2 Corinthians 4:2 - We reject all shameful deeds and underhanded methods. We don’t try to trick anyone or distort the word of God. We tell the truth before God, and all who are honest know this.
It isn’t enough to just look the part – we have to BE the part. Christianity is not just a shirt we put on for church on Sunday, it has to permeate our skin so that it is so intrinsically connected to who we are, one cannot be distinguished from the other. We must “tell the truth before God” in all that we say and all that we do. To do that means that there can’t be anything questionable in our closets – all of those things must be rejected and removed. Chambers opens today’s message by asking us:
Have you “renounced the hidden things of dishonesty” – the things that your sense of honour will not allow to come to the light? You can easily hide them. Is there a thought in your heart about anyone which you would not like to be dragged into the light? Renounce it as soon as it springs up; renounce the whole thing until there is no hidden thing of dishonesty or craftiness about you…Maintain a continual watchfulness so that nothing of which you would be ashamed arises in your life.
Chambers tells us that we can easily hide the “ugly” things in us from the world, but we can never hide them from God. I can attend church every Sunday, volunteer my time for whatever events the church might host, even teach Sunday school, but if I’m harboring secret sins all of my efforts at “looking the part” are ruined by the truth of my condition. The Lord knows our innermost thoughts, even the ugliest ones, and if we aren’t right before Him what is the point in trying to look it for man? If our thoughts were played out loud for all to hear, would people’s opinion of us change? If so, we have some work to do. I would suggest that most all of us have some work to do.
Chambers gets right to the root of the issue – we must simply renounce those things. Do we feel envy creep in when we hear of another person’s financial windfall or good fortune? We must immediately recognize it, renounce it and thank God for the many blessings He’s bestowed upon us. Do we find ourselves smug with satisfaction when we hear that someone we dislike suffered in some way? We must renounce those thoughts and pray for them. It is all part of 2 Corinthians 10:5 – “taking every thought captive.” God isn’t interested in what type of Christian we appear to be – he see’s us for what kind of Christian we truly ARE and that runs to the very core of our existence, our thoughts and the state of our hearts.
Chambers tells us:
“Not walking in craftiness,” (2 Corinthians 4:2 KJV) that is, resorting to what will carry your point. This is a great snare…Others are doing things which to you would be walking in craftiness, but it may not be so with them: God has given you another standpoint. Never blunt the sense of your Utmost for His Highest. For you to do a certain thing would mean the incoming of craftiness for an end other than the highest, and the blunting of the motive God has given you.
There are two points here worth deliberation, I think:
First, we have to be cognizant of our tendency to justify our sinfulness. We can justify anything: We can justify greed by claiming it is done for the greater good. We can justify lying by claiming it makes our story a better “witness.” We can rationalize any number of behaviors and try to minimize their impact on our Spiritual lives, but we are only deceiving ourselves. We are called to TRUTH and nothing less. There is no justification for anything else before God.
The second point is our tendency to compare ourselves to other believers. When I was a senior in high school, I was a teacher’s assistant for an English teacher. During the hour I spent in her classroom, I graded papers and did whatever she needed doing while she taught a sophomore level class. During a midterm test, I noticed one of the students obviously cheating off of the person next to him. What he didn’t know was that there were several versions of the test and they were distributed in such a way that no one had the same test as anyone around them. When the tests were returned, he was shocked to discover that he’d failed it – and that the person he’d cheated off of had gotten an almost perfect score. As Christians, our measuring stick is simply the Savior Himself and not the person we sat next to last Sunday in church. We need to spend our time and energies on resolving our own issues and focusing squarely on seeking our “Utmost for His Highest.” Our paths as believers are not always the same – some have one test, some another. If we spend all of our time focused on another’s test we may fail our own.
Sometimes honesty is hard, and it is often hardest when it involves being honest with ourselves. We need to submit ourselves before the Father in all things, even our thoughts – especially our thoughts – so that we no longer have anything to be ashamed of. God seeks to transform us from the inside out. Our greatest call as Christians is to allow Him to do so.
This one's a real gut-wrencher! Hebrews 4:13 says, "Nothing in all creation is hidden from God's sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account." Yet so many of us still try (as Adam and Eve did in the garden) to hide from our Father! We need to allow Him to shine His searchlight into the depths of our soul.
ReplyDeleteEven those nasty thoughts are not news to God. I think sometimes we believe if we don't actually VERBALIZE a thought, that it's not sin -- but it IS sin, and needs to be confessed as such. Lately God has been convicting me about my thoughts about other people -- how when I see somebody, a certain judgment or criticism will pass through my mind. And my Father says, "Why did you say that about someone made in My image?" YIKES. I am trying to learn to view everybody as a type of Christ -- to intentionally think to myself, "If this were JESUS, how would I treat them?"
You are right, Catharine -- we are called to TRUTH and nothing less. May we so endeavor to live it!