Good Dog, Bad Dog

I’ve been reading alot lately about the differentiation between our position
as believers in our risen Lord and our current condition. Our position is
one of being saved for all eternity, and it’s clearly secure in the hands of
Jesus Christ. Our condition represents how we’re doing right now in our
fellowship with God the Father.

We believers have two beings inside of us; we have the old sinful self still
hanging around (although he’s actually dead … powerless), and we have the
new creation in Christ (our new life in the risen Jesus). The problem here is
that we keep giving that old, dead guy attention. We don’t always leave him
lie dead at the cross; instead, we check in on him every once in a while and
see how he’s doing. We talk to him and even worse, we listen to him.

He holds no power over us any more but we still try to “be good” using his old
power, and of course we fail. It’s the old treadmill that Paul described with
so much passion in Romans 7. We try to be good (forgetting who we are) and we
come up short; we agonize over the failure vowing to do better … and we might
do better for a while. But then we do the whole thing all over again.

The more we fail, the more it bothers us as believers. Why oh why can’t I just
be like I want to be all the time? So we feel bad at times, but we just keep on
working hard on that treadmill.

I think there are 2 things that can help us with this. But first we need to
be really sure of what the problem is. First and foremost is to be sure that
we believe what we say we believe. Do we know that we know that we know that
Jesus died for us? If so, then we need to be sure that we don’t stop at the
place where our sins are forgiven, and we need to keep going into the new life
that we’ve been given. Yes, our position of being forgiven is secure, but it’s
this new life that’s not getting enough attention.

But how do we live more in the new life and less in the old life? What can I
do to spend less time with the old Tom and more time with the new Tom? Well,
from much of the studying I’ve done, I’ve found 2 really good things that have
helped me. I’ll never be fully done with the old Tom while I walk the earth,
but I can spend less and less time with him.

#1. Our mind. What is on my mind? What do I think about? What do I dream
about? What do I get angry about? What do I laugh about? What makes me get
up out of my chair? What stirs me to object? What allows me to close my eyes?
What do I long for?

Getting our minds right is something we NEED to do as believers. Remember the old
movie Coolhand Luke, where Luke could just never seem to get his “mind right”.
We’re supposed to have our minds on heavenly things, but how do we do that here in
the midst of the world?

I heard an old story where a believer explained to an unbeliever that it was like
he (the believer) had 2 dogs living inside him, the old self and the new self.
These dogs were at odds with each other all the time. The unbeliever asked him
which dog was winning; to which the believer replied, “Whichever one gets fed the
most.”

I know for a fact that the more time I spend “feeding the good dog” by reading
God’s Word and studying it … and by sincere prayer and connection with God,
the more likely it is that God is closer to the forefront of my thoughts. A new
believer I knew once asked, “Is there a CliffNotes version of the bible that I
can get?” The answer of course was “No, you have to read it.” That answer was
partially true; there are summaries of the bible available, but I know that if I
want any depth, I have to read it … alot…. and I have to pray … alot.

#2. Confession. It took me a while to learn about the value of real confession…
and I’m not talking about a denominational view of confession where you simply say
some words to the right person and … poof … you’re good to go.

It is very easy for us to rationalize what we do. Just last week my daughter wanted
to borrow something of mine in order to make something for a person who was
instrumental in helping my wife leave me 3 years ago. I was devastated when all that
took place; it was unbiblical and wrong and hurtful … and this person was there
at every step to help my ex-wife every time she needed help. She helped her commit
an egregious sin. My daughter thinks she was just being a “good friend” to my
ex-wife, but I see it differently. So I refused the request.

I had it all worked out in my mind; she did wrong, and she helped my wife do wrong,
and therefore I was right to refuse to help her in any way … declaring that I
wanted nothing to do with her.

It was during my quiet time this morning where God finally broke through to me and
showed me that although she may have been wrong in what she did, I’m the one who is
wrong now. I needed to CONFESS before God that I probably knew all along that I
was not doing right by holding that grudge … but I held it nonetheless … and I
would not admit it.

I know this post is getting long, but bear with me a bit longer. Listen to a passage
from Miles Stanford in his work “The Ground of Growth”:

“Yes, frank and immediate confession of sin is vital. Think for a moment of
someone who observes a loved one sinning against him. Wounded, but ever loving,
he forgives and says nothing. Meanwhile the loved one, although knowing there
is forgiveness, does not confess his sin. Forgiveness is there, but love is
waiting. But now where is the fellowship and integrity of this relationship?”

I could not get past that sentence … forgiveness is there but love is waiting.
The Father has forgiven me, but until I come clean with Him, my fellowship with
Him is never going to be what it could be.

“Examine yourselves as to whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves.” (2 Cor 13;5)
Unless I do ongoing serious and conscious tests of myself, I’m going to miss the areas
that I hold onto … the areas that need to be understood and confessed. If I
can do that, then my fellowship with God gets better and better, and my time
with the old Tom becomes less and less.

Peter

I think that sometimes we are very harsh in our judgment of Peter as he swore up and down that he would never deny Christ … but then did exactly that. If we look at what happened in the garden, we see that ALL of Jesus’ followers who were with him ran away. Now if you’ve ever been in real fear of something, where do you go when you run away?

Well, there isn’t one answer for that, but I think the one place that we would NOT go is where the very source of our fear is. We would tend to go in the opposite direction of the threat. But where did Peter go when he ran away? That’s right; he went to the Chief Priest’s house and was sitting outside next to the fire. Then when someone recognized him and the threat became even greater for him, did he run out of the compound and hide? No, he stayed in the compound.

Basically, Peter decided to just hang around the threat. Yes, he certainly let his fear get the best of him when it was ‘put up or shut up’ time, but at least he was still there. Where were the others?

The other thing to notice, I think, is when the two Marys went to the tomb and found it empty. What did the ‘young man’ in the tomb tell the Marys to do? “But go! Tell his disciples and Peter.”

Peter must have felt lower than a snake’s belly in a wagon rut after his disloyalty and Jesus’ death. But he was specifically singled out to be told about Jesus’ triumph over death, and assuming he heard about being singled out, it had to warm his heart and lift his spirit to know how much Jesus trusted him even on the field of his defeat.

Being sons and daughters of the Father through Jesus, isn’t it good to know that although we fail and we fail and we fail again, Jesus still loves and trusts us? We can use that knowledge to get back up when sin has knocked us down and get back into the fight with renewed resolve. Sin and Satan are going to knock us down … count on it … but the love of Jesus Christ has given us the power to get up … again and again.

Personally, I would love to hear about instances where each one of us were knocked down and yet claimed the power of our position in Jesus to get back up. Sharing these stories, whether large of small, with each other helps strengthen and encourage all of us.