“The church wants you to be holy but not happy. The world wants you to be happy but not holy. Christ wants you to be both happy and holy.” I spent a summer in Mozambique and this is something someone said that has been forever engraved in my brain. Sounded like something unattainable to me. Human ain’t holy. At least, we would never equate humanness with holiness. In my early years of being a Christian, I always wondered how I could ever live up to the standards depicted in the Bible. I mean, Jesus was Jesus. He was God! How could He possibly expect the same (or even greater things) from me? I’m just me. What does He expect from us when we are only human.
To be quite honest, while the years have passed, I am still uncertain as to what exactly He expects from our mere humanity. However, I am coming to understand that humanity is not so much the disqualifying factor that I gave it so much weight for. Rather, it is the quality that requires grace – from God and from each other. While it is so easy for us to use humanity as an excuse to get out of so much, it is the mere reason God has granted us the grace we never deserved. While humanness allows us to throw ourselves a pity party or excuses our way out of our personal responsibilities, it has somehow become our idol. This is where I see that our interpretations of the Bible has become so corrupted. We use it to win arguments and not attempt to restore our holiness. We have allowed it to feed our selfish desires and even sin lifestyles. Though we don’t like to admit it to each other, we are still accountable to God.
In discussions with people about theology, the conversations typically get climaxed around the time when people bring up faulty theologies excusing their sin for their own personal pleasure. Here is the reality though; it may work among people but justice stands in the eyes of God. At the end of the day, God is the ultimate judge and the wages of sin always equal death! When we allow a filtered version of Scripture to float around within our churches and communities, we are allowing it to do its damage for those who have yet to know the truth. It just isn’t fair. The reality is that casual Christianity has made its way into our world, and we have been cool with that. The problem is that when the Bible gets thrown into the mix, suddenly someone or another is offended, so we just end up tolerating all the mess so it’s not offensive to anyone. Here is the thing, though. Jesus was the most offensive guy who walked on this Earth! He stood up for justice while standing up to religious hypocrites and saved sinners all around.
As you may have already noticed, a lot of my references are from superhero stuff as they literally portray flawed characters who rescue others. In Captain Marvel, there is a scene, ***spoiler alert*** that reminds her of her personal truth – her childhood and her past – she remembers every scene in her life where she had fallen, fallen hard, failed, cried, been hurt, but she would get back up and keep getting back up, not letting herself stay defeated. It was her human nature! It was her humanness that caused her to fall, but the same humanness that helped her get back up. Her strong will made it possible for her to stand up again and fight for the truth as opposed to the lies she had once believed.
In the same way, being human does not guarantee that we won’t fall. Neither does it guarantee that we are invincible. However, God our Creator, believes that there is something in us that makes us capable of becoming Holy. Many times, it is our own personal excuses disqualifying our access to holiness. Deuteronomy 28:9 states that “If you obey the commands of the Lord your God and walk in His ways, the Lord will establish you as His holy people as He swore He would do.” There is nothing confusing about this passage. It requires no Hebrew translating or extra intuition. It’s pretty straight-forward. So I wonder why “human” has turned into our excuse as opposed to our reason as to why we can live a life worthy of our calling.
The truth is that casual Christianity ain’t holy. Holy is the Kingdom Standard and this requires us to obey the commandments of God. This sounds super uncool in this time and age, because the New Testament only refers to the two most important commandments – to love the Lord and to love each other – the 10 commandments paraphrased. Let’s refer back to the 10 commandments. Literally the 1st 4 commandments are about loving the Lord and about keeping the Sabbath day Holy. Unfortunately, empty pews are not a big deal anymore, personal conviction is a rarity nowadays, and while the last 6 commandments are about loving each other, who has time for that when people are better left unbothered.
The Sabbath has been reprioritized or even redefined, and thus, God has shifted from being in the place of preeminence. There is a reason why the Sabbath is to be kept holy. One of many is that it would be the day the family joins in fellowship with other believers to worship God in spirit and in truth. It would be a tradition that gets passed down from one generation to the next, so that the reality of Christ would be passed on to every following generation. It is for the preservation of Christianity! While this pandemic changed much of our daily lifestyles, it is important to consider what we have prioritized over God in our lives. How has our humanness excused us from not following the commandments of God? What have we excused into our lives and what must we let go of to be in right standing again? With Easter approaching, as we remember that Jesus died for our sins and paid the price for us, we have the freedom in His resurrection. We have the confidence that sin doesn’t hold a grip over us anymore. While grace carries us now, are we prepared to face Him without it and still be holy?
Sounds solid. Well written.