Saturday-Stranger

Dear friends, I urge you, as foreigners and exiles, to abstain from sinful desires, which wage war against your soul. Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us.

1 Peter 2:11,12

Have you ever had that nagging feeling in the back of your mind that everything wasn’t quite right? That the rest of the world was moving along smoothly while your life was filled with bumps and potholes. That everyone you knew were running fast while you struggled just to get out of bed in the morning.

I don’t know if I’m just built differently, or there was something in my past that made me this way, but that exactly how I feel. Everyone seemed to just glide through life while has to struggle just to make it through the day. What came easily to everyone took a lot of work for me.

One simple but powerful example was spelling. When it came to putting the right letters in the right order, I wasn’t just bad. I was horrible! Going through elementary school, I earned a string of D’s and D-‘s. And I earned them every single week.

It’s not like it was a surprise or anything. On Monday we were given the words that we were going to be tested on the following Friday. There even was a pretest in the middle of the week to help us understand which words we needed some help with. But none of that mattered. Every Friday brought another disappointment.

The double discouragement came with the public embarrassment and humiliation of the class spelling bee. Everyone stood around the room and the teacher asked us to spell words from the spelling book. My plan to stay in longer was based on moving to the end of the line. This was, I increased the odds that someone else would be the first person out. But, even with this scheme, I almost always was the first kid to sit down.

And then there was my name. Chester. No one else with an ounce of cool was ever named Chester. And the characters on TV named Chester were the kind of people that everyone liked to make fun of. I won’t go into what Chester means right now. I’m saving that one for later.

But the cherry on top of all this, the thing that told me without any doubt that I was a stranger was my middle name. Wallace. Yes, Wallace. I got this because I was named after my dad and his middle name was Wallace. But Wallace wasn’t anywhere on his birth certificate. Wallace appeared because of a mistake that was made when he enlisted for World War II. This is a story for another time.

You see, Wallace means stranger. How could it get any clearer than that? Life hadn’t convinced me enough that I was a stranger. Now my name confirms puts an exclamation point on what I’ve felt all my days. I am a stranger.

But even though I’ve felt like a stranger, the Apostle Peter tells his fellow Christians that being a stranger is exactly what they should be. He’s telling them and us that we shouldn’t just feel like strangers, but to actually be strangers in this world. Now, he uses the words foreigners and exiles, but the idea of being strangers covers it all.

This isn’t a new idea at abb because Jesus himself is described as being a stranger. He was called the Son of the Most High. His birth happened because the Holy Spirit came onto Mary[1]. When answering Pontious Pilate’s question, Jesus said that his kingdom is not of this world[2].

And that stranger status is also given to all Jesus followers. Whether first century or 21’s century, everyone who believes that Jesus paid for their sins so that they don’t are strangers. He makes this very clear when he tells his disciples that they are not of the world, even as he is not of it[3].

So, what used to frustrate me has changed into something that frees me. Instead of thinking that I was some kind of ugly and slimy worm, I’m changed. God has changed me. He’s constantly in the process of remaking me to be just like Jesus[4]. And why would he go to all this trouble?

For this world is not our home; we are looking forward to our everlasting home in heaven.

Hebrews 13:14 TLB

This is no excuse for Christians to do anything they want. Instead, it’s a calling to change the way we look at life. Since this world isn’t our home, then we naturally shouldn’t feel all that comfortable with this life. It’s going to be a little bit uncomfortable. We’re never really going to feel totally at home. So, when troubles come, and they are coming like a freight train, we can know that there’s whole lot more to live than just the stuff that’s going on in this world. That we’re going to spend all eternity with the one who loves us. Who died for us. And that will bring peace to our disjointed lives.

Noodling Questions

• How do you feel when people treat you like a stranger? Why?

• Describe what “such good lives” looks like.

• What power wants to make us do anything that God asks? Describe.

[1] Luke 32-35

[2] John 18:36

[3] John 17:16

[4] 2 Corinthians 3:18