Galatians 5.22-23 ESV - 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.
Faith is also
And hey, fidelity can be an admirable trait. But that all depends on whom we show fidelity to. As humanity has demonstrated lots of times, we can show fidelity to some really godless people, ideas, and institutions. We can do profoundly stupid or evil things in their support—because we value them more than we do wisdom or goodness.
Should Christians be loyal? To Jesus, absolutely. To family members, friends, fellow Christians, and the suffering, sure: Part of love is not giving up, and enduring all.
But is it what Paul meant by pístis? No; he meant faith. It’s a lot harder to trust God, than it is to stand up for people. Humans can pretty much stand up for anything. Doesn’t take the Spirit’s power to do so. People can be loyal, dependable, steadfast Christians our whole lives long… yet when the Holy Spirit expects us to put our doubt on hold and trust him, often we can’t. We might be loyal to the Lord, but we don’t entirely trust him. And which of the two is more important?
Likewise we Christians tend to be just like everybody else in the world when it comes to loyalty and fidelity: It has a cut-off point. We love and support one another in good times and bad… until somebody violates something to which we show more loyalty. We’ll eat Big Macs every day… till that giant heart attack. We’ll love our kids no matter what… till they declare they’re gay. We’ll love our spouses through thick and thin… till they cheat on us. There’s nearly always another line in our minds, whether we realize this or not, and once it’s been crossed, that’s the end of our fidelity. We cut ’em off.
True fidelity among fellow Christians is hard to find. Oh, it exists. But you won’t see it unless we’ve done something that’ll alienate nearly everyone. Like murdering your parents: Most of your so-called Christian friends won’t stick around after that. (Even if they think you’re not guilty!—they’re too afraid of what others will think when they associate with you.
Fidelity when times are good.
It’s just as true when we’re talking about God. Christians just love God—when times are good, when our family members are getting along, when our health is fine, when the job pays comfortably, when there are no crises or problems. Now, take any of these things away,
Yep, God crossed that other line with them. (Or circumstances did; or in Job’s case, Satan did.) Their fidelity to God was entirely contingent on whether he let them keep the things they really valued, and when he didn’t do that anymore, they adopted the attitude of Job’s wife.
Job 2.9-10 KWL - 9 Job’s woman told him, “You still cling to your integrity? Bless God and die.”
- 10 Job told her, “You speak like one of the fools speak.
- When we receive the good we’re with God, and we won’t receive the bad?”
- In all this, Job didn’t sin with his lips.
Yeah, some bibles translate her words as “curse God,” (i.e.
Satan expected Job to act exactly like his wife,
Some of this is because of our own naïveté. We think of God as a form of Santa Claus or genie, who’s obligated to bless us
Blind fidelity versus godly fidelity.
It’s easiest to be faithful to something imaginary. After all, it’s all in our heads. Plus we can tweak it as we go, to make it as ideal as we like it.
Hence there are many Americans who are loyal to “America,” even though the America in their heads is entirely fictional. It’s not the United States as it is, but as they imagine it used to be… but never actually was ’cause they don’t know squat about history. It’s the United States as they wish it were… but it’s a simplistic view that commits a lot of grievous evil towards the rich and powerful, or the weak and needy, depending on your politics.
Hence there are many Christians who are loyal to “Jesus,” but they do the very same thing. It’s not the Jesus we see in the gospels, consistent with the breathing, eternally-alive Jesus who has real expectations of his followers,
It’s why we see a vast disconnect between
The way to avoid this is to immerse ourselves in reality.
Being truly faithful to Jesus means we focus on our fellow Christians, his church. Jesus ordered us to love one another, just as he loves us.
Whenever we disagree with family, we usually bear in mind we can’t just treat them like people whom we’ll never see again. We will see them again: We’re gonna live forever
So while we might be tempted to start slamming fellow Christians—particularly the ignorant, fruitless, self-focused, annoying Christians—let’s start by giving one another the benefit of the doubt. Maybe we’re the ones in the wrong. We gotta talk things out, try to understand one another, and sort out our relationships. Not shatter them completely.
We need to extend
Fruit.
