Getting our arms around the transformed life - a summary
ROMANS 12 – Think back over past holiday gatherings.
Were they full of joy? Or bickering? Mocking? Put-downs? Belittling? Our hope
today: that godly brothers/sisters/authors and God’s Word can shed some light on how we can
bring light and grace to future gatherings at home and wherever we find ourselves.
What
contributes to messing up our soul or heart or spirit:
Rejection – in my own life: favoritism shown to my siblings,
translating into rebellion and reinforced by lack of self-esteem and rejection
by dates and unfaithful wives.
Assault – we observe put-downs and mockery in marriages
GROWING UP & AS ADULTS, as well as outright shouting & sometimes
violence (one wife threw a flowerpot at me. If she had better aim, I’d be dead).
As kids, we take these observations in marriages to the playground, where they
are practiced in abundance.
Withdrawal – being attacked or guilty of such results in
withdrawal or distancing in marriage, and then socially, we self-distance.
Defensiveness – with assaults & distancing in our
experience, we think we must defend our every thought and action.
We bring these problems into our own marriage and raise kids
who observe them and carry on the vicious cycle. That’s what’s wrong with
America and the whole world today, THE AUTHOR SAYS.
God, however, offers ways to refocus our thoughts, feelings
and actions to transform our lives. Paul said, follow me as I follow Christ.
Few of us dare to say that. We may think of a very few as examples in many ways of a transformed, humble life.
THE FIRST MAIN ELEMENT in the transformed social dimension is for individuals to come to see themselves whole, as God himself sees them. Such a vision sets them beyond the wounds and limitations they have received in their past relationships to others. It is this vision of oneself from God’s point of view that makes it possible to regard oneself as blessed, no matter what has happened.
“We are dead,” Paul tells us, and “our life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then we will appear with him, glorious” (Colossians 3:3-4, PAR). We have stepped into a new life where the primary relationship is with Christ and we are assured of a glorious existence forever. God has a plan for each of us in the work he is doing during our lifetime, and no one can prevent this from being fulfilled if we place our hope entirely in him. The part we play in his plans now will extend to the role he has set before us for eternity. Our life in him is whole and it is blessed, no matter what has or has not been done to us, no matter how shamefully our human circles of sufficiency have been violated. It is God’s sufficiency to us that secures everything else. Paul again said, “Our sufficiency is of God” (2 Corinthians 3:5; 9:8, PAR). It is the God-given vision of us as whole in him that draws all the poisons from our relationships to others and enables us to go forward with sincere forgiveness and blessing toward them. Only in this way can we stand free from the wounds of the past and from those who have assaulted or forsaken us. DEFENSIVENESS GONE
THE SECOND ELEMENT IN the spiritually transformed social
dimension is abandonment of all defensiveness. This of course could occur only
in a social context where Christ dwells—that is, among his special people. But
it is natural it would occur in the absence of attack and withdrawal, wherever
that may be, or where we have an impregnable defense against it.
GENUINE LOVE PREDOMINATES IN OUR
GATHERINGS AND THEN ALL PRETENSE would vanish from our lives. That would be the
THIRD ELEMENT in the spiritually transformed social dimension of the self. Love
between Christians then would, as Paul says to the Romans, “be genuine.”
The FOURTH element is an opening
up of our broader social dimension to redemption. Not having the burden of
defending and securing ourselves, and acting now from the resources of our new
“life from above,” we can devote our lives to the service of others. This is
the positive moment in redemption of the social side of the self. It is not
just a matter of not attacking or withdrawing. That redemption will naturally
and rightly be chiefly focused in blessing upon those closest to us, beginning
with our family members and moving out from there, proportional to our degree
of life involvement with others.And that is the central factor in
the beautiful picture of what the local gatherings of disciples into “churches”
should be like, given by Paul in Romans 12:1-21,
WHICH OFFERS A PICTURE OF WHAT A TRANSFORMED HEART WOULD LOOK LIKE. Christ’s apprentices would be carrying out
their particular work in the group life with a grace and power that is not from
themselves, but from God SOMEONE READ THE FIRST 8 VERSES (verses 3-8), EACH ONE
would be exhibiting the following qualities (verses 9-21):
WRAP-UP1. Letting love be
completely real 2. Abhorring what is evil 3. Clinging to what is good 4. Being
devoted to one another in family-like love (philostorgoi) 5. Outdoing one
another in giving honor 6. Serving the Lord with ardent spirit and all
diligence 7. Rejoicing in hope 8. Being patient in troubles 9. Being devoted
constantly to prayer 10. Contributing to the needs of the saints 11. Pursuing
(running after) hospitality 12. Blessing persecutors and not cursing them 13.
Being joyful with those who are rejoicing and being sorrowful with those in
sorrow 14. Living in harmony with each other 15. Not being haughty, but fitting
right in with the “lowly” in human terms 16. Not seeing yourself as wise 17.
Never repaying evil for evil 18. Having due regard for what everyone takes to
be right 19. Being at peace with everyone, so far as it depends on you 20.
Never taking revenge, but leaving that to whatever God may decide 21. Providing
for needy enemies 22. Not being overwhelmed by evil, but overwhelming evil with
good This is the most adequate biblical description of what the details of a
spiritually transformed social dimension look like. We should pause to contemplate it. Just think for a
moment what it would be like to be part of a group of disciples in which this
list was the conscious, shared intention, and where it was actually lived out,
even if with some imperfection. You can see, I think, how it would totally
transform the marriage relation and the home and family. Its effect on the
community would be incalculable, as it in fact has been wherever realized
throughout the history of Christ’s people on earth. The abandonment of all
defensiveness and its many strategies would clearly be achieved in such a
group. There would no longer be any need for them. In their place would be
receptiveness and blessing for all, even enemies. Certainly, to achieve this in
our social dimension we must have heard and accepted the gospel of grace, of
Jesus’ defenseless death on the cross on our behalf, and of his acceptance of
us into his life beyond death and beyond the worst that could be done to him or
to us. We must stand safe and solid in his kingdom. The
social world is set before us as an infinite task, which can only be carried
out in the power of God. We accept that. Just as we cannot be the husband or
wife or parent God intends except in the power of God, so for our life as a
whole. We do not even know how to pray as we ought, Paul tells us (Romans
8:26). What then, shall we not pray? By no means, for “the Spirit Himself intercedes
for us with groanings too deep for words” (verse 26). And the Spirit of God
will enter into all of our social connections if we invite him, wait on him,
and proceed as best we can. We have the promise of Jesus to those who live by
his “living water.” That water “shall become in him a well of water springing
up to eternal life” (John 4:14), and “‘from his innermost being shall flow
rivers of living water’” (John 7:38; compare Isaiah 58:11). Spiritual formation
in Christ obviously requires that we increasingly be happily reconciled to
living in and by the direct upholding of the hand of God. This is clearly what
the entire biblical view of life calls for, and especially what Jesus himself
lived and presented as the truth. Only from within this gospel outlook on life
can we begin to approach the godly reformation of the self in its social world.
But from within that outlook we can cease from assault and withdrawal and can
extend ourselves in blessing to all whose lives we touch
Willard, Dallas. Renovation of the Heart: Putting On the
Character of Christ (pp. 195-197). The Navigators. Kindle Edition.
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