Authentic

"Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned: "  I Timothy 1:5

Pen drawing from elisabethelliot.org

Good morning, dear friends,

As many of you have probably already heard, one of my favorite heroines of the faith passed into glory this week.  Elisabeth Elliot, who spent many years as a missionary to the Auca Indian tribe, ministered there after this same tribe killed her husband and several close friends.  God in His grace allowed her to see many people come to Him, and her legacy of living faithfully in the midst of great difficulties and great obstacles has been and will be an encouragement to many more in the future.

What is most striking to me about her life, is her extraordinary faith.  That, and the fact that she lived out her faith as though it was the most normal thing to do.

Which begs the question:

Shouldn't it be?

Genuineness is such a rare quality in our time.  People applaud courage, sacrifice, decency and faithfulness, but very few people live that way.  Even we Christians find ourselves too often caught in the trap of saying one thing, and living another.  We desperately look for heroes, people whose lives stimulate and challenge us to be better than ourselves, but instead of looking for heroes, maybe I should be spending my time concentrating on my life, instead.

Do I live my faith in God as an godly example for my children and others to follow?

An old-fashioned word that doesn't get much use anymore is the word "authentic."  According to Webster's Online Dictionary, there are three definitions to this word:  "real or genuine, not copied or false",  "true and accurate", and, my personal favorite, "made to be or to look just like an original."

Very few things in life come close to being "authentic" anymore.  And rightfully so.  "Realness" can be synthesized in a laboratory, or manipulated on a computer.  It is difficult to judge many times the "real" from the "fake."

But that does not mean that as a Christian, I should not try.

One of my favorite passages that talks about being the genuine article is I Timothy 1:3-6. Paul was encouraging Timothy to be careful for false doctrine, and for those who were teaching false doctrine.  Here was his warning:

"As I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus, when I went into Macedonia, that thou mightest charge some that they teach no other doctrine, Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister questions, rather than godly edifying which is in faith: so do.  Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned:  From which some having swerved have turned aside unto vain jangling;"

As I reread this passage this morning, I noted all the contrasts between what is real and what is fake.  There is the real doctrine, and there are fables and genealogies.  There are questions, and then there is godly edifying which is in faith.  There is charity, and there is not.  There is a good conscience, and there is the conscience that allows others to "swerve" from what is real.  There is a faith unfeigned, and there is the nonsense of "vain jangling."

It is not hard to spot the "authentic," if one is truly looking for it.

May the Lord help me to be a genuine Christian, one whose life lines up with what I say I believe.  May the Lord allow His Word to penetrate deep in my heart, so that others looking into my life will not be able to see a difference between what I say and what I do.

May I, like Elisabeth Elliot, be authentic to those around me today.