The Truth Beneath the Rose

My recent lack of inspiration and subsequent reflection about my writing has caused me to do a lot of thinking. As I've stated before, I believe at least part of the purpose behind these doldrums is to essentially put my tools in their proper place: off of the altar. But this reflection has gotten me thinking about all the things that get more or less idolized in an effort to be true to faith.

There are a lot of things that Christians as a group tend to put on a pedestal as evidence of true faith and assurance of salvation. But the fact is, our salvation is ultimately between our individual selves and God. He's the only one that knows us completely and understands every motive within our hearts. So He knows that, being human, we have an uncanny knack for taking even the most godly of earthly things and selfishly turning them to serve our own will, regardless of our initial intentions.

The fact is, the stereotypical Christian activities are not necessarily evidence of faith. There's no quantity of pious religious observation, tithing, or kind acts that provide any assurance. There's no quality of holy living or theological understanding that will earn our way. Nor can any ministry, mission trip, or humanitarian cause. It ultimately doesn't matter how often we go to church, how loudly we sing, how high we raise our hands, or how many sermon notes we take. We're saved by God's grace alone, through the conduit of our faith in Christ. The rest is gravy.

Note that none of these things are inherently bad. On the contrary, each one of them, given proper context and proportion, can be a wonderful thing. In a healthy walk, most or all of them are likely to be present, each either as a tool which helps to develop true faith, or as an effect of it. In fact, for many of these things, absence from a Christian's life could be a cause for some concern regarding his or her faith. But when they become unbalanced on the opposite end and we put too much stress on them, we effectively worship them as idols as we put them before Christ.