“Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” I Thessalonians 5:23,24

Think of humility in terms of renovating a house—a lot has to be stripped away to make it better. The process is ugly at a point, as everything is dirty, broken down, and chaotic. To stop at that point is a shame; it prevents the new from coming in.

Pride (self-defense) turns a blind eye and says, “Mess? What mess?” And nothing gets done. Strangely, the more wrong we are, the more unwilling we are to be set right. Humility makes us free—free to accept God’s help, and the changes that must happen to make the best things real in us.

“Jesus is the God whom we can approach without pride and before whom we can humble ourselves without despair.” —Blaise Pascal

“Remember also your Creator in the days of your youth, before the evil days come and the years draw near when you will say, ‘I have no delight in them.’” Ecclesiastes. 12:1

Time wasted is time lost. There’s a time to search, and a time to keep—but if we do neither when it’s time, can something be found if it’s never been looked for, or can something be kept after it’s already been thrown away? God equipped the heart of man to discern the appropriate time for all things. Ignoring our hearts will mean opportunities lost. No one can recover their youth when they’re old—and, no one who calls upon the name of the Lord will be unheard. God is a God of restoration. He forgives actions of ignorant or willful haste, and He sets errant and aimless feet upon level, straight pathways. The past is gone, and the future is God’s domain alone—the truth of real hope—so the present is ours to squander or to live by faith in. Make today one that isn’t bitter to recall when it becomes yesterday.

From The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis—Demon uncle, Screwtape, tutors his demon nephew, Wormwood, in how to corrupt a human:

“You must therefore zealously guard in his mind the curious assumption ‘My time is my own.’ Let him have the feeling that he starts each day as the lawful possessor of twenty-four hours…The assumption which you want him to go on making is so absurd that, if once it is questioned, even we cannot find a shred of argument in its defense. The man can neither make, nor retain, one moment of time; it all comes to him by pure gift; he might as well regard the sun and moon as his chattels*…When I speak of preserving this assumption in his mind, therefore, the last thing I mean you to do is to furnish him with arguments in its defense. There aren’t any.”

*personal property

Even though the writers of The Constitution of the United States weren’t all strictly followers of Jesus, they set up this nation “Under God.” They understood that creating a government from a lesser ideal would lead its people back to a ruling hierarchy and common-variety tyranny. No human ideology allows total freedom. Strong statement, but think about it. It’s the truth.

However, the idea that there’s a Christian nation, a Christian business, or a Christian structure of any kind is a misapplication. Jesus Christ didn’t lay His life down for an individual nation, business, structure, what have you; Jesus died for people, the people of the world.

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” John 3:16,17

A stretch of land, a business, a building—each of these things can be dedicated to the ideals of Christianity, and, each can just as easily be wiped from existence. A Christian is a living soul—any time, any place, any condition—whether in great company, or all alone.

Neither the idolatry and polytheism of eastern cultures, the humanism of European nations and her colonies, the superstition and despotism of third world classes, nor the tide of relativism beating on America, can stop the indwelling Spirit of Christ in the heart of a person with an active, living faith.

“Nations, cultures, arts, civilization—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendours.” C.S. Lewis

©Cami Tapley.