When UNgodliness is next to godliness…

You know the old saying, “cleanliness is next to godliness”? The scary thing about that saying is that most Americans believe it is actually scripture. In reality, it is just one of those psuedo-scriptural sayings that moms have used for years to try to get young boys to take a bath. It has never worked. The only thing that gets young boys, and most men for that matter, to stay clean is young girls… But none of this has anything to do with what I want to talk about today.

What I do want to talk about is something that IS next to godliness: that is UNgodliness. “Wait a minute,” you might say, “we are supposed to be like God! How can UNgodliness be next to godliness?” Stay with me for a minute and let me explain what I mean.

I am getting this idea from the beginning of God’s interaction with man in Genesis chapters 2 & 3. In 2:16-17 the Bible says, “But the LORD God gave him this warning: “You may freely eat any fruit in the garden except fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. If you eat of its fruit, you will surely die.” Then in 3:5, the serpent puts his twist on things by saying, “God knows that your eyes will be opened when you eat of it. You will become just like God, knowing everything, both good and evil.” These verses have always bothered me because I have always thought that being like God was a good thing. Aren’t we supposed to be developing His character in our lives? I also thought that knowing the difference between good and evil was a good thing. This bothered me enough that I have pretty much ignored it for years. I am really good at ignoring things I don’t want to spend the mental energy on, like doing the dishes.

Recently though, I started reading through Genesis again and asking what is does this mean? Why is it bad to be like God? Why is it bad to know good and evil? I started spend some of my precious mental energy reserves on these questions. To understand I needed to answer two questions: what does it mean to know good and evil? and what does it mean to be like God?

I have always understood knowing good and evil to mean having the knowledge that stealing cookies was bad and leaving the toilet seat down was good. But that can’t be what it means here. After all God had already given Adam the list: eating from this tree, BAD, everything else, GOOD. I may not be able to remember what I am supposed to get at the grocery store, but even I can remember that. So knowing good and evil has to mean more than just being able to read or remember a list of dos and don’ts.

Next, I had to realize that we are created to be like God just not, like, God. I hope that clears it all up for you. What I mean is that we are supposed to be like Him in our emotions, passions, and character but not like Him as in trying to do His job. We are not created to be our own god and to decide what is good and evil. Do you see it now? Being like God is bad when it means that we decide for ourselves what is good and evil. Our job is to trust God, not do His job for Him.

So this is how I understand the passage; We die when we decide we know better than God what is good and evil. We live when we trust that what He has told us is true and live accordingly. Seems kind of simple, doesn’t it? But I have the gift of making the simple complex (for example, the preceding explanation of this simple topic). I have to argue with God about what is good and what is evil. I also have to argue with obsess over the couple of things He says are bad instead of focusing on the entire world of good things He has given me. Adam was free to do everything in the world except one thing, so he did that! I am just like that. God has set me free to live and enjoy the world but I seem to always be arguing about the one of two things He warns will kill me. “But God, You don’t understand. That is so old fashioned. Things are different today…” It is simple, BE God, BAD, be like God, GOOD.

DO Good

How have we come to the point where the world identifies Christians by what they are against? The number one thing non-church goers think of when they think of us is that we are anti-gay. As I read 3 John I was once again reminded that YOU called us to be FOR something, not against stuff.

Verse 11 says “…do not imitate evil but imitate good. Whoever does good is from God…” YOU didn’t tell us to protest, picket, scream at, judge, or kill evil. YOU just said, don’t imitate it. Our job is simply to imitate good: to do good. YOU taught us to DO to others would we would have them do to us (Mt. 7:12). We are supposed to be proactive in living and doing good.

The evil in this world will not change because we attack it and complain about it. If we would just go out and live YOUR love, then the world will change. Evil will not be defeated by being attacked. It will be defeated because the virtue of good will outshine it. You can’t change darkness by attacking it, you just turn on the light and it goes away. LORD, help me to live FOR YOU not against everything else!

Flee TO Love

Paul tells us to flee youthful passions (2 Tim 2:22). In 20 years of ministry, at least 12 of those with youth, I have found myself teaching this over and over. I have preached quiet a few “Don’t do this…” “Stop doing that…” type sermons. No wonder people develop religious/ controlling spirits. We teach rules; people try to follow the rules and impose those rules on more people. Eventually, we realize that we struggle with the rule so we create a new, more stringent rule to protect people from breaking the first rule… And the wheel keeps spinning around. Then we wonder why dead religion is so prevalent.

But Paul did not teach dead religious rule keeping. He did NOT stop with flee youthful passions, he went on to say and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace… Paul was not just telling us not to be bad, he told us to pursue the good. Many times I have tried to resist temptation and found myself failing because while I was resisting, the temptation was all I thought about. Paul says, run from the temptation and replace it with righteousness, faith, love, and peace. Flee TO these things. When tempted to exact revenge, don’t just resist it, DO good to them. When my spirit is dry and I’m tired, I need to do more than just not let the enemy steal my joy. I need to force my flesh to get up and worship God. I need ask what true love would do in the situation. I need to let the love of God flow out through me. In short Paul is saying be more concerned about righteousness, faith, love, and peace and you won’t have to worry so much about righting youthful (or not quiet so youthful anymore) lusts… Stop fighting against things and start running to God.

Lord, help me get this deep down in my spirit. I need to live FOR you not against stuff. If I immerse myself in YOU, the lusts of the flesh will melt away. Help me get it straight. Help me focus on letting YOUR love flow in and through me. I can’t do this alone, Lord, fill me.

Alienated

    Which comes first, the chicken or the egg? That is the question that comes to mind when I think about sin. Does sin cause me to pull away from YOU, or do I sin because I have pulled away from YOU? Colossians 1:21 says, “you who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds…” The problem is not the physical outward sin, or “deeds of evil.” The problem is alienation and being hostile in mind to YOU. The NIV translates it as, “once you were alienated and were enemies in your minds, because of your evil behavior…” While this is possible in the original language, YOU said that “…the words you speak come from the heart—that’s what defiles you. For from the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, all sexual immorality, theft, lying, and slander (Matthew 15:18-19). So, I sin because my heart is alienated and hostile to YOU.

    So why am I so quick to condemn outward behaviors in other people? The problem is not what they DO. The problem is what they THINK and BELIEVE. We don’t trust YOU, we don’t believe YOU are good, we don’t want to submit our lives to YOU. So we pull away and become alienated.The natural outcome of this wrong thinking is sin. We all do evil things because our hearts are alienated from YOU. If people knew, trusted, and loved YOU, evil deeds would cease to exist.

    Maybe, in presenting You to the world, I should concentrate more on these issues of the heart rather than criticizing outward behaviors. After all, when someone starts by just obeying rules, they will always resent those rules. But if someone starts by falling in love with YOU, the standards become something we do out of love and respect.

    Lord, let my life be dedicated to promoting relationship with YOU, not attacking “deeds of evil.” I do not want my life to be defined by what I am AGAINST but by WHO I am FOR!