Becoming

Image by Monika from Pixabay

I am on the road of becoming who God meant to be.

I am reminded through regretting saying this and doing that, I am not yet who God wants me to be.

We are developing into the men and women we strive to be.

When I was five years old I prayed under the willow tree by our home for God to rescue me, my mother, brother and two sisters, from abuse from our schizophrenic father, Jim.

I poured out my tears to the Lord. He heard my cry for help.

Six years later God answered my prayer when we had the opportunity to escape from our abuse.

That is more than a lifetime for a despairing five-year-old boy.

Our father spoke lies into me.

He said my brother was smarter than I would ever be.

Some sibling rivalry is normal in childhood, but it went beyond that

I engaged in unhealthy competition with my brother.

My brother skated 24 hours for a community fundraiser as a teenager.

I skated for 12 as a child. I was four years younger than my brother.

I was held up by each arm in the last hour by my aunt, Mitz, and uncle, Ben.

Pain surged through my body. It increased with each second, with every minute.
I enjoyed the skating, but beneath all the fun, there was proving to my father and brother I was worthy of their respect.
I thought to myself, “I’ll show you both I can do more than you think I can!”

During a few of the breaks when Dr. Mom gave me hot chocolate and massaged my aching feet, she said that I wasn’t failing to pull out. I said in my stubbornness something like this. “No, Mom. I want to finish what I’ve started.” I could say it was because people were counting on me. That was only part of why I wouldn’t stop. I wanted to prove to my father that I was just as capable as my brother.

I know Mom had a far more important concern. I was sick a lot as a child. I didn’t have a strong immune system. I was off school for weeks at a time with illnesses such as flu, whooping cough, mumps, measles and chicken pox. My brother and two sisters got sick too. Most times it wasn’t for as long as me.

Dr. Mom would make something special for us when we were ill. She gave me tomato soup cake. Of course, I had to have hot cocoa with it. It was absolutely essential to my recovery.

Mom never said a word about us staying home from school. We had to be awfully sick for her to allow that.

Mom knew also when we weren’t telling the truth.

My Mom knew when I was lying to her.

When I was a child cod liver oil was thought to have medicinal benefits, especially in boosting the immune system. Mom would ask, “Kevin, have you taken your cod liver oil?” There was a protracted pause as I replied, “Yes, Mom, I did.” She said with insistence, “Kevin, stick out your tongue.” I said, “Mom, really I did.” She said emphatically, “Kevin, stick out your tongue.” Did I say I’m a terrible liar? I responded, “Okay, Mom.” I was resigned to taking it. I said, “Fine, Mom. You win.” I opened my mouth. Mom put the cod liver oil in using a spoon. I said, “Yuck.” I scrunched up my face. I shook my head back and forth multiple times. I said to myself, “Thanks, Mom. My tongue is coated with this black crap. I’m going to taste it for hours.”

I walked off in a huff.

I have no doubt many of you were given cod liver oil by your mothers when you were children. I feel your pain.

When we are on the pathway to becoming the people God wants us to be, we will probably lie many times.

When we are adults we may lie to cover up for doing