I recently found this posted online:
“How are we supposed to feel about this? Here is the good news: You are allowed to think and feel WHATEVER YOU NEED OR WANT TO FEEL! I have cared so much, for so long. It has been a great honour. Now we are entering a new time which calls for a different type of leadership. I want you to grow so comfortable in your own skin, your own knowing, that you become more interested in your own joy and freedom and integrity than in what others think about you. That you remember that you only live once, that this is not a dress rehearsal and so you must BE who you are. I want you to refuse to betray yourself. Not just for you – FOR ALL OF US. Because that is what the world needs – in order for you to grow, in order to relax, in order to find peace, in order to become brave – is to watch one person at a time live their truth without asking for permission or offering an explanation.”
Wow, isn’t that powerful stuff??!! This encouragement to stop comparing ourselves to others, to be authentic, to be true to who we truly are - you’re hearing this kind of message a lot lately, I bet?
Well, what if I told you that the post I just read you was from a “Christian” mommy-blogger who recently divorced her husband and is now in a “relationship” with and deeply in love with ... another woman??!!
Scary stuff right??
And it would be so easy to read this post and go “Oh well, she’s obviously not a Christian!!” and then just move on with our day.
But I want to look at this from a different point of view today – what does this post say about me – about us?
Because as Christians we’ve also bought into this message of being free to be who we “really” are, following our hearts, living out our passion, pursuing a life of freedom and integrity ...
And that sounds so cool, so freeing, so inspirational, until what we want to be, the life we’re living, that thing we’re pursuing, comes face to face with this ... THE WORD OF GOD ...and then we truly declare whether we are disciples of the Lord, or disciples of the world.
Let me counter the quote I shared with you from the internet about “growing comfortable in our own skin”, with this text from the Book of Hebrews: ‘His voice shook the earth at that time, but now He has promised, Yet once more I will shake not only the earth but also heaven. This expression, “Yet once more,” indicates the removal of what can be shaken — that is, created things — so that what is not shaken might remain. Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us hold on to grace. By it, we may serve God acceptably, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire.’ Hebrews 12: 26 – 29 (HCSB)
Here in verse 28 we have the command to worship the Father in reverence and awe. The writer of Hebrews says that we need to offer God “acceptable” service ... acceptable to who do you think – to me or to Father God??
Let that sink in a little ...
Is your life, your truth, your authenticity , your freedom in line with the Father’s desires for you?
Or are you simply following your own head, your own desires, and then calling it freedom, and giving God fake glory for it because you say “it was for freedom that Christ set us free”?
Join me again next week, when I share more on this topic.