Nonconformity

Nonconformity

Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

Romans 12:2

IN WORD Imagine a culture in which there is no word to describe deception. No lie has ever been told and no one has even considered deviating from the truth. This culture has such clear lines of authority that it would occur to no one to assert his own rights—or violate another’s. It has a complete absence of conflict, a perfectly united fellowship, and a plan that everyone single-mindedly pursues. There’s no discord there, only harmony. It’s the utopia that human beings have instinctively envisioned, yet never achieved.

Such was the culture of heaven before Satan fell like lightning from his high estate. As far as we can tell from Scripture, Lucifer’s rebellion was an isolated incident. It drew many followers—one-third of heaven’s hosts, according to many interpretations of Revelation 12:4—but was not in any way typical of the remainder of heaven’s inhabitants. No, heaven’s culture was perfect. Who—except for a being as prideful as Satan—would have wanted to mess it up?

We can’t relate to a society in which evil is foreign. We’re not nearly innocent enough for that. We’ve grown up with sin all around us, showing up in violence, bitterness and anger, lust and greed, and all sorts of idolatries. But in the enormous span of cosmic history, our earth has gone tragically wrong for only a well-defined moment—a brief sliver of eternity. What we’ve accepted as normal is drastically abnormal. God’s eternal kingdom will not accept any elements of rebellion. Regardless of how comfortable we’ve been in the past with the human rebellion, we need to be terribly uncomfortable with it now. We have to change.

IN DEED Our worship of God is to involve a radical transformation to His culture—a society in which all disobedience is a horrifying thought. No lying, no lust, no discord, no rebellion. Our minds must fit the eternal patterns of heaven, not the momentary aberrations of earth. We are citizens of a very different kingdom than we’ve ever known. The ways of this world hold nothing for us anymore. Our conformity is over. Transformation must begin.

Measure your growth in grace by your sensitiveness to sin.

—OSWALD CHAMBERS