Rebellion vs. Conviction

I like to think I have made a habit in my life of swimming up stream, going against the grain, living for something different. When I look at my life, and it's pursuits, I see that to be true in some ways, and not so true in others. Certainly my career choice, and devotion to Christ sets me apart as a person who is swimming up stream at least in the context of American secular culture.

This week I was thinking about the motives for choosing to be different, and had an epiphany. Here is what I came up with...

"If you are going to swim up stream, do it with conviction, not rebellion. Conviction is intentional, rebellion is reactionary."

For most of my life I have been a go with the flow, fit in, don't ruffle any feathers kind of guy. I avoided conflict, wanted to be liked and didn't want to offend. About 3 years ago, in the process of making a significant life change, I decided not to value fitting in anymore. I wanted to be different, I wanted to, "rebel," against everything I thought was wrong with the world, the church, and all of the people involved who I believed were wrong in there pursuits. In doing so, I created rebellion as a value of my life. I wanted to be seen as different, bucking the system, or sticking it to the man, so to speak. This was especially true in the context of church. I saw things in the church that I didn't like, in fact I hated them, and that caused me to react with rebellion. It was anger that was driving my desire for change.

Yesterday afternoon, I was in an online conversation, and somehow it moved to the subject of living life against the grain, swimming up stream. It was then that this concept became clear to me, for the first time really.

A person's desire to, "rebel," most often comes out of a desire to be different, change something, or make a statement of independence. The heart of rebellion however, is anger, and frustration. Rebellion is a reaction to a wrong, so a person living with a heart of rebellion is actually not in control or independent at all. Their desperate attempt to change things has them living a life enslaved to whatever it is they are rebelling against.

rebellion is not calculated, it is a reaction, and any time we react with un calculated emotion, we are being controlled by whatever or whoever we are reacting to. This stands in direct opposition to all that a "rebel," is trying to attain. Unless that person is a rebel simply because they want to be. The heart of rebellion is selfish, it is unkind, and lacks vision. It is most often not well thought out, or founded upon anything. There is no room for rebellion in the church. God is calling us to speak the truth in love, not in anger and frustration.

I don't want to live my life on un calculated emotion. I want to live my life, set my values, and interact with people based on conviction. Being different isn't at all about sticking it to someone, or standing in opposition. No, in our world today, the unique individual is the one who lives their life on purpose, with intentionality, with conviction.

Conviction is different than rebellion. Conviction says, this is the way I choose to live my life, and it is for these reasons, and it doesn't really matter what anyone else does, this is who I am. It is not angry, it is not based on emotion, it is based on a calculated, intentional values driven pursuit. It doesn't force anyone else to live the same way, it isn't even asking for that. It is a simple statement about values.

Ultimately rebellion comes from a desire to see things change, and in my anger and frustration I was unable to see that in that state, I would never change anyone, or anything. It is when we step back, humble ourselves, and let conviction rule that we become people that have potential for lasting impact.

Things kids say...

Yesterday when I woke my 6 year old son up for school I was greeted with a response that I have grown accustom to. You see my son has a part of his brain that I am convinced no one else has, or at least no one else uses. When he goes to sleep at night he logs a whole bunch of one phrase ideas in his brain that he heard from that day. He saves them like a hard drive, and for some reason when he wakes up in the morning they are right there waiting to be used with reckless abandon. This particular morning he woke up and said.

"Did you know that people can die with their eyes open."

I have no idea why he decided this was the right way to greet me on a Wednesday morning, but that was it, not hi daddy, not good morning, no he had been intentionally logging this phrase on his memories hard drive so that he could spout it to the first person he saw the next day.

It's pretty amazing how the human brain works. It can remember and re use things that we had no idea we were logging.

As we get older we learn how to control our brain, and it's functions, ultimately leading to a lifestyle that intentionally keeps people at bay. We use only parts of our brain that are safe, and we seem to learn how to keep at bay the parts that might open us up to public rejection. My son Neal still has not learned that skill yet. He says what he thinks, and does not filter a single word. I can't help but wonder what our world would be like if we never grew up and learned how to hide our emotions the way we do. What if we were all walking around saying the first thing that came to our mind.

For example, a man with a white beard walks by, everyone things, hey that guy looks like Santa! Our adult brains think it, and wouldn't dare say it out loud. Neal... well, he says it, and not only does he say it, but he says it at a volume that anyone in a three block radius could hear it (I wonder where he got that).

For the most part this skill is a good thing, if we said everything we thought it would likely create a whole lot of problems, but this important skill has also taught us that we can construct an image we want people to see, and present it weather it's who we are or not. We have learned how to live our lives completely void of any real relationships.

I think that when God compares us to children in how we should approach Him, this is at least partly what He means. We can pretend with people, we cannot pretend with God. Maybe the more important truth is that we don't have to. People cannot handle every thought in our brain, but God can. What if we lived life simply sharing every thought, emotion, and idea with our God. What if we didn't filter with Him. We would be giving God our anger, fear, insecurity, joy, pain, hopes and dreams on a moment by moment basis. God has the ability to see and know our hearts, and it's this kind of intimacy that He longs to share with us. It is in this context that we allow God access to alter the state of our heart.