Our small group is studying Colossians lately. It was my idea. Strangely enough, two of the three studies our group has done in the last year have been my idea. Maybe this means I should shut my mouth more often and let someone else do the thinking . . .
That thought itself provides a convenient segue to the meat of this post. Colossians 1:21 radically changed my thoughts on my relationship with Christ, while at the same time confirming what I already knew in my heart. (As a small aside, the more time I spend reading the Bible the more I discover things like that happening -- changes in my thinking. And every time it happens I think, "Wow! I should do this more often!". However, my best time to do it happens to be my best time to hit the snooze button as well, and I unfortunately choose the snooze button every time.) The verse was Colossians 1:21, and it happens toward the end of Paul's big theological spiel on the Supremacy of Christ, which is post-worthy in and of itself. But then, there's this line:
"Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your mind because of your evil behavior."
Did you catch it?
I think that humans are always looking for something in which we can believe. Something that calls us to a bigger purpose. For some and myself, this is faith in a Creative and Redemptive God. For others, this is belief in the laws of science, or in the belief that there is no supreme deity. Still others find their solace in money and wealth, in the ability to have and do whatever they desire. I know many who find this place in doing good things for others, though there is no deity that inspires that desire to do good. Regardless of where we find it, we all believe in something. It's in our nature, the core of our being. Our hearts need this.
Where were we enemies with God? In our minds. Not our hearts. In our minds -- our thoughts, our selfish feelings, our over-thinking and heavy analysis. Our minds inspired, even created our evil behavior. Not our hearts.
Look at the what happened in the Garden of Eden. Eve sinned when Satan got in her head. When the serpent first asked her about the fruit of the forbidden tree, she simply said, "We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, 'You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.' " (Gen. 3:2) But then what happened? Satan twisted God's words ever so slightly, making her second-guess what God meant, saying that "God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil" (Gen 3:5) Before Satan got to her, she believed God's word blindly. She took it to be the truth, and accepted and believed it with her heart. She didn't rationalize it or try to wrap her brain around it; she just believed it. But then came Satan, twisting God's word just enough to make Eve stop and get into her head, thereby leaving behind what she knew in her heart to be true. He's crafty like that. He did it knowing that man's weakness would not be his heart, but in his mind, knowing that was the place from which he could most easily sway man to doubt God.
And how true is that? How many times in my own faith journey have I missed the mark, not because my heart wasn't right, but because my mind got in the way. Second-guessing whether or not it was the Spirit's leading in my life or just my own desires. Thinking and doing things that aren't in line with the Truth. For the last few weeks, I feel like I've been at war with myself. Battling my head to get in line with my heart, trying to synchronize that which I think and what I know in my heart to be true.
I do this in my marriage. I do this with my students. I do this with my colleagues, my friends, my family. I ignore what my heart knows and I get lost inside of my thoughts, ignoring truth, succumbing to the "reality" I create in my mind. That reality is lonely, even though I'm always right and perfect and doing "what Christ wants me to do." The problem is almost never with my heart. My heart truly wants to do the will of God. It's my selfish thoughts, my insecurities, my foolhardy belief that I'm in control that clashes with the desires of my heart, the will of God, and it's in that moment that my thoughts make me an enemy of God.
In 2 Corinthians 10:5, Paul is defending his ministry, talking about the differences between the world and those who are in the company of the Redeemer. When I read this verse a few weeks ago, it was almost as if God pulled the verse off the page and slapped me across the face with it (nicely, of course. God created chivalry, after all.) In that moment, He made me aware that I'm letting my thoughts go unbridled, like the children who run a muck at the doctor's office while their parents read Cosmo, blissfully unaware of what damage the little angels are causing until it's too late.
God shook me awake just in time to see the damage, though, before it passed the point of repair. In it's wake, I'm left facing qualities of myself that are less than flattering, facets of my being that I've let run lose while I sat to the side and and read my Cosmo. I've got this insane desire to control everything and everyone around me. I need validation from everyone that I'm doing a good job, that I am important and irreplaceable, and when they don't give it to me I get frustrated and whiny and think terrible things about them. I am jealous of others when they get the recognition I feel I deserve and I'm left playing a supporting-role. I'm arrogant enough to think that I deserve the spotlight, and prideful enough to pretend like I'm modest and humble so that others won't see this part of me. I don't just feel this way when I'm at home in my head, either. I think this way when I'm teaching, when I'm praying, when I'm studying the Bible. I'm even awful enough to think these things when I'm singing on Worship Team and I'm supposed to be leading others to greater communion with their Creator, as if my voice will somehow get them closer than another's voice. Realizing this about myself, especially when I hold myself in such high regard, is painful. Even though this blog is relatively private and there are only a few people that even look at it, I'm still hesitant to publish this post.
But the beauty of all of this is that God still uses this broken vessel. God still works beauty through all of my ugliness. His grace and mercy is deeper, and wider, and higher than I can grasp. Despite me, He still works in my life.
Because of me, He is at work in my life.
His love is just like that. His love and tenderness frees me to boast in my weaknesses, because it is in these weaknesses that God's glory can truly shine through. So He'll continue to work, giving me the power to take my thoughts captive and make them obedient to Christ so that I can be called a friend of God.
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