What Does God Require?

I got a thought about this. I’ve thought this for a long, long, long, long time. Like, for years and years.

What God requires of you, might not be what God requires of me.

This principle is caught up in the parable of the talents. The man with 1 talent could not do the things of the man with 10 talents. And he wasn’t required to.

Jesus required more of the 12 Apostles than he did of a poor blind man that lived his life by the pool.

A homeless herion addict that eats in the soup kitchen and has just met the Lord probably can’t keep up with you, or us. It is OK for him to walk a bit slower, and to stumble some. Whereas you, you are required to do more because you know better. You’ve developed some strengths. You’ve learned how to resist some temptations.

God didn’t require you to do all the things you do now way back when you first met the Lord.
I hear you preach some Cattleman. I know God didn’t require you to do that way back when. You had to grow first. You had to learn some things. You had to get stronger.

I think sometimes we try to transpose “our” gifts, and skills and talents and our STRENGHTS into others.
Sometimes that does not work.

If you tried to force that herion addict to live up to the expectations that you have for yourself, then I’d challenge you. I’d say – “Back off.  Leave him alone.”

When we do that, we are way to often only encouraging them to backslide because they just can’t live up to that yet. We heap guilt on them, make the way too difficult and we give them burdens that they can’t carry.

So – they give up. And, it is our fault. We drove them away.  I’ve seen this so many times it is quite sad.
And then we blame them. “Oh, they just couldn’t cut it. They couldn’t keep the commandments.”  

We lay burdens on people that they are not ready for. And we justify it too. “The bible says so.”

Now, in some other threads we’ve been talking about marriage and divorce.
Some have said “If God requires me not to get married again, then I will obey.”
And I say to that – you bet. You would be obeying the commandents as you know them and as you have the strength to do. So, you should live that out. Anything less would be wrong.”

I gave the illustration of an immature teenager getting married on a drunk lark in Vegas and then us trying to force OUR lives into her life and forcing her to live in imprisonment all of her life. To that, I say we are wrong.
There is a place in this thing we call life where we deliver forgiveness and we accept that level of repentance that they are able to give.  

Some are able to repent at a certain level – and that is where God’s forgiveness meets us.

Here is where the church must nurture others in the faith. The church must bear their burdens and accept that degree of repentance which it is possible for them to achieve.

What I see way too often – is seasoned, mature Christians trying to transpose their maturity and strength into others who just aren’t there yet. And we heap coals of guilt into them and we push them down into despair because they just don’t measure up.

And, to that – I say “Shame on us.”  

We don’t demand that a 6 month old baby do the same things as a 10 year old boy.
Even a mature man of 30 who has little educational skills and people skills, we don’t demand of them that they become the president of a major corporation. We don’t demand that they become school teachers. We don’t demand someone who can’t read to become a newspaper editor.

So, why do we demand some of these things on our Christian brothers and sisters?

I’m perplexed by this.

Let’s learn to help each other walk, and encourage each other to grow.

This might be a little of of the intended topic, but it did seem to fit. I hope so. Carry on.

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