Truth Lies in the Lie

How many times have we said, "But its not my fault, if they wouldn't have... I wouldn't have..." The truth lies in the lie. There are consequences for all of us. The hardest consequences are the ones that we must look at and take responsibility for ourselves. Those actions that we want to blame on another person, but ultimately we are the ones that did that action, that got that consequence. The story of Abraham, Sarah, Hagar, and Ishmael is full of bad decisions made by other people, then entangled with personal bad decisions that made matters even worse.

Genesis 16, "Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had not been able to bear children for him. But she had an Egyptian servant named Hagar. So Sarai said to Abram, 'The Lord has prevented me from having children. Go and sleep with my servant. Perhaps I can have children through her.' And Abram agreed with Sarai’s proposal. So Sarai, Abram’s wife, took Hagar the Egyptian servant and gave her to Abram as a wife. So Abram had sexual relations with Hagar, and she became pregnant. But when Hagar knew she was pregnant, she began to treat her mistress, Sarai, with contempt... (21:9), But Sarah saw Ishmael—the son of Abraham and her Egyptian servant Hagar—making fun of her son, Isaac."

The trail of bad decisions in this story is almost sickening. Hagar a slave had no ability to defend herself and not sleep with Abraham, but she did have the ability to control her attitude afterwards toward Sarah. (I don't now how, but she did.) Her bad attitude rubbed off on her son Ishmael, and he became a man who was always against everyone, fighting for everything. Much of what happened to him cannot be blamed on Ishmael. He was caught in a whirlwind of contempt and hate between his mother and Sarah. "However, his own actions showed that he had chosen to become part of the problem and not part of the solution. He chose to live under his circumstances rather than above them."

I have chosen this cycle of victim decision making so many times in my life. When my friends would want to go out and party, I made my own night even worse by not only joining them, but one upping them with my own foolishness. When my ex wanted me to do certain things, I chose to be the victim and made his desires even worse by my own choices. While I was doing these thing, I never took responsibility for my choices, but blamed others for my consequences. I thought this was easier than taking responsibility myself, but what it ultimately gave me was more heartache than I could have ever dreamed. I still have the tendency to blame others for my bad attitude. Instead of taking responsibility for how I act, I tend to blame someone else and say, "If you hadn't done... then I wouldn't have lost my temper."

Oswald Chambers, " God came in the flesh to take sin away, not to accomplish something for Himself. The Cross is the central event in time and eternity, and the answer to all the problems of both. The Cross is not the cross of a man, but the Cross of God, and it can never be fully comprehended through human experience. The Cross is God exhibiting His nature. It is the gate through which any and every individual can enter into oneness with God. But it is not a gate we pass right through; it is one where we abide in the life that is found there."

There are so many situations that we find ourselves in, that are not our fault. How we act in those situations, now that is our responsibility. We cannot go around as a victim for the rest of our life, and continue on in making a bad situation even worse, by our own attitude or actions. We have Christ to help us live as we should no matter what situation we find ourself in. Our responsibility lies in the choices we make while we are in that situation. This is the point of Christ and the Cross, not necessarily to change our situation, but to change our heart. How are our actions and attitude in our situation? We may not be able to change others or our situation, but have we allowed Him to change us.

http://utmost.org/the-collision-of-god-and-sin/