I lay in bed last night till maybe 4 or 5am, stunned by all that the two books (Stop Dating the Church and Questioning Evangelism) have conjured up in me.
In some ways, it was what needed to happen. It answered a lot of my questions of the longest time.
Why wasn’t I changing? Why am I still the same person really? I’ve stopped doing certain things, but other than those brief periods where I experience and desire God, it stops.
Well, because there’s something deeper in me… something that has to die first.
It made sense, I thought over and over about it, and it hit me. Or not that it came out of nowhere.
But it became crystal clear.
There’s another god I truly worship. Those brief moments when I worship God, something does happen. Something does start stirring in me. Grace visits me and it starts working.
But then, like a rake hitting a hard rock in the soil, He stops. He finds something I have to move and get rid of first. Every time, He quietly points to it and says, “What’s this?”
“Uhm…. this is this god I’ve worshipping for years.”
“I see. Have you read My word?”
“Yeah. I know all about it. I know that it’s sin and it’s wrong. But I can’t just dump it and move on. I mean, won’t You change things when I let you in?”
Silence.
“Please, please, tell me that you will change things.”
“I will never get far in your heart unless you do something about this. You have to renounce that god…”
“But…”
“You shall have no other gods but me.”
“You don’t understand…”
“Forsake all and follow me.”
“Please, look, I’m really screwed, this is of years!”
“Come to me all you weary and heavy burden, and I shall give you rest.”
Silence.
And everytime, when the old god shows his face, when he rocks up whether invited or unexpected, I rush to him. I fall at his feet and worship. I do all the things that the woman did at the feet of the Lord. She and I do the same thing. But we worship different lords. One saves and the other kills.
I always confused who does what.
What will happen next?
The Lord stands knocking at my door. He’s getting awfully cold waiting outside after I keep on kicking him out when the other one rears his head through the kitchen window. The martyrdom that arises when I forsake the other one is the beginning of glory with the real One.
It’s martyrdom any way I look at it as I will be pursued and tortured for my choices and convictions. I have always given in easily when he makes me agonize about my new life and choices. His voice is loud, raging, accusatory, billowing with hatred and deceit. The voice of the real Lord is gentle, cutting to the heart, but desiring my transformation rather than my mindless worship.
Following Christ to the mystery of the Trinity is an inner martyrdom and an outer confessorship. The confessors were those who suffered (and sometimes often died) for confessing the true faith in front of the unbelieving Roman emperors. And so, we are confessors in the world. And sometimes, the hardest and most ruthless enemy that we will have to face and confess the true faith is not the hardened atheist at work or the wayward ‘Christian’ who needs to be ’shown Christ’.
No. It’s the inner gods who sit on thrones of our heart who when they hear of us wanting to change our ways and alleigances, they launch an endless attack on us until we give in.
So, it’s not Satan or the ‘evil forces’. It’s us. Our own personal, hidden idolatry brings on the worst war. And all that Satan does, because he’s a bloody coward, is just play on it and shoots his own lies on the back of the personal war.
And the thing is… I truly want to be transformed. To be delivered from this idolatry. To find my refuge, regardless of the veracity of the attack of the god, in the bosom of God.
Those books, I deeply recommend. Not for my reasons. But because they’re incredibly engaging and amazing books.
