FROM THE PASTOR
August 19, 2018
Have you ever noticed how society tends to exaggerate? I have. Maybe it’s because I’m around and speaking with fisherman so much at the boat landings. A 2# bass becomes 6#... the one that got away “fought like a mule and was the biggest fish all year” and the fish “bit like never before … yesterday”. Regardless, for some reason when a story is told… when a point is related and an incident shared… to make a point have even greater impact there seems to be a tendency to stretch the facts. To make ourselves feel better, we have given this tendency the title of ‘embellishment’. Sounds so much more sophisticated than ‘lie”, right?
Maybe we embellish because we feel our lives are just too boring for anyone else to be ‘interested’ in without a little help. Maybe we just like to entertain. Politicians do it all the time. They call it hyperbole. The talking heads on television do it. They call it ‘opinion’. News reporters do it. They call it ‘our side of the story. But let’s be honest, while the ‘out of norm’ incidents do happen… they happen rarely. I’m also confident that every incident happens, just as they happened, for a very specific purpose.
We need to accept the truth that if we’re really allowing God to guide our lives, every incident, as the incident occurred, is for someone’s benefit (yours or others). That means there is one area of our lives that we should never give in to the temptation of embellishment… our Christian walk. Besides, you can never fool God anyways… He always knows the true intention of every heart.
Luke records…
Luke 9:47 (NASB)
47 But Jesus, knowing what they were thinking in their heart, …
If we truly believe God has a predetermined plan for each of us, that plan needs to happen and be shared exactly as His perfect will made it happen. This requires no embellishment to have its intended affect. It just needs to be lived out and related in the light of absolute truth.
Unfortunately, I’ve noticed something over the years of listening to people share God’s work in their lives that is troubling. In too many cases, as embellishment begins, the focus increasingly turns from ‘what God has or is doing’ (upward) and begins to focus on the person who is sharing the incident (inward). Here’s an unembellished fact for you… the minute the story turns ‘inward’, God’s purpose is altered… and His glory has been robbed.
God’s Word is clear…
1 Corinthians 10:31 (NASB)
31 Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.
Colossians 3:17 (NASB)
17 Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to God the Father.
Colossians 3:23 (NASB)
23 Whatever you do, do your work heartily, as for the Lord rather than for men,
Think about it… let’s be honest… the truth is evident… no embellishment required… when we live our life exactly as God intended, we actually live an amazingly interesting life. A life with eternal consequences that glorifies the One who’s really the most ‘interested’ in our story to begin with.
Thank you for your faithfulness. Pastor Larry
