The Game-Playing Is Over--February 5, 2021

The Game-Playing Is Over--February 5, 2021

"If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the universe, why do you live as though you still belonged to the world? Why do you submit to regulations, 'Do not handle, Do not taste, Do not touch'? All these regulations refer to things that perish with use; they are simply human commands and teachings. These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-imposed piety, humility, and severe treatment of the body, but they are of no value in checking self-indulgence." [Colossians 2:20-23]

Okay, I'm just going to say this once: life is not an eternal game of Twister. Breathe yourself a sigh of relief.

Do a thought experiment with me, if you would. My kids are going through a phase these days where they are periodically obsessed with the game Twister.  Yes, you know--the one with the slippery vinyl plastic mat with multicolored dots on it.  And they will, out of nowhere on an evening, get out the Twister mat and insist that I spin the spinner and call out which body part has to touch which color dot: "Right foot green!"  "Left hand yellow!" and so on.  That's all well and good, and they usually get bored with it after about fifteen minutes (longer than I would give that game, personally).  

So far, so good, right?  They're playing the game just fine, and then when it's done, we put all the pieces back in the box until they want to do it all over again the next night.

But what if--and here's where I need your faithful imagination for this thought experiment--what if they never let the game end, even when they went on to other parts of their day?  What if they insisted on calling out body parts and colors and would only let themselves touch, say, a red sock that had been left on the floor, and reached over to find a blue chair they could rest their hand on.  What if they tried to go to school, or do their homework, or live their whole lives, only allowing a hand or a foot on the officially declared color objects they could find around them?  

It would be pure insanity, right?  I mean, sure, you might applaud their dedication.  Or you might say, "Wow, those kids sure are getting a workout finding random objects or properly colored floor-tiles to leap onto, but that's got to be difficult to do while still paying attention in school, getting dressed, or living your life!"  It would be kind of impressive for about a minute, until you realized what a colossal waste of time and effort it was, you know?  And not only that, but pretty quickly anybody who tried this would discover that they couldn't actually live much of their lives any more--you can't help a friend move, or make a meal to bring to the homeless family in shelter, or go for a normal walk in the forest, or swim at the beach, if you are constantly holding yourself to made-up rules about putting your extremities on color-coded dots.  You would be putting in all that effort for rules you don't really have to follow, and all the while you'd be pushing yourself to exhaustion in the attempt and missing out on the real joys of life.  What a waste that would be--all from being unable to recognize that you weren't bound to the arbitrary rules of a game you had finished playing.

Okay, well, if we can recognize how foolish and tragic that situation would be, then we're already on the right track for understanding these verses from Colossians.  In so many words, the apostle says, "Life isn't an eternal game of Twister--you can stop pretending that you are required to fuss over what you do and don't touch or eat or handle!  You're not required to observe those rules!"  In particular, he's probably addressing the issue that the early church wrestled with about whether Christians who came to faith in Jesus but who hadn't been Jewish first were still required to obey the covenantal rules of ancient Israel when it came to ceremonial cleanness and uncleanness. There were also groups who took those rules even further than the letter of the Torah and made them into prohibitions against associating with people known as "sinners," or outsiders, foreigners, strangers, or other people who might themselves be unclean.  You see this controversy in the gospels a good bit, where the Respectable Religious Leaders are upset at Jesus for hanging out with the wrong crowd. In their mind, he's risking making himself ritually unclean, like he is tainted or contaminated by being with the wrong people.  And yet Jesus saw that he was specifically sent to the ones labeled as sinners, unclean people, outsiders, and outcasts.

That, I am convinced, is why these verses from Colossians basically say the same: no--you don't have to worry about avoiding touching things that are unclean, or being friends with someone who isn't on the Approved List, or associating with people who have been told they are unacceptable.  You don't have to worry about those things, because life isn't an eternal game of Twister, and you don't have to live as though those rules constrain you.  You are free--free to go where Christ's love leads you... free to accept people like Jesus did... free to let go of losing any sleep over whether a "sinner" has touched that plate you were going to use, or whether you're sharing a table with a "foreigner" or if the stranger in line ahead of you at the grocery store is "clean" or "unclean." We aren't playing by those rules, and you don't have to live like they hold you in.  

And when we hear these verses in that light, it really does take a weight off of our shoulders.  If the Christian life was never really about avoiding red pen marks on our Heavenly Permanent Record, but really about the freedom of loving everybody because Jesus has loved us first, well, then there's a lot of stuff we just don't have to worry about anymore--no matter what the Respectable Religious People of any time or place say.  We are freed to meet people where they are, and to love them as they are, and to share tables and tears and time with them as we all are, because it turns out the old rules of Twister about where we are and aren't allowed to go do not hold us back.  The game playing is done.  We can step out into real life.  We are free.

Go, use that freedom to follow where Jesus leads you.  Go, knowing you don't have to impress anybody else--not even God.  Go, trusting that we can plant our footsteps where Jesus has stepped ahead of us--even if it's walking out on the water.

Lord Jesus, help us today to be free from worries about things that don't last, so that we are freed to love people who are of infinite and eternal worth to you.