TomGray

Hi, my name is Tom and I live in Lakewood, CO (west suburb of Denver) with my wife (22 years) and two nearly grown and fully great kids. Looking forward to this study.

Since Christ's return can come at any time we should "...make every effort to be found spotless, blameless and at peace with him." (2 Peter 3:14). As a kid, with a pile of chores to do, I used to time the completion of those chores with my belief in what time my dad was coming home from the golf course. If I judged right and my chores were done, I'd get rewarded. If I misjudged and my chores were not done I'd get punished. Often I'd get punished because the urge to have fun (which didn't involve chores in any way) often overroad my 'belief' system, i.e., I lost track of the time. If I'd had more wisdom I would have realized that doing my chores immediately and diligently would have removed the stress of my perpetual guessing game and assured me of 'reward' regardless of when Dad came home. An underemphasis means that as Christians we buy into the false belief that we have time. Time to repent. Time to get our acts together. Time to get rid of the persistent sin in our lives. Time to proclaim his kingdom to those we love, etc. How many of us will be standing in front of Christ looking guilty and sheepish while we stammer, "but I meant to do those things, I just didn't realize what time it was..."

His Word tells us that all have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God. Therefore sin is a given and the humility to face this fact, this innate imperfection, is a requirement. In today's culture we no longer strive so hard to 'raise the bar' as we do to 'lower the bar'. We do it for good reason, to be inclusive, do avoid discrimination, etc. If SAT scores are falling, do we increase our investment in education to remedy this situation? No. We rejigger the SAT scoring system instead. And, since it works for the SAT, we think we can apply the same logic to God's standards. We cut ourselves slack. We argue what the meaning of 'is' is. We quibble, we equivocate, we church shop, we 'understand' and we 'tolerate'. Ours is a win-win society that revels in shades of gray and is intolerant of black and white. Our God is black and white. A thing is right or wrong. The wheat will be separated from the chaff. We will be directed to His right or His left. Martha Stewart is convicted of lying and cheating, she blames everyone else for this 'miscarriage' of justice, her fans rally to her side, her business booms. I'm not Martha but do you think she thinks, "Wow, pretty slick deal. I'll serve my time. I'll write a book. I'll do the talk shows. I'll be bigger than ever."? Why does our culture resist...? Because God's standards and expectations threaten it and if you don't acknowledge that a thing is sin then there ain't no reason to repent. And, in our culture, the pool of acknowledged sins is awfully shallow. Can there be salvation without repentance? Luke 13:3 "...But unless you repent, you too will all perish." What is repentance but an act of humility. If we acknowledge Jesus as Lord then, I believe, we have to acknowledge - and admit - the error of our ways when they depart from His Way. Can you recall a time in your life...? I still struggle with admitting and repenting of my sins. It was harder, however, when I was younger. It was easier than to justify and temporize - more a happy victim of peer pressure back then I guess. The longer I've believed, the harder it's become to escape the consequences. Repentance, when looked at as more than acknowledgement but as active remediation for my sin, remains difficult. It has become easy to acknowledge sin and ask for forgiveness. The struggle remains in the follow up, the reparation for and the elimination of sin. Finally, I don't believe that we can or will fully eliminate sin from our lives. But we can continue to strive to do so and in the striving seek God's perfection until we are perfected in His presence.