Taking a long hard look at look at myself

Poatina Morning Tea devotion given today

Purity

How do we do the things we say we want to do?

I’m finishing my series of devotions on  1 Tim 4:12.

That verse was pretty significant when I started with Fusion.  Have you ever had to lead someone who is older or more experienced than you?  It’s a bit of a challenge.   I imagine Timothy feeling like that.  Paul then gives a list of ways in which Timothy is to set an example to the believers.  And we could do worse than to take this list seriously.

It starts with our speech –how we talk to each other – the little things of life.  John Lennon said,” Life is what happens, when you’re making other plans”.

So we come to setting the example of Purity.  One translation uses the word integrity.  I appreciate the wrestle that Bernie and I have about the sign out the front.  It’s a wrestle about integrity. If we’re only about words we’ve got a problem. In Psalm 12 we have a picture of evil:

Everyone talks in lie language;
Lies slide off their oily lips.
They doubletalk with forked tongues.
Slice their lips off their faces! Pull
The braggart tongues from their mouths!
I’m tired of hearing, “We can talk anyone into anything!
Our lips manage the world.”

That’s the opposite of purity. Being able to paint a very clever picture and convince people.  Politicians have been using focus groups to check every sentence for its impact.

The past political campaign the best scripted in history. Tony Abbot stuck to the script.  Julia Gillard repeating the same text. But  it was also the blandest political campaign in history because it was about words and not substance.

Purity scares me. Because I know I’m not that. I know that I’d like to be, but I know that I’m not. I identify with Paul as he says ”The things I don’t want to do I do; the things I want to do, I don’t do.”

Paul says, but if you use grace as an excuse, you’re missing the point. I also have to face my impurity and

Tolstoy said true spirituality is not measured by your purity but by your awareness of you impurity.

You need to take a long hard look at yourself and change.

I’ve been reading James, and there’s a lot about purity.

James 4: 4 – 10  You’re cheating on God. If all you want is your own way, flirting with the world every chance you get, you end up enemies of God and his way. And do you suppose God doesn’t care? The proverb has it that “he’s a fiercely jealous lover.” And what he gives in love is far better than anything else you’ll find. It’s common knowledge that “God goes against the wilful proud; God gives grace to the willing humble.”

So let God work his will in you. Yell a loud no to the Devil and watch him scamper. Say a quiet yes to God and he’ll be there in no time. Quit dabbling in sin. Purify your inner life. Quit playing the field. Hit bottom, and cry your eyes out. The fun and games are over. Get serious, really serious. Get down on your knees before the Master; it’s the only way you’ll get on your feet.

I know I have to face the parts of me that are messy and that is painful. Most of us spend a fair bit of time trying to avoid it, but ut that’s where the hard-won victories lie.

There is a foundation for our lives that is laid and is Jesus Christ.  You can build on that with wood, hay and straw All very cheap, easily accessible materials.    But you’ve got to gold; refine silver and mine for precious stones. It costs to build out of these: to be pure.

William Shakespeare wrote, “To thine own self be true,  and it must follow,  as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.”

There’s another verse about purity in James 1:27, which says, “Religion that God our Father says is pure and faultless is this: to look after the orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.”

Thats what the village I live in, Poatina, is all about.