I dowannabe a bad example
of a follower of Jesus, or a bad example of a hubby, father, grandfather, great-grandfather. Or a bad example of ANYthing. Who wants to be a failure, loser, bad example? Not ShepherdDave. ShepherdDave has passionately avoided being a bad example all his Christian life, and instead has strived with all his might to be a great example, a gold-medal Christian. Outside of my cup sparkling clean. For the glory of Jesus? Well. I always thought so. Now I’m less sure. I suspect it’s been more about ShepherdDave feeling good about himself. Living in denial of what a bad example I ACTUALLY am, in denial of the real me. Imagining myself this wonderful example. Like the Pharisees of Jesus’ day, wanting desperately to believe they were the good guys, the followers of God. I used to tell people, “I’ma recovering Pharisee.” Today, when my eyes have been freshly opened by Jesus’ Spirit, I’m able to recognize that I’m just a plain old Pharisee, not in recovery, mostly in denial about how much I wannabe admired, maybe even envied, so I can feel worthy, like a somebody, because I’m so unsatisfied with Jesus and His imputed worthiness, wanting some of my own. Malcontent.
Unless. I’ve been freshly convicted of my sin, so I’m momentarily DumbSheepDave. Ahhh. I’m so glad Jesus came for bad examples, SINNERS. I’m so glad that grace flows downhill to bad examples who know they are bad examples, because their eyes have been momentarily opened to see the awful truth about themselves, the bad examples. Not only bad examples in the past. Bad examples TODAY. I’m so thankful that I QUALIFY for grace.
—DumbSheepDave, for the moment anyway, because of the convicting work of the Spirit, with a healthy indifference to his reputation, record, worthiness, apart from Jesus, and a healthy indifference to being pitied by others for being such a bad example of a Christian, but amazingly enabled by Jesus to enjoy himself, just as he is, warts and all, and enjoy others just as they are, even jerks and enemies
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