Most of us will momentarily act ok with who we are, but the truth is we are chomping at the bit to be someone else… To be that person who is prettier or more handsome or the person who seems to glide through life without a care. To be a person who always knows the right thing to say, who always fits in every social situation, the person who seems to have it down right.
Were ok with who we are for the moment, but if we had the chance we'd be someone else. Until then we just spend our lives taking our cues from those other people who we think have it together, trying to imitate who they are. It's not just the world it also happens in the church, with christians. You come to Christ and all of a sudden you start looking around at who you should be… You think you need to spend your life trying to be the person who has all the Bible verses memorized and can spit them out, the person who carries the right kind of Bible and understands why you should be loving, and to be kind. The truth is what God really wants you to be is You. But don't we have to holy, loving and know this? Yes, but you can't be any of that if you are not you. Then you are just a poser/faker. People trying to live like they don't have any flaws, trying to cover it up and hide it and trying to look good. The problem with this is, it will make you be doubtful, bitter, cynical it will make you be everything that God doesn't want you to be..
God wants us to be is beyond intimidation, imitation, He wants us to live in realization in who we are in him. The challenge is we are so, afraid of being ourselves, living in our flaws and yet that is what God wants us to do.
Standing In What You know Will Help You Know Where You Stand
If your going to be who you are in Christ then you better know who you are… and you better be willing to stand in who you are. Only then that you can know exactly where you stand. If I spend my life faking, after a while I'll never know who I am and where I stand. We create all this junk and we try to live up to what someone else is doing.
Romans 14
Accept the one whose faith is weak, without quarreling over disputable matters. 2 One person's faith allows them to eat anything, but another, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. 3 The one who eats everything must not treat with contempt the one who does not, and the one who does not eat everything must not judge the one who does, for God has accepted them.
Paul is talking about other, Paul is talking about that divide between Gentile Christians and Jewish Christians, because many of the Jews who accepted Christ still kept the laws of the Jewish faith and there were the Gentile Christians that look at them and they carry an air of superiority. Now look at the first verse again: Paul is saying this, if there is somebody who you can look at and say "their faith is still a little young/uncertain" things that they don't quite get or they are wrong. Paul says accept them.
Disputable matters are the silly things, not the core of the Bible. Can you really be a christian if you smoke? Go to the movies? If your a democrat/republican? If you let your children go trick or treating? Can you really be a christian if you don't make all the services? Can you really be a christian if you don't tithe? All these things. Can you really be a christian and be who you are? God's answer is, yes. Accept him whose faith is weak, (Because we don't know any better)
Verse 3, "for God has accepted them." God accepts us right where we are. Remember the thief on the Cross where he turned to Jesus and said; remember me when you go to your kingdom. Jesus said back; by the end of the day you will be with me in the kingdom. What theology did this man have? God's goal is for us to be who we are.
4 Who are you to judge someone else's servant…
7 For none of us lives for ourselves alone, and none of us dies for ourselves alone. 8 If we live, we live for the Lord; and if we die, we die for the Lord.
God is going to correct us and God is going to direct us, and we have to trust that. If someone comes up to you and says, I'm an arminian or I'm a vegetarian, I need to accept them for who they are, don't sit there and try to judge them, or talk them out of it or manipulate/persuade them, because that is not what God wants me to do. God wants me to look at them and accept them for who they are, that is where it begins. I can't accept you if I don't accept me. If I don't believe wholeheartedly that God wants me to be who I am, then I not going to believe wholeheartedly that God wants you to be who you are. God will give us what we need. God is looking for who you are in Him. Am I saying don't be Biblical? No. That is going to help us know who we are, but the goal is not "I'm doing everything right" because then you don't know who you are.
13 Therefore let us stop passing judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in the way of a brother or sister.
19 Let us therefore make every effort to do what leads to peace and to mutual edification. 20 Do not destroy the work of God for the sake of food.
Don't destroy what God is doing in somebody over your insignificant things. do we correct someone if they are way off? yes we do it in love too. how do you do that? ask questions, always gentle, non threatening and the willingness to walk away and let it settle. We are so controlling.
All food is clean, but it is wrong for a person to eat anything that causes someone else to stumble.
22 So whatever you believe about these things keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the one who does not condemn himself by what he approves. 23 But whoever has doubts is condemned if they eat, because their eating is not from faith; and everything that does not come from faith is sin.
What Paul is saying is this… if you believe something, but everyone else says your wrong and so you say to yourself, vegetarian "I don't think I should eat meat, but I'll eat it…" Then you are wrong, your in sin… if I live like someone else, and biblically they are right but I'm not sure they are right before God, but just to keep them happy I do it anyways? Is wrong.
The Bible says, if it is not of your faith and it is not what you believe and you do it. It's sin. God doesn't want phonies. God wants people to stand in what they know, so they will always know where they stand. Not just to look like the people around you. You won't become more spiritual you will just become more miserable. The issue is me not being me, because I'm trying to be you and your opinion matters so much to me that I'll stop being me.
I. Accept Others: Look at others and recognize that God wants me to accept them. I can only accept him if I can accept me. Enjoy others in Christ. They are there for your mutual edification. They are there to help you in your growth. If we can only look each other in the eye and not see the differences, and not put each other in our spiritual pecking order, financial or political if we could just put this away and just look at the eyes of another.
II. Trust God: Trust God with your spouse, Ruth Graham said, my job is to love Billy and it is God's job to change him. You have permission to love without have to judge. Trust God with your children.
III. Have A Voice: Don't be afraid to be you, don't be in a crowd of people talking and you be silent just because you might not know what to say. God wants you to have a voice, you don't have to get it right because your not going to. Speak when you know it is the right time to speak when you are called to speak, but don't not speak. God is not looking for echo's he is looking for voices.
IV. Remain Open: Stand in what you know so you know where you stand and understand you don't know everything. Always remain open even if you think someone doesn't have anything to contribute to your life.
Notes taken by: lorelllawrence@comcast.net
Any errors or miscommunication please refer to me not the pastor, the intent is for you to have the notes for review in the series, also to reflect on during the week.
God Bless,
Lorell
Service by: Pastor Frederick Williams