Human Frailty Made To Look Strong: Part Three

Center-right...facing straight ahead.

This mural, to me, represents the duality, ambiguity, plurality, and factuality of Christianity.
It seems four faces opposed, but actually it is a unified front.
It is the backside which is not seen, and in the dark, and anti-Christ.
Confusion amongst minds does not equal lost nor condemned, thus the call to love.

Some small men buy large vehicles... some people say to compensate in some way.

I am not short in stature, but I did always want a large pickup truck with large tires... still do.

I exuded my masculinity in another way: motorcycles – Harley Davidsons.

(My dad has / had both large trucks and Harley motorcycles)

Leather jacket, black shoes, blue jeans, and an often scary look with an open-face black carbon-fiber helmet.

Years ago on the weekends, I would join 10 to 20 'bikers' on a ride around town, up and down the coast and through twisty mountain roads.

We looked tough on the outside, but most of us were yuppies living a dream.

Some of these were solid and faithful brothers, others uninterested or at a particular place on their journey, and others adamantly opposed to anything God-related.

Isn't this a simple cross-section of the world around us?

Yet we approach others as reflections of His image in love.

When I was younger, I didn't notice any peer pressure to conform to others.

It may have been there, but I was not aware.

However, in my late twenties I began to not only sense a peer pressured conformity, I actually fell for it when the biker troupe leader suggested I get a bigger bike (I had a Sportster and he called it a lady's bike).

Selling that first Sporty and buying a bigger bike took its toll, and I realized how I became yet another lemming trying to fit in.

After years of mostly not caring what others thought about me, here I was trying to impress others.

It was a journey, a time taking a sojourn into certain desert paths.

It was a time of selfishness on my part, of a search for identity.

I thought I had disconnected from such nonsense when I was a part of a dynamic church group in my early twenties (yet still, I had adapted and adopted the unique norms of that particular church, so the 'change' was a desired one in my view and one expected, as with any other peer group).

When my perception of the world went from right to left (looking at that mural), so did my tastes and manners...yet God's grace was still in effect.

Some Christians perceive their salvation can be lost.

I say it was never there in the first place if it can be considered 'lost'.

The parable of the sower grants further insight.

For those that are enlivened at some point in their lives, or several times like myself, they may understand the several faces they've seen when gazing into the mirror when looking for His face.

It is those times of weakness, of faithlessness, of fear, of failure that I have doubted His love for me.

I doubted because of where I was standing, what I had done, my judgment of my self and questioning His salvation according to my human understanding.

But little did I know that He had sealed me so long ago, prior to my acknowledgement of what He had already done for me on the cross.

I think God's grace is widely misunderstood.

Often times people shy away from speaking of grace because perhaps they suspect they are arguing for sin's allowance.

Yet this is exactly why grace needs to be affirmed.

Open with, endure through, and end in love.

We live in a state of perpetual grace despite our efforts to be firmly obedient and keep a perfect record.

Part One.

Part Two.