It is a grave error and a massive conceit to attempt to usurp the role of God in another person’s sanctification process, telling God, “As far as I’m concerned, you’re not working fast enough.”

So writes Dan Edelen in his post A Long Obedience in the Same Direction.

Oh I needed to read this today! Dan refers to this passage:

Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.

– 2 Corinthians 3:17-18 ESV

That’s a great word. We are all being transformed into the image of Christ, from one degree of glory to another. It’s a process that does not end while we’re on this earth. “One degree of glory to another” – wow! There is hope for me after all.

But what of others? How do I treat them as I observe them at their place on the journey of sanctification? I’ve had some wise friends caution me recently that I am far too impatient with (and discouraged by) others who aren’t “getting it” as fast as I want them to. Dan presents a view of sanctification as a numberline, from -10 to +10, with +10 being the image of Christ:

But what are we to expect when someone starts at -9? Is +7 a week after meeting Jesus possible? A month? A year? A decade? If we can’t distinguish the difference in the sun’s arc across the sky from one minute to the next, how confident are we that we see with the eyes of God that one minute difference in the arc of a person’s sanctification process? To go back to the 2 Corinthians 3 passage and its note on “degrees of glory,” there are 180 degrees in a U-turn. A long obedience in the same directionThat’s a lot of tiny steps to take. Being made to look like Jesus is not a blink-of-an-eye affair, but one of a lifetime of minute, resolute steps. As Eugene Peterson’s classic book on discipleship is titled, it’s “a long obedience in the same direction.”

There’s not a person reading this now who doesn’t know at least one Christian out there who’s taking a long time to break out of the negative numbers on the depravity scale and into those higher, positive sanctification digits. Yet what does it say about us when we screw up our faces and rail that the ex-biker who spent ten years smoking crack isn’t where he should be after meeting Jesus two years ago because he smokes cigarettes now instead of crack? Sure, he’s down to just a pack a day from five a year ago, but still. And just why is it that he takes so long locating the Book of Habakkuk?

I really, really needed to read this today.

Go read the whole post if you get a chance.

Search me, O God, and know my heart!

Try me and know my thoughts!

And see if there be any grievous way in me,

and lead me in the way everlasting!

Psalm 139:23-24 (ESV)

This is a frightful request to make. Yet I find myself making it more and more these days.

I read other Christians in the blogosphere speak of their brokenness, and I reflect upon my own. Though redeemed I contend, daily, with the condition of being human in a fallen world, in my fallen body. In his novel Out of the Silent Planet, C.S. Lewis tells of the interaction between Ransom, a man from Earth, and a race of creatures, the “Hrossa”, inhabiting another planet. It slowly becomes clear to Ransom that these creatures do not have a sin nature. As he learns their language he realizes that they don’t even have a word for “bad”. The closest servicable word they have is the word “bent”. I remember one point in the novel when Ransom, in speaking of the human race, shamefully confesses “We are very bent”.

I am very bent.

I am becoming more aware these days of what an enemy to good and rational thought my mind is. My mind tells me things that simply aren’t true. My mind rationalizes my motives, keeps me blind to my failings, invents failings for me to fret about that aren’t even real, misinterprets the motives of others, and constantly circles around the little god of self. My mind couldn’t identify a grievous way in me even if it wanted to. And, I can guarantee you it doesn’t.

I need another set of eyes looking at this problem. There is both a thrill and a great fear in asking the Father to examine my life. A thrill because I know he can and does know my heart far better than I do. If anyone can identify a grievous way in me, my Lord can. And he can lead me in the way everlasting!

But the fear comes from the vulnerability of being unmasked under the bright light of Truth. Of being “searched”. In my worst moments (which are all too frequent) I’d prefer not to spread ’em and get the divine pat-down. I’ve got too many secrets.

But Lord, I know I need it. Search me, try me, and know my thoughts. See if there is anything in me that grieves you. Cleanse me, heal me, and lead me. You only can I trust to do this.

I was reading Philippians 3 today. There are truths here that are too deep, too wonderful, too terrible for me to want to understand. And yet I do want to understand. Paul writes:

Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith

– Philippians 3:8-9 (ESV)

I wonder what it’s like to lose all things and consider them rubbish after the losing. All things? I’m too invested in this world, I’m too secure in my multi-layered safety nets. I’m too secure in my own righteousness.

Paul, on the other hand, had skin in the game, literally. In fact, he’d already lost quite a bit of his skin for the sake of the gospel.

– that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

– Philippians 3:10-11 (ESV)

. . . and may share in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death . . .

This is where we begin to understand what loving God is like. I tell God that I love him all the time, yet I wonder. Will I be willing to share in his sufferings when my number is called?

Paul understood and lived a life aligned with Christ’s sufferings. He identified himself with the rogue Galilean who had been executed in the backwater land of Judea years earlier. Paul made the authorities nervous. He and those of like mind (the “Christians” they were derisively called) were beginning to topple some important structures. They spoke of another kingdom, which their Christ had inaugurated and had commanded them to take to the world. They appeared insane enough to carry their mission to its logical conclusion, no matter how many of them had to be nailed up.

They made people uneasy.

To be honest, they make me uneasy too.

Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Let those of us who are mature think this way, and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that also to you. Only let us hold true to what we have attained.

– Philippians 3:12-16 (ESV)

Lord, you have made me your own. I know, with increasing lucidity, that I don’t deserve this. Grace is so beautiful.

To strain forward to the goal, to stretch toward the upward call, not the call of the status quo, must be my desire. Yet even the desire is something I can’t manufacture on my own. I am not mature, but I know you have promised to reveal the steps ahead, in your time, as you mature me.

In the meantime, I pray that I will hold true to what I have attained, because it was you who attained it.

May I begin to grasp these deep, wonderful, and terrible truths.

Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor.

– Romans 12:10 (ESV)

Just picture it. Everyone, all of us, striving hard to outdo each other in showing honor to each other. Or, as it’s rendered in the NASB, to “give preference to one another in honor.”

I love that! Picture it. Brothers and sisters saying, in small ways and big ways, “This honor is coming to me, but I’d prefer it go to you.” Brothers and sisters loving each other not just as a “have to”, but with affection. In other words, not just loving each other but also “liking” each other, that we might be a true family.

Beautiful. What a light to shine in a world that sometimes seems crammed full of chest-pounding, glad-handing, end-zone-dancing, boasting, braying, glory hogs. And sometimes the hog doing the chest-pounding (ow), end-zone-dancing (ever seen me dance? Not a pretty sight), boasting and braying is me. And that, my friends, will suck the light out of any situation.

Dear Lord, may I strive, with motives clean and heart pure, to outdo others in passing honor on to them. That ultimately You will be honored, above all and alone. For You alone deserve all honor.