The other night we were at our small group at church and our friend JoAnna shared insight from the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Discussing this story got me to thinking, and being me my brain went in another direction. Haha.
As I was contemplating what it means at times to go through a fire I had a scene from the movie Pure Country pop into my head. Random right? Not really. In the scene the characters are discussing a dancing chicken that was at a carnival when they were kids. They had snuck back stage to find that as the ring master was putting the music on he was also turning up the heat on a stove beneath the stage. The heat of the stove made the chicken on the stage hop around as if it were dancing. Odd comparison I know.
This got me to thinking that sometime we go through fires in life so that we can be purified by the flames. These fires are allowed in our lives by God to grow us and to transform us. Other times we go through fires because we make bad choices. Yet other times we go through fires because we are pushed into it or refused to eliminate things (habits, thoughts, addictions, and even relationships) from our lives that God has told us to eliminate.
I think that far to often when us Christians read the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, we assume that every fire is from God, and every fire is one that we are supposed to go through. We must learn to recognize the source of the fire, not just assume and jump in, or allow ourselves to be pushed or dragged in.
In discerning the source of the fire, and striving to understand it's purpose in our lives, we must process through 2 things: 1) sometimes we are supposed to get out of the fire, and 2) sometimes we are supposed to go through the fire. The most important lesson is learning to know the difference, because not every fire is something God intends for us to go through. Sometimes, like that dancing chicken, we are just supposed to jump off that stage and out of the fire.
Without knowing the difference we will go through fires that we were never meant to go through. When that happens we end up getting ourselves stuck in a loop, repeating patterns and lessons, until we grow and change the cycle.
Another important lesson that I took from this was that we aren't supposed to camp out in the fire. We are to go THROUGH the fire, not stay in it. Even as unstable, disobedient, and un-persevering as Israel was in the books of the Old Testament they never set up camp and stayed in the desert. They continued to push forward and out of the fire, even if they did grumble and complain the whole way. We may not like the fire, we aren't really supposed to, but we go THROUGH it, not stay in it.
Friday, October 19, 2018
Thursday, October 11, 2018
Truth and Wonder Woman
I came across this post (picture? meme? I don't know what you call it) on Pinterest a while back. It was promptly followed by another picture, which of course now I can't find.
It wasn't the picture itself that caught my attention, but what someone had written below it. Truth changes people. Truth reshapes how we see the world around us, and how we react to that world.
The picture I saw following this said something about those who survive abuse, manipulation, and toxic relationships. Which at first might not seem similar. It proposed the idea that those who survive and heal from such situations actually become acutely aware of manipulation. It suggested that they are able to detect being manipulated faster than the normal person, and avoid it. It offered the thought and perspective that in the healing from such abuses there was a strength at the end, a trait that made such people stronger, more aware, and less susceptible to being manipulated.
Perhaps such a comment following the Wonder Woman post is odd, but not when we consider that the very thing that the very thing that kept Diana on that island was a manipulation. A lie, about her identity. Once truth entered in, her identity was her's to live, and her life changed forever.
Truth shapes our identity. Each Truth we encounter has the ability to change us, but the catch is that we must allow it. We can encounter Truth and reject it or we can encounter Truth and be transformed by it.
This difference is played out in the Bible in both the stories of Saul and David. Each one was faced with conviction from God for their sin, but they had very different reactions to that conviction.
Saul shaped his identity upon his actions, upon works. When he was faced with conviction for his sin he refused to face this truth because it would have caused him to reshape his identity. Since his identity was based upon his actions, he refused. To accept conviction for him, and the truth of his sin, would have meant: accepting an identity of a sinner, or accepting the identity of a flawed person, or changing that which his identity was based upon. Saul was incapable of doing any of this, so he rejected Truth instead. He ran from conviction, ran from Truth, and in the end made an even bigger mess of himself and his life.
David shaped his identity upon the truth of who God said he was. When he was faced with conviction for his sin he immediately repented. He was overwhelmed with grief because of his sin, but he wasn't crushed by it. His identity wasn't in what he did, but in Whose he was, he allowed truth to shape his identity. When faced with sin and repentance David was able to meet it head on and be transformed. David may not have been perfect but he knew the Truth of his identity, and that was who God said he was and nothing else. David's life may have been a mess of humanness, but his identity wasn't.
We also are to be like David. We are to be people shaped by Truth, shaped by God's Truth. God's Truth is unchanging, unwavering, solid, and eternal. It's not swayed, or manipulated by anyone or anything.
Ephesians tells us that this Truth is to be wrapped around us, holding us together, and supporting us. It is to be our foundation, and source of uprightness and righteousness.
The enemy's key weapon is lies, Jesus warns us that Satan comes to steal, kill, and destroy. Yet, sometimes the death he brings isn't physical death, it's death of identity, calling, and purpose to deception and manipulation.
