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While I'm waiting for everyone to finish reading so that they can talk to me, I'll talk about being a vegetarian and the correlations that I see between that and Christianity.
Now, I have been trying to be a vegetarian for 3 months. About. And I have been trying to be a Christian for ten years. About.
I ate meat the other day, and I felt really really bad because one, my goodness, can't I stick to anything? And number two, I know that meat is bad for me and makes me feel gross and sick and makes me fat, but what do I do? I EAT IT ANYWAY. It's sickening to see how in a moment of temptation, I just stuff meat in my mouth. So how can I even call myself a vegetarian?
The answer, my friends, is that I am trying. I am trying to be a vegetarian and I know exactly why. The important thing is that I KNOW how to eat, and I aspire to eat that way, whether or not I always succeed. I feel bad (not only gastrically) when I fail and I feel good when I don't.
And I think maybe that's how it is with Christianity. I know how to behave and how to think, but I don't always. I screw up all the time. (Last month and a half, anyone?) How can I still call myself a Christian when I do things that Christians know not to do? Once again the point is that I know, and I am trying, and I feel remorse when I fail, and succeeding makes me want to succeed more.
Last night Joey had a song that struck me: The Way of Salvation. Salvation isn't only a destination, it's the starting point and the path as well. You're always being saved and you'll never be completely saved until you get to the very end. Even then, will you be whole? There isn't really a lot of satisfaction in that, when there's nothing left to strive for.
July 18 2005, 01:16:24 UTC 6 years ago
"we know that the law is spiritual; but i am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. i do not understand what i do. for what i want to do i do not do, but what i hate i do." ...
"now if i do what i do not want to do, it is no longer i who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.
so i find this law at work: when i want to do good, evil is right there with me. for in my inner being i delight in God's law; but i see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. what a wretched man i am! who will rescue me from this body of death? thanks be to God — through Jesus Christ our Lord!
so then, i myself in my mind am a slave to God's law, but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin."
-romans 7 and stuff.
so yeah... paul couldn't do it, and he frickin' spread the gospel to the world. so to answer your question, "how can i still call myself a Christian when i do things that Christians know not to do?" - being a Christian isn't about your behavior. the point is not that you are trying, the point is that you are trusting Christ with your life, and that you are trusting him to work in you.
as for salvation, you're right in that it's a starting point and a path. the starting point is when God makes you alive spiritually... and then there is no "very end." one day your flesh will be destroyed along with your sinful nature, and you'll get to heaven where you won't have to strive anymore... there won't be anything to struggle against. to me that will be beautiful and wonderful and ultimately satisfying, because i won't have to strive. ever. Jesus already did that for us.
so, hooray! don't feel bad when you screw up. it's like catherine told me earlier today when i was being a pouty depressed fool for being out of town at a wedding, where i discovered i was apparently scheduled to work at office depot that day (that was way too much background information): "when life seems jolly rotten, there's something you've forgotten, and that's to laugh and smile and dance and sing." we later listened to art garfunkel's lovely rendition of that eric idle tune. and then there's sam's later advice: "whenever you hit a brick wall, you either have to die or go through the brick wall," and "i've discovered that sometimes you just have to laugh at yourself for being the pathetic loser everyone else sees you as."
that was a LOT. i hope i'm not being too stupid or preachy or whatever. i just don't want you to feel like a loser, because no matter what happens, you're going to screw up somewhere. eventually you'll have to completely trust the Lord, and that's hard.
i'm also not going to scroll up and edit, because i need a shower. forgive me for any grammatical blunders. except for the constant lack of capitalization; i like it that way. oh, also ignore that fragment i just left sitting behind the semicolon.
p.s.: this should count for at least five posts on my little comment tally. :)