i am the crazy cat lady

When I was at Baylor, my college pastor used a the most powerful word picture for sin that I have ever heard and I can't get out of my head.

He told a story about a trip that he took to Mexico. He was in a village walking down a road when he looked into an alley and saw a group of boys playing with something. They were using sticks to throw it in the air. Some of them would use their hands to pick it up and toss it at the other boys. They were laughing and screaming. This looked like a very fun game. He was too far away to tell what it was in the beginning, but as he got closer, he was disgusted at what he saw. These boys had found a dead cat and they were playing with it as if it was a normal everyday toy. His immediate reaction was, "Why would they pick up something dead and play with it?"

Anytime I have ever shared this story with other people, their reaction has been that of disgust. Almost like they wish I wouldn't have told them. It's gross and offensive. But isn't that the point? Sin should disgust us. Why would we pick up something dead and play with it? But I pick it up. And I do more than throw it around. I hand a deliver an invitation for it to come and visit. I cuddle with it. I give it a bath and a special bed. I even feed it. Even though scripture demands that I flee from sin, I don't. I treat it like a friend. And at any given time, if you could take a peek into my soul, I may resemble a crazy cat lady, collecting the ugliest animals you have ever seen (and dead on top of that).

Phillip Yancey in The Jesus I Never Knew says "How easily do we who live in material bodies devalue the world of spirit. It occurs to me that although Jesus spent much time on issues such as hypocrisy, legalism, and pride, I know of no television ministries devoted to healing those 'spiritual' problems; yet I know of many that center on physical ailments. Just as I begin feeling smug, however, I remember how easily I feel tormented by the slightest bout with physical suffering, and how seldom I feel tormented by sin."

I am not tormented by my sin and I am not digusted by it. I feel guilty. I feel shame. It doesn't take me long to stuff those feelings, though, and make a decision that it will never happen again. So my pride convinces me that I've got this and I have to just deal with the feeling of separation from God until I've "done my time" and then I can feel better. This is madness!

What I forget in all of this is that the penalty for my sin has already been paid. That is not to say that there will not be consequences for it. If there weren't, then God would not be loving. He disciplines and it is not fun, but I know that this is the priviledge of His children to receive that discipline and be sanctified by it. Micah 7: 7-9 says, "But as for me, I will watch expectantly for the Lord; I will wait for the God of my salvation. My God will hear me. Do not rejoice over me, O my enemy. Though I fall down, I will rise; though I dwell in darkness, the Lord is a light for me. I will bear the indignation of the Lord because I have sinned against Him, until He pleads my case and executes justice for me. He will bring me out into the light and I will see His righteousness." That entire chapter is a story of redemption. It is the story of His redeeming me. The Lord will trample my iniquity. He will cast my sin into the depth of the sea. Therefored, I will gladly accept His discipline because little by little it makes me more like Him.

So as He sanctifies, I pray that I will begin to feel about my sin the way I would feel about playing with a dead animal. Let it disgust me. But more than that, I want to remember what was purchased for me so that I would not have to settle for that. God offers me more. He offers Life. Why, then, do I choose to play with something dead?