Short-Cuts

I walk to work two or three times a week. I had a look at a map and realised that there was a pleasanter and shorter route. First time I tried it, it took almost three songs longer than normal. (I like that playlist on my iPod). I looked again at the map and made some adjustments. Today it took two songs longer. This will come as no surprise to many of you. When we're driving and I say 'oh, I know a short-cut' there are cries from the family, pleading that we take the longer way round. They know from painful experience how long the short-cut might take. Never mind a couple of songs, you could fit the entire works of The Boss into some of my short-cuts.

The problem extends beyond geography. Early in my faith journey, I was in a church full of young-people of my age who were much further on in their own journies. I wanted to be like them, to be seen like them, to have the same opportunities as them. So I took a short cut. I learned how to look the part of a mature young Christian. I knew what songs to sing, how to lift up my hands (radical in those pre-Charismatic Movement days), I learned a lot about the Bible, how to pray 'professional sounding' prayers. On the outside I looked great (metaphorically speaking - flares and kipper ties - whose idea were thay?). Trouble was, it was only superficial, all about what was seen. There was no real holiness, just the legalistic impression of it. So when the foundations were tested, there was nothing there. When the wall was needed to hold real weight, turned out it wasn't structurally sound.

When the 'lost son' comes to his senses it says that "he started out from the place where he was". I wondered about that and other similar statements in the Bible. Where else would you start from? Then I realised. It's what I've spent a lifetime doing... denying where I really am, starting out from where I'd like to be, from where I'd like others to think I am.... But I keep discovering the simple truth. There aren't any short-cuts to Christ-likeness.  At first I found that distressing. I felt ashamed that I wasn't further on, that I'd let my saviour down. I knew sin mattered, that it has dismaying consequences, that it kills and ripples on into the future.

Then I learned something new. Jesus is really, really patient. Yes sin matters, yes it has effects - but these can be mitigated, overcome, redeemed. And in the meantime, He takes all the time it needs to patiently dig out the weeds, turn and prepare the ground, plant and water the seeds, tend and protect the shoots, train and prune for a mighty harvest.

I can breathe again. It doesn't all have to be finished this week. Or even this life. The Holy Spirit of God chooses what to work on next and gently encourages to action. He uses scripture, other believers, lifes circumstances to refine me. He doesn't rush the job, doesn't nag impatiently about all the other stuff there is left to do. But as a master craftsman, with inordinate pride in his work, He takes His time and makes something of exquisite value, worthy of the price that has been paid.

So lets not start from the wrong place - from the place of guilt, from the place of condemnation, from the place of false-expectation.

Let's start from where we are and avoid the short-cuts.