Skip to main content

A Thought on Heroes

A thought: 

    Every time we really look into the lives of our heroes, one truth emerges--they are imperfect.  Whether they're athletes, musicians, religious leaders, or even Bible characters, our leaders all share the fact that they are human, and, accordingly, they were flawed (except Jesus, of course).  They all have character weaknesses that went along with their character strengths.  They have sins with which they struggle. 

    This is actually a good thing.  Mentors and heroes that are perfect are much less useful to us.  We need to have real people to look up to, not illusions of grandeur. 

    There is a common issue, however, that I've noticed results when we discover our heroes' flaws and sins.  We tend to excuse our own sins.  We see that even great men/women were sinners, and so we allow ourselves to copy their sins.  "It can be that bad," we think, "after all, so and so did it."  Our heroes, instead of lifting us up, then grant us license to sink down.

    Instead of license to sin, these flaws should motivate us to rise above such flaws.  David's sins were recorded, not so that we could copy him, but so that we could avoid similar behavior. 

    We should be humbled by the fact that great men have fallen.  Seeing righteous men and women sin should not soothe our consciences, but should put us on guard.  If men so mightily used of God and sanctified by Him could sin, even a man after God's own heart or the meekest man on earth, then certainly you and I can and will fall.  This should inspire us to guard our hearts, eyes, mouths, etc. 

    In the end, it is a good thing to look up to others who have been successful and faithful.  It is a good thing to draw courage and faith from how God worked in their lives.  We must, however, use this history in the right way.  We must not condone our own sin by remembering theirs.  We must use their struggles with sin as ammunition in our own spiritual battles.    

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

The Real Presence & Paedocommunion: A Deeper Rift Between Reformed Churches

You're going back to Rome! Theological disagreements within the Reformed world, especially those of the last half century, often devolve into these sorts of accusations.  As controversialists like Doug Wilson and Peter Leithart began to break away from the larger conservative Presbyterian and Reformed denominations, it became clear that the rift was deeper than semantics and systematic minutiae.  Much like the Reformation four centuries before, the Table was a primary point of conflict.   What does it mean?  Who may partake?  What do we call it?    These questions, along with a few more, divided Reformed brethren as the physical elements of our religion reflected deeper conflicts.  Good men began to understand that the problem wasn't just in our logos, but in our pathos and ethos, as well. Paedocommunion (hereafter PC) has been one of the hottest points of contention.  PC has always been normal to me as I grew up with it.  I underst...

Anglicanism, Paedocommunion, & Being Reformed

I consider myself Reformed.  I was baptized as a baby in a PCA church.  I grew up in a Reformed microdenomination that allowed its member churches to subscribe to any of the Reformed confessions (we subscribed to the Three Forms of Unity).  In many ways, whether I like it or not, I still think and act like a Reformed Presbyterian.   Some, however, would seek to deny me that label.  I suspect there are many reasons for this, but paramount among them is that I hold to Paedocommunion (hereafter PC), which, for some reason, is absolutely the worst thing ever to these people.  Some would go so far as to say that PC makes me a heretic, but they all agree that I am certainly not Reformed .   My recent engagement with these opponents of PC has caused me to reflect on what it means to be Reformed and what it means to be a Christian.  This online jousting has dovetailed well with some of my recent study, particularly  An Apology of the Church...

Some Thoughts on the 2024 Election

So, we had an election earlier this week.  Perhaps you heard about it. I have done my best to remain mostly silent on political issues this time around because I have found that fixating on such matters does little for my mental or spiritual health.  Also, no one cares what I think.  Nevertheless, here are a few thoughts on our recent election. 1) I didn't vote for Donald Trump, but I'd be lying if I said I'm not glad he won.  To be clear, that says more about Kamala Harris than about Donald Trump. 2) This election seemed much cleaner--much less suspicious--than the sordid affair we had in 2020.  This election didn't feature any poll workers tallying (discovering? conjuring?) votes behind closed doors in the wee hours of the night, messy mail-in voting, or voter turnout beyond plausible expectations.  The 2020 election had me convinced that we would never see another peaceful, uncontested election, but, as contentious as things were this year, it seems like...