Sobering

I honestly didn’t see this one coming. Just this past weekend, I was talking with a few guys at a men’s retreat about an experience I’d had concerning spiritual eyes. I told them that once they’re turned on, you can see Spiritual truth most anywhere. On the way home, I saw this house that reminded me of a movie, so I snapped a quick pic. Totally unrelated...at the time.

Later, I was revisiting this latest blog idea and I was still searching for how to bring it all together. Then, it all came together: The men's talk, the pic and what you're about to read.

Ever been in situation,
fraught with frustration,
no long contemplation,
just leave it.

Your place of employment
has lost all enjoyment.
How can I avoid it?
Just leave it.

After trying and trying,
now shipwrecked and crying,
hope just feels like lying,
just leave it.

Endurance long depleted,
everyday more defeated,
only Heaven knows what's needed
just leave it.

Once dearly beloved
Now you’re just so above it,
It’s off, now unplug it.
Just leave it.

This would usually be mistaken for the kind of post that encourages you to endure...but it's not. I needed to drive home that feeling of futility that we’ve all experienced for a TOTALLY different reason; To understand and embrace true humility.
But don't fret, at the end there's humility and rejoicing!

This is a place that I think we really wrestle with. When we’re happy, we need to be careful to keep it in its right place, just as when things aren’t going as well, care need also be exercised so that we avoid despair.

Here’s The Word:

1 Thessalonians 5:8 But let us, who are of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love; and for an helmet, the hope of salvation.

Titus 2:6 Young men likewise exhort to be sober minded.

Sometimes it seems that Christianity wants us to walk an impossible tightrope. On one hand, it’s all Rejoice always, and on the other hand its sobering humility. What gives? This is another thing where I believe that it’s only confusing if you’re not understanding things properly. The truth is, you can be the most joyful, hopeful, “happy in Christ” Christian indivisibly from a posture of prayerful sobriety.

So, then….How do we tie this dilapidated house and the poem about futility to Scriptures about a sober mind?

It’s all in how you see with Spiritual eyes.

We know what it’s like to feel “done”, when any more investment is basically throwing away effort. The most correct response is to put the bucket down and abandon ship.

This is the soil where we need to plant our humility, because before a Holy God, that should’ve been us. There was absolutely nothing redeemable about us. We would’ve considered the situation futile, but He didn’t. In His great love and mercy and in keeping His promise didn’t leave us....He loved us.

This also flips things on its head a bit, only because we really do want value. We want to be seen as a good investment.
I’m sorry, but that’s just not Scriptural. As we were all once dead in trespasses and sin, and biblically, our righteousness is compared to filthy rags only good for disposing of, this is still the reason for our greatest praise. We weren’t abandoned, we were adopted.

This is a situation where we need to remember and realize that a sober mind and the rejoicing mind are one mind, based in truth. The truth is that we receive, we don’t contribute. We yield, we don’t control. We submit, we don’t subvert. We appreciate, we don’t accomplish.
I pray that God would help us to see more clearly through Spiritual eyes, these truths He has for us.

In closing, be of good cheer! It doesn't take two minds to accept that Christ is destroying that dilapidated house to make a mansion suitable for Himself as King of Glory and the only thing you have to offer is sober submission. Absolutely nothing more. Rejoice that He could've rightfully condemned us all but was crucified for us instead. Place your hope in the fact that He's working all things out according to His purpose and the glory of His Father...Who has also become ours.

In Him,
Cros