September 6
DebDay 176: Comprehensive Integrity
(This new forced Facebook layout is making my formatting a little more challenging. Please forgive me.)
Yesterday, Deb and I went on a little hike out the road. We then stopped by the marina for our annual meal at Hot Bite. It was good. But I grossly violated our usual (Keto) eating plan, and paid dearly. For most of the night, short of sleep, I wished I hadn't violated my own standard.
Lately, the Spirit has called me to considering the nature of personal integrity. How any of us so easily will maintain consistency. In certain areas, to the exclusion of other areas of our lives.
John 7 finds Jesus interacting with religious officials, responding to their questions regarding His identity. His answers blow their collective minds, as they didn't have a category for what He was telling them.
In one part of this conversation, Jesus says, "If on the Sabbath a man received circumcision, so that the law of Moses may not be broken, are you angry with me because on the Sabbath I made a man's whole body well?"
Uh, yes; they are. While they are challenging His identity in order to challenge His credentials, Jesus comes back with, "Yours is a partial integrity, a selective integrity." While they are looking to discredit Him, Jesus hits them with a gut punch; a punch they're unwilling to absorb.
No one can measure their own integrity, or that of someone else, unless that integrity represents the risk of loss or painful circumstances. We're born with a predisposition to avoid risk or loss or painful circumstances.
When it comes to religious duties, the validity of our personal integrity can be seen in our convictions; the things we regard as important. (And those things we deem not so important.)
Are we motivated by moral conviction? Or are we motivated by moral convenience?
More so, are we convinced our integrity should be consistent, and comprehensive? Or are we content to be selective, favoring those aspects of thought and living that present no risk?
We're all prone to proclaim our own devotion to Jesus. As Christians, none of us would think it proper or acceptable to say, "I talk a good game, but I'm just not that in to Him today."
Too often we're content to talk a good game. We all know how to put on the show for the Christian audience, all the while internally mocking ourselves. If we stop and think, we know ourselves better than we care to admit.
So today, as my gustatory system recovers, I will continue to allow the Spirit to expose to me my selective integrity. Can I truly be the person I want you to believe I am?
Not without the Spirit's help. It is only He who can make ours a comprehensive integrity.
-Mike Rydman, Lead Pastor, Radiant Church | Juneau
