From
Romans 12:1-12
H,
Well,
that is the difference between high ideals and low reality. After all the talk
in the world there is still a life to be lived. It does not seem to respond to
good intentions and self help anecdotes. There is a level where being positive
is always superior to being negative but if we are honest about the whole brunt
of life then we know that there is a glass ceiling where wishing wells cannot
reach. We all come face to face sooner or later with the mountains we cannot
climb and the stars we cannot reach. Life will eventually present us with the
joy-stealing reality of the limits of our control and influence.
In this
dark room of doubt there is only hope, only joy and only prayer to sustain. When
people say that Christians live in a fantasy I always chuckle. You only have to
read the bible to capture a seething realism that runs through the whole
glorious book. Who starts a fantasy by telling you: “in this world you will see
many troubles…”? Who encourages a person’s
ego in dreaming of himself as good or god with words like: “I know that in me (us) lies
no good thing”? There is a reality to
this faith that is oddly refreshing but only when you reach the end of your
rope.
Hope?
It is in the words that follow: “in this world you shall see many troubles but
be of good cheer (joy) for I have overcome the world.” It is realism with the
hope of a brighter day. I know we have all these rough days now where the instability
within leads to unstable acts without. The source of our joy was never meant to
be external factors. Again, the story of the birth of Christianity is littered
with prison and pain and crosses and death. They faced much more physical
danger for what they believed but the bible bubbles over with their obvious
joy. They knew the end of all things. They had joy in the present knowing it
was not the forever. They connected with each other and, together, with the
nature of all reality above. They took that report from heaven as sacred and
the famous “reality on ground” as passing.
That
we would learn to do the same.
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