Paint and Renovation

Yesterday, on my day off, I spent most of the day slapping paint on my house.  The siding needed paint a couple of years ago, and it got dry and cracked.  The surface of the wood soaked up the primer like a thirsty man soaks up water, but the primer is doing its job.  The surface is now sealed and looks a whole lot better.  And that's what paint is for, to weather-proof the exterior and make it look good.  But of course paint does nothing to repair the structure, seal the windows, or insulate the walls.  A good paint job can make a dilapidated house look great -- if you don't look too closely.

Some people approach Christianity the same way as painting a house.  Attending church, and taking on Christian culture and speech and dress, can make you look better on the outside -- but right below the surface, the old person still exists, unchanged.  When Jesus invited his original disciples to follow him, he started them on a process that created a change in the innermost being:  thinking, focus, emotions, and responses to other people.  He invites his disciples today to do exactly the same! 

In church we're preaching through the Beatitudes (Matthew. 5:3-10).  Those sayings of Jesus have brought up uncomfortable realities about how we, no matter how long we've gone to church, haven't "arrived" -- we are still on the journey of learning to think and be as Jesus taught.  Jesus meant these sayings to shake us, to wake us up to his new Kingdom reality, and to challenge us to surrender our thinking and emotions to him. 

Paul was concerned for his flock in the same way.  He wrote the epistle to the churches in Galatia to warn people not to get caught up in empty religious forms (in this case, the Old Covenant law -- but it could have been anything) because those had no power to change the inner person.  In Galatians 4:19 Paul tells them his goal for them, that "Christ is fully developed in your lives" and in chapters 5 and 6 he emphasizes the role of the Holy Spirit in change.  That lifelong process of learning about Jesus and letting him change us is what we call "discipleship" or "spiritual formation."  Spiritual formation, for ourselves first of all, is the foundational job of church pastors and leaders.  It's a major part of what we continue to teach and emphasize to all Christ-followers.

Following Jesus isn't a surface-level paint job.  It's a back-to-the-foundation renovation project.  He is exceedingly patient and kind while he works us through this process, but he is exceedingly thorough and persistent, too.  So he asks us to listen carefully to him, to surrender our wills to him and to ask the Holy Spirit's constant help in revising our thinking and our emotions.  And when that happens, something else results -- the outside becomes beautiful.  Let's determine to take on the lifelong work of following Jesus, and see what he wants us to look like!