Chapter 15

The Christian faith promises lavish grace; the Christian faith demands radical obedience. How can we learn to live in this tension of lavish grace and radical obedience? Paul shows us the way. The deeper problem from which we need deliverance is our obsession with the self, and it doesn’t matter whether this self succeeds or fails. Christianity delivers us from this obsession, inviting us to turn away from self and to turn toward God. We learn to gaze upon Jesus Christ, who has come to us as a human person to redeem us and show us what God intends us to become. Once we focus on Jesus Christ, we are constantly being transformed, one degree of glory giving way to another. Ironically, we find the self—the true self—when we turn first to God.

II Corinthians 3, 4, 5

Read Romans 7, 8

These are difficult texts. What are the main themes you observe? How did it speak into your life?

We get stuck on ourselves more than we’re willing to admit. When we walk into a room, we wonder what people think of us. When we do something stupid, we worry that someone might notice and hold us in contempt. When we succeed, we hope—and angle—for affirmation. God sent Jesus Christ for many reasons, but surely one is that Jesus would liberate us from ourselves. In Jesus Christ we are known, loved and delighted in, we are safe and secure. Jesus stands with us no matter where we are. The challenge we face is to locate him in our lives, behold his presence, and see him at work in our daily life. The exercise over the next week or two is to see Jesus already at work in your daily life, to “locate” him, as it were, in your world. He is already there. He is active and dynamic. He is present. As you pray in the morning and evening, and as you go about your daily tasks at home and in your neighborhood, at church and in play, when shopping and attending meetings, at work and during leisure, can you find him there? Who is the Jesus you see? What is Jesus trying to do? How can you see him more clearly? How can you step into the work he is doing in you and those around you?

To help you in this, set a quiet alarm on your phone or other device that will go off 2-3 times during the day at random times. In those moments, do your best to do what is instructed above as a way to begin ‘locating’ Jesus in the ordinary.

Ponder this poem:

I Am the Kite

I am the kite:
Red and orange,
Fire in the sky,
Stunt Kite,
Cutting loops
And gashes in the blue,
My skin vibrates
On my frame with power.

I cut the cord
To fly yet higher still,
To show the rest
What freedom's all about.
I turn and twist
My fanciest curl
And set my course
For distance.

But, my mistake
Was not
To take the wind for granted,
But the cord
That tensioned me
To one I did not see
So far below.

The flyer is not me.

Lord, give me the anchor. Give me pause.
Let me know in freedom's limited flight, 
The kite's first cause.

Bruce Bartobn Bailey, “I Am the Kite,” an unpublished poem quoted in a Bear Creek School document exploring the differences between excellence and perfectionism. 

What did you learn from the chapter, the biblical texts, and the spiritual exercise about what it means to live in freedom? How does that address the way our culture defines freedom? Why the importance of “gaze”? How can you begin to live in such freedom?

II Corinthians 3:17-18