Transformation

People often get me confused with a smart person because I wear glasses. Glasses can make even the dumbest person look remotely intelligent so I am partially grateful that my eyes hate contacts, but I have not always had glasses. When I as in 9^Th grade, I started getting headaches and my eyes would hurt when I would read things. At first nobody believed me, thinking that it must have been an elaborate story to get out of doing homework but eventually I made it to an eye doctor.

I discovered a couple things at the optometrist. The first was that I had astigmatism which was causing my headaches, but also I found out I had extremely poor vision in my left eye. I was practically blind in the one eye and it caused my total vision to suffer greatly. I became very amused at closing my good eye and then my bad eye and seeing how blurry things got as I went between the two. I remember wondering how I could have been so ignorant to the poor vision in my left eye.

After a few days I got my glasses and it changed everything. The world came to life in a vivid way that I could not have imagined the day before. I remember looking out the window into my backyard, nothing in the backyard had changed overnight but I perceived it in a whole new way. The redwood tree I had climbed as a younger child was no longer a reddish pole with greenish blobs attached; it had a trunk, complete with bark that was peeling off as squirrels playing tag scrambled up and down. The green blobs were made of individual branches each with smaller twigs full of needles bursting out of the long brown arms.

In the days that followed it became alarming at how I had gotten so used to the blurry world that I had lived in for so long. I was completely unaware of the vivid realities that were around me. I had not made a decision to view the world in a lesser way. I did not even know I was missing out. However, the reality was that I was not viewing the world as it was meant to be viewed. I had been settling for a blurry version rather than the vivid reality of what was around me.

I was reading through Romans a while ago and read the part that says "Do not conform any longer" (Rom 12:2). I am sure I had read that passage many times but for some reason this simple phrase really stuck out to me. Paul says “any longer" which implies that it was something the Church was actively doing. I often see myself in the characters of scripture and began to wonder if this was still true today? Does the church still conform to the world around them? Do I as an individual Christian still conform to society?

 As I began to think about all the ways that I look no different than the world around me it became alarming how often I go to society for my identity rather than the cross. I have a hunch too, that this is not a problem that is limited to me. As I look at the church I see that collectively we are conforming to the society we are called to change. The scariest thing about conformity is how subtle it can be. It is not as if Christians are trying to live just like the people next to them, most of the time we are unaware we are even doing it. It happens when we view issues and define terms through the lens of society rather than that of Christ. Our definitions and understanding of things like of success, love, holiness, salvation and so many others get blurred by their cultural understandings.

However, there is hope in the second half of the verse. It goes on to say "be transformed by the renewing of your mind" (Rom 12:2). When I think of this notion of being transformed it brings me back to when I got glasses. Just like I was ignorant of what was around me, we are unknowingly settling for the blurry versions of what it means to be a Christian. We are not necessarily actively choosing to conform, but rather are passively defaulting to what is around us. In calling us to be transformed, it is as if God is asking us to stop living in a dim and shadowy world and to put on new lenses that will allow us to view the world in the vivid reality that God intended.

When we look at the life of Christ it is clear that He viewed the world differently. He looked into situations and people and saw things that other people missed. Where others viewed failures and lost causes, He saw opportunities to love.  He looked at the world with a fresh perspective that was anything but what those around Him saw. Paul is essentially challenging Christians to try and see the world that Jesus saw; to try and see people the way Christ did.

I believe that if we do this, if we allow God to change the way we view the world and think about simple ideas, we will be transformed. We will be the salt of the Earth. We will be the light of the world. We will shine Christ’s love into the darkness and illuminate a world around us with a vivid reality that we have been unknowingly blind to for so long. We will change the world through simple acts of love like Christ and we will open other people's eyes to that very world which we had failed to see for so long.

We will be transformed and transform the world around us.

Conformity

I was pretty awkward in Junior High. I am still pretty awkward today, but in Junior High I was excessively awkward. I desperately wanted to be accepted by everyone so I had to create multiple versions of myself to appeal to various different people. I've always liked wearing hats so a lot of my rebellion meant wearing it backwards. My dad hated it. He would make little comments about how stupid and backwards my hat was. I thought about giving in to my dad's critical remarks but I knew better. I had to be cool and that meant wearing my hat backwards. These versions of myself looked a lot more like the person I was trying to win over than who I used to be. I tried to like the music they liked. I talked like they did. I did what they did.  I thought to be accepted I should just act like everyone else. Fortunately I was not nearly cool enough to hang out with people who were actually doing bad things, but I still lost a lot of who I was for a couple years.


When you read through the Old Testament you end up following around a group of people called the Israelites. The Israelites were God's chosen people and He did a lot of amazing things for them. When the Israelites found themselves enslaved by the Egyptians God sent Moses to lead them out of Egypt and into the promise land. However, Moses was not just supposed to lead them out of Egypt, God wanted everyone to know how great and powerful He is. I can probably skip the story recap because everyone saw Prince of Egypt, but for those who are rusty on their Disney movies: to show God's power Moses was told to bring down a series of plagues on Egypt. These plagues ended with the Egyptians giving the Israelites all their cool stuff and telling them to get out of town. The story doesn't stop there though, the Israelites run into the Red Sea and by then Pharaoh realized that he had let his slave labor quit so was chasing after them with an army to bring them back. So things are looking grim for the Israelites until God shows up again. He holds the army at bay with a pillar of fire while He parts the Red Sea. After the Israelites had cross the sea on dry land the fire disappears and Pharaoh's army gets punked. While in the middle of the sea the water comes back and drowns the army. That is amazing.


