ENTERTAINED or ORDAINED | PART 2

In part 1, I spoke a lot about how our relationship with God is not about being entertained. But there’s an even more pervasive danger out there.

For all of you who have iTunes through any sort of device, you may have fallen in love with Podcasts much like I have. I simply love them. Then when I discovered iTunes U (the link is for anyone who was under the same rock I was), I locked myself in my bedroom for a while and geeked-camped on a C.S. Lewis biographical class. Not everyone is that into Podcasts -- but if you are, you’ll really appreciate this next part.

I want you to do an experiment; go to the iTunes Podcast store and look under the “Religion & Spirituality” category. Look at the titles of episodes from some of the most popular feeds.

This ebbs and flows throughout the year, but the majority of the most popular feeds have titles like “Overcoming Fear”, “Focusing on Positive Things”, “Living your Best”. Go to Barnes & Noble and look at the most popular spiritual titles. You’ll see Joel Osteen’s smiling face next to the words “Your Best Life Now” in a big glossy font.

Say what you want about the well-intended folks behind these materials. This post is not about them - it’s about the false teachings to which they’ve fallen victim. Adam Ford of Adam4D.com said it best in one of his comics: the phrase “I have these new theological ideas” is best translated “I subscribe to some old heresies.” The problem with the aforementioned ideas is that they all spike the pool of good resources for the learning Christian with the Prosperity Gospel.

There’s little need for another blogger pulling apart the Prosperity Gospel. But if you’re like me and weren’t brought up in church, you may not know what that is. The Prosperity Gospel takes the idea of “Jesus died for my sins and now the Holy Spirit has transformed me and continues to make me look more and more like Christ” (2 Corinthians 3:18) and twists it to say “God wants what is best for me and will give me a nice life because He favors me.” I’m sure there’s a better way to explain it, but that’s the gist of it.

And for the stutterer, this idea can be poison. It leads you to think “If God values me and favors me, He’ll heal me someday.” And then when God doesn’t heal you, you turn your back, mutter something awful about “fundamentalists”, and crawl under your agnostic rock. 

What if I told you that being a Christian is nothing like signing up for boy scouts? I love how scouts are taught to do so many things that improve a young man’s character, momentarily looking past the recent controversies surrounding Boy Scouts of America.  But mere character is not the point of following Jesus. It’s not about self-improvement and it’s not about feeling good about yourself. When I attended church before I was a Christian, I was disappointed that the messages didn’t help me in a practical way. I didn’t feel better about myself and I certainly didn’t feel any different about my stuttering. I assumed that meant that I was in a bad church and the teachings were outdated.

Looking back, I realize the reason I didn’t like messages: They were about Jesus and not about me.

1 Thessalonians 4:3 says “This is the will of God, your sanctification...”. Some translations say “The will of God is for you to be holy...”. The rest of the verse talks specifically about keeping out of sexual sin, but even the first half of the verse strikes home when you see that it doesn’t say “The will of God is for you to be happy/comfortable.” Look at the life of Jesus. Read the books of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. I challenge you to find a passage in which Jesus talks a lot about his disciples.

When you realize that following Jesus is about Jesus and not about you, your life will change. And not because you’re changing you, but because you have been changed because of what He has done. For the stutterer - God may heal your speech. But if He chooses not to, you have/get to keep His words even closer; When Paul begged for healing, the Lord told him “My grace is sufficient for you. My strength is made perfect in weakness.”

I touched on that verse in my first blog post. I love that it’s not simply comfort for a person who has not been given healing from some sort of ailment. It goes beyond comfort. It gives purpose to my “thorn in the flesh”. That truth takes me to my knees. Every day, my prayer must be “Lord, I need you for literally every word I say.” What the Holy Spirit has done in me tremendous.

He has taken my plea of “Lord, why did you make me like this?” and made it “I would rather struggle to speak Your words than say my own with ease.”

[End of PART 2 of series]

[Mirrored from thestutteringchristian.com]