Losing the Fight; Winning the Relationship

Nobody wins a fight with God. I didn’t either. I didn’t expect to. I didn’t want to. I didn’t fight to be proven right. I fought to be righteous. I’ve heard “righteous” explained as “right relationship.” Having a right relationship with God, or my wife, or my friends, is so much better than being right. The purpose of “fighting” is not to be proven right, or to harm another. The purpose is to remove the things that separate, whether those things are thoughts and emotions, or actions that need to be confessed or forgiven. What I thought and felt separated me from God. Those things were honest, but not true. My fight restored truth about God and about me.

By nature, we tend to either be presumptuous with God or dishonest. We either insist that we know better than Him, or we’re afraid to be real. We’re arrogant or we’re hypocrites. When those outside the Church rightly accuse us, most often it’s one of these. Ghandi is quoted as saying, “If it weren't for Christians, I'd be a Christian.” For my own sake, and for the sake of dishonoring Christ, I cannot afford to knowingly be dishonest or proud. It will cost my relationship with God and potentially cost others theirs.

But what can I do? The prophet Habakkuk told God His perspective and asked to be corrected. I’ve tried to follow his example. And like Habakkuk, I’ve regained perspective. He’s God and I’m not. Truth has replaced mistaken honesty. Although the barrier is gone between us, distance remains. I still must “makeup” with God.

Again the prophet shows the way. At the end of his short book, he says:

"Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will be joyful in God my Savior. The Sovereign LORD is my strength; he makes my feet like the feet of a deer, he enables me to go on the heights."

I make a choice. Loving and following Jesus is not dependent on getting what I want or think I need. That would be a shallow relationship. I love God because He loves me. I must stop looking at circumstances and look at Him and remember and recount His love for me. “Though the fig tree does not bud…” Even though life may not be what I’d expected or hoped for, I will rejoice—not in circumstances, but in God, my Savior. And as I make the choice and act on it, I move towards God. The separation is gone and I again experience the love of God.

The fight not fun; it was deeply painful. But the outcome is worth it.