I tell this story because of the one that comes after it. It is hard to believe some of the things that God did for the Israelites, but it is even harder to believe some of the things that the Israelites did knowing what God had done in their midst. After being lead out of Egypt they are camped at the base of a mountain and Moses goes up to get the commandments from God, but the Israelites decide Moses and God are taking too long. They decide they don't want to be God's special people anymore; they don't want to be different. So they get together and tell Moses' brother Aaron to make them a golden cow to worship. They are basically saying that they want to be like everyone else around them.


When I used to read these stories I would get so mad because time and time again the Israelites would try and be like the nations around them and God would always say, "No, I want something else for you. I want you to be different. I want you to be set apart." God would plead with them to be His and His alone, but the chosen people had made a choice to by like everyone else. They chose to conform.


I was not kidding when I said this used to upset me. I would get actually angry and these dead people for being so stupid. One times I must have been excessively mad and God overheard my thoughts because He hit me with a ton of bricks. I realized that I am the same way. Not just the Junior High awkward Alan, but every version of me ever. God has done amazing things in my life, but still time and time again I get my identity from everyone and everything around me. I conform.

I stopped getting mad at the Israelites and started identifying with them.


The thing about myself and the Israelites is that I don't think we are alone. When I look at Christians today I see countless places where we have conformed to the society around us. Where we have gotten our identity from someplace other than a God calling us to be set apart, to be different. We have blown it, we have conformed.

You can get depressed when you start thinking of all the places we have messed up, but one of the comforts I get also comes from the Israelites. No matter how many times they blew it, no matter how many times they failed and conformed to the people around them. No matter how many times they turned away from God, He still pursued them. God refused to leave them alone and continued to love and seek them, and this is another thing I can identify with.

God loves us. God pursues us and He is still calling us to be different; to be set apart.

Set Apart

Why do people tend

To chase the latest trend?

No matter what it is we see

We follow, mindlessly.

We dare not fight against the tide

For fear of being swept aside.

It’s far easier to indulge

And simply do what we’re told.

But courage I suppose is this:

To feel the currant and resist;

To see the norm, but depart

And in doing so, be set apart.

Reflections

I love to write but never want to do it. I love sharing my ideas but turning them into something more concrete than thoughts floating aimlessly around in my head is sometimes hard. This blog is my attempt to be proactive with the situation. As these thoughts escape my brain and take on the form of words my hope is that they will be a blessing and encouragement to those who read them.

The framework that I come from is that of a Christian who has been saved by the grace of God. Everything else is touched by that reality and it shapes the way I think. It is impossible for people to adequately understand the greatness and magnitude of the love and mercy shown to people by God without first understanding the human condition. It is easy to be positive and focus on the beauty and good that is in people and ignore anything else. However, when we closely examine who we are we find that there is an ugliness that lurks beneath the surface. While often ignored or hidden away, we are all broken people. Ignoring the brokenness can get in the way of allowing God to fix us and restore us to what we were created to be.

When we understand that brokenness we can then fully appreciate the work of Christ on the cross. Jesus enters into our brokenness and fixes us. He does not save us because of who we are, but rather in spite of who we are, because of who HE is.

I am titling this blog "Reflections" because I intend to reflect of the human condition and the work of God. His work in both my life and on a larger scale. The other reason is because of what Christ does in our lives. As we follow after Him we begin to realize that we are the Light of the World. We are doing the very work Christ did by loving people and spreading that love which He so lavishly bestowed on everyone He met. However, we do not create this light. The light we shine into the darkness is just a reflection of the light that God, through His grace and mercy, is pouring out on us daily. The means, and the power, and the purpose of Life is Christ alone. To take anything away from that is a great disservice to the gospel.

The gospel is the most beautiful gift ever given, but it shines brighter still when contrasted to the ugliness of who we are apart from Jesus. I hope by delving into the depths of our fractured and broken souls we can catch a glimpse of Christ's light and in time become a reflection of that to the lost world around us. Some of us are already experiencing what it means to be a reflection of Christ to the world, but we can all polish off the dirt and shine brighter still.

Transforming into You

I tried my best to be accepted

But despite my best still felt dejected

No matter how fast, toward You, I 'd run

The distance could not be overcome

I looked to the commands but got nowhere

Except hopelessly caught in despair

But, with grace, You looked down from above

 Restored and saved me by Your Love

Now this Love dwells in me

Sanctifying; making me holy

Because in my heart Your word resides

Changing who I am inside

Like the sun drives out the night

So my darkness leaves in Your light

Which slowly begins shining through

As I am transforming into You

My priorities get rearranged

As my perspective is being changed

I long to spread Your Love around

So that others lost, may be found