These two events added to my solid convictions about the New Testament structure for rebuking someone. Matthew 18 says that I should approach another person alone to tell them of their sin. In this way, I am respecting them and giving them opportunity to fix their error. If they hear me, I have won them, and if not, then I can ask a second concerned person to come with me in the rebuke.
This week I’ve been reminded again that God’s way is perfect, and that it applies to little goof-ups as well as blatant sin. I made another absent-minded error. Instead of a personal correction, one person made fun of me publically. I felt like I was back in high school. It was not a big deal, even less important than missing one math or science question, but I realized again that God wants me to be gracious, even in the little things. If another person goofs up, kindness and grace are always called for rather than assuming making fun is funny.
My devotional reading this morning offers some thoughts about whom I serve. Yesterday offered the same type of question. I’m seeing a connection in these questions to my feelings about being unloved.
And Elijah came to all the people, and said, “How long will you falter between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him.” But the people answered him not a word. (1 Kings 18:21)In my case, Baal is not the alternative. Instead, my god could easily be me, my desires, and my way of doing things. It could also be my feelings, particularly when they are injured.
The first line of Rick Warren’s book on living as a Christian, The Purpose Driven Life, says, “It is not about you.” He is so right. As I think about my offenses, and about those who offend me, neither are important. What is important is that I honor God when I mess up, and also honor Him when others mess up in the way they handle my mistakes.
Jesus died for all and for all sin, big or small, purposeful or thoughtless. Spelling words incorrectly, or making an error in division, or calling someone by the wrong name is nothing. My goal is not perfection in those things but in acting like Jesus. Living the Christian life is about Him. I need to be like Him in how I treat others who make mistakes. Even though He made none of His own, I need to be like Him in my response to unloving barbs against what I do. I need to live so that what I do honors Him and I need to respond to even little things the way He responds.
The Holy Spirit puts a line from the Bible in my mind. It is the first part of Jeremiah 12:5. “If you have run with the footmen, and they have wearied you, Then how can you contend with horses?”
Jesus never flinched at the false accusations cast in His direction. He rebuked Peter for suggesting another path for His life, but other than that, what people said to Him were of no import to His focus. If He responded at all, it was for their sake. In other words, His pain was not that He was attacked or treated without respect, but that they had sinned against God and their sin was damaging that relationship.
While I want to be loved by others, this isn’t a lesson about that. It is a lesson about responding to a lack of that love like Jesus responds; He loved them anyway, no matter what people did to Him.
As Warren says, this is not about me. It is about choosing whom I will serve — the Lord God . . . or my own desire for respect, even in the little things.
No comments:
Post a Comment