I've never avoided questioning those I love or those who say they care for the ones I love. One day a person close to me introduced me to the person they were sure was the one they'd spend the rest of their life with. I thought, "this kind of relationship should be able to handle the tough questions." I asked, "what makes you committed to this relationship?" He looked at me with a big bright smile and answered, "I'm happy! She makes me happy." My smile diminished, and my shoulders slumped in sadness. He looked at me a bit quizzically. I could read his face, "what is wrong with that answer?" That's what I read. I seemed as sincere as possible and asked, "what happens when the shiny is gone?" I'm not sure why that question put this conversation in a tailspin, but a tailspin began. Neither of them could even imagine that happening. I knew they were in trouble. Sadly, too many relationships end because happy ends, and they never consider getting through the tough back to the content and the commitment.
The following statement has to be understood. Clearly, no relationship remains shiny. You can translate "shiny" to happy or feeling good, whatever word you prefer. Remaining only for the shiny means you will not. Christianity is analogous to marriage even in the vow, "for better or worse, through sickness and health," when Jesus tells us in John 16:33, "These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world, you will have tribulation, but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” This statement starts with, "these things." What are these things? He was warning them of all the thingsChristianity's shiny disappearity go away. The cost that needs to be counted. The tough road ahead that folks will need to make deliberate choices to remain in Christ, to continue in the faith, to keep their eyes on him "through faith" so the genuineness of their relationship is proven true.
The Lord offers us the parable of "soils" to warn us of the things that can come to show how easy it is to prove the shiny can be thwarted by the shallow, rocky, or thorny in our lives. I cannot even count how many times I heard someone claiming they loved Jesus say, "God wants me happy. I cannot imagine that God wants me to feel so dissatisfied. As a Mom (Dad), I want my kids happy; why would God as a good Dad, not want me happy too?" If I had a dollar for every time I heard that, I would throw it in away because I wouldn't want to keep it. It is a lie of our fleshly lusts. It is the same deception believed by Eve in the garden when faced with the Liar from the beginning, as Jesus calls Satan. Too many Christians, I'll say, believers of Jesus, not Believers in Jesus, have left such a surface testimony conflating Jesus with the shiny that people come to a faith, not The faith, and they shatter in the shallow, rocky, or thorny of life.
In the conversation I had with the young man I spoke of at the beginning of this blog, I warned him, "you will not be around for long if happy is the expectation." He laughed and said, "I cannot imagine that. She makes me so happy." Well, today, they are not together.
That is the warning for all, whether it is marriage or Christianity. In both these relationships, we are called to remain. We need to know marriage is a commitment beyond the shiny. In Christianity, our justification is offered and completely done in the work of Christ given by grace. It is a free offer received by faith. Faith is not a work, so we are told in Galatians and Romans. The Bible tells us we remain by faith; eternal life is in Christ through faith, we are told in 1 John. Marriage will have days, weeks, months, even years of the shiny becoming dull; only the faithful will remain, maturing, understanding this too will pass. In Christianity, we are warned that the days, weeks, months, and years of tribulations, persecutions, and trials can go on without the shiny ever being seen on the surface.
What Jesus gives us over the shiny that our fleare desires is deep contentment in our soul where joy is unfathomable, peace is unexplainable, grace is sufficient, and faith is proven genuine. But you've got to remain when the shiny is gone to experience any of that—only the weak and immature run when the shiny is gone. You get to choose.
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