Spiritual Dashboard

I think that most people view sin like the speedometer on their car’s dashboard. They say, “well, I know what I’m doing is wrong but it’s not that bad.” Or, “yeah, it’s pretty bad but not as bad as that guy.” This type of thinking puts us in a couple of awkward positions. One, it has us comparing ourselves to others which is not only unhealthy but it’s also not how God says He sees us. God doesn’t grade on the curve. He tells us not to compare ourselves to one another but to God’s law (Which is not meant to be even attainable but to show us how many bad choices we make… But that’s another post).

Second, this speedometer view of sin is malformed. The spiritual sin-o-meter is not a gauge like a speedometer it’s an indicator light like your check engine light. For that matter, as long as you’re accepting of God’s free gift of forgiveness, it’s not even a measure of transgressions but, rather, an indicator that you’ve gone off track somewhere. It’s a sign that you need to reevaluate your decisions.

Forming and cultivating a relationship with God does not mean that our sin is jettisoned. Our sin is always present in us because as long as we have that human nature we will all have a bit of evil desire in us. Thankfully, as Jesuit Bernard Bush notes, “God does not condone or sanction evil, but he does not withhold his love because there is evil in us.”

Remember to check those indicators frequently. If you find the check engine light on you need to investigate why and make those corrections or, at the risk of extending the metaphor too far, you may just have a breakdown.

Why I Suck

This is a post I’ve been intending to write for some time now. It’ll be a short one.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how, as a Chrisitan, I should be talking less and doing more. Is there a place for talking? Sure, but there are a lot of people out there who need help and I am not very good at getting out and doing stuff. In fact, I really don’t like to. When I’m not at work or working at home I like my free time to be my time. I don’t often give it up. I need to work on that…

God’s Timeline

Our church is just finishing a series about questions people have about God and/or faith. One question that was tackled today was essentially, “if God knows everything that has and will happen, why bother praying?” You can get the podcast to hear Andy’s take on the answer but it got me thinking and I decided to preempt my list of things to write about and do this while it’s fresh in my mind.

I think the main thing is the God wants a relationship with us. That he wants us to come to him in petition when something is on our minds, whether our desired outcome is actualized or not. Only slightly secondary is that God wants us to care about others. When someone we care for is in need we should do something about it even if all we can do is go to God in prayer.

There is a theory that God tested Abraham by asking him to take the life of his son, that God wanted to know if he would argue on behalf of his family as fervently as he argued for others. The theory suggests that God stopped him from killing his son, not because God changed his mind, but because Abraham failed the test by even trying to follow through. Obviously I don’t know how much truth there is to the theory but I think there is a lot of logic in it.

So the bottom line, I suppose is, love God with all your heart and love your neighbor as yourself!