Allow me to introduce myself. Some of you may already know me. I don’t mean to be rude or intrusive. I just thought it would be fair to give you a warning. We may already be best friends, or you may hardly even know I exist. Either way, let me paint you some perspectives. On my campus, I walk down the halls of my high school, too cool to pray, and too proud to pursue the vision God has called me to. I’ll say I’m waiting for confirmation or some kind of sign while I sit back and watch my classmates be blind. “They have planks in their eyes,” I’ll say. “I just have a little bit of sawdust in mine.” Lord, this was not what I had in mind! I’m trying to be their light, but it’s too dark in here to shine. I will justify and rationalize to nullify the pain of watching my closest friends die. I am the hardened heart of Christianity. Well, me, myself, and I are doing just fine within the confines of the church property lines. We are seeing more and more come to church every single week and still experiencing defeat out on the city streets. Seven days without Jesus makes one weak. That’s why my favorite thing to play is hide and go seek, seeking Jesus at church but hiding the rest of the week. And I am numb to feeling sympathy, passion, a stranger to me, as if doing something about injustice is actually my responsibility. I’m too busy with my own calling and what God has for me than to actually do anything about the call God has placed right in front of me. But I’m such a good actor, I could fool Steven Spielberg. The performance I put on at church is superb. My script is equipped with mighty adjectives but lacks the verbs. I have won the Hypocrisy Oscar Awards. You see, I learned all the motions until I became a master of disguise, thought I could hide from the Master of the skies, thought my own theories were divine so I disconnected from the vine, telling everybody else where to find Christ, but never allowing Himself to change my life. But I mean, my salvation is set in stone, right? I mean, I am a Christian by tradition, ’cause after all, I do celebrate Christmas. But these material presents are blinding me from God’s presence. Now I’m bitter and restless, and my callousness has brought me to cowardliness. So in the fight to save my family, coworkers, and friends, I have become a pacifist. But I’ll sit in church, say I’m getting fed while lacking the spiritual nutrients, starved myself from fasting so becoming well-fed was really becoming sick, refused to partake of the Bread daily so I got anorexic, developed a gag reflex so I spat out the same regurgitated message and expected those around me to openly digest it. See, I have a confession. I am the victim. I long for redemption. I’m sick of saying I don’t hear anything from God when really, I won’t listen. I’m tired of these conditions. Side effects are heart-attackin’ me, searing the freedom that once pumped through these arteries. They put my heart’s dreams into custody, handcuffed my destiny to apathy, cardiac arrest in me when all I needed was a rest in me. No wonder the leading cause of death is heart disease. But even though these bones have been dry for the longest time, I think I can hear that still small voice calling this sleeper to rise, because where there is death, He breathes life. He says, “I will take your cold, calloused heart and replace it with Mine. Let Me exchange your heart with its original design.”
Posted on: Fri, 29 Aug 2014 02:59:38 +0000
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