One of my favorite quotes is from Oswald Chambers. He writes: “The things we are going through are either making us sweeter, better, nobler men and women; or they are making us more captious and fault-finding, more insistent upon our own way. The things that happen either make us fiends, or they make us saints; it depends entirely upon the relationship we are in to God.”
We are continuously “made” by what we are going through. According to Chambers, we can be “made” into one of two persons: a fiend or a saint.
It’s interesting that one of the most popular MTV shows is entitled “Made.” In this show young people share who they would like to become that in many ways is quite different from who they currently are. So, for example, one young person may be gifted at non-physical activities and decide he wants to become a wrestler. So, he is given a coach who works with him over a process of time and brings him to the place of becoming who he would like to be but has never had the courage to become.
I believe we have an innate desire/need to become made into the image of Jesus Christ. Many of us perceive this need through crisis and the experience of salvation. Others of us may never know (unless someone shares the Gospel) that this Jesus is who we are created to be like. Still some may know the goal of life, i.e. becoming like Jesus, but choose to be “made” into something/one else.
It was Thomas Merton (monastic hermit in KY back in the 50s and 60s) who often commented that we become more truly who we are. I’ve seen this to be very much the case in the lives of people. If one moves down the road of fault-finding… over time… that person becomes a fault-finding person ever more so. If one goes down the road of anger, that person becomes an angry person… etc… etc…
Who are you becoming? Who are you being “made” into by what you are going through? A fiend or a saint? Note, the ability to become a saint (more like Jesus) depends, according to Chambers, upon the relationship we are in with God.
Pastor Tim
Tim,
I, for one know first hand that we are made into who we are by our choices. I have made countless bad choices during my brief time on this Earth. However, the choice is ours as to how we react and recover from these poor choices. We can choose to correct our mistakes and not make the same ones again, or we can choose not to correct these mistakes only to stumble yet another time.
There is something to be said about the person who chooses to fix his or her poor choices in life and turn those poor choices into who they ultimately become.
I have read, and I have also heard from a dear friend, that God never wastes a hurt. This is so true. I have been hurting most of my life due to poor choices I have made. Well, I have made the choice to take my years of hurting and devote myself to helping others with their choices; not to help them make them, but to help them use them. Choices they have made, and are yet to make. I want them to know as I do, that by choosing to have a relationship with Jesus Christ, He will take our poor choices and make them into something good.
Romans 3:23 says that we have all fallen short of the Glory of God. However Romans 8:28 says that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, and who have been called according to His purpose. God is saying in this powerful book of Romans that we have all made poor choices, but we know that God will help us to turn those poor choices into something good if we only make the choice to love Him
I pray that whomever reads your blog entry will realize that their poor choices in life will not be wasted. There is a purpose and an opportunity that they have due to these choices. God will not let their hurts go to waste.
— Eddie Coleman · May 5, 09:21 PM · #
I know that God always works things out to be for the good of those that love Him, even when we have been bad. We also have to have patience, because God is working things out in His time, not ours. Without Him it isn’t going to come out the way it is supposed to. We must wait on Him, not try and take control of a situation that we can’t really control in the first place.
— Brenda Lowman · May 14, 08:31 PM · #