Matthew 15:3-9
But Jesus put it right back on
them. “Why do you use your rules to play fast and loose with God’s
commands? God clearly says, ‘Respect your father and mother,’ and,
‘Anyone denouncing father or mother should be killed.’ But you weasel
around that by saying, ‘Whoever wants to, can say to father and mother,
What I owed to you I’ve given to God.’ That can hardly be called
respecting a parent. You cancel God’s command by your rules. Frauds!
Isaiah’s prophecy of you hit the bull’s-eye:
These people make a big show of saying the right thing,
but their heart isn’t in it.
They act like they’re worshiping me,
but they don’t mean it.
They just use me as a cover
for teaching whatever suits their fancy.”
Scripture
quotations from The Message. © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002
by Eugene Peterson. Used by permission of NavPress, Colorado Springs,
CO. All rights reserved.
Nathan has developed a new
“game” that he likes to play where he hides behind an open door (in the
little wedge of space between the door and the wall), peers through the
crack where the hinges are…and says, “I’m hiding! You can’t see me!”
Whether he realizes that we indeed can see him or not, he revels in his
perceived “cover.”
This is his way of saying, “I know you are
there, but since you can’t see what I’m really doing behind this door,
it doesn’t count!” I’ve warned him repeatedly that he is going to pinch
is little fingers in that hinge space someday…and he continues to test
this idea. It will be a sad day if/when this happens.
We are all
hiding and testing God, in some way. We go to church on Sunday, read
our Bible, and “say and do all the right things.” But then we hide
behind the “door” of our Christian faith and judge others. We pretend
that no one can see us when we commit sins – of all kinds (I’ll let you
fill in the blank). We claim the name of Jesus as we interpret
scripture to suit our own needs and desires…or to condemn others…and we
try to mold the meaning of Christian discipleship to fit the way we want
things to be. In a nutshell, we fail to keep the main thing (Jesus),
the Main Thing! And someday, a lot of us are going to get our fingers pinched in the doorway.
Nowhere
in the Bible will you find a lot of the things that “Christians” hold
to so dearly as the be-all-end-all tenets of their faith. Scripture
doesn’t say that we have to shove God’s commandments down the throats of
others – or plaster them on our walls. There is no Bible verse that
tells us that we must pray at a certain hour each day – in a certain
place…or that we must offer a prayer before every meal or ballgame.
There is no specific commandment that tells us that we are to let every
person who thinks or feels differently from us know that we are right –
and they are wrong.
If you boil it down to what the Bible does
say, you will see that we are commanded to love and respect God…to love
others as He loves them and as we love ourselves…and to share the GOOD
NEWS of Jesus with our words and actions. Everything else is just a
smokescreen that the devil likes to use to make us think we are
something we aren’t…that we can hide behind God and have it our way –
and drag others along for the ride. Yes, someday, a whole lot of us are
going to get pinched!
Where are you hiding today? How are you
using God and your Christian faith as a “cover” to do as you please?
Where have you twisted scripture to suit your desires and attitudes?
Are you really ready to step out into the light of day and be who God
has called you to be…to serve Him as He desires…to truly dig into His word and find out what He is saying…and to act on His intentions, not your own? Don’t you think it’s time you were?
©2015 Debbie Robus
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