Christian Living
January 18, 2012 – Borrowed Things and Recycled Material
5 But as one was felling his beam, the axhead fell into the water; and he cried, Alas, my master, for it was borrowed! – 2 Kings 6:5 (AMP)
Borrowing was and still is serious business to God. The Bible contains several instructions on borrowing. If someone borrowed something, like an ox to plow a field and it died, the borrower was expected to make full restitution (Exodus 22:14). God forbade the Israelites to borrow anything from foreigners (Deuteronomy 28:12). Even Solomon in his infinite wisdom tells us that the borrower is servant to the lender (Proverbs 22:7).
I remember as a child growing up on a farm and people borrowing things from us. It became so bad that my father stopped loaning things out. He even joked about having two lawn mowers. One was a lawn mower, which he would cut the grass with weekly. The other was his loan mower, which was in a continual state of disrepair. He wanted to completely bypass the possibility of someone breaking something he had invested his money into.
But Christians borrow things so much sometimes that they are eternal servants to the lender. Some Christians borrow money in excess so that there is never any money left at the end of their pay period. Some borrow so many tools from a neighbor that their tool shed should have their neighbor’s lock on it. Very often these actions leave Christians not only servants to the lenders, but also leave them wishing they would have never borrowed anything in the first place.
But borrowing doesn’t end there. Christians borrow from each other things that they think will grow their faith. Believers continually share their faith with their brothers and sisters in Christ. They do it at church, over the phone, over a meal, or even through blogs just like this. The information exchanged can prove invaluable, especially when failures are admitted so that mistakes will hopefully not be repeated. But when we try to duplicate what works for one person to help them grow closer to God, we sometimes find ourselves face down in a mud puddle, completely missing the bus as it passes by.
In my baby Christian days, Marlo and I met several believers who were all about spiritual warfare. We even made a three hour drive with some of these individuals to a special Friday night service to a church which supposedly specialized in this realm unknown to me. Let me tell you now that I got in way over my head. Nothing there drew me closer to God. I was wrong to believe that I could borrow what worked for them and think it would work for me.
But borrowing doesn’t even stop there. Churches do it too. I have heard worship songs before that were very profound. These songs were recorded live on compact disc in their original church setting and had a great message in the lyrics. When I have heard them I could hear the congregation singing and you could literally hear in the recording how it touched their hearts. But when my home church took the song and played it what happened? As my mother-in-law says, it was just karaoke in the tabernacle. Very often there was no move of God. The congregation was not touched the same way as the original recording. It was just another song on another Sunday. It was merely recycled material that could not live up to the original.
I am not saying that recycling material is entirely bad. I recycle bad jokes so much that I wonder sometimes if Marlo thinks I missed my calling in life and should have been a corn farmer. But when churches and believers alike think they can take something that has enabled an individual or a group draw closer to God and duplicate it, things just are not the same. The original will always be the original and no one on earth can duplicate it.
What have I learned in my walk with God? He loves all of us individually. God doesn’t want us to try to duplicate what someone else is doing. He doesn’t want us to borrow from someone else’s faith in order to build our own. If we don’t draw closer to God in our own way we will never come to know Him personally. I don’t know about you, but I do not want to look at Jesus one day and say, alas, my master, my faith was borrowed!
What’s the solution? It is simple. Draw close to God yourself. I’m not saying to lay aside your church, your small group, or even a brother or sister in the faith you have lunch with once or twice a week. What I am saying is that you might find Him where you least expect it. What draws your friend closer to God probably won’t draw you closer to Him. When you seek Him one on one and find Him speaking to your heart that first time, you will never forget it. That will be a moment no one can borrow and no church can recycle.
Are you borrowing from others to build your faith? Is your church taking something that worked in another church and trying to recycle it and make it their own? Would you rather have something borrowed or recycled or actually have the real thing? Seek God first in your own way. There will never be a lender wanting it back. Besides, the original is always better.
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