Flattening the Curve (Gal. 2:20 & Gal. 5)

If you’ve turned on a news channel or read an online paper or even scrolled through Facebook lately, you’ve heard or seen much talk about “flattening the curve” of the Coronavirus and why it is so important to stay home, to be consistent, to be safe. Maybe that (in addition to spending a lot of time reading parables in the gospels) is why I woke up this morning wondering about what causes a person’s walk with Christ to “flatten out.” 

Make no mistake that the world holds many stumbling blocks. Recently I wrote about how we listen being important, but who we listen to also matters. If we are not attending churches where the truth is taught, there is little hope for intentional growth and much opportunity for oblivious regression. Unfortunately, many today eagerly ingest false teaching on a regular basis and have no idea that what they’re listening to is opposed to the truth of the gospel. Many have remarked how wonderful it is that the gospel has had the opportunity to go into all homes, and it is good if it’s the truth of the gospel and not a perversion. Who/what we listen to really does matter! There is more opportunity for both good and false teaching in the home, one of which is the prosperity gospel rampant in the church in America today. The idea that suffering has no place in a Christian’s life on this earth is not only off the mark, it is about as far from the teachings of Christ as it can possibly get, which leads to yet another reason the walk "flattens" over time.

Time spent in God’s Word has been pushed aside for worldly endeavors, dampening not only growth but also spiritual reality. I can think back on how many times I’ve either heard or thought (in my younger, super-busy-I’m-a-wife-mother-cook-housekeeper-piano-player-Bible-teaching-teacher days), “I wish I had more time to read my Bible, but I’m so busy doing ______fill in the blank with your excuse______!”  

And if that life isn’t complicated enough, now one must make time to scroll through Facebook (and all the other relevant social media feeds) and get in some binge-watching on one of the many subscription services available, all refined to appeal to and meet a person’s every desire, to pamper them even. 

See the problem? Satan will make sure that there will never be enough time to spend with God but will simultaneously offer more than enough time to visit and revisit all the distractions and indulgences of the flesh. All this because we are too “tired” or too “stressed” after doing everything else to spend precious, daily time in the Word. It is a deadly cycle. 

AVOIDING A FLAT WALK

It is through the Word our minds are renewed as Romans 12:2 affirms: “And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect” (NASB). Without this renewal, there will be a flatness to our Christian walk. For some, 2 Timothy 3:1-7 has become the norm, and they are holding to a form of godliness devoid of power because they have removed themselves from their power source and recharging station (if they were ever plugged in at all):

But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power; avoid such men as these. For among them are those who enter into households and captivate weak women weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses, always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.

Lord, let it not be so!

ASKING HARD QUESTIONS

Galatians 2:20 affirms that we are not to continue living in the flesh as it has been crucified with Christ and is now dead. “Christ lives in me, and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and delivered Himself up for me.” If we are in Christ, He has redeemed us from the curse of the Law. We do not walk because we are obligated to do so or because we fear the consequences if we do not; rather, we walk with Christ because we cannot conceive of doing anything else. We walk with Christ because we want to. We walk with Christ, we grow, because we delight in spending time with Him and serving Him, and our joy in doing so overflows. 

Once we have been truly known by God, we begin walking in His Spirit and are set free to pursue Him eagerly regardless of our state in this world. It is not our home! 

Paul reminds his readers in Galatians 5:7, “You were running well; who hindered you from obeying the truth?” We, too, should be asking ourselves hard questions (and listening to the answers we find in the scriptures) if we were running well and now aren’t. Things like 

• What has hindered me from obeying the truth?
• Have I turned my freedom into an opportunity for my flesh or am I serving others in love?
• Am I led by the Spirit or my flesh?
• Am I spending time in the Word?
• Am I praying?
• Do I have accountability (someone like Paul writing to the Galatians)?
• Do I have fellowship?

Galatians 5:19-21 lists for us the deeds of the flesh. Read them. They are ugly. There is no denial of that, but knowing the ugliness of the flesh only makes the fruit resulting of the Spirit in us more beautiful and more evident—the love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Without knowing what my flesh looks like and spending time in the Word to let the Spirit convict me and foster my turning away from the flesh, my Christian walk will definitely flatten out. My prayer is that during this time when we really DO have more time, we will use it in a manner that will foster new, better habits, and a walk that is vibrant in Christ! 

Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit.