Solid Food

I was recently convicted, pretty strongly, of sin in my life. More specifically, pride and selfishness. There's pain in seeing the 'log in our eye' sometimes.

Conviction by the power of the Holy Spirit is something all Christians have experienced. It's a fundamental characteristic. What do you need to believe in Jesus for if you don't need to be saved from anything?

I think when God convicts us of something that's messed up in our heart, it's, statistically, a favourite time for the Devil to come in and try to twist things around and make the waters murky.

God reproves those whom He loves, and this is a truly beautiful thing. It's something to be rejoiced over. But feelings of conviction can be quickly followed by feelings of hopelessness, self loathe and degradation. I think this is the devil coming in to mess stuff up.

I felt those things in this recent process of realizing some ugly stuff in my heart. A perspective that helped me was recognizing that, first of all, God initiated this. If what you're recognizing in yourself is truly sin, it's God bringing something to your attention that He is trying to work on. The devil wouldn't let you know of these things - I think He would much rather let them marinate in us as long as possible.

So God has initiated this process. And what I think He's doing is actually saying something akin to:

Hey, there's some stuff in here that I want to redeem. Let me come in and work on it

Hear this voice as a calm one. Hear the voice of God - the God who created everything and knows every last inch of your heart and every breath and heartbeat in your past and future. This isn't something that shocks Him.

In my mind, for some reason God is often someone that is truly appalled and angry and what He has apparently just stumbled across. It's a voice that is purely heaping burdens and shame on me. I've been busted, I'm a piece of crap, and I need to fix this, pronto, or I'll get burnt to an eternal crisp.

I don't know why I struggle with that voice to be honest, but I'll bet I'm not alone. It's good to expose these lies and bring us back to God's true voice. The voice of a Father who is fully aware of everything we are, and is parenting us gently, patiently and lovingly.

If you are a Christian, you have been made clean by the power of the blood of Jesus Christ for all eternity. Acts 10:15 says:

Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.

Yep. That includes us.

So if you have a story about dealing with this voice I'm talking about, I'd love to hear it. I think that the truth about how God speaks to us, broadly, not just regarding conviction, is extremely loving. Shame and burden-heaping can actually be treated as an indicator that it's a voice you should ignore. But as we all grow in to people who have been trained in discernment to eat solid food, community is not just recommended, it's vital.