"So," they say, "nobody's perfect!"
But the Vinedresser won't buy that.
Given the opportunity, He will trim the unproductive suckers and shape the branches so each one will bask in Sonlight.

Saturday, December 04, 2010

Hand Me That Crutch!

            One of the more inane objections to accepting Christ's work on the cross and depending on God is, "I don't need no religion for a crutch!" Left unstated is, I'm an independent person. I can make it on my own, so I can live my own way. Nobody can tell me what to do!
            The world is full of rugged individualists like that. They are the ones who won't go to the doctor unless it's in a hospital emergency room, or take advice, even from someone who knows what they're talking about. It's easy to tell who they are; they're the ones who crash through life making stupid mistakes and never learning from them.
            Whether they admit it or not, they are their own gods, refusing to bow to any authority. Is that a death-wish we see? If they persist, that wish will surely be granted, and they will get eternally more than they bargained for.
            Judging by their track record, I'm probably wasting my time and energy writing about such knuckle-heads; they won't listen any more than usual, and the rest of us don't need to be told who they are. Bible passages about scoffers abound, with detailed descriptions of their stupidity and foolishness. Did they get the message from God's chosen spokesmen? Hardly!
            Today they like to call themselves "Free Thinkers," "Skeptics," or "Atheists." A few of them are quite ingenious with their "proofs" that God doesn't exist, though such are hardly original. The rest of them simply parrot their more studious mentors, spouting pop-anthropology and Darwinian rhetoric. Not even Saint Charles doubted God's existence, viewing his Theory of Natural Selection as simply part of God's creative process.
            I'm near-sighted, so I wear glasses. My weird feet need orthotics. And not long ago I needed a crutch to get around while recovering from foot surgery. Sensible people admit that nobody's perfect, and to function at a level above that dictated by our imperfections we need to compensate for them. That defines the generic crutch.
            Our human imperfections go way beyond what is visible, effecting our inner motives, our resulting behavior, our self-image, and even our appearance. Despite the problems they cause, we must thank God for our human glitches, as they result from His creating us with the ability to go our own imperfect way. And as if anyone needed proof of our fallen nature we go to great lengths to prove it with the trouble we get ourselves into.
            Without God's Crutch, we'd stumble through life hurting ourselves and others. And without God's Crutch our ultimate destiny is the eternally prolonged death that is the only alternative to eternal life. The Crutch God has furnished us is His Son the Lord Jesus Christ. Leaning on Him allows us to walk the way God designed for us, to the destination He created for our eternal blessing. And the Crutch of Christ fits us perfectly–no adjustment necessary.

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