My Life. #18 Stealing from the Shepherd.
I soon realized that most believers steal from God to attempt to motivate others to change through external standards, resulting in being a control freak.
THE ROLE OF THE SHEPHERD
Godship:
A simple term to describe what the Word defines as the number one problem in life — mankind attempting to function as their own god in the lives of self, others, and even God. This includes suffering from divorce, suicide, eating problems, depression, or any other common problem with the self-life. Most of the time, it falls under the category of Godship -finding ways to fix the fix that God has fixed on you to stop fixing life through self-effort. I have learned that the act of “playing God” helps me identify the real problem in each of the lives I reach out to. I have also learned that the most common consequence of Godship is “rejection” (Gen. 3:5).
After entering the world of discipleship, I noticed that people were drawn to me for help, even though I was in a nasty habit of playing god to do much of my ministering. I knew without question that I needed to embrace the rhyme and reason as to why I focused on Christians “doing to get.”
I soon realized that most believers do this in order to attempt to motivate others to change through external standards. It didn’t matter if the person I was ministering to was going through a divorce, struggling with sins, anger, or control issues – it was all rooted in a problem called stealing the role of God.
Playing god is humanity functioning as his or her own god. One of my mentors coined the term GODSHIP to define this problem. It is a term people pick up and start using the moment they get the definition, and I was no different. This term is so harshly distinctive – it helps believers identify the core problem in all of life’s situations. In fact, I believe that if a believer doesn’t understand this truth, they will struggle their entire lives with attempting to bring change in their own lives, as well as in the lives of others!
The root definition of “man functioning as his or her own god” is nothing short of a believer walking after their own flesh. Remember here that walking after one’s flesh can be so pretty and productive that it can easily deceive. This all results in the person living life without truly considering what God has to say about their lives.
I was aware of many of the standards of God by simply getting to know the Word. I learned I have one of two simple choices to make. Either God lives out His standards through the indwelling Life of Christ, or I can replicate His standards through walking after my flesh. For example, I knew full well that God wanted me to be a good husband and father, but instead of tapping the indwelling life of Christ to live out these Truths, I worked desperately to practice the standards of God - resulting in me being a “doing Christian.” If God was to be God of my life, then I needed to know what He says about Christ living these guidelines in me from the inside out. I knew I would have to learn how to walk inwardly and not externally. If I didn’t learn this lesson, I figured that my life would be plagued with failure.
The stark realization.
Every one of us is absolutely, categorically, without question, is guilty of playing god. It is the most common and repetitive problem in all of humanity – particularly in the Church. It is the complete reason why we have wars, rumors of wars, arguments, and conflicts in our daily lives. People, saved or not, want to be the god of their own lives, of their destiny, and identity, deciding what their selfish “fast fixes” are for their problems and sources of conflict. In fact, most will attempt to take on the world, if necessary, through fruitless efforts of changing externals, always working to make their lives more comfortable in order to live the “Christian life” more effectively.
I remember the day when my discipler revealed to me my ugliest form of playing god – allowing circumstances or my “feelings” to rule my life instead of the Spirit of Truth within me. This form of flesh was beyond my understanding. It took the work of Christ within me over a long period of time to reveal this level of deception. Since I was over-sensitive to rejection, this was a major Truth to appropriate.
How often did I find myself in a situation where somebody said something to me, particularly a family member, and found myself rising to the occasion of defense and thus letting the rejecter rule me? Pure idolatry is what this was. By allowing people’s opinions to rule me vs. allowing Christ’s thoughts to dominate, I was agitating the boundaries of idolatry regularly. I soon discovered that playing god made and formed my self-life, walking after my flesh instead of walking in & after the Spirit from within.
CHRIST THROUGH ME
This diagram has become the clearest and most used to explain what it looks like to walk in and after the Holy Spirit. It all starts with Christ placing Himself at the very core of the believer. Our Lord purified, redeemed, and perfected one-third of our being. Jesus, through the representation of the Holy Spirit, is able to live and function in righteousness in and through the believer. Walking after the flesh is believing that our thoughts, feelings, and appearance define who we are. In the first diagram, ID-105, we saw the details of a believer walking after their flesh.
We must discover it truly is possible to walk in and after in the Spirit. This is accomplished by choosing to believe in the renewal of the MIND as He flows from the Spirit and into the human mind. Once that happens, the WILL then chooses to process the thoughts of Christ as Truth. Since the EMOTIONS always support what the WILL decides, the excitement of renewal flows into the BODY. This is how we get Christ-as-Life behavior.
Despite childhood trauma, rejection, and deceptions, all the things God says are true about us and come from the Life and mind of Christ within. Unless we use our mind, will, and emotions to “allow” or release the Spirit, we end up living off of our childhood thoughts, choosing our own way, having defiled emotions, and fulfilling the desires that are embedded in our bodies. What Paul said to the Romans (in chapter 7) leaves us with a deep understanding and clarity about what is really going on within us when we do things we really don’t want to do.
“For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate. But if I do the very thing I do not want to do, I agree with the Law, confessing that the Law is good” (Romans 7:15-16).
In my next essay, “The Shepherd Boy’s Root Deception,” I will detail the madness methods Satan used to block me from taking action in Christ.
GODSHIP: How do you tend to play God?
And you are called for sure !