Recently I was cut to the quick by a good friend. I was
commenting about how inadequate I felt in proclaiming the uncompromising
values of the Gospel. I know that God gave me certain gifts, and not without a
reason. He wills, I am sure, that what He gave me be used for His purposes and
for His glory. Still, there is the matter of my own relationship to the truth,
a matter of conviction.
I wonder, for example, if in my speaking I am more showman than messenger. I wonder, if in my writing, I do not strive more for melody than for lyric. I am, I told my friend, at odds with myself. Who am I to hold up the Gospel when I fall so miserably short of it? Who am I to urge others to accept it when I am powerless to live the truth on my own?
You can't be righteous, my friend said, when there is a secret sin in your soul, an indulgence in wrong you are saving to the side. It may be pride. It may be lust. It may be a lack of forgiveness. Whatever it might be, you know what it is: an area that is unyielded to the light. That, my friend said, compromises your conviction.
It's not a matter of victory over some defect of character; it's the unwillingness to acknowledge that it is a defect. No one can speak with conviction and be yielded to darkness at the same time. Perhaps a too-cute image: You can't play footsie with the devil.
My mind flashed on Father Boehmike, an assistant pastor who used to come around to our classroom in grade school. "Do you see?" he'd say. "Do you understand?"
Like I said, my good friend cut me to the quick. I saw. I understood. The Gospel is not an ideal. The radical message of Jesus Christ was that all this was possible.
I sat in my parish church on Holy Thursday night and read, as I am wont to do on Holy Thursday night, the Last Discourse in John. In a deep and intimate and powerful way the Lord veritably pleads with the apostles and with us who would be His followers to understand who He is and why He has come. It is a conversation profuse with love and with hope, but at bottom, uncompromising:
The world is covered in darkness, but that darkness must not extend to some secret alcove in my spirit. I know my entrenched attitudes, my compromises, my unyielding diffidence cannot be overcome on my own. I know it is Jesus who will gain the victory. But I must let Him in. Then my darkness will be unable to coexist with His light.
I know I am called to be a witness to His light, even as it shines on my weakness and failure. Of that I can write boldly and speak forthrightly and with conviction. -T.R.
written by Thomas A. Russell
first published in the Lafayette Sunday Visitor on an unknown date
I wonder, for example, if in my speaking I am more showman than messenger. I wonder, if in my writing, I do not strive more for melody than for lyric. I am, I told my friend, at odds with myself. Who am I to hold up the Gospel when I fall so miserably short of it? Who am I to urge others to accept it when I am powerless to live the truth on my own?
You can't be righteous, my friend said, when there is a secret sin in your soul, an indulgence in wrong you are saving to the side. It may be pride. It may be lust. It may be a lack of forgiveness. Whatever it might be, you know what it is: an area that is unyielded to the light. That, my friend said, compromises your conviction.
It's not a matter of victory over some defect of character; it's the unwillingness to acknowledge that it is a defect. No one can speak with conviction and be yielded to darkness at the same time. Perhaps a too-cute image: You can't play footsie with the devil.
My mind flashed on Father Boehmike, an assistant pastor who used to come around to our classroom in grade school. "Do you see?" he'd say. "Do you understand?"
Like I said, my good friend cut me to the quick. I saw. I understood. The Gospel is not an ideal. The radical message of Jesus Christ was that all this was possible.
I sat in my parish church on Holy Thursday night and read, as I am wont to do on Holy Thursday night, the Last Discourse in John. In a deep and intimate and powerful way the Lord veritably pleads with the apostles and with us who would be His followers to understand who He is and why He has come. It is a conversation profuse with love and with hope, but at bottom, uncompromising:
"If you keep my commandments..."I came away from my prayer that night with my heart yearning for conviction. I wanted to hide myself in the Rock, to stand firm on the Rock, to believe past the soft soap and the middle of the road and the half-hearted. I wanted His light to shine not only on my face but in my heart, to reveal every hidden thing now, not waiting for the last day and the certain judgment.
"If you do all that I have commanded you..."
"The reason the world hates you is that you do not belong to the world..."
"He prunes away every barren branch..."
The world is covered in darkness, but that darkness must not extend to some secret alcove in my spirit. I know my entrenched attitudes, my compromises, my unyielding diffidence cannot be overcome on my own. I know it is Jesus who will gain the victory. But I must let Him in. Then my darkness will be unable to coexist with His light.
I know I am called to be a witness to His light, even as it shines on my weakness and failure. Of that I can write boldly and speak forthrightly and with conviction. -T.R.
written by Thomas A. Russell
first published in the Lafayette Sunday Visitor on an unknown date
