What Lies Beneath

Recently someone was unsure how I might feel about them because of a lifestyle choice they made. Now before I continue, I must say that the point of this post is not to say anything about any specific behavior, but something much more important than that. So, for the sake of example and having something in your head, pick something from the list: a college guy choosing to live and sleep with his girlfriend before getting married, or an older man choosing to turn to the bottle to drown his sorrows and forget his problems, or a young girl choosing to sell her body for money, or a teenager choosing to center his life around smoking pot, or two men/women choosing to "marry" each other, and so on.

The point here in these examples -- examples that we see every day in the world -- is that these are people who have chosen to live outside the will of God. But that's not the central issue! The lifestyle, choice, behavior, whatever you want to call it, is not the real problem. Sure, many people might focus on it and try to correct it if the person's particular choice is not "normal" by the world's standards. But the fact of the matter is this:

Cleaning up a sinful lifestyle apart from a saving relationship with Jesus Christ does no good.

It's like what Duncan said (roughly) in one of his sermons: "A lot of people tell me 'I got a lot of sin in my life right now; let me go clean that up and then I'll come to your church.' No, that ain't it. Come as you are, get right with God through Jesus, and he'll do the cleaning up."

Duncan hit the nail on the head. Hard.

You could be Mr. Goody Two Shoes "Christian" Boy your entire life. You could go to church every weekend, twice. You could go to several midweek Bible studies. You could give all your extra money away and then some. You could spend all your free time serving at the church or in the community. But if you are not born again from above through the power of the Holy Spirit, it doesn't matter one bit. All the "good works" and "good behavior" people do will not save them. Only the power of God working in their lives after realizing and admitting spiritual bankruptcy can do that.

Only after that new birth can a person really begin to have a changed life that means something, because only then do they have a changed heart.

So when those who are not in Christ and making "shocking" lifestyle choices, their Christian friends and family may have much to say against their external behavior and condemn it very harshly, but that's not really justified in my opinion. If someone is outside of Christ, it doesn't really matter what they are doing in their life -- denying Jesus as Lord and Savior is denying Jesus as Lord and Savior -- no matter what.

Getting right with God through Jesus is the biggest and only issue that needs to be addressed in anyone's life! Anything beyond that gets taken care of as the person grows spiritually in Christ.

So to my brothers and sisters out there, focus not on condemning or correcting behaviors in your unsaved friends and family, but rather keep showing them the love of Jesus, keep praying for them, and keep preaching Christ crucified. These are the things that attack the real problem. After all, Christ suffered and died to restore relationships with God, not to make rule-following robots that don't love him! The line really is right -- "no religion, just a relationship."

Grace and Peace