Human nature can be a funny thing. We are often quick to look at the problems and issues of others. We ignore our own. Worse yet, we sometimes make our issues noble or spiritual (when they are anything but that). Addressing your issues can be a challenging and difficult task, especially when it feels like others get away with things or you must face uncomfortable things in the process. Don’t despair! God has given great words about addressing your issues, no matter how great or small. While you are living and able, it’s vital to start dealing with things while you still have time.
Looking to the Bible for inspiration
Have you ever looked over the Bible and wondered why some of the stories are in there? Many of the accounts don’t exactly paint the “heroes of the faith” in a very positive light. Before you protest, think about it. No matter how much we might like to make it look, some Bible stories just…don’t sound…very noble. Or heroic. Or even decent.
- Samson’s tryst with Delilah
- David’s affair with Bathsheba
- Jephthah killing his own daughter because he hastily spoke a vow
- Dinah’s rape and her brother’s extreme vengeance
- Absalom raping his own sister, Tamar
- Jonah…being Jonah
- Abraham lying to Pharaoh
Onward it goes.
Sure, people try to teach lessons from these different stories. They slant them in a light that makes us think about something in a different way or consider it more deeply. Nothing wrong with this, not at all. But it still begs the question…why put it in there in the first place?
We like to put our best foot forward. We expect that, in the history of people who sought to follow God, that He would want to do the same, right? So…why…didn’t He?
The Bible addresses your issues
All throughout the Bible, we note a common theme of human nature. In it, people often don’t want to take responsibility for what they do.
- Adam blamed Eve
- The Israelites thought their problem was their surrounding neighbors
- The first-century Jews thought their problem was the Romans
- New Testament Christians with a Jewish background thought the former Gentiles were their problem, and vice versa
In reality, Adam made the choice to disobey God. The Israelites made the deliberate choice to fall into idolatry. The first-century Jews were living out prophecy as part of their Roman occupation (which was due to their own disobedience). New Testament Christians needed an attitude adjustment.
The problem isn’t everyone else
In the examples above, the problem was the people themselves. It was not everyone else. What we see as obvious, we want to scream from the rooftops. “Hey you, your sin is your problem, duh!” That’s why all those stories showing less-than-stellar human nature at play are found in the Bible. It wouldn’t be right to gloss over a history with a bunch of “alternative facts,” so they are in there. They prove, once and for all, no matter who they might have felt was their problem – the problem wasn’t everyone else, it was them.
Food for thought for all of us. Or it should be.
Stop finger-pointing
Today it seems like many Christians have mastered the art of finger-pointing. Society’s breakdowns are “caused” by everyone else: feminists, gay marriage advocates, the school system, presidents, immigrants, Muslims, terrorists, radical Muslims, women who’ve had abortions, women who march on Washington, the president, and any other barrage of options. It’s as if vocal Christians think they aren’t getting their way, they believe they can act and do whatever they want.
In other words, many sound whiny and immature.
It deeply disturbs me that this trend is now often found in the highest of places, where people openly degrade others because they don’t agree or respond in agreement. The other individual might have done nothing wrong, but as some of the most powerful people in the world call names and attack the integrity of others through social media under the guise of “If they did it, I can do whatever I want.” There’s always an excuse as to why Christians don’t act Christian enough. Call it defense, protection, retaliation, or even a difference of political opinion. However you want to deal with it, it’s simply not right.
This should clearly make us aware of who our “problem” is. It isn’t the other side. We can sit on social media all day long, cuss and swear, throw shade at others, and make a mockery of Christianity. It doesn’t make such behavior acceptable. Addressing your issues is more important than hating others.
Recognizing your greatest enemy is yourself
It’s time you realized that your biggest enemy isn’t everyone else. It is you. This is the first step to addressing your issues.
The Bible tells its less-than-stellar stories to prove that the biggest problem we have is within ourselves. No matter how much Bible people sincerely sought God at times, there were other times when they didn’t feel real saved and certainly didn’t act like it. It’s not there to form public policy or debate, but to make each of us look at who we are and deal with it unto the end of redemption.
We argue over eternal security and whether or not we can lose our salvation, but maybe the part of the debate we don’t want to embrace is that we don’t let God redeem us. We are so hung up on something and someone else that we aren’t letting God do within each of us what He wants and needs to do. It’s an unfortunate fact that you can dance, shout, run around the room, be a genius with church protocol, be the best preacher your church has ever seen, and be completely and totally lost, so far away from redemption, that you wouldn’t know God if He fell on your head.
The consistent aspect of the Bible is that somewhere, some way in time, God dealt with all these people. He dealt with their lack of accountability and responsibility. He addressed the idolatry, the judgments, their bigotry, hasty words, violation of others, lying, and their hasty actions. They came to a point where they dealt with what they had done, and lived with those realities.
Stop looking at everyone else
We can forever turn our faces to everyone else and try to make them our problem. We can forever avoid the realities we face right now and the consequences that remain for us, be they personally, nationally, or globally. Everyone else can be blamed for where we are. At some point in time, we will come to the end of ourselves and God will deal with us. In that day, there will be no fancy end-times theories to fall back on, no false doctrine, and no escapism. It will just be us and God, addressing our issues, and the realities we have woven.
“Then He will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from Me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave Me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave Me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite Me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe Me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after Me.’ They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for Me.’” (Matthew 25:41-46, NIV)
“Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?” The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.” Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.” (Luke 10:36-37, NIV)
Addressing your issues
You can’t be a Christian and have some of the attitudes and behaviors I’ve mentioned. Confronting these means admitting they don’t represent a true transformation of grace. If we understand we are saved by grace through faith, that means facing ourselves and our sins as we transform into His Image and less into our own. These issues reflect a deeper problem, one that prove we aren’t receiving the teaching and instruction we need because it assaults too much at who we are and makes us feel too uncomfortable.
If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you. (The Gospel of Thomas, Verse 70)
When we have to answer what did we did or didn’t do, I pray mercy falls on the souls of too many whose fate the Bible has already sealed. God’s not going to care about all the things you were against. He’s not going to tolerate that you didn’t help a refugee or a foreigner because they were Muslim. It won’t matter that the reason you abandoned your child is because they were gay. It won’t matter that you didn’t educate yourself because you hated the school system. It’s not going to matter that you stand behind something because you hate now or did hate a former leader. It won’t matter that you didn’t help out someone because they had an abortion and you’re against abortion. All the things we stand upon in self-righteousness will not matter. All that will matter is what you did not do because you disobeyed Him. It won’t matter how much you danced or shouted down the house. If you sat in ignorance and blamed everyone else, God’s going to give you a message you won’t like, so I give it now while there is still time:
It’s not them. It’s you.
Look at yourself. Be about addressing your issues. Fix you while there is still time.
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