More thoughts on being forgiveness-conscious

I’m still thinking about sin-consciousness and forgiveness-consciousness. I’m thinking of a drama team we once developed in a Church. We were encouraged by some there to act out messages of guilt so that people might be shamed into some kind of a conviction. Yikes!

Several of us questioned this tactic as manipulative and wrong but couldn’t make much headway. It seems like sin-consciousness has been purported as the way to bring about holiness. I don’t agree. In 1 Peter 1:5-9 it talks about adding to your faith virtue, knowledge, self-control and the like but the conclusion in verse nine is interesting. It says, “For he who lacks these things is shortsighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins.” So could it be that what drives our desire for holiness isn’t the knowledge of our sins but the knowledge of our forgiveness?

From a parent’s perspective that makes total sense. Children thrive when, even in correction, you keep in mind who they are as individuals. Children know their flaws, what they need is a way out in spite of them. For instance, I have a son who can not learn sitting still. (that doesn’t mean he is ADD, it means he is a kinetic learner. He learns by doing not so much by looking or listening.) I used to try to teach him spelling the way I was taught (which didn’t work for me btw). My son is super smart but he could never get the spelling of words to stick. He was frustrated, I was frustrated… but telling him he was a lousy speller and that he needed to do better would not have helped. Instead we looked for new ways to understand spelling. I told him he was very smart (because he is) and there must be a way to get that stuff in there in a way where it would stick. In the process we learned he needed to pace or wiggle in order to learn.

My son didn’t need to be told he was inadequate. He was very clear that he missed the mark in spelling. He needed to be given a way out of his inadequacies. When given that way out, he flourished in spelling along with every aspect of learning.

Knowing that I am forgiven, gives me the courage to risk.

Taking Sin and Grace out of Church Speak (part two) The root of defeat, the antidote and bicycle riding :)

I’m still reading that Joseph Prince’s book. It’s full of good stuff… and stuff that I question. I think I am pretty good at throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Maybe that’s an old saying ey? It means that I throw out the whole message because there is something in it that I disagree with. That’s sad. I wonder if that comes from damage (listening) hmmm there is something hurtful to someone who is truth based when you tell, or imply that the teacher is always right. That doesn’t give permission to say that a good teacher can be wrong sometimes. Or that you can think for yourself, go over the message and dig out the nuggets without swallowing the whole pan full.

Back to the book, and still thinking of sin and grace. Joseph talks about being sin- conscious vs. forgiveness- conscious. He says many Christians are living out their lives sin-conscience… In other words we are still walking around fully aware of, and brutalized by, our inadequacies. It’s almost like we have built our faith around our inadequacies instead of the antidote. That puts words to things I have been trying a long time to put words to. He says further that being sin- conscious sends down a vicious root of condemnation in our lives out of which we can not thrive as believers. I totally get that.

The cure, the antidote is understanding our rescue. In every way we are inadequate Jesus intervened. In every way that we missed the mark, Jesus won the prize and then gave it to us. In Jesus, there is no missing the mark… period. If we get that, really get that? Then we can walk around forgiveness-conscious. Thinking not of how we don’t measure up but of why we do! That is what the word grace means to me… it’s like pushing the back of my kid’s bicycle so that they can ride it without falling. They are riding the bicycle they are being successful I am giving that success to them and having a ball in the process! I see Jesus in that light. He delights in keeping us upright while we flounder in the right direction. :)

Taking sin and grace out of Church speak (part one)

I have been wondering about grace and sin. If you have never been to Church, what would those words mean to you? They had little to no meaning to me. Grace was something that I lacked when I was growing up. Grace meant that you didn’t trip on your platform, high-heeled shoes, your hair was always perfect and you knew just what to say.. Somehow grace had an element of lucky attached to it. You either had it or you didn’t…. I didn’t.

Sin was something I could never grasp the meaning of. Being accused of being a “sinner” didn’t mean anything to me. I was accused of a lot of things, being ugly, lazy, dumb… sinner was just another vicious label. It didn’t mean anything when someone said, “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God”. Well, again, what does glory mean anyway?

Language is important if you want to be cross cultural. I think it’s important to know what you are saying or not saying to the people you are talking to. So, what do grace and sin really mean… in plain English? I’m asking, not telling.

The dictionary, at least some dictionaries, define sin as the breaking of a moral or religious law .The word sin translated from the Greek means to miss the mark, like an archer that misses the target. It has a little more to it… like an archer that lost the prize because he missed the mark might be a better picture. That idea is understandable to me. To say that sin is doing something bad or wrong religiously or morally would mean two things. That you and I agree on what is morally wrong or that you and I agree on what is religiously wrong. Good luck with that these days! I believe that we can all intuitively know that we are in need of help from a God who wants to. But what does that look like?

Going back to the concept of missing out because we missed the mark, I see that message in every advertisement. I’m too fat, so I miss the mark and need to go on a diet, I miss the mark so I need a dating service to help me find the love of my life. I miss the mark, so I need an attorney, I miss the mark so I need a new kind of hair shampoo or deodorant or whatever. Missing the mark means to me we are inadequate. Growing up you couldn’t convince me I was a “sinner” because I would have argued with you about the meaning of “moral” or “religious” but there was no end of feeling inadequate. That sense of inadequacy has driven me to the feet of Jesus many times. As a mother, I can not even hope to make the mark… I don’t even know how. I’m not sure what the target even is but I can guarantee you that I’m missing it. I don’t feel adequate as a friend, a wife, a writer, you name it.

Does that feel like a flippant definition of sin? I wonder if getting a better understanding of what sin “feels” like would give us more of a handle of our real need for relief. In all the ways that I feel inadequate, I struggle with shame. There is a difference between shame and guilt. Guilt says you did something wrong. Shame says there is something wrong with me. Feeling inadequate carries with it the idea that I “should” be adequate… or that there is a way to become adequate if I just focus and work hard enough. How many shoes, hair products and self help books are sold on that premise? Hmmm, there is more to say, and I haven’t even thought much about our antidote (grace). But more thoughts will have to wait until tomorrow. What are your thoughts?

TO BE CONTINUED: