Fear is the root of nearly every problem you face.
Think about it.
I’m in a relationship where I’m constantly fearing that I won’t be pretty enough for him. I worry that he’ll betray me for another woman. I withdraw. I question him constantly. I make accusations based on my perceptions. I become controlling. I push him away.
Fear. In some instances, the fear of betrayal (resulting in withdrawn love and control) may actually cause him to essentially betray me for someone whose love is not based on fear.
When I came home from Cambodia, I wouldn’t have thought for one second that I was a Pharisee. If anything, I was the one that had it together. I’d been away for five months and not once during that time did I butt heads with someone. I got along with people. I liked people. And they seemed to like me. So if anyone was in the wrong, it had be my parents. And I couldn’t wait for them to see it. I couldn’t wait for them to start treating me like I deserved to be treated.
Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of dead men’s bones and everything unclean. -Jesus’ words to the Pharisees, Matthew 23:27
Because the name “Pharisee” sounds so old and out-dated and old-fashioned, I never thought much about the prospect of such people being alive today. Weren’t those the kind of people who wore long robes and tried to fulfill long lists of religious rules and regulations? I didn’t personally know anyone like that. Maybe those people existed in dusty old Catholic cathedrals, but I was charismatic. I had to be the furthest thing from a Pharisee. There was no tradition in my church. No list of rules to fulfill. We just loved Jesus and wanted to be like Him. What was Pharisaical about that?
Meet Lia. She’s a 12-year-old seventh grader that recently decided to make a courageous stand in her school by giving a persuasive speech on the topic of abortion. Even when her teachers strongly encouraged her to choose a different topic, she decided to stick with what she felt passionate about. An email from her mother describes what led Lia to make such a bold move.
I’m on a journey back to Cambodia (mentally) and what I’m starting to realize is that my first reaction to seeing the poor children who stood before me at the border check station to beg for money was not love. It was shock. After I spent hours in line, trying to secure my visa and finally plopped on the curb to wipe the sweat from my face, they stood before me. They were orphans. They were dirty and they wore tattered shirts that draped over their bony shoulders. They were looking at me. And during all my months of training leading up to this point, my leaders had never prepared me for that moment. The only thing they told me before crossing over the border was to keep a close eye on my bags.
What would it be like to be a Heidi Baker in America? What would that even look like? Now, of course, being a Heidi Baker is a really lame goal. Being like Jesus Christ — that alone is a worthy goal to expend my life for. But, at the same time, I have never seen Jesus’ love through anyone more than I have through that woman. So, my question is: What would it look like to love people like that? Americans. Westerners. Rich people. Spoiled people. People who have everything.
God wants to teach me how to love. I thought I already knew how. I thought I’d sat through that lesson at least a hundred times. But He wasn’t looking at that. He was looking at how I live.
We all want to see and meet and know people who are real. Christians and non-Christians alike want to see people who say what they mean and mean what they say. We don’t have to look very far to find good teachers and preachers and leaders and experts who can tell us a great many things about anything we want to know. But I think what we want even more is to find leaders who live out that message they preach. We want to find leaders whose lives speak even louder than their words.
I just finished watching Walk the Line (the movie). Now, I know it’s just a movie and that the actual real-life story of how things unfolded may have been quite different than what was depicted in the movie, but… nevertheless, God spoke to me as I watched it tonight.
This was probably the fourth time I’ve seen this movie — and, I’ll admit, much of the movie is very dark, very unfortunate and very sad. But there’s a part at the end that brings me to tears nearly every time I see it.
