Back to School
Show Thyself
Acts 11:19-26
November 1, 2009
Last week we looked at issues of emotional awareness and the need to know ourselves. We need to know what we are feeling, why we are feeling these things, how we should deal with things, being reflective in order to accurately assess ourselves.
While those thoughts were pretty inward focused, this week we are going to turn outward. Specifically what is needed to show thyself. What do we need to exhibit and practice outwardly in order to grow emotionally healthy spirituality.
When I thought of these things, I thought of early Paul. I thought of when Paul was just starting out in his ministry after his conversion. It was a time when God was pouring out His Spirit on Gentile believers. For a while, the Jesus movement was focused on Jews. Then God spoke to Peter and God moved in a mighty way on some Gentiles forever changing the spiritual landscape. It was determined that God was at work among the Gentiles.
A guy named Barney not a purple dinosaur nor was he bumbling deputy that carried an unloaded gun so he wouldn’t shoot himself. Barney (his real name was Barnabas) felt called to give proper instruction to some of these Gentile believers. After a while, God multiplied the ministry and he needed help so Barney stopped off and recruited Paul.
Paul was a former Pharisee. He knew the scriptures inside and out, backward and forward. Paul was on fire for God and knew that if God’s people would get their act together, then God would move mightily and deliver His people. So Paul made it his personal mission to eradicate the obvious obstacle: the heretics who taught that Jesus had risen from the dead. They were the ones to blame. God is obviously testing the truly faithful to clean things up so he went on this mission from God giving it everything he had.
Only one little problem. Paul (who called himself Saul) was completely wrong. He knew the scriptures but didn’t know God. His rigid belief system kept him from seeing that the scriptures revealed everything about this Jesus who is indeed the savior of the world. Paul couldn’t see it until Jesus personally showed him. So now here we are. Paul is now a converted Saul. He follows Jesus. He has completely changed his mind and Barn sends him a text message asking if Paul might allow God to stretch his new belief system by bringing these new Gentiles believers to a robust faith. Something which would have been utterly foreign to closed-minded Saul. Paul gets the opportunity to show his true colors.
Acts 11:19-26
Paul’s attitude and change reveals an hugely important concept for emotionally healthy spirituality.
Show Thyself
• Be open-minded
What I don’t mean is to be blown about by any new idea that comes your way. You can still hold convictions and remain open-minded. Being open-minded means that you listen and hear the perspective of others.
Emotionally immature people don’t do this. They feel threatened by new people and new ideas (though they don’t usually realize that they feel this way and are emotionally unaware). Because of this, emotionally mature spirituality also means the willingness to constantly grow and learn. Not only is one willing to listen to different perspective but one actually seeks them out. People who are insecure with themselves do not do this.
Emotionally healthy people who are comfortable with themselves are open to candid feedback, new perspectives, continuous learning, and self-development.
I argue that Saul was this way. He was right. They were wrong. They need to conform or literally be killed.
Being open-minded means that I am willing to listen to feedback (like through a mentor as we talked about last week) and might even seek it out. It means that I will truly listen to what you perceive to be inconsistencies or flaws whether in my character or beliefs. It means that I will seriously evaluate them and if needed will seek to change myself or even my beliefs.
I have had conversations with those who shared their own doubts and misgivings as to the divinity of Christ. I have listened to and read some of these arguments and seriously reflected on why I hold onto what I believe. And I have determined that following Jesus is not only logical but actually exemplifies the best way to live. What I have found is that most people the Jesus most people object most strongly is more the Jesus of a particular church or group and doesn’t seem to reflect the Jesus that I read about in the New Testament.
Paul became so open-minded that he willingly believed Barney that God was doing an incredible new work with those that he would have previously considered unredeemable: the Gentiles.
• Laugh @ ourselves
Ok, this one is not really in the passage that I read. But I have to wonder if Paul didn’t sometimes chuckle at the irony of his ministry. Surely he must have laughed at his arrogance and pretension. Surely he must have had a good belly laugh at how serious he used to take himself.
Emotionally healthy spirituality seeks to gain a measure of detachment from ourselves and our emotions and our reactions and just laugh. I can’t believe I did that or I can’t believe used to think that way or I can’t believe that I said that.
Emotionally unhealthy people can’t let things go. They always bring it up. Mistakes. Sins. They never let you live them down because they never let themselves live it down.
Whenever I find myself overstressed and filled with anxiety, it is usually because I have been taking myself way too seriously. This translates into “poor me’s,” stinking thinking, and a self-centered preoccupation.
Just remember, that eventually at your dinner following your funeral, people are going asking the defining question of your existence, “Can someone pass the green beans?”
• Guided by God’s perspective
There is a huge sense of security from knowing that you have been following God’s ways even though others might not see it that. Can Gentiles really follow Jesus? Sure they can. They are filled with God’s Spirit. They are repenting. God is blessing. In fact, it wasn’t until God really started moving among the Gentiles (who were so ripe and ready for hope and love and forgiveness) that the followers of Jesus took upon themselves the title of God (as in called by my name) as their identity. They were first called Christians.
For more on this check the previous sermon. “Rooted in God’s Love.”
• Go against the flow (if it is right in God’s eyes)
Because one is rooted in God’s ways and because one is aware of one’s strengths, weaknesses, limits and even calling, the emotionally healthy can go against the flow. They do not need the affirmation of others. Their conscience is clear before God even though the accusations and blame get heaped on them.
If their views are right in God’s eyes, they will even be the only voice that might go against what the majority believe.
Gentiles believers were accepted (barely). But Barney and Paul stepped out before this to teach them and simply continued the work that they saw God blessing.
• Make timely decisions
The last thing that I have for you today that emotionally healthy spirituality means making timely decisions. This means that they make sound decisions despite uncertainties and pressures. This also means that they accept the consequences of their decisions without blaming.
For Paul and Barney the time was right. God multiplied and even gave their ministry the notoriety of being the first place where these followers of Jesus were given the name of Christians.
He was brought in to head a privately owned airline in a small Latin American country. Revenues were falling dramatically. The main sales agent for the airline was a close friend of the owner and his contract was more favorable than his competitor’s even though his agency was weak in sales. The excessively generous contract with the hugely powerful pilots union was a major cash drain. Their pay was far above industry standard.
He told the pilots that if they didn’t renegotiate the company would go under even though he was told not to take on the pilot union. They listened and upped the hours of work without more pay.
Then he went to the owner of the airline and told him that the owner’s close friend, head of the ticket agency, was incompetent and wasn’t producing. “Get rid of that agency or I’m leaving.” The owner listened and canned his crony’s contract.
On the road to emotionally healthy spirituality these are several of the competencies that allow us to show our true colors. It is one thing to know ourselves but it is another to show everyone who we are. The emotionally mature person is secure enough with who she is and her relationship with God to live out her beliefs even while being open-minded toward others. The immature lets his emotions rule him. He is reactive, close-minded, takes himself and others too seriously, has a self-centered perspective, capitulates to peer pressure, and often makes poor decisions at the worst possible timing blaming others for his mistakes.
The bible often depicts the one ruled by his emotions as a fool. But the wise person who seeks godly wisdom and is in turn sought by others, is the master of her emotional well-being. Which way characterizes your life? Primarily one or the other. Probably like most of us, a little bit of both depending on the situation. Knowing that is a great first step in making the changes and doing the hard inner work that is needed to be the emotionally healthy spiritual person that God calls us to be.
