Sometimes...

I used to believe that the most troubling word in all of the English language was the word “why”. But a recent question posed on a popular blog (http://ginkworld.blogspot.com/) got me to thinking that the word why is actually a word that can be avoided and even thrown away entirely in some cases. So what was left? What word was left staring me in the face, haunting me and taking control of my thoughts in a way that no other word has ever captured my imagination?

Sometimes…

The question posed on the blog was “what are you?” And the author, John O’Keefe was lamenting, as I was, over why people want to label you as “saved”, “un-saved”, “Christian”, “un-Christian”, “NASCAR fan”, or “normal”. The basis of the question is why it is that people feel compelled to label you and force you into a corner. In other words; why do people feel more enlightened than you to define who you are in the world?

I think the answer to that question is that they are only “sometimes” who they claim to be, and we are only “sometimes” who we claim to be…

No matter what you are, what profession you claim to have, how compassionate you claim to be, how smart you think you are, how Christian you think you are…no matter what you are, you can only claim at best to that thing…sometimes.

I have a history of power lifting and bodybuilding in my life, but I can only rightly claim to be that sometimes. As a matter of fact, everything that I identify myself as a human being I can only claim those things to be true sometimes, and that includes breathing.

I believe that one of the things that is at the heart of the Gospel is the fact that we are inconsistent, that we are all cursed as “sometimes” persons. I was just re-reading the book of Genesis, chapter 15, about Abram and his faith. And you know what astounds me? Even as it says “And he (Abram) believed the LORD, and he counted it to him as righteousness.” Abram continued, even after that event to only believe “sometimes”. Abram slept with a concubine (ch. 16), he laughs at God’s word to him (ch. 17)…Abram’s history of faith is scarred, just like ours is, and he only “sometimes” lived up to his words, and yet he was still sealed by the word of God.

Paul in, what I affectionately call the “bonehead” chapter, Romans 7 speaks to how inconsistently we cal live with our faith, doing things we wish and pray that we do not do, and not doing things that we know in our hearts our right. But what does he say? “Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death (this “sometimes” kind of life)? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.” (Rom 7:24-25) What do we do with our “sometimes” faith? Throw ourselves at Jesus!!

At the heart of sometimes is grace. Because we are only “sometimes” people at best, grace is there to throw ourselves upon. It is there, in the flow of the kingdom of grace, the kingdom of God, that we find something consistent to define and measure ourselves by. This is the gospel! Yes Jesus came, lived, died, and rose again to “save” me from my sins. And yes if I give myself freely to him and ask his forgiveness and grace he will stand in my place at judgment and I will be counted as he is counted before God, perfect. But more than that, the heart of the gospel (for me) is that my “sometimes” life is not the end. And no matter how much anyone would like to hold my “sometimes” life up by putting my “sometimes” life down, they have no power to do so anymore because Jesus has taken away my “sometimes”.