The Real Deal

Earlier this week, I was writing out a prophetic word and I was struggling because I felt that what I had heard from God sounded a bit extreme. He had started me off with the phrase “naked truth” and as he started to unpack what he wanted me to say, it felt uncomfortably stern. Then I realised that I was looking for a ‘kinder’ version of the scripture that he had given me to include, to soften the impact of it.

As I was thinking about the phrase, ‘naked truth’ again today, I was struck by my desire to make God softer round the edges, to try and make him more palatable. I realised that I have done this for years. I have preached many times and I always tried to find a way to “help people receive” what God had given me. I wonder now how much that was actually a cover up for wanting to keep it fluffy round the edges, to present God in a way that made him acceptable, “nice”, neat and tidy, and not too over the top – nicely middle class maybe. Making sure that he didn’t ruffle too many feathers and definitely didn’t make me say anything that made anyone want to disagree with me, or dislike me. I quite liked having a reputation for being challenging in what I said as long as there was no danger of it upsetting anyone too badly or creating any animosity.

Another point was that I thought it was my job to represent God in a way that made people want to accept him. I think I thought that being his representative meant airbrushing him in a way that made him acceptable to the person I was talking to, especially if they were someone who did not know Jesus as their personal saviour. I wanted to make sure that I didn’t put them off in any way.

The problem is that God doesn’t seem to back me up in this attempt to airbrush him! Jesus definitely did not play the people-pleasing game. He said outrageous things, didn’t seem to understand the church politics of his time and definitely did not try desperately to hold on to the disciples he had gained. Sometimes he seemed to go out of his way to make it easy for people to walk away. For example, in John 6 when his disciples were saying “This is a hard teaching” about his words, he responded by asking in verse 61,

Does this offend you?

He went on to add more challenge, not softening it in any way, and asked them if they want to walk away too. If it had been me, I probably would have told the rich man in Mark 10:17-22 a different story as he started to walk away, in order to try and make it easier for him to get into the kingdom. I would have suggested a lesser option to “ease him in”. But no, Jesus demands an all or nothing approach from day one. Isn’t that the point? He is an all or nothing God! As Matthew 22:37 says

Jesus replied: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.”

I have a choice whether or not to represent God as he truly is. I may have said before that I used to have an “Old Testament scary -New Testament nice” view of God. Judging by this week’s reaction to the scripture I found hard, maybe I am not as free from that viewpoint as I thought.

“Naked truth” is a phrase that means unembellished, telling it like it is. God wants us to know him as he actually is, not an idol we have invented, not a fluffier, more palatable, domesticated version of our God, but the real deal. It is not love to present a version of Jesus that is not real; to hide the truth of who God is. In fact, the desire to do so shows some fundamental flaws in my understanding of who he is, and his character. Somehow in my thinking, there must be bits of God that are not good, that need to be hidden, that are the equivalent of the embarrassing relative that you try to keep hidden from those you want to impress. At the very least my attitudes uncover a desire to keep people happy, sometimes at the expense of their salvation. And a desire to keep my reputation intact – let’s have it right, it’s more about my reputation than God’s in some situations.

Aaargh! God, I am so sorry. Not only have a misrepresented you because I deliberately filtered out parts of your character when I found them difficult, but I didn’t take the time to wrestle with scripture and find out why they seemed at odds with what I knew of your goodness. God forgive me where I have been lazy with scripture and skimmed over the bits I found uncomfortable. Holy Spirit, I need your help when I read scripture . I pray like Paul prayed in Ephesians 1:17, “Give me a spirit of wisdom and revelation so that I may know you better.”

So, my prayer is once more, “God, what lies do I believe about you?” and “God, what aspect of your character do you want me to know today?” I want to remove every filter that would make me represent God as anything other than who he is. This means not only contemplating aspects of his character that I am less familiar with but also re-examining some of the ones I think I do know. For example, I would happily declare:

God is good!

There are many scriptures that back that up. Have a look! But what do I mean by that? Are there times in the bible where I hold that truth, and it is a truth, in tension with what I am reading? Can I reconcile, for example the story of Sodom and Gomorrah with the phrase “God is good”? When I feel I’m reading a passage that emphasises ‘God is just’, or ‘God is righteous’, do I feel like I have to suspend my belief that God is good? If so, what does that tell me about what I am believing?

So often, I think when the church receives a fresh revelation, we swing like a pendulum towards that revelation and go too far the other way, almost throwing the baby out with the bath water. For example, the revelation about God’s grace is wonderful but we don’t want to lose the understanding of the reality of sin, or forget the need for repentance, for righteousness and holiness. We need balance! We need all aspects of God, not a one-dimensional, weird distortion of him! We need the reality of who he is. In Matthew 7:21, Jesus says:

Not everyone who says to me ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom.

He continues with this sobering declaration in verse 23:

Then I will tell them plainly, ’I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’

The question is, ‘Do I know you God? Do I really know you?’ Teach me your ways, Lord. Let’s have the naked truth, the plain, unadorned, complete, sometimes shocking and uncomfortable, truth because Jesus IS the truth and it’s his name we carry. We are those called to bear his image, so the image we bear, the image we present, needs to reflect the real deal, the real I AM!