Originally posted on October 16, 2005
Again, more stuff transferred from Myspace….
The following may be the equivalent of blog-suicide but, hey, we’ll see what happens. Maybe you’ll be so bored you’ll never come back, maybe not.
“Self-Diminishing Compromises.” I’ve really been thinking through sermons lately, so I thought I’d walk you through my latest cogitations. What does ’self-diminishing’ mean? Speaking from a New Testament standpoint, I cannot even attempt a definition. Speaking from a pop-psychology standpoint, I assume self-diminishing refers to something which makes me less authentic, less good, less “ME” than I ought to be. The language of ’self’ was not typically used in the New Testament. Self language has come into its own in the modern era. Once the Enlightenment taught us we were cosmically on our own–No God to help you….existentially alone–the self became important. It is our most valuable commodity, our most important commitment and our primary focus. Sound particularly Biblical to you? Me neither. The Enlightenment viewpoint posits humans as unconnected individuals, and when all you have is you, you better protect you with everything you’ve got.
But if, as Christian tradition typically teaches, the self is not the most important, focal or valuable thing, what is? Try this on for size: John Donne was right-No man/woman is an island. We live in relationships with God and each other. I believe our primary responsibilities as Christians are to obey/glorify God, and to love others. We are to honor and nurture, rather than ignore or harm, those relationships whenever possible. Therefore, avoiding sin is not so much a matter of seeing that my SELF doesn’t get DIMINISHED, but of seeing that those I love aren’t harmed by what I say and do. Moreover, do we not have a Christian tradition of self-diminishing??? In John 3:30, John the Baptist says of his relationship to Jesus, “He must become greater; I must become less.” Part of being truly human is recognizing our place in the world. We are less than God. In relationships with others, we are to continue this ‘lessening’ by humbly considering others better than ourselves (Philippians 2:3). Sin is much more often a matter of relationship, than a matter solely of self. After all, if there were no such things as relationships, what would still be wrong? Without a relationship with God, humans would have no tools for discerning right and wrong and without relationships with others, our opportunities to sin would be significantly narrowed. For example, is pornography a sin just because God says so and just because naked ladies are evil? Or because some kind of moral corruption occurs in my soul? I would argue that pornography’s greatest evil lies in the objectification of a person willing to sell sex (a relational experience) for cold hard cash, and of our corruption of our own relationships by treating sex like a purely physiological process. We SIN here by not considering the best interests of the pornographic performers, and not considering how best to use the relational abilities (sex) God has given us.
So should we avoid sinful compromises? Yes. But until we begin to understand the harm which sin has on relationships we value (or should learn to value), the motivation to avoid sin is small. If the only thing keeping me from sin is my commitment to keeping my invisible soul blemish free, frankly, it is difficult to motivate myself. But if my motivation to avoid sin is to honor my God, husband, parents, friends, etc., and the relationships I share with them, then sin just got a lot less invisible and a lot more expensive. My motivators are clear and compelling. The effects of sin in my life, my relationships and the lives of others is clear, as is my responsibility to act in the best interests of those I love.