Superbad Habits

So I'm pretty sure I forgot to mention it officially, but I found a new homechurch! I liked my old homechurch too, its only fault being that it is held on Monday nights, the same night as my winter and summer classes.

I like this new homechurch for the same reasons I like my old one - good atmosphere, friendly people, good discussion, and they have cats. Priorities, people. It also has the added bonus of being hosted by someone I actually already knew from church, so I felt at home almost instantly.

This week's discussion revolved around last Sunday's sermon, the first in a short series called Superbad (and NOT to be confused with the movie of the same title!), which brought to light some issues and attitudes surrounding sin, and how sin is dealt with. Of course the base understanding is that our sin is atoned for by Christ, but how do move on from there? If we are in the habit of committing the same sin, or beating ourselves up in the hopes at that we'll do better next time, are we being transformed? I know personally I struggle as a 'repeat offender' - I can't seem to break the cycle of certain bad habits, and just as Joel shared in the sermon, I too have had several people tell me not to fret - those wrongs are righted by Christ! That's very, very well and good, but it does little to help me as I struggle with what almost seems to be a dual nature. Read Romans 7:15-24 for a better idea of what I'm talking about here.

Andy, our homechurch leader, had us read Phillipians 3:4-6 to contrast the previous verses.

⁴though I myself have reasons for such confidence.

If anyone else thinks he has reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: ⁵circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; ⁶as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for legalistic righteousness, faultless.

I'm still chewing on these two, but I believe Andy's point was the arrogance that legalism can tend to breed - "I did this, this, this, and this, so I'm that." - versus the humility of grace. Take a look at verse 24, and realize that this is the same man who wrote the above:

What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?

Paul is one of those guys, possibly even the guy of the bible whom I love to hate and hate to love, I've grown into his teachings and writing over the last while, though I still find myself at odds with some of the things he says. However, dude lived an amazing life and these two passages go to show the struggle that Paul, like this rest of us, endured all of his believing life. Externally, I may look like I have things pretty together, and I've fooled myself on numerous occasions into thinking that I really do have it all together. But then, as one of the other women put it last night, I get out of bed. I ought to get up every day thanking God and asking what I can do to serve today, but most days I fall into the same routine of doing pretty much exactly the opposite. Habit. It can be killer.

That isn't to say all habits are bad, of course. This blog is becoming one of my better habits. Keeping my room clean (which it has been, for the most part, for at least the last two weeks) is another. That may sound incredibly juvenile, but think about what your room says about your self-esteem, your work habits, etc. And learning a routine has been healthy, too.

Anyways, someone else also raised the point that if we happen to fall through on a promise we make or a habit we've tried to break, we're often very hard on ourselves. If a friend or a child or family member were to make the same mistake, we'd likely respond in a compassionate way. Help them back on the horse, so to speak. We often don't show the same healthy compassion towards ourselves. Have you ever found this? I'd never really thought of it until this person brought it up, but I'm pretty sure I'd never treat anyone around me to the kind of things I've said to myself over the past few months. Are there time-outs for verbally abusing yourself?

As the night wound down, there was one more thing that was said that made a very relieving click in my head. In OT times, of course, whenever the Israelites broke a law, they were required to make a sacrifice. What hadn't occurred to me was the sacrifice had to be presented at the temple - the dwelling place of God. Doing wrong literally brought the Jews to God's doorstep. Living under grace as we are, we aren't required to make sacrifices in the same way, as the price has already been paid. But, as I suggested above, how often to we find ourselves at God's feet when we've done something wrong? I can honestly say, my habit is to give myself a good duffing before I even consider praying it over. I'm actually quite amazed to realize it, because that's not grace at all!

Does anyone else find this? Or is it the opposite for you? I know I've also swung the other direction, where I simply shrug off whatever it is I've done, too disappointed in myself to deal with it. Sometimes, I'm not even disappointed. It's going to be an interesting few weeks.

Reason, and Chapter Two

There is just no way to reason about playing 6 hours of games when I should be studying.

What is it about a vast expanse of free time that screams "Go, play!", when I know I should be studying? ...Okay, maybe it's a stupid question.

How about, Why do I choose what's bad for me, even when I know what's best? The time I wasted last night is time I wasted in the full knowledge that there was and is something more valuable I could be spending my free evening doing. And I don't just mean studying, either.

See, something I did do yesterday was read through the second chapter of Don't Waste Your Life. The further I get, the happier I am I decided to pick it up again. The chapter, titled Breakthrough: the Beauty of Christ, My Joy, is very much applicable. I'm not a student of literature, and my encounters with literary study have been few, especially since coming to university. I consider this a shame. However, Piper's criticism of scholarly treatments of literary text resonated with me. In several courses I've been encouraged to apply my interpretation of a particular reading, to override the author's intentions with my own vision for what their piece meant. But, in so doing, we start to muddy things! As Piper states, "If there is only one life to live in this world, and if it is not to be wasted, nothing seemed more important to me than finding out what God really meant in the Bible, since he inspired men to write it. If that was up for grabs, then no one could tell which life is worthy and which life is wasted." (p. 24) His point being, by deciding to interpret and apply the text as you see fit, the reader robs the text of the author's intended meaning. If we understand the author of the bible to be God, who is Love, Truth, Justice, Wisdom, and Strength, among other things, then would it not make sense to seek with every fiber of our being to discover the meaning of his words?

The rest of the chapter Piper spends explaining how he continued to learn The Obvious and seek objective meaning from the bible... and of course, the answer to The Meaning Of Life. Now, reading this nearly two years after becoming a Christian, his words are far less shocking to me, though no less potent: God's intent is to display his glory, and our purpose is to glorify him by delighting in him. To be truthful, though I'd of course heard this over and again for the last almost-two years, Piper's explanation of this truth is one of the most eloquent I've read, and easily one of the most comprehensible! I, like Piper, have been wrestling for the last few months with, as Piper puts it, "what is right, and what is inevitable" (p. 31) (emphasis mine). What is right is that we glorify God, and what is inevitable is that we seek our own happiness. As someone who's dealt with a lot emotionally for the last 3 years, it would of course be a natural response to seek happiness. What I have honestly struggled with is that glorifying God and my happiness have seemed two entirely different things!

Some fundamental part of me (the part that bears the thumbprint of my maker, no doubt, as well as the Holy Spirit) has always recognized this as a problem, a glitch in my understanding. I laughed a little ruefully when I read further, "Compounding the problem was that many who seemed to emphasize the glory of God in their thinking did not seem to be enjoying him much. And many who seemed to enjoy God most were defective in their thinking about his glory." (p. 31) In some ways, to me, desiring God seemed... undesirable. Icky. Between watching fellow Christians fling bible verses heedlessly at Atheists and skeptics, the arguments between denominations, and the constant struggle between my real self vs. my ideal self, my own faith had begun to leave a bad taste in my mouth. So, Piper's revelation that glorifying God and being happy are one and the same was something of a revelation for me as well, one that has challenged me to take my study of God's message to us much more seriously. "God created me - and you - to live with a single, all-embracing, all-transforming passion - namely, a passion to glorify God by enjoying and displaying his supreme excellence in all the spheres of life. Enjoying and displaying are both crucial. If we try to display the excellence of God without joy in it, we will display a shell of hypocrisy and create scorn or legalism..." (ibid.) (Emphasis mine - this definitely home)

Piper explains further on what exactly is meant by 'glorify', and I have to say, although I probably understood this word on some level, the cultured part of my mind always flinched when I heard it (much like words like, 'evangelize', and 'religious') - it seemed narcissistic. But, why SHOULD he get all the glory? Being Love, Truth, Justice, Wisdom, and Strength (as I mentioned before) has a lot to do with this. To be honest, it's still something I'm wrapping my head around. Piper offers the helpful metaphor that glorifying God is like magnifying God, in that if you magnify God as a telescope magnifies planets and stars, you are making something that is unfathomably large appear very clearly. Our lives are meant to show God more clearly - this is done by enjoying him. Again, part of me thinks this is amazing, and part of me thinks this outrageous.

I think what twisted the knife through my little heart, though, was a section on love that bears the title, "Does Being Loved Mean Being Made Much Of?"

Why yes, John, I believe it does.

Oh, shoot, is that wrong? This, unfortunately, is a belief I've held so close to me that I'm having a hard time escaping it. It became painfully obvious during my last relationship, but I have little doubt it has existed much, much longer than I'll ever recall. I still suffer from extreme self-interest - I will admit it. The fact that this blog exists is in part a testimony to that. The fact that my computer is full of pictures of myself is another. Pipers words are the smack upside the head that I have sorely needed for so very long: "Love is doing what is best for someone. But making self the object of our highest affections is not best for us. It is, in fact, a lethal distraction. We were made to see and savor God - and savoring him, to be supremely satisfied, and thus spread in all the world the worth of his presence. Not to show people the all-satisfying God is not to love them. To make them feel good about themselves when they were made to feel good about seeing God is like taking someone to the Alps and locking them in a room full of mirrors." (p. 33)

As I sit and write, and consider how this post started and where it is ending, something seems painfully clear to me. When asking myself how I can continue to fritter away useful time on worthless things, I normally cite a lack of motivation. But in so doing, I'm exempting myself from the more obvious issue - I can't even choose what is best for myself.

Sorry for another epically long post, it was probably as hard to write as it is for you all to read. I promise I'll post more cat pictures to make up for it!