This is why we are called to be a people of Truth. This is why Truth is so important. Only Truth can fight off lies. Only Truth can be a firm foundation. Manipulations and lies are nothing but shifting sand, and like sand they change when exposed to adversity. When sand is exposed to the adversity of wind or rain, it moves and shifts. The same is true of lies and manipulation, when exposed to Truth, they must move.
Jesus promises true freedom in the Truth of God. His freedom can change and shape us if we allow it. It can also free us from lies, deception, and manipulation. Just like the post I mentioned above, when we escape from lies, deception, and manipulation we become better at detecting it. Better at avoiding it. Like a barometer predicting the weather, we become able to gauge manipulation and lies when we are around them.
The more we mature in Christ, the greater barometers we become. The more we walk in freedom, the better we become at detecting those things that would attempt to lead us into captivity. This is perhaps a great reason to saturate ourselves in Truth.
We are not only to saturate ourselves in Truth, but we are also to be shaped and transformed by Truth. Like Wonder Woman, we are to carry it every where with us, view our lives and the world around us through it's lens. While this can make us more unpalatable to some, it stabilizes us in a way that nothing in this world can. With that stability comes peace that isn't worth trading for anything.
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The picture I saw following this said something about those who survive abuse, manipulation, and toxic relationships. Which at first might not seem similar. It proposed the idea that those who survive and heal from such situations actually become acutely aware of manipulation. It suggested that they are able to detect being manipulated faster than the normal person, and avoid it. It offered the thought and perspective that in the healing from such abuses there was a strength at the end, a trait that made such people stronger, more aware, and less susceptible to being manipulated.
Perhaps such a comment following the Wonder Woman post is odd, but not when we consider that the very thing that the very thing that kept Diana on that island was a manipulation. A lie, about her identity. Once truth entered in, her identity was her's to live, and her life changed forever.
Truth shapes our identity. Each Truth we encounter has the ability to change us, but the catch is that we must allow it. We can encounter Truth and reject it or we can encounter Truth and be transformed by it.
This difference is played out in the Bible in both the stories of Saul and David. Each one was faced with conviction from God for their sin, but they had very different reactions to that conviction.
Saul shaped his identity upon his actions, upon works. When he was faced with conviction for his sin he refused to face this truth because it would have caused him to reshape his identity. Since his identity was based upon his actions, he refused. To accept conviction for him, and the truth of his sin, would have meant: accepting an identity of a sinner, or accepting the identity of a flawed person, or changing that which his identity was based upon. Saul was incapable of doing any of this, so he rejected Truth instead. He ran from conviction, ran from Truth, and in the end made an even bigger mess of himself and his life.
David shaped his identity upon the truth of who God said he was. When he was faced with conviction for his sin he immediately repented. He was overwhelmed with grief because of his sin, but he wasn't crushed by it. His identity wasn't in what he did, but in Whose he was, he allowed truth to shape his identity. When faced with sin and repentance David was able to meet it head on and be transformed. David may not have been perfect but he knew the Truth of his identity, and that was who God said he was and nothing else. David's life may have been a mess of humanness, but his identity wasn't.
We also are to be like David. We are to be people shaped by Truth, shaped by God's Truth. God's Truth is unchanging, unwavering, solid, and eternal. It's not swayed, or manipulated by anyone or anything.
Ephesians tells us that this Truth is to be wrapped around us, holding us together, and supporting us. It is to be our foundation, and source of uprightness and righteousness.
The enemy's key weapon is lies, Jesus warns us that Satan comes to steal, kill, and destroy. Yet, sometimes the death he brings isn't physical death, it's death of identity, calling, and purpose to deception and manipulation.
This is why we are called to be a people of Truth. This is why Truth is so important. Only Truth can fight off lies. Only Truth can be a firm foundation. Manipulations and lies are nothing but shifting sand, and like sand they change when exposed to adversity. When sand is exposed to the adversity of wind or rain, it moves and shifts. The same is true of lies and manipulation, when exposed to Truth, they must move.
Jesus promises true freedom in the Truth of God. His freedom can change and shape us if we allow it. It can also free us from lies, deception, and manipulation. Just like the post I mentioned above, when we escape from lies, deception, and manipulation we become better at detecting it. Better at avoiding it. Like a barometer predicting the weather, we become able to gauge manipulation and lies when we are around them.
The more we mature in Christ, the greater barometers we become. The more we walk in freedom, the better we become at detecting those things that would attempt to lead us into captivity. This is perhaps a great reason to saturate ourselves in Truth.
We are not only to saturate ourselves in Truth, but we are also to be shaped and transformed by Truth. Like Wonder Woman, we are to carry it every where with us, view our lives and the world around us through it's lens. While this can make us more unpalatable to some, it stabilizes us in a way that nothing in this world can. With that stability comes peace that isn't worth trading for anything.
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