It was a dream. I’m walking through a neighborhood, blessed by the cherry-lined lane, the bouquet of barbecuing beef and the giggle-shouts of “Marco! Polo!” The residential lawns give way to Main Street, and then beyond the Mom ’n Pop stores rises a wrought iron fence. Chips of black enamel flake off the finials and settle at the foot of adjacent tombstones. Rusty hinges scream at me as the gate twists open, daring me to ascend the churchyard steps. With each step something changes. Children, now crying, are silenced at the sound of backdoor sliders slamming. The only aroma lingering is the vague scent of decay. And all the trees have gone to box elder.
I stare at the door handle of a poorly maintained church. A new sound fades in, slowly. High pitched tapping; rapid-fire tapping; castanets out of control? I jerk open the door. All across the vestibule and down the aisle, on the pews, the platform and the pulpit, two feet deep, are sets of chattering teeth. The rancid smell is repulsive now. The trees lose their balance, bursting against the window glass. Shards and twigs get sucked into the vacuum of the sanctuary. The children are crying again. It wasn't a dream. It was a nightmare.
I have to wonder if this bizarre visual doesn’t have some actual form of existence. Especially in light of what Paul says in today’s text. “If you keep on biting and devouring each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other.” Isn’t that what it would look like? If everyone in the church kept taking big chunks out of each other; unabated soul cannibalism? In the end there’d be nothing left but the teeth, chattering away out of muscle memory; a snapping, writhing reminder of what happens if we live lovelessly and out of our sin nature.
Glean three instructions from this passage: serve one another, love one another, live by the Spirit. (Much easier said than done.) The natural desires in us are at odds with the desires of God’s Spirit in us. Both are struggling for the leadership of our soul. The natural is the sinful self and so sin comes naturally. Unchecked, the desires of the natural lead us into all sorts of destructive behaviors. Listing them is a breeze. Paul says, they are “obvious.” And by them, we rip at each other and wound and destroy each other.
The better way to live is the harder way to live. It’s not natural; it’s supernatural. It’s Spirit led. But the supernatural self produces far better outcomes for everyone involved. In the natural, one gains while all others lose. And in the end, even the gains are hollow. In the supernatural, everybody gains, and the rewards are eternal.
In some ways, this is the test of the true child of God. “Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature …” Those who persist in sin as a natural way of life have no inheritance with the children of God. So, are you pursuing a life overflowing with the fruit of the Spirit and encouraging others to do the same? Or are you excusing your bad behavior as the natural, normal way of things, and in the process eating and being eaten alive?
Christian, live by the Spirit. Be led by the Spirit. Keep in step with the Spirit. Serve one another in love.
Pray: Holy Spirit, come alive in me and put to death my natural, sinful self. Let me be consumed by You, before I start consuming everybody else around me. Fill us. Lead us. May we yield to You to make our churches orchards of abundant fruit. Elsewise, we will make them mass graves of chattering teeth.
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