4 As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. 2 Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one anotherin love.
Have you ever felt like you were a prisoner to something or someone? Have you ever felt like you were held captive by something or someone to the point that you're suffocating?? I know at times I've felt a prisoner to my own thoughts. My mind is a big ole battlefield. It's a constant stream of schedules and thoughts..good and bad, happy and sad. My needs, others needs, my worries, their worries. Worry, negativity, anxiety...they run and run until I'm overwhelmed and suffocating within myself. I read this scripture tonight just on a whim and it hit me like a sledgehammer slap to the face.
"As a PRISONER"...that's what it said. Prisoner. We are called to be a prisoner of the Lord. We are called to allow Him to be our overwhelming thought. We are called to let Him radiate, through us, His love. But we become prisoners to every other possible thing in this world. We allow social media to distort what "real life" is with happy family pictures in spotless kitchens. We allow someone's world, that seems so perfect, to be our goal. All of the sudden money, status and materialist riff raff become what we obsess over. We become prisoner to "keeping up with the Kardashians" instead of a prisoner of the Lord, honoring and focusing on the calling He gave us.
We talked about worry and anxieties in Sunday School today. Reading out of Matthew 6...verse 34 says "Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.". I have probably read this verse 10, 000 times. It's a pretty common "encouraging" type verse that is written in every "cheer you up" note or card you'll receive. But here's the thing....If we would just allow ourselves to be a Prisoner for the Lord, we would have nothing to worry about. If we allow God to reveal our calling, we can become the person He created us to be. We can walk in a new light without being a prisoner to anything or anyone...only to the Most High.
Now the next part of the verse talks about walking humbly and gently. Now see...Gentle isn't my thing. I'm sarcastic, loud and can be a little overwhelming. I can be pretty blunt and honest in effort to get a laugh from someone. But in this verse I believe it is referring to how you use your gifts and how you are perceived. If I were a stand up comedian, which would make sense because I'm hilarious...pick up on that? Aside from my obvious sarcasm, that attitude would be an example of not being gentle or humble in the gifts He has blessed me with. Being humble in what we are blessed with and gentle with the hurting souls we are trying to reach...that's the point. Why would He bless us with such powerful gifts if we weren't able to use them with humility, admitting our own faults, and covering the hurting in grace and gentle love? That's the point. It's not to gloat or boast...because nothing in this world is truly ours, not even our gifts.
Okay okay, my favorite part, READY?? .."be patient, bearing with one another in love". Can I get a Holla?? Stop it. Just stop. We all, every single one of us, have faults and flaws. We all sin differently yet we all put our pants on the same way. It's hard to be patient sometimes when someone you love may be going astray and its hard not to place judgement when someone sins so differently than you. But we are called to be a Prisioner of the Lord and to love them...as He loved us. Do we love one another or do we covet one another? Do we love on the hurting or do we shun them and judge their sins more harshly than our own? At what point to we give up and allow God to rein and rule in our lives? At what point do we give Him the keys and say "throw them where you will, Here I am".
Being a perfect prisoner of the Lord is ridiculously impossible..it will not and can not happen. Perfection isn't attainable and God doesn't expect it out of us. What He wants and truly desires is for us to fall on our face and allow Him to rule. He pursues us and only request that we return that pursuit and be a light for Him.
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