noughts and crosses

It's not about trying to not be what you are.
It's not about trying to not be angry, or depressed, or sick, or gay.

That misses the point.

It's about not ceding that those things are your master.
It's about choosing Jesus to be your Lord.
And it's about Him being more than enough. That sufficiency is not just for a heart that is OK with what His Lordship means for it and its desires. That sufficiency is for a heart that is not OK with what His Lordship means for it; but chooses 'vision over visibility', chooses to trust that His Lordship is good and right because He is full of both grace and kindness AND truth and holiness.

That sufficiency is for a heart that will choose to put itself (angry, depressed, sick, gay) SECOND to what He wants.

You may well still be angry, depressed, sick or gay. But you have a choice over who will be your master (those things, or Jesus).

It is at that juncture that the posture of your heart (one of faith and trust and obedience) can mean that you choose to bow to Jesus, not anger or homosexuality. You can still have the desires that flow from anger/homosexuality's presence in your heart, but the Spirit's work in your heart to make your cravings for Jesus to reign supreme over all those competing desires means that you choose to love Jesus more than you love those other things. 'If you love me, you will obey me.'

Dying to yourself and your desires, dispositions and postures of your heart isn't easy. Surely no one is that naive. It's agony. Torture.

But I suspect that that's not incongruous with taking up your cross and dying to your self.

The self can be full of anger and pride and misplaced desires, but the regenerate self can choose to not be mastered by them. The regenerate self can choose to put them off, take up whatever cross He lays before you and follow Him to a place of radical love.

And I suspect that the present cries of "It's unfair" won't be what's on our lips when He appears. I suspect that we will instead be overwhelmed by how gracious He was in allowing us the opportunity to choose to bow and have our stubbornness worn away.

Let me briefly qualify what I've said by saying that His Lordship certainly does change things. His Spirit does mould us in His likeness. But you don't bow the knee AFTER you've been conformed to His likeness. You bow the knee during the process of sanctification, even BEFORE your heart has been rid of the blemishes of this world.

Because it's the competing affections that make the choosing to love Jesus all the more authentic. It makes the love robust.

May we rest in His grace, and out of spiritual bankruptcy cry to Him to give us cravings to know Him more deeply that override all competing desires. May love be our fuel to plough into Him more deeply, allow Him to plough more deeply into us, and apprehend Him more fully, as He has already taken hold of us.