Sunday, December 2, 2007

What I Want for Christmas

Today the column is kind of an all-you-can-eat-buffet of profundity/thoughts about Christmas, Christian life, and my weight loss. I realize it may come to a shock to my three or four regular readers (Hi Mom…send money), but not all from this column is of focused, deep theological significance. Laying this small deficiency aside, I enter this week’s exploration into journalistic excellence with a type of peace normally only found on my cat Silver when the finishes wheezing up his hairball then approaches his Meow Mix.
My first thought…the meatloaf part of the buffet…what I want for Christmas. I have been asked this several times lately. It is such an easy answer. I admit it is a little selfish, but it costs no money. You don’t have to wake up at 4am to buy it next to the flashing blue light. The only difficult issue at all is the number of people involved to fulfill my Christmas wish. All I want for Christmas is… for everyone I know to become a Christian. I don’t want the head knowledge/casual “walk down an aisle and say a fancy prayer you forget a day later”-type of experience for you. I don’t want a “works-based salvation that doesn’t”/ someone other than Jesus Christ gets the glory/ brood of vipers/ hypocrisy-type of salvation for you. I don’t want a man-made false gospel for you. All I want for Christmas is for you to read the book of First John with a reflective, honest mindset. Is Jesus precious to you? Is He more important than work, family, money, your spouse, your favorite team, your kids, your political party, or anything else? Does your sin repulse you (not in comparison to other’s sin but compared to the Sinless One)? Do you love other Christians? Do you love non-believers? Is Heaven real to you? Is Hell? Please read First John and call out to God if you don’t know. Repent (turn from sin) and Believe (that Jesus died as a substitute for the punishment we deserved and couldn’t pay for ourselves). You don’t have to tell me about your decision to be born again, but I am sure when it happens everyone around you will figure it out quickly (see 2 Corinthians 5:17). I know that when I die I am promised eternal life (I am the wretch the song talked about). My only wish is to see you there so I can enjoy it with you. (Note to my First Southern Baptist family… I am first in the buffet line, but you had better all be there too! Don’t let anything hinder you from knowing your eternal destination.) Heaven just won’t be heaven without all of my friends, family, and fellow Stocktonians! Selfish? Maybe so…but with the right motive.
The second thought is the green veggies of the buffet line. This is the stuff that is “good for you”. This area in the Christian walk closely corresponds with God’s correction of His kids. Job had this one down as best he could given the hard times he was going through when he said (in Job 5:17) “Blessed is the man whom God corrects; so do not despise the discipline of the Almighty.” God does or allows the correcting for our good. Sometimes it doesn’t feel at all like it is for our good. My recent heart issues are directly tied to God’s desire for me to live a healthy lifestyle. It was a wakeup call to me. If we miss the correction God has for us, He doesn’t give up. He ramps up the correction. I have had high blood pressure symptoms for some time. He started getting through to me when I had palpitations couple years ago prompting me to need medicine. He really has my attention now after my visit to the E.R. I was told a couple years ago by my doctor that I must reduce my stress in my life for my heart’s sake (just before charging me a hundred bucks for the visit), and my response was saying “I am not stressed…I am a Christian.” I was missing God’s call to grow closer to Him (James 4:8) because of a sinful pride in my life. It took far too long to see what was right under my nose. God loves us so much He wants us to be refined into the image of His Son. He cares much more deeply about this than about the comforts of our life or that we are, to borrow a title of a current best seller, “Living our Best Life Now”. Join me in reflecting on this stuff. Have you found God’s purpose in the challenges in your life?

The final thought on the buffet is the dessert. My weigh-in this week was good. I am down to 326.8. I lost 4.3 lbs this week! Praise God! The sweet as chocolate pie part of this is the novelty/hilarity of seeing the ritual in which I do the weigh-in. I shed as much clothing as is appropriate in my house, shave my face, visit the latrine (sorry Dear), skip the deodorant (it’s so heavy!), tweeze my unibrow, scrub/pluck nostrils, blow nose, cut toenails and fingernails, scrub teeth for weighty gingivitis/plaque, wash face of heavy extra skin, and do anything else than can shave off an ounce. My Biggest Loser brand scale goes down to the ounce, so I wouldn’t want to miss all opportunities, you know. (Email me with your weigh-in ideas.) I am not sure cutting off the lower half of my body would get me to my target weight, but it has crossed my mind.
Such is life. All the good stuff we can do will not help us reach our goal of going to heaven. Sure we can seem closer to our goal to others by shedding a few pounds through giving money to the poor, recycling our cans, knocking on doors, or practicing Oprah’s random acts of kindness. The problem is that our goal is beyond our reach. All the cutting, tweezing, and scrubbing will not get us to our goal. We may make ourselves feel good with self-righteousness, but God isn’t impressed (see Isaiah 64:6). Doing all these things is important. They will make for a better house, neighborhood, and ecosystem. We will feel better, but still fall short (Romans 3:23). Address the sin issue, let God get the glory, and God will grant you heaven. Any other way is pointless, like cutting off our lower half.
I appreciate your visiting my buffet today. I hope the service was excellent and your waiter filled your cup. May God richly bless you until your next visit! I’ve got some dishes to do!

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