Living As Foreigners

There is a statement in 1 Peter 1:1 that has been rocking my world for the last 2 weeks.  It's something that I've read more times than I can count but it hit me really deeply early one morning and I've been trying to unpack all the implications of it every since.  Peter says, "I am writing to God's chosen people who are living as foreigners..."  As I've been pondering this its had a deep impact on me.  On a simple note its because the last three years of my life I've been in a wilderness experience where I wasn't involved in vocational ministry, wasn't very outgoing in the pursuits of relationships, wasn't doing a lot of things I had done for fifteen years of ministry.  What  I was doing was learning... a lot!  Mostly about myself and how I related to God, when I related to God, and why I related to God.  I learned about who I was and who I wasn't, how I was being myself and how I wasn't, when I was and when I wasn't being myself, and why I was or wasn't being myself.  To sum it up... I learned a lot about being instead of doing.  This left me in a really good place, but it is a place that I've never been before so there is still more to learn.  I love it!  One aspect of living like a foreigner that has began to work into my understanding is how I relate to the people I've known and loved for many years.  Being back in Conway has given me the great opportunity to be around my long time friends.  Its different though because I'm not the same as I was when I left... and they're not either.  Some of those relationships are continuing to grow and become a thriving, fruitful one and some withered and are no more.  The ones that are remaining are undergoing some changes though.  That's what gives them the foreign concept.  In my travels I've come to understand the sense of the unfamiliar and that same sense is what is redefining my relationships now.  Its not a bad thing... in fact its really good and healthy.  It brings a richness and depth that will produce an amazing fruit in the seasons to come.  This brings great joy to my spirit! 

Another aspect of living as a foreigner in this place is that I see my surroundings with different vision than I did when living here before.  What I mean is this... Two people walk into a house.  One is a builder and the other is not.  The vision they have of the same place is different based on their different levels of understanding.  What I understood then and what I understand now gives me a different vision of this place and that is what makes it foreign to me.  There are many aspects of it that aren't but there are some none the less. 

Continuing on this learning curve I am faced with many new opportunities and relationships that have to be discerned, tried on for fit, and eventually embraced or put back on the shelf for another time and season.  For clarity let me say that none of this is about who's right or wrong, good or bad.  Its simply about where God has each of us in the body.  It's like the water in the Arkansas River... the water in Conway isn't the same water that's in Little Rock but its still the same body of water.  Or to come at it from a more biblical approach its the difference between being an arm and an eye. 

I could go on and on with different example like these, but I really have the sense that I need to go deeper into what God's saying to me in this seemingly simple statement.  To live as a foreigner is to live without rights, privileges, ownership, and most importantly citizenship.  When in a foreign place I can't vote or have a say in matters of state.  I have no rights that citizens of that country do and as such miss out on many privileges enjoyed by citizens.  I have to live as a guest and that leaves me feeling left out.  Not a good feeling to be sure!  We are born with a deep desire to belong.  Its programed into our DNA and we can't escape it.  We don't want to be a foreigner and will go to great links, even compromise to be rid of that feeling.

We understand these principles in the natural realm we live in, but Paul is very clear that there is a direct correlation of the natural and spiritual realms.  If we are to make any lasting progress, have any lasting fruit in God's Kingdom we have to move from the natural to the spiritual.  Paul passionately urges us to live in the spirit.  Why?  Because there we aren't foreigners.  I know there are many different veins to mine on this principle but the one God has me mining on now is this citizenship vein.  For clarity... when you mine for silver it runs through the earth in what is called veins.  When you find it you keep following it until you come to its end then you start on another one.  Back to the spiritual side.  When I surrendered my life to Christ I became a citizen of Heaven and not only that I became an heir to the inheritance of God.  He became my Father and I became His son.  What I have to continually walk in is that I don't have to wait until I get to heaven to access this inheritance!  I, through the Spirit, have access now!  Was that a record I just heard scratch?  Ephesians is filled with this truth!  It says that this inheritance is in the saints!  1 John says that as Jesus is so are we in the world.  I'm not putting the verse references in on purpose.  If what I'm talking about is for you then you'll start mining for it on your own.  I know there is a part of this inheritance that is reserved for us in heaven but there is much of it for now!  Jesus also makes mention that we will do greater works than he did when the Spirit comes.  So how does this relate to the foreigner verse?  Well I'm glad I asked that question for you. LOL!  When I began to weigh my life in the balance with the truth of this verse then I am baffled by all the inheritance I'm not taking part in.  I am just as baffled at the Church's lack of partaking in that inheritance as well.  I am constantly hearing from believes how defeated of a life they are living.  As God began pinging my radar with this verse I too began to understand how timidly I have been walking.  Can I just vent here for a second... That pisses me off!  Okay... I'm done.  Not at anyone but me. I am the only one responsible for my walk. I will admit this condition is encouraged by not so accurate teaching on this subject. We are taught that heaven is where we're going when we die instead of it being our home the moment we surrender to Christ. This belief subtly translates into the thought process of enduring until we die and go to be with Jesus instead of I have victory and citizenship in Christ and I don't have to just endure this pounding from the devil. No! I am a living manifestation of God who exists to know God and express God and His kingdom!  I have access to the arsenal of heaven and I will not bow my knee to the devil or live as a defeated, beat down soul.  I don't have to live like a foreigner because I'm not!  I am a son of the Most High and a citizen of heaven now and forever more!

As I go deeper then I have to identify why I have been living life as a foreigner.  This isn't something that's much fun to do because it usually deals with things that are weaknesses instead of strengths.  The thing that is strange about that is that it is our weaknesses that allow Christ to be made perfect in our lives and not our strengths so why do we push so hard to have it all together and be strong?  This is an answer that has to be on an individual level.  My answer will look different than yours.  It may be from some bad teaching, or some bad believing.  It could have something to do with pride, either on the boastful side or the false humility side.  They both are a form of pride!  There could be numerous other reasons and I encourage believers to identify them because they are the places that give the devil the footholds in their lives. So why I have I been living as foreigner?  For me some of it has to do with not wanting to be back in the religious system.  I don't like the aspect of being back in the political side of church life.  That's not an arena that I flourish in.  I don't like it because it feels wrong to me.  Let me be clear... I am not saying this is wrong in general.  Someone has to be involved in the daily administration of church life.  I am saying that "I" don't flourish there!  I know others who don't flourish where I am so I encourage them to be where they are the most fulfilled and see the most fruit.  Another aspect of this that I allow to be a hindrance is the southern mold that comes with church life.  In the bible belt little time is spent encouraging people to be who God made them to be and a lot of time is spent trying to make everyone a cookie cutter image of whatever view of God is prevalent in a specific congregation.  To boil these down I'd have to be honest and say there is some fear involved in being myself here.  The other side of that coin is having to deal with the slander of being someone different than I was when I was in this area before.  People don't like change.  It makes them nervous because it takes their illusion of control and messes it all up.  This is that cookie cutter mold deal.  Because I believe things differently than when I left I have new labels.  Not that I care much but dealing with it does get old and tends to wear on a person.  I would like to just avoid that whole thing but to do that would be to avoid what God has called me back here to do. 

I could go on with other excuses but I hope I have been transparent enough to stir and provoke some soul searching to examine what it is that encourages this foreigner lifestyle in believers lives.  I don't want to live like a foreigner anymore.  I want to be the best me I can be and I want to accomplish what is mine in the kingdom to do.  I want to walk with joy!  I want to spend life investing in deep relationships that will sharpen me and provoke me to all the love and good works God has put in me.  In short... I want to bask in the awesome glory of being a son!