Cut them some slack

Ihave a friend who is also a pastor. He loves Jesus a lot, but he is so hard to like. He is prideful, boastful and somewhat narcissistic. I know that sounds like a contradiction, but we all have our struggles, right? Every Christian is a struggling Christian. We are about the same age, and he recently ran in a marathon and so I’ve decided if he can do it I can do it too so I’ve started training to run my first marathon. Life is not a competition, but I also get tired of this guy talking all the time about his accomplishments, blah, blah, blah.

Goals are good, new things interest me. Moving forward in life is good. It’s especially good when it comes to our faith journey. I sense I’m in a season of grace and what I mean by that is being uptight over other people’s sin is bothering me less. Again every Christian is struggling and we need to cut them some slack.

Sometimes, however, I wonder if I’m going the wrong way as I’m being kind, gentle and patient. I’ve got a friend who’s a famous television preacher, he’s on the radio too and if I said his name you would probably know who he is, but he tells the story about being ordained into the ministry as a Methodist (Btw, I might be Baptist but I love the old Methodist Church.) One of the questions they asked him in the ordination process was, “Are you moving on to perfection?”

My friend said as he thought about his answer he realized he was not a very good person and really not that spiritual but after all he was being ordained into the ministry and that made him better than most (so he thought) so he answered, “Yes.”

Now that my friend is old and understands the mercy God has given him over all of the years that he has walked with Jesus he says he would now answer the question with, “Who the hell knows?” Please forgive my friend for cussing, he’s Presbyterian now and I think they allow it.

But here’s my point. As I cut people slack, love freely - as I offer grace because I think most people are doing the best they can I feel like I’m becoming complacent, complicit, a part of the problem and not a part of the solution. I feel like I am abandoning precepts like accountability and because of that mass anarchy might break out around me at any moment. My goal in grace is to be more like Jesus (perfection) but I feel like I’m becoming less like Jesus and if someone asked me how I’m doing I might have to answer with, “Who knows?!” Does that make sense?

What I’m saying is I’m not in control, God is. I can’t fix anyone and I can’t change anyone but I can encourage (love) everyone. Jesus didn’t really come to “fix” the world He said He came to save the world. He will come back to fix it later but right now my goal is to tell people God’s not mad at them, He likes them, and they can’t do anything about it. What they do with that message and whether or not they follow the rules (for lack of a better phrase) is up to them. I have to be okay with that; you do too.

He told me to tell you that.