Clothespin Christians

Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away: behold, all things are become new.  2 Corinthians, Chapter 5, verse 17.

I know my comparison can’t come anywhere close to the impact this passage has on our lives as Christians.  In my second grade class I have a Good Choices Chart.  Those who are making good choices have their clothes pins in a particular area of the chart.  There is another area of the chart where students move their clothes pin if they make poor choices as a reminder for them to refocus.  I like to empower students so that they feel capable of turning things around.  I let them do things to help around the class to earn it off.  Afterwards, they can put their clothespin back in the good choices section.  Students start all over with their clothespins in the Good Choices section each and every day.
Well, Salvation is kind of like this chart.  When we are behaving in sinful ways and are caught up in a self-focused lifestyle, our clothespins would be in the poor choices section.  Sometimes God will have things happen in our lives, drawing our attention to our need to refocus.  Once we ask God for forgiveness and try to turn our lives around, we don’t have to do something tangible to earn off the clothespin.  Jesus did that for us through His death and Resurrection!  We just need to do our best to continue to live as examples of how God works in our lives.  When we slip, just like the chart, everyday we have a fresh start as Clothespin Christians...thanks to Jesus.  God never gives up on us!

Since this is an example of the positive influence God has made on my walk with Christ, this may not reflect the whole meaning of the Bible verses.

Check These Things Out Christian

For God, who commanded the Light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.  But we have this Treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us. 2 Corinthians, Chapter 4, verses 6-7.

This is another one of the Bible passages that confirms my focus on God rather than us: “willing” things, using the “power of positive thinking”, “using the god power within me” or “visualizing” things the way you want them to be.  It’s not just someone’s opinion or someone’s philosophy.  God tells us in this passage and throughout the Bible that He wants us to focus on Him.
I think it’s important for you to know that I’m not just giving my opinion, because there is a religious basis for my belief related to passages in the Bible.  It’s very important as a Christian, to check things out.  A lot of different religious beliefs sound really good or plausible.  Some have isolated passages from the Bible to support them.  That’s using the Bible out of context.  I doubt if all who do this mean to be deceitful, but concepts and beliefs out of alignment with the Bible may possibly be leading people astray, no matter how plausible the belief sounds.  Remember to be a Check These Things Out Christian.  It’s YOUR Salvation that’s in question!

Since this is an example of the positive influence God has made on my walk with Christ, this may not reflect the whole meaning of the Bible verses.

Your Life Will Really Show It Christian

Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.  And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.  And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.  Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself; is not puffed up, Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil; Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the Truth; Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.  Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.  For we know in part, and we prophesy in part.  1 Corinthians, Chapter 13, verses 1-9. 
And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.  1 Corinthians, Chapter 13, verse 13.

I love this passage.  It tells me that I can profess to be a good Christian and do all kinds of things that look generous to others.  Unless I live the life of a Christian by being genuinely charitable in my actions, loving my neighbors, my enemies or those that believe differently than I do, then I’m all talk.
There was a song we learned in Vacation Bible School years ago called If You’re a Christian and You Know It.  Well, it says that if you were a Christian then your face would really show it, clap your hands.  I think it should say instead that if you were a Christian, then your life will really show it.  That’s the true indicator of being a: Your Life Will Really Show It Christian, not what we look like on the outside to others.

Since this is an example of the positive influence God has made on my walk with Christ, this may not reflect the whole meaning of the Bible verses.

Best Intentions Christians

I wrote to you in an epistle not to company with fornicators: Yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or with idolaters; for then must ye needs go out of the world.  But now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such an one no not to eat.  For what have I to do to judge them also that are without?  Do not ye judge them that are within?  But them that are without God judgeth.  Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person.  1 Corinthians, Chapter 5:9-13. 

I think God talks to us through Paul like a parent talks to their teenager about people who might be poor influences on them.  A parent might say something like, “I think it’s very important for you to be cautious about what type of people you hang around with at school.  Now, I want you to be polite to everyone, because we aren’t to be judgmental of others, but we are supposed to be aware of the lifestyle choices others make.
“Although you may have the best of intentions, sometimes other people’s bad habits rub off on us even without our being aware of it.  So, it’s important that you don’t hang with kids that you think do drugs, drink, and party or are rude and crude.  I know it’s hard because some of the kids who make poor choices are the ones who seem the most popular.  I hope you know that I’m only telling you this because I love you.  I just don’t want to see you get involved with the wrong type of people.”  Well, I think God often guides us Best Intentions Christians like a loving parent, as well.
Here is a related passage:
*Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath Light with darkness?  And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel?  2 Corinthians, Chapter 6:14-15.


Since this is an example of the positive influence God has made on my walk with Christ, this may not reflect the whole meaning of the Bible verses.
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