I've been thinking about many of your posts, especially Caron's reflections on the pride we can find in being "saved" (cf. Mandy Moore movie). As both an upstanding Christian at my Christian school (which was, in my view, ever slipping closer to complete depravity) and an upstanding Christian at my secular prep school (already totally lost, of course) I felt a great deal of subtle pride in being a good kid. I think it stemmed from a strong life-of-the-mind and self-consciousness of belief.
In "The Pursuit of God," A.W. Tozer says, "Faith is not in itself a meritorious act; the merit is in the One toward whom it is directed. Faith is a redirecting of our sight ... sin has twisted our vision inward and made it self-regarding."
Sin can twist our vision of our own faith inward, so we focus on our faith as fact, as identity, and as an end, rather than actually directing our actions and thoughts to God. At a conference at Georgetown last week, Evangelicals and Muslims came together and had an honest conversation about the nature of faith and witness. The Muslims exhorted us to think about faith as action, not as belief. Without abandoning the creeds, I think there's some truth to that.
What feels radical about Christianity to me is that even faith is a gift of God. It's easier to take credit for an action than a state of being. My hopeless state of being apart from that gift is what I have been prone to forget, and therein much more tempted to focus on the merit of my actions than on the privilege of my being which was bestowed on me because of Jesus when I didn't deserve it. As I understand it, being precedes action.
ReplyDeleteI have this proneness of forgetting that my nature is sinful...in my thinking, I don't need God. But then I struggle with patterns and yet don't recognize them for what they are. And then, instead of being desperately downward about it, I remember (with relief-??!) that I am sinful and there is a reason why I need God. I am so elated by this revelation every time -- it's like it gives me a fresh reason to give all my muck back to him so he can conquer it AND I DON'T HAVE TO. I have a laundry list of stuff to give him every time I remember.
ReplyDeleteMichelle, I think you're right that being (completely undeserved transformation of our identity) should precede action. And it's definitely easier to take credit for an action. I think what I was trying to communicate is how easily pride in "being a good Christian" can keep us from actually acting in a way that is compassionate and focused outside of ourselves. Growing up, I think I thought too much about how I was a Christian vs. non-Christian, rather than what it meant to actually follow Jesus.
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