’s just a lawn.

But in my spirit? In my soul? I ought to care. I ought to look with more care on what I’m growing, what I’m tending, which plants are healthy and strong. Because I don’t want it to be the sins.

Of course, the rebel in me asks, “What makes something a weed, anyway?” According to the definition, it’s used to describe plants growing where they are not desired, especially when they choke out the desirable plants.

Ahh. That’s actually really good. Because even if someone decides they do want that weed–we all know people who like their prejudices, their bitternesses, their agression, their selfishness, right?–that doesn’t make it a good plant because it’s choking out the MORE desirable ones.

When we nurture prejudice, it chokes out love. When we nurture bitterness, it chokes out forgiveness.

When we nurture selfishness, it chokes out Jesus, who pointed us always toward loving our neighbor and our God above ourselves.

For the purposes of the parables, I think it’s safe to say that the “desirable” plants are the ones that bear fruit. They are the wheat, the vines, the olive trees. They are the ones that sustain our spirits, not just our flesh. That draw us closer to Him and to each other.

The weeds…the weeds aren’t just the people that do otherwise. They are the parts of us that do otherwise. That lead us astray. Make us lazy. Blind our eyes to His loving Truth and substitute our own tarnished version in its place.

But we’re called to #BeBetter. We’re called to nurture the good seed instead of the bad. Will it still be there? It will. Because until we reach our final perfection in Him, we know we keep on sinning, keep on fighting that urge to sin. But we shouldn’t be fertilizing those. Pruning them. Maximizing their growth. We should, when we can, be weeding them out. And when we can’t, when like in that parable they’re too closely entwined with the good, we should pay attention to our seasons of harvest, at the least. Like a field, we don’t have just one at the end of our lives. We have many seasons, many harvests.

What have we produced this year? This season?

Evaluate it. Which parts are good? Which parts will nourish ourselves and our families and others…and which parts deserve only to be thrown into the fire?

When we put our trust in the Lord, He sees His own righteousness in us and that sanctifies and saves us. But He makes it pretty clear that we’re still expected to work always toward tending that garden plot of our lives, of our souls. We’re to be always striving forward, onward. And we can, because He lends us His wisdom and strength and goodness.

What weeds have we been tending too carefully, friends? Which ones are choking out His promises?

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The Value of Our Work

The Value of Our Work

by | Aug 3, 2023 | Thoughtful Thursdays

God created man in His image. And He created us to work. We see that even from the first story of the first man. When Adam was placed in the garden, even before the Fall, he had tasks to do. He tended the garden. He named and cared for the animals. He wasn’t lazing about all day. He was working…but the work was easy and rewarding. Then, of course, sin entered the world, and with it, work became heavy and hard and not always rewarding.

Still, we do it. We do it because it’s part of our makeup. And we rant a bit about those who refuse to do it, right? I remember complaints about “kids today don’t want to work” from the day when I was a kid and I’m still hearing it now. Frankly, you can hear it from books and texts a hundred years old too, or two hundred, or three. There have always been those who don’t want to work–and they are always looked down upon by those who do. Work ethic is recognized as a virtue.

Think about that, though. A virtue is more than doing something because we have to or should. A virtue is when we long to do right, not just because it’s right, but because it draws us closer to God. Closer to each other. And yes–work can and does absolutely do that too. Because whether we’re tending a field or garden or writing books or filing papers in an office, whether we’re tending the sick or faulty mechanical things or answering phones, work is creative. Sustaining. Part of our nature. We need to work…and we need to reap the fruits of our labor.

This, too, is how God made us. He never intended that we sweat and toil for nothing. He meant us to be able to look with satisfaction on what we’ve accomplished–just like He did. When He finished His mighty act, He sat back and said, “This is good.”

We all want to be able to do that. We want to know that we’ve accomplished something good…and we want others to recognize that too. We want to know that by our efforts, our families are fed and clothed and society is a little better. We want to know that it means something.

As a writer–and as someone whose family survives on what I bring in from my writing and design work–I don’t spend my days in a field. But I do spend 10 hours a day at my desk, toiling with fingers on keyboard. I have perpetual back and neck pain, frequent headaches. It’s work. I love it…but it’s work. And that work becomes all the harder when society enters a phase of devaluing it. When a writer hears readers say they won’t pay more than a couple dollars for a book it took them six months to write, that hurts.

When a farmer is told that their produce is overpriced, or when government regulations tell them they can’t sell it, that hurts. When someone who has worked twenty years at a railroad is laid off and fired because the location is downsizing, that hurts. When a pastor’s church is shut down…when a doctor is sued for something that went wrong through no fault of their own…when a lawyer is called nasty names even though they work for others all day…it hurts.

We need to work. We need to reap the fruits of our labor. We need our work to be appreciated.

Here’s the thing though–we can’t ever make someone else appreciate what we’re doing. I can’t make readers agree with the new CEO of Barnes and Noble and say, “Books are not overpriced.” I can’t force anyone to consider the dozens of people who spent countless hours on each book that’s produced. I can’t make anyone do the math of hours put in by all those people, from author to editor to printer to accountant, and admit that $18.99 is actually pretty reasonable. I can’t even say, “Continue to undervalue us and we’re simply all going to go out of business and then you won’t have stories to read anymore.” Because you will. There’s a glut. There are plenty of self-publishers with lower overhead willing to sell for a couple bucks. I can’t say any of that with any insistence, because no one will listen.

But here’s what I can do: I can value YOU.

I can value the work you put in day after day. I can praise you for the beautiful house you keep. The wonderful meals you cook. The love with which your raise your kids. I can thank you for answering the phone at the office. For handling all the appointments. For welcoming me with a smile when I come in, anxious, before my appointment. I can see a train running along the tracks and breathe a prayer of gratitude for the hundreds of people whose efforts allow it to do so, so that the goods I consider valuable can make it to the stores. I can smile at the truck drivers who do the same, instead of grumbling at how I hate to pass them on the highway because they’re big and scary. I can appreciate the produce in my stores or farmer’s market or direct-from-farm shed, knowing that the five dollars they ask me for that watermelon represents months of planting and tending and care. I can offer a kind word to the cashier. I can thank the customer service person. I can appreciate the wisdom of the doctor. The study of the lawyer. The yearning of the teacher to impart knowledge.

None of us can make someone value US–but we can value THEM. And if we all focus on what work others are doing instead of what they aren’t…if we stop complaining about prices and lazy people and how it would be so different if we ran things…if we tend the dreams of others and dare to dream ourselves…well, then, I think we’re even more like Adam than we think. Because then, the garden we’re tending isn’t just the plants and animals. It’s the people around us.

And I know we’ll see a far different, even more rewarding fruit. Because when we value each other, the reward is love. Life. Eternity.

When we value each other, we truly live in the image of God…because He values us all as His beloved.

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Proof

Proof

by | Jul 27, 2023 | Thoughtful Thursdays

But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and lead the children of Israel out of Egypt?”

He answered, “I will be with you; and this shall be your proof that it is I who have sent you: when you bring my people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this very mountain.”

Exodus 3:11-12

Have you ever spoken the words, “Prove it”?

Has anyone ever demanded it of you?

What answers were acceptable in that situation? Usually, when someone challenges you to prove something, you have to produce evidence. History. Documentation. Indisputable logic.

According to Merriam-Webster, proof is “the cogency of evidence that compels acceptance by the mind of a truth or a fact” or maybe “something that induces certainty or establishes validity.” An older use of the word is “the quality or state of having been tested or tried.”

In Geometry, a proof takes you step by step from a given statement to a new discovery. In physical science, proof is the result of testing, a meaning that we still retain for things like alcoholic content, which is known only by the test it undergoes.

Always, always the word carries a meaning of demonstration through evidence.

Now let’s look at that passage in Exodus again. When I read this recently, those words from God jumped out at me, and I couldn’t quite square them. Moses questions whether he can do the task assigned to him, and God’s answer is “I’ll be with you. And I’ll prove it to you–you’ll come back here and worship me.”

Now, if anyone but God had said this, I’d frown and say, “Yeah, um, that’s not proof.” It contains no reasoning. No logic. No step-by-step deduction. At best, it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy–of course Moses would bring them back to Horeb (aka Sinai) to worship, because God just said he would. Right?

Clearly I was missing something. And the question hounded me all day. Answers flitted into and out of my mind as I went about my tasks; first I’d think, “Oh, of course!” and then an hour later I’d go, “What was that again? I’ve lost it.” I’m still not sure what I thought I’d come up with at the time…but as I continued to contemplate the question over the next several days, something settled in my heart.

God swears only by Himself, because there is no greater thing in the universe to swear by. God will occasionally appease us when we ask for proof, yes, but a wet or dry fleece is a pretty silly little thing, right? When He’s telling us to do something, when He’s inviting us to walk beside Him into our destiny, to change the course of a nation, of history, or just of our own lives, He can offer visible, logical proof.

But sometimes…often…He offers something far better. Something far bigger. Something far less easily comprehended by our finite minds.

He offers Himself.

The proof, my friends, is the promise.

When God is speaking to Moses this first time, the ultimate proof He gives is the very promise it follows: I will be with you. I will lead you. And you’ll know it, because I’m going to lead you right back to where you started. You’ll know it because I’m not just calling my people to freedom. I’m calling them to worship.

That was the promise–that was the proof. When asked for evidence, the best, biggest, and deepest form of it is worship.

Maybe that makes little sense to us, but think about it in context. The Israelites had been living in Egypt for hundreds of years. We know from other Scripture passages that most Israelites worshiped the gods of Egypt, and if a few remembered the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, it was an imperfect knowledge. Few, if any, understood what that meant. What He demanded. How to serve Him. It’s no coincidence that all the Laws handed down had the common theme of setting yourselves apart. No mixing. No blending. Purity must saturate their lives, inside and out. Necessary instruction because it WASN’T how they were living.

Hundreds of thousands of people serving Egypt, its gods, and themselves…hundreds of thousands of people that had no knowledge or respect of Moses…hundreds of thousands of people that ached for freedom as much as they feared it.

To those people, through that unknown man, God promised something unheard of. You will all worship me here, in one place. How? Because I am with you.

Gods weren’t known for walking by humanity’s side in the ancient days. Gods were capricious. Demanding. Fickle. Cruel. Gods promised success to those who worshipped them right without knowing the rules.

The Lord showed Himself to be different. He promised worship through the rules because He loves us and is moved by our cries.

This isn’t geometric. It isn’t logical. It isn’t evidentiary.

It’s something better. It’s God coming down. Igniting a fire without burning us up. Calling out to us where we least expect Him, when we’re just going about our work. Charging us with a task we know we can’t do, and promising that we will do it, because He is with us. And we’ll know it’s true, because He’ll meet us there.

His proof isn’t just what has come before–it’s what will come when we obey.

His proof is His promise. And we learn it only by obeying the call.

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Themes for Seasons

Themes for Seasons

by | Jul 20, 2023 | Thoughtful Thursdays

I know we’ve all had this experience. Something’s on our mind or jumps out at us somewhere…and then we keep smacking into it again and again and AGAIN.

Sometimes it can be bad things, things we’d rather not be reminded of over and over. When we’re in seasons of grief, all the reminders of the loved one we lost can be heavy and hard. When we’re under stress from something in particular, that something shows up everywhere. When we’re dreading something, it surrounds us.

Sometimes the repeated message is one of encouragement, lifting us up day after day when we need it most. Speaking the same edifying words into our spirits day after day, hour after hour, from different sources and different mouths, but always with the same message. Maybe it’s a reminder that we’re loved…or that we’re seen…or that He’s there with us, we’re not alone. Maybe it’s encouragement to press on, to persevere, to run the race with endurance.

Often, in my life at least, I run into specific themes…themes for seasons. Sometimes they speak directly to whatever I’m going through, sure–and sometimes they alert me to something I know I need to pay attention to. Or sometimes I’m pretty sure I just begin to notice what’s already, always surrounding me. Those are fun too.

In the last month or so, I’ve been bumping into a lot of themes that speak to God being the God of the depths and the heights, of sea and of air, heaven and earth. How He calms the waves and the wind, silences the storm, and rescues us in our distress. Why have these jumped out at me? Well, because I’m playing around with a story that leans heavily on these natural elements as themes. There were so many mentions of them in my monthly devotional book though that I stashed the June edition with my research books to draw on whenever I’m writing this story. I literally just opened it to a random page just now and saw this from Psalm 107

Some sailed to the sea in ships
to trade on the mighty waters.
These men have seen the Lord’s deeds,
the wonders he does in the deep.

For he spoke; he summoned the gale,
raising up the waves of the sea.
Tossed up to heaven, then into the deep;
their soul melted away in their distress.

They staggered, reeled like drunken men,
for all their skill was gone.
Then they cried to the Lord in their need
and he rescued them from their distress.

He stilled the storm to a whisper:
all the waves of the sea were hushed.
They rejoiced because of the calm
and he led them to the haven they desired.

These words jumped out at me first because I thought, “Oh hey, I can use these as quotes to start my chapters and sections!” Always the writer, LOL. But they resonate for a far deeper reason.

They resonate because even though I’m not a sailor, even though I’ve never really even been on a ship, even though I’m never in the middle of the sea, beset by literal storms, crying out to God for a very physical deliverance, I still get it. We all do.

Because we’ve all had seasons of life when we feel adrift on an endless sea. When the storms come upon us, and all our strength fails. We all have seasons in life when all our skill, all our talent, all our abilities fail us. We can’t do it anymore. We can’t win against forces so much stronger than us. We can only cry out to God.

And that’s all we have to do. Because God will rescue us. He’s there. He’s not only there, He has the power. The power to calm our storms to a mere whisper. The power to reduce the waves that would swamp us to a mother’s comforting shush. The power to pull us out of the depths and deliver us to a safe harbor.

We’ve all been there, or will be. That’s why Psalm 107 still matters to us today, even when we’re landlocked lubbers. And maybe it’s also why trips to the coast are my favorite–where I can see the vastness of this world stretching out to the horizon. See the minuscule grains of sand beneath my feet. And know that my God is the God of the infinite, in both directions. He is the God of the universe, the galaxy, the solar system, the world, the sea. He is the God of the grains and the crystals and the cells and the molecules and the atoms and the sub-atomic particles. The God of the nano and the macro. The biggest and the smallest. Nothing is outside His power, even when it is so, so outside my own.

That’s a big part of what I want to explore in this story I’m playing with. And it matters, because it’s a big part of the theme for this season of my life.

What’s the theme of your season? What words have you come across over and over again these past weeks or months? What resonates deep in your spirit and speaks to your heart today?

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The Water Before Us

The Water Before Us

by | Jul 13, 2023 | Thoughtful Thursdays

Last week, the story of Hagar and Ishmael made its way into my reading. Like most other tales from Genesis, it’s so familiar that my eyes sometimes glaze over when I get to it. “Yeah, yeah,” I think to myself. “I know. They got kicked out, ran out of water, angel shows her a well…”

Which is why I stared at those familiar words a good long time last week when something jumped out at me that never had before, despite the dozens of times I’ve read this story.

So she put the child down under a shrub, and then went and sat down opposite him, about a bowshot away; for she said to herself, “Let me not watch to see the child die.” As she sat opposite Ishmael, he began to cry.

God heard the boy’s cry, and God’s messenger called to Hagar from heaven: “What is the matter, Hagar? Don’t be afraid; God has heard the boy’s cry in this plight of his. Arise, lift up the boy, and hold him by the hand; for I will make of him a great nation.”

Then God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water. She went and filled the skin with water, and then she let the boy drink.

Genesis 21:15-19 (emphasis mine)

You can tell from the bold words here what jumped out at me this time. God opened her eyes, and SHE SAW A WELL OF WATER. He didn’t send that angel to touch a rock or the earth and make water spring up where there had been none before. She didn’t discover a hidden stream. She suddenly saw a WELL–as in, access to water dug by men. Something that would have been there all along.

Her salvation, her child’s salvation was always right there in front of her. She just couldn’t see it.

This isn’t recounted to us like the story of Pharaoh or even Paul–God didn’t harden her heart or blind her first, then reveal it all to her. She was just a scared mother, tossed out of her home with her son. She’d given him the last of their supplies. They were wandering in the wilderness of Beersheba.

Did she even bother looking around? Or did she just assume, “This is it. Sarah wanted us gone, and we’re gone. Done for. There’s no help for us out here.”

She was defeated. Utterly, totally defeated. So defeated that she didn’t even bother calling out to the God of Abraham for help. Why should she? Abraham was the one who had sent her out here. He had to have known that one skin of water wouldn’t be enough. Maybe she was angry with him. Maybe she was hurt. Or maybe none of that had a chance of lodging in her heart, because it was too full of impending grief.

She didn’t want to watch her child suffer and die.

Think about this for a minute. If I was out in the desert with my child and we were out of water, I’m pretty sure this wouldn’t be my reaction. I would hold him close. I would suffer right there with him. But maybe I’m judging too harshly, actually.

She put him under a bush. The only shade she could find–but bushes aren’t large. Probably not big enough for both of them. My first thought was, “Wow, Hagar, that was selfish–leaving him to die alone while you go away because you can’t stand to watch.” But you know, I could have it all wrong. I think it’s just as likely, more likely, that she gave him the last scrap of mercy she could find in that wasteland. She gave him the last of their water. She gave him the only sliver of shade. She did every last thing she could do.

And then she was out of ideas. Out of power. Out of resources. She knew–she KNEW–that this was it. They were both going to die. And that heartache did her in.

Then Ishmael did something very simple.

He started crying.

Now, let’s take a step back. This narrative reads like she’s toting around a toddler, but we know that Ishmael was ten years older than Isaac, who was himself three or four by now. This isn’t a child. This is a teenager.

A teenager, so weakened by their plight that his mother has to all but carry him. A teenager, a teenage boy who just watched his mother give him their last bit of hope and walk away to die. A teenager whose father had just cast him out of the only home he’d ever known.

He cried. He cried not in the confusion of a toddler, but with the desperation of a fully reasonable near-adult who knew, just as his mother did, that this was the end. He was too weak to crawl out from under that bush. He’d been too weak to crawl under it, she’d had to put him there. He cried. No words. Just the last of his water reserves, dripping from his eyes.

And God heard him. Neither he nor Hagar had cried out to God. But He heard him anyway. He heard him, because He’d never taken his attention off that abandoned mother and son. He’d told Abraham to obey Sarah’s wishes, knowing full well that He had great things in store for Ishmael too.

Still, He let them wander. He let them get to the end of their ropes. He let them try every…last…thing they could think of. He’d let them use up the last of their resources. He’d let them give up.

Maybe (though I don’t pretend to know the mind of God here!), He waited that extra moment, just to see if they would look beyond their despair to what was there before them the whole time. Or maybe He waited until the last vestiges of pride had fallen away. Maybe they had to be just that desperate before they were ready to hear the voice of an angel. Before they were ready to accept help from the hand of a God they hadn’t even petitioned directly.

The well was there the whole time. There. Just there. It was waiting, right there, as they stumbled to that bush, curled themselves into a ball, and gave up. It was there, right there, when they resigned themselves. It was there when Ishmael let himself cry.

It was there–but it took an act of God for Hagar to see it. It was there–and it was not only the direct answer to the wordless prayer of Ishmael’s cry, it was also the key to that promise, that command, the angel spoke just beforehand. “Arise, lift up the boy, and hold him by the hand; for I will make of him a great nation.”

The words, spoken to a woman blind with despair, could have sounded mocking. They could have sounded impossible. They probably felt unreachable. But then God opened her eyes, and she saw her salvation. She saw how they could take that next step toward a future worth chasing.

If I thought Hagar a little selfish at that abandonment on first glance, the last words of the passage I quoted should have corrected me. She did exactly what any mother would do, after she filled that skin–she gave the water to her son. She filled the skin and brought it directly to him.

How often are we like Hagar and Ishmael in this life? How often do we feel rejected by those who should love and protect us? How often do we feel like we’ve used up the last of our reserves? The last of our ideas? How often does life feel like a wilderness with a glaring, punishing sun and not enough shade?

How often do we do all we possibly can for our children, or our friends, or our spouses, or even ourselves, and KNOW that it isn’t enough? That we can’t save them?

How often does our own despair blind us to the help just a few steps away?

There aren’t always happy endings to our stories, or at least to our chapters. There are tragedies. There is loss. There is grief. There is pain. Sometimes, there really is no well in the wilderness–nothing that will stave off the horrible reality we dread most.

But there is always a God who hears our cries, even when we don’t have the words to direct them to Him. There is always a God watching us, ready to keep His covenant and fulfill His promise.

That doesn’t mean that He will “make a great nation” of each of us. We aren’t all promised prosperity and good health and long life.

But we’re all promised the best reward imaginable when we let Him take us by the hand: being in His presence. And when we’re there, by His side, it isn’t even about relief from the pain and sorrow and tears anymore–it’s about HIM. All about Him. It’s about trusting Him so much that pain and sorrow are understood. Unfathomable to us as finite humans…inescapable in the presence of the divine.

In a sermon I’ll never forget, our pastor said, of heaven, “I don’t want to be there because I’ll be free of pain or reunited with my family. Those are just happy side-effects. I want to be there BECAUSE THAT’S WHERE JESUS IS.” When we’re in His presence, that’s why the other pains and fears fall away. They can’t exist in the light of His face. They’re cast away. Forgotten.

Hagar’s pain, her hopes, her fears, and her entire existence revolved around that boy she tucked under the bush. The boy whose hand the angel instructed her to take. Her son. Her future. Her hope.

Our existence ought to revolve around the Son too. And when we take Him by the hand, we can cling to Him just as He clings to us. Because He is our future. Our hope.

And the wellspring of living water is right before us…if only we open our eyes to see it.

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Throwback Thursday – Being Good

Throwback Thursday – Being Good

by | Jun 29, 2023 | Thoughtful Thursdays, Throwback Thursdays


Be good. It’s a familiar refrain, one we probably say to our children a gazillion times. Whenever we send them off to a friend’s house, or on those days when The Sibling Wars are especially fierce. It’s understood that there are the good things to do and the bad. That those are, to a point, what define us. That it’s by what we’re judged by the people around us, at the least.

And in my ongoing quest to figure out how to be who God wants me to be in this world that seems more intent upon pursuing all the bad things rather than the good, I came across this verse.

“For this is the will of God, that by doing good you may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men— 16 as free, yet not using liberty as a cloak for vice, but as bondservants of God. 17 Honor all people. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the king.”
~ I Peter 2:15-17 

 
In this section, Peter is cautioning people to live a Godly life before the world, abstaining from lusts of the flush and sinful things. Obeying the government. Then these verses above. I’ve no doubt read them quite a few times, but they really struck me the last time I did. Look closely.
 
By doing good you my put to silence the ignorance of foolish men.
 
What does that mean? It means that our actions speak louder than the words of our enemies, of our detractors. It means that by doing good, doing the will of God, we point to Him, and in the face of it, no one can really say anything bad about us. It means that by being/doing good, we force the other side to bite their tongues. Because how can they argue with what is universally acknowledged as good?
 
But then it goes on. Let’s examine verse 16. …as free, yet not using liberty as a cloak for vice…
This reminds me of the part in I Corinthians where Paul says, “Look, guys. You’re free from the law. That means all things are lawful for you. But don’t be stupid. It doesn’t mean all things are good for you, that all things are helpful. Act like they are and you’re just going to become a slave to them.” (That’s the Roseanna paraphrase.)
 
We are free. Yes, absolutely. Faith in Jesus frees us from law, from religion. But we’re still responsible for our actions in the world. And what’s more, people are still watching us. So we don’t want to use freedom as an excuse to do bad things. That’s just stupid. We have to find the balance to strike–embracing the freedom without abusing it. Rejecting the chains of the law, be it the ancient ones that Jesus was arguing with or the ones the church was pretty quick to develop within the first couple hundred years of Christianity–but not betraying the spirit behind all those constricting rules.
 
And here’s the clincher. …as bondservants of God.
 
I’ve talked before about what it really means to be a bondservant of God. (Read that post here. It’s one I go back to frequently.) In a nutshell, it means we freely turn our will over to Him. We swear to serve Him for all our lives, and in return we become part of His family, part of His household. A servant, yes, but one beloved by our master and even able to inherit. So if we’re living out our liberty as bondservants of God, then that means EVERYTHING WE DO is for Him. In His interests. What He asks of us.
 
It means we’re going to show respect to those in authority. We’re going to love our brethren in Christ. We’re going to be good citizens. We’re never going to forget what God can do. We’re going to be good. And because we are, others will see and respect us and love us and seek God. It means that the worst thing people will be able to say about us is that we follow a strange God who doesn’t do the things that the world does, doesn’t worship what the world worships, and leads others to this same God. 
 
Now that’s a criticism we should all seek to have lobbed at us!

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