Positive Faith & Sin: Last One

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This conversation on how we talk about sin as people of faith comes down to this (for me): Are we creating more faithful people?

If the way we talk about sin and separation from God isn’t creating more faithful followers of God then we’re doing something wrong. Again, just my opinion.

I personally believe that if you beat people over the head with their “sinfulness” then they get defensive, feel ashamed, and enter survival mode (not in a good way). This isn’t helping people grow and blossom into people defined by their love, mercy, forgiveness, charity, and whatever else. It’s keeping people paralyzed by fear. And, largely, this is because people’s inability to live as who they’d like to be is not new information for them.

We do not need to slam people in the face with things they already know (and are ashamed of).

So, what do we do?

Positive Faith in Scripture: A God Who Comforts

“He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more. There will be no mourning, crying, or pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”

Revelation 21:4, CEB

God’s goal, his plan, in fact, is to move creation to a place where there will be no death, no pain. There will be no more need for sadness because creation itself will perfectly embody his compassion, patience, mercy, and love.

And, even so, he will wipe away the tears from the sadness that has come before. Because he is a comforter.

There will one day be a time where no future comfort is needed- but we all have pasts- and he is here for us, to heal us.

Positive Faith in Scripture: God’s Dominant Characteristics

“But you, my Lord,

are a God of compassion and mercy;

you are very patient and full of faithful love.”

Psalm 86:15, CEB

Thinking about faith in positive terms is not just about how we view ourselves- it also has quite a lot to do with how we view God.

Many struggle to believe in God as scripture presents him and as God speaks of himself in scripture. This is because preachers for the last 100 years or so have treated God’s “rare” qualities as if they are “dominant” qualities in order to motivate people into joining churches, or making decisions, or whatever the case may be. Regardless of the specifics, this has largely been done to make the preacher look good and has little to do with God or the person on the receiving end of the message.

Psalm 86 echoes the most-often repeated claim about God in the Bible- that he is compassionate and merciful, and patient and loving. These are his dominant traits. They are the ones most prominently on display “most” of the time (it generally takes hundreds of years to get God angry).

God spends more of his time lamenting the fact that his own people can’t seem to embody these same traits- compassion, mercy, patience, and love- than he does being angry at them over it.

Because of your past, it is likely quite hard to believe that God is the things Psalm 86 says. But, if you did believe them…what would that change for you?

A Quiet Space of Strength

“Never assume that loud is strong and quiet is weak.”

Unknown

My granddaughter needs to get into gymnastics as soon as possible. We are running out of options at Meme’s house for her to express her athletic prowess and dramatic moves. Our TRX, end tables, exercise balls and weight bench have all become places for Norah to practice her moves. When she tried to do a pull up using an end table with a big lamp on it, we had to get LOUD to get her attention. Otherwise, that lamp was going to tumble and her head was probably going to be the thing that broke its fall.

But mostly, loud is not the way God works.

God is often quiet. He is in the song of the bird, the sneaky budding of plants in spring. Did you ever catch a leaf opening? God is quiet in his relentless movement towards justice and mercy for all. He is in the steady murmur of a new father as he rocks his wailing, loud baby to sleep.

God is quiet. God is showing us how to do strong.

Could you find some quiet today in your life? Just a few minutes is better than none.

See if conscious contact with God improves when you move into his quiet space of strength.

The Power of Imagination

The past can steal your present if you let it. You can spend hours, days, weeks, months, or even years overanalyzing a situation from the past...Or you can just leave the pieces on the floor and walk out the door and into the sunlight.

Marc and Angel Cheernoff

Imagination is a wonderful coping strategy. Especially if we use it to our advantage. Marc and Angel’s suggestion to “leave the pieces on the floor and walk out the door and into the sunlight” sparks my imagination for recovery and change.

What if...we came to believe that any situation from the past, no matter how upsetting, does not have to steal our capacity for living in the warm light of the sun?

What if...we came to understand that the “why” is not often where we find forgiveness, grace and mercy? What if we grappled with the ill effects of ruminating and began to let that destructive habit go?

How could we use our imagination to spur us forward, toward the light?