Recently I have been reading the book Side by Side by Ed Welch and it is fast becoming one of my favorites.  I could probably list a number of reasons why that's so and how it has impacted me but I'd like to just focus on one which aligns with last week's sermon.  The first half of the book Welch begins with the premise that we are needy people.  We are needy because of the challenges and trials of life and because of our own sin which so easily entangles and veers us from the narrow way of life and running the race well.  Thus, when we share our lives with others who are needy in the same way, we often have messy spiritual relationships.

One means of straightening up the messiness is through sharing our stuggles - both the trials of life and the faith/sin struggles of the heart.  When we do so honestly and openly, it allows another fellow pilgrim to walk side by side with us and pray for us (as we with them).  When we leave either of those things out (our hard circumstances and our hard hearts), others don't see our life challenges or our faith struggle underneath and we don't see us as we really are - needy sinners saved by the grace of God.  Sometimes I wonder why I don't share that openly or others, either only sharing stories that impress (look how much I've accomplished, or how much I have to go through in life), or sharing only about the challenges but leaving out my own sin and faith struggle, and I think it is because of a lack of humility.  In Micah 6:8 God tells us what he requires of us - to do justice, to love mercy and to walk humbly with our God.  I think the reason we don't share as needy pilgrims is we don't see ourselves that way, and the reason we don't see ourselves that way is that we are not walking humbly with our God.

In James it tells us to confess our sins to one another, in Galatians 6 it speaks of bearing one another's burdens.  James 4:10 speaks of not getting into quarrels but humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord.  And when we do God and others are there to help lift us up.  My guess is that is one of God's means of helping us to walk side by side amidst messy relationships and messy circumstances.  We share humbly, honestly and look to God and others for grace.  How are you doing in walking humbly and sharing our lives with others humbly?  What do you think - too difficult, too ideal?  Let me know.  Let us walk together through the messiness of life side by side.  

Tony