"You have your heads in your Bibles constantly because you think
you'll find eternal life there. But you miss the forest for the trees. These
Scriptures are all about me! And here I am, standing right before you, and you
aren't willing to receive from me the life you say you want. I'm not interested
in crowd approval. And do you know why? Because I know you and your crowds. I
know that love, especially God's love, is not on your working agenda. (John
5:39-42 - MSG)
I was reading my FaceBook page this morning and a
photo and comment brought the above scripture to mind; so I decided to explore
what was going on.
Of course, my first thoughts were gratitude.
Mostly gratitude for the journey that God has taken me on: from legalism to
freedom in Christ. Life is so much more joyful and peaceful if I don't have to
tally everything into black/white or right/wrong. After all, God is the judge
and I'm not; I'm just called to follow Him and love like He loved - that was
shown in Jesus's life. He included all: those who were willing to dive off the
high board; those who would tiptoe into the water or those who were fearful and
refused to evenget a toe wet in the rich baptism of His forgiving, unconditional
love. To be accepted just as I was made and love and accept others just as they
are.... and to trust Him to move my ego out of the way so He can do the deep
inner work of letting me see more of His love and compassion in Him, in myself
and in others. Then, with that new experience He shows me more love and
compassion on others. With that experience I fall deeper in love with Him and
as I fall deeper in love with Him, I fall in love with who He created me to be
-- whether I achieve, excel, or fall flat on my face. I'm lovable because God
loves me and honours me as His beloved - what a glorious condition and
position. Him in me. Me in him. Him
permeating everything and that has been the most mind-blowing, life-changing
experience I've ever been blessed with. I stand in humble awe that my beautiful
Saviour could perform such a miracle in my stony, egocentric, judgmental heart.
I'm overwhelmed with love for this humble, loving Saviour who has turned my
life inside out, upside down. At times I don't know where I end and He begins
and I just want more of Him and more and more and more. How could I reject or
rebel from this life-changing love and peace? Why would I even want to?
I often tease close friends by holding out my
hand and shaking theirs and saying, "Hi.
My name is Debbie and I'm a recovering Pharisee." Yes, it is fun and funny but the work God is
doing inside me is staggering in intensity of change. I believe Jesus is the
healer and deliverer; He has healed me many times (not just physically but in
every way) and delivered me from trouble; But the greatest work He has done in
me is is made inroads to chip away at the ego - He's not done with that work,
but I can see a few chips are gone. I give glory to Him for that work.
I remember the years of reading the scriptures
and hunting for new rules - of course, the "rules" I found were things
I was already doing. This made me feel good because I wasn't "like
them" or the people who didn't obey my new-found rules. For me, it was not
God-driven, or even love-driven; but fully ego driven. There is such a power
rush to feel that I wasn't "like them." Yeah, that is still a temptation even in my more
gentle and loving and compassionate approach. The Pharisees even had rules for
how long the fringe on their prayer shawl was requred to be and if it wasn't
accurate the the pray and person were rejected. I was not quite that deep into
rules; but I was heading that direction in a rapid descent.
The scripture below so depicts who I was:
"You're hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds!
You keep meticulous account books, tithing on every nickel and dime you get,
but on the meat of God's Law, things like fairness and compassion and
commitment--the absolute basics!--you carelessly take it or leave it. Careful
bookkeeping is commendable, but the basics are required. Do you have any idea
how silly you look, writing a life story that's wrong from start to finish,
nitpicking over commas and semicolons? "You're hopeless, you religion
scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You burnish the surface of your cups and bowls
so they sparkle in the sun, while the insides are maggoty with your greed and
gluttony. Stupid Pharisee! Scour the insides, and then the gleaming surface
will mean something. (Mat 23:23 - MSG)
I kept meticulous mental account books of who was
holy enough to be in my circle and who was so unholy that I had to avoid them.
My fear was they might contaminate me; like their God was more powerful than
the God who lives in me and guides and directs me. The deeper level was that had I opened to a new
style of friendship, I might have let go of one of my rules and my identity was
wrapped up in compulsive, ultra-pious, rule-keeping instead of Jesus's
unconditional, all-inclusive love that I wouldn't have recognized his freedom.
Had he walked the earth at the time I was a Pharisee, I wouldn't have befriended
Him but been one who would have judged Him as not meeting the rules of how I
interpreted the Bible and I would have been plotting to crucify Hm. No, I don't
like that about me - but my focus was on my interpretation of Biblical rules
and not on who He was. It was easy to
love people legalistic like me but a new skill to love and care for people who
were different was foreign. So I hid behind the rules. A safe fence from having
to act like Jesus; and I could find scriptures fragments to back up that stance
and appease my mind to stay there in that egocentric spot. I could state I was
obeying Jesus while acting the total opposite of how He did. I totally forgot that God's love is expansive
and grows; it doesn't bring me to isolation. That expansiveness is amazing...
just like God. Scientists tell us the universe continues to expand: and I
intuit it's because God craves more to love; since God is love. When I am acting
like Abba Yhwh, then I'm expanding in my ability to love and who I am willing
to love.
I'm so grateful the breath of God blew down that
fence of rules that I'd built and He made me stand (as T. D. Jakes would says)
naked and not ashamed - being who God created me to be. Scary stuff at first;
but now I love this place of freedom where my mind is free to be present to the
person I'm talking with instead of forcing my mind to burden me with evaluating
everything that is going on to judge if it's right or wrong. I think Jesus
could hang out with all kinds of people and love them because He knew it wasn't
His time to judge - it was His time to love.
Since the title of this blog is Eternal Life and
Other Thoughts; I`ll write a bit more about eternal life.
And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God,
and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent. (John 17:13)
What a beautiful God I know and love. Full of the
fruit of the spirit: love, joy, peace,
patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control (Galatians 5) And the beauty is these are not
rules to follow; but something that happens spontaneously as I let go of the
rules that hinder growing this deeper life. God is so marvelously good.
Yet, the paragraph before that beautiful scripture
shows what a law-dominated thought process leads to (edited to the areas where
I struggled):
Why don't you choose to be led by the Spirit and so escape the erratic
compulsions of a law-dominated existence? It is obvious what kind of life
develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, a
stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless
grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness;
cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal
temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives;
small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing
everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly
parodies of community. I could go on. This isn't the first time I have warned
you, you know. If you use your freedom this way, you will not inherit God's
kingdom. (Gal 5:18-21 - MSG)
When I was a Pharisee, I was blinded to see those
things in my life; just as Paul on the road to Damascus - I was blind and Jesus
opened my eyes to behold life without the inner Pharisee. As I read that scripture
once again, I realized those things are a great example of sowing and reaping.
When I was in my legalistic, rule-keeping, Pharisaical stage, those were what I
sowed and I reaped a bumper crop of the same in return. That`s a blessing
because "when the pain of
change is less then the pain of staying the same: then we change." (a
favorite quote of a lady pastor in Broken Arrow, OK). I finally started looking
at Jesus's life and ministry; and God grew in me a desire to become more like
Him, who was so far from being a legalistic Pharisee. He gave me the desire to
grow a bumper crop of His fruit: love, joy,
peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
During this Lenten season where I've spent extra
time with the Saviour in self-reflection; so many beautiful things have
happened. My trust in Him has grown and as my physical eyes are being healed;
my spiritual eyes are letting in more of the Light of Life - my Lord and
Saviour.
