Know Be Do

GOD’S KINDNESS

The cloudless Kentucky sky was powder blue, the sun was scorching hot, and the three feet of fresh water in our new above-ground pool in the backyard was cool and beckoning. The only thing standing between my energetic little 6-year body and that sparkling water was the bologna sandwich my mom said I had to eat before I could get back in. She was out in the backyard hanging up freshly laundered white towels on the clothesline as I wolfed down the sandwich and shot toward the back door, headed for the pool.

Then I did something my father had told me a million times not to do. Instead of pressing on the door frame to push open the rickety old storm door, I pushed my hand right on its glass window pane. The glass gave way, and my small hand shot right through as shards of glass splintered everywhere. Blood from my skinny wrist landed on the concrete stoop of our back porch.

The crash startled my mom, and she whipped around, clothespins in her mouth and a white towel still in her hand, beholding the gruesome sight of what had just happened. She ran over with the towel and quickly wrapped my wrist in it. The thirsty white towel soaked up the bright red blood as she led me through the house and out the front door toward the car. Halfway down the driveway, I looked up at her and asked a question, what seems now like quite a peculiar question, but to my 6-year-old mind, it was something I needed to know above anything else at the moment.

“Mommy, do you still love me?”

Compassion and bewilderment flitted across her face. “Yes, honey, I still love you…”

I don’t really remember what else she said because once I heard the words, “Yes, I still love you,” nothing else mattered.

In my small mind, I asked the question because I had broken a glass window, ruined one of her good towels, and was causing a major catastrophe. I wasn’t sure if she still loved me after all that. How little I understood about love. The value of windows and towels were the furthest thing from her mind right then. All she wanted was for her little boy to be alright.

A few stitches later, I was just fine, but I had learned three important lessons that day. 1. Never press on the glass to open a door. 2. Dad knows what he’s talking about. 3. Mom will love me no matter what I do.

Despite that lesson, and many others since, I still often suffer from small-minded thinking and an inability to grasp unconditional love when it comes to my Heavenly Father. How many times have I broken windows, ruined towels, or cut myself to shreds and then looked up at my Heavenly Father and doubtfully asked, “Do you still love me?”

“How could you love me…after I did that? Again? And again? And again? And again?…”

How little I still understand about God’s love. He’s not concerned about breaking glass and ruining towels. He’s concerned about us being alright. Like my earthly father, when God says, “Don’t do that,” He’s really saying, “Don’t hurt yourself.”

We expect His wrath. And as His children, we get His mercy. Yes, we may get some discipline, as I did from my father after the dust settled over that broken window pane. But we always get His love.

“Thou shalt not…” means “Don’t hurt yourself.”

“Thou shalt…” means “Help yourself to some happiness.”

And yet Satan, the world, and sin have really done a number on me. I believe the lie. I believe sin can satisfy. And even more sadly, I believe that God doesn’t love me when I sin.

All my life, I’ve felt like I was such a disappointment to God.

How could He love me, when I keep going around breaking windows and ruining towels? Never learning from my mistakes, I keep pressing my hand through that glass pane over and over. And then doubting the Father’s love for me. Over. And over. And over. And over…

Eventually, I have the courage to look up at His face and ask, “Do you still love me?”

The answer always comes back, “Yes, of course, I still love you.”

After all, He bled first.

Why Are We Such Bad Advertisements for Christianity?

I’ve worked in the ad agency world for years, and the one thing you can say for most ads is that they make the product sound better than it really is. Most Christians are the opposite. Their pitch for God turns off most “buyers” quicker than a McDonald’s commercial on Animal Planet. And yet we have the ultimate “product” to advertise! Why are we such bad ads?

In a nutshell…

First, we don’t truly know God intimately.

Second, we fail to see ourselves as we truly are—both the assets and the liabilities.

Third, because we’re not knowing and being, we’re not inspired to do what we should do.

Let’s break this down even further, starting at the very beginning.

God is. God is a being. He has being just as we have being. The goal is for our being to be a perfect reflection of His being. That won’t happen in full until we get to Heaven. But in the meantime, the way we sync up His being and our being is by getting to know Him. As we get a more and more complete picture of Who He is, we can see who we are, where we resemble Him and where we don’t. As we begin to accentuate the similarities and eliminate the dissimilarities, we can begin to do what He wills through us.

Take God’s kindness, for example, and let’s begin with know. Can you say you truly and intimately know the extent of God’s grace to us? Grasping it begins with a recognition of how sinful we are, just like how large our debt truly is. Most people I know consider themselves to be pretty good people. But look at God’s standard of perfection. Think about all the times you do the right thing for the wrong motive. The evil thoughts you have that nobody knows but you. All the good things you should do but you fail to do. The more you know about God’s holiness, the more you see how far short you fall. From this humbled position, we can begin to be who we really are. Forgiven wretches. From there, it’s a whole lot easier to reach out with mercy, grace, and compassion to our fellow man and do kindness.