I like Jesus and I like Him a lot. Why He wants to hang out with an old, tired, cynical and worn out pastor is hard to understand. Besides the Blonde (aka my wife Jennifer), He is the best friend I’ve got and sometimes He is the only friend I’ve got beside the Blonde.
I believe it to be an occupational hazard that pastors sometimes have the ability to tick people off. We don’t mean to, it just happens so please forgive us. My point is we need Jesus as a BFF.
The Pharisee in me says I’m not that bad. I don’t drink, smoke or chew, I don’t cuss and I love my wife but sometimes I still do things that don’t make Jesus happy. Here’s the deal. Every time I go “prodigal son” on Jesus, He’s always there waiting for me and He always tells me to come and warm my hands by the fire (we call it grace). When this happens, I’m embarrassed, I’m mad at myself and I promise to never do whatever it was I did again.
Sound familiar? This is typically when Jesus rolls His eyes and tells me that it’s not okay to sin but He died for this kind of stuff and that He loves me.
The Apostle Paul, who is probably the best Christian I know, said he did not understand his own actions. He wrote that the good he wanted to do, he did not do and the evil he hated, he kept doing (Romans 7). I think we can relate.
So, pastor, all of this is depressing, what do we do? I’m glad you asked.
What if we stopped trying to get better on our own (sin less) because the temptation to touch the bench with the “wet paint” sign seems to be way too much. Sinning less is obviously good but what if we loved more?
I read somewhere about loving God and loving people (Matthew 22:36-40). What if we practiced that? And if we did maybe we would automatically sin less and then we would get better, if that makes sense?
We need to replace the inaction (not sinning) with action (love). John captured this idea in 1st John 3:9 and 18. We need to stop sinning and start to practice love, not in theory or just with our words but rather to show that we love by the things we actually do.
If we were the ones who painted the bench we would already know it was wet, therefore we would not need to touch it (sin). I don’t know about you, but I am feeling better already!
Some of us grew up singing, “I need thee, oh I need thee, every hour I need thee.” It’s not that we needed Jesus, it’s that we need Jesus. We need Him to pick us up and dust us off and tell us to go and sin no more (John 8:11). We need Him to empower us to both not sin and to love.
He told me to tell you that.
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