Honey, I Shrunk Jesus
Welcome to another post on the Still in the Storm Substack.
It’s everywhere these days, even amongst Christians.
I’m talking about fighting and division.
Don’t believe me?
Just go on social media and look up Christian groups. It’s everywhere.
My denomination is better than your denomination.
Your beliefs, doctrine, or theology is wrong but, mine is correct.
My church or creed or beliefs are scriptural but, yours aren’t.
And on and on it goes.
When we focus on differences in doctrine, creed, theology or anything else that divides us we limit and reduce the size of Jesus Christ.
You might say we shrink Him. What a thought!
But, yes we can, in fact, shrink the Son of God, the Creator of the universe.
How you might ask?
Well, what we are doing when we judge other Christians as I described above is to say that we cannot possibly find Christ in those we disagree with.
That He can't be found in them because they believe xyz and we don't.
However, that’s is it truly possible shrink Christ? In short, no.
Jesus Christ is infinite. He is eternal, divine life.
We can never, ever reach the end of His unfathomable and unsearchable riches.
I hope you can appreciate that whenever we limit Christ by our own machinations that is not a good thing.
Often we do this without realizing it.
It stems from the projection of a selfish, judgmental, fleshy attitude towards others that is really something which needs to be addressed in yourself.
It's like seeing a splinter in someone else’s eye and trying to fix it without addressing the pole that's in your eye which turns out to be where the splinter came from.
I can attest to this from first hand experience.
Ever since losing my Dad to cancer and losing my job/career during covid, I have been on a spiritual journey and a renewed following of the Lord in all my life.
I used to be part of different denominations but now my pursuit is Jesus Christ and Him alone. A deeper journey, if you will.
It’s so easy to fall in to the trap of comparing your denomination and its set of beliefs or doctrine to others.
My guide is God’s Word, the Bible. If it’s not in there then we must ask whether the Lord has willed it.
Because of that I’ve come to have certain strong opinions which led to me not seeing eye to eye with brothers and sisters in certain denominations.
Unfortunately, I saw them as the problem and thought they were taking offense to people like me who didn’t share their beliefs.
It’s certainly possible that there are some who do and may want nothing to do with me but that’s not the point.
The problem was that I effectively ruled out anyone in these denominations and convinced myself that they couldn’t possibly be part of the body of Christ because of what they believed, that Christ couldn’t be dwelling in them.
Well, recently I engaged with someone who showed me just how wrong I was.
This person was one who I thought would never accept me as an equal because of our differences in beliefs, yet that is exactly what he did.
I was blown away. It was like scales falling from my eyes.
The Lord had essentially blasted a spotlight directly on me and my issue.
It wasn’t them at all. It was me. I had a pole in my eye that I couldn’t see.
I saw very clearly that Jesus was living within this person and as time has gone on I’ve come to see Him in a number of others in the same denomination.
Regrettably, I limited and shrunk Jesus Christ by not thinking that I could find Him in any of these people that I disagree with.
I took offense because I thought they were judging me (or others like me) but it was really me who was judging them.
This has not been an easy pill to swallow but, I know it’s true.
And the more I have come to understand this, the more I’ve felt the Lord nudging me to speak up about it.
I think it is one thing for someone to “preach” about a specific topic but quite another to share from your own shortcomings, so that is what I’ve tried to do.
My writing is as much for me as it is for you. I need it for my own transformation as much, if not more than others do.
And, I think it is helpful to write about things that you feel led to by the Lord, things that you feel strongly about, or things that you feel need to be probed and dealt with yourself.
We are all so unique and while there is an incredible amount of wonderful writing out there from people who exude Jesus Christ from their very being, sometimes you can’t find that one piece that deals specifically with what you are going through or not in the right context.
So, I humbly try to write it myself.
I mean there’s billions of people on the planet, including millions and millions of Christians.
If I’m dealing with certain issues that the Lord is revealing to me, it’s highly likely that others are too and so perhaps it will be beneficial to them.
All I ask is that you carefully consider whether there truly is a splinter in that other person’s eye or if, in fact, it’s just broken off a pole that’s in your eye.
The more I learn and know Jesus Christ, the more I realize that many of us do not know truly know Him.
Perhaps we know of Him. Certainly from a historical standpoint.
Most Christians can testify to His birth, death, resurrection and ascension.
But, do you really know Him on an intimate level? Have you given your life, your everyday life and all it contains, to Him?
I used to think you believed and then voila!, you’re transformed.
It turns out that it takes a lifetime for the Lord to blast and chisel away us and conform us into Christ.
Think marathon, not sprint. I’m talking glacial.
So, don’t beat yourself up if you’ve made the mistake I have, if you find yourself to be judgmental of others when you thought it was them.
It’s not easy to see. It’s even harder to come to terms and deal with.
When you are getting ready to dig your heels in and act out in the flesh remember that Jesus is Love.
I used to think that what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 13 was just about romantic love and was simply a perfect verse for weddings.
Boy was I wrong. He was telling the saints in Corinth, who had gone quite off the tracks, what it looks like when you live by Christ, when you live by love.
It’s only in taking up and bearing the inwrought cross daily that we can live a life of love as the Lord desires, a life of complete selflessness.
Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.
1 Corinthians 13:4-7
We may technically be right about doctrine but, when we fail to love our sisters and brothers in Christ, when we judge them or slander them then we lose the argument.
I love the idea that all Christians are family, brothers and sisters in Christ.
The problem is that I didn’t live it out. I didn’t show love towards those I disagree with.
Jesus tells us that “whatever you do to the least of these, you do to me.”
The “least of these” are the brethren, the saints, the brothers and sisters in Christ.
And He said whatever you do to the least of these you do to me. To me!
He doesn’t differentiate between Himself and His body.
So, if you don’t live out the love of Christ towards your brothers and sisters, if you treat them poorly, if you judge them, if you slander them, then you are doing that to Jesus Christ.
You are mistreating and doing harm to Christ and His very body on this earth.
Just think about that for a moment.
It breaks my heart to think of doing that to the Lord but it’s true and I did.
Praise God though, He’s already dealt with my sins and I don’t have to wallow in guilt and condemnation.
But, now I know and believe with all my heart that if you are Christ’s then we are kin, regardless of what doctrine or theology you believe.
When you start to see the Lord, I mean really see Him, then everything else falls by the wayside and pales in comparison.
He is not just the most important thing, He is the only thing.
May Christ be made real in your lives, may we each bear the cross and may we love each other as we do Him.
Let me know what you think in the discussion below.
Talk soon,
Mike
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Thank you for sharing your heart, brother. When I think about divisions within the body of Christ, what comes to mind is the scripture where Jesus addresses people who did miraculous works in his name, and yet he says “I never knew you”. And don’t we ALWAYS cast ourselves in the role of the others, the ones who truly did know him, of course. Funny how everybody does that! Nobody ever says “yeah, I could be one of those who didn’t know him”. Maybe we need to put aside the idea that anyone we disagree with “never knew him”.
Mike, you have a unique ability to discuss things I am going through too. Thanks for sharing your thoughts from your perspective. I always look forward to reading your posts, thank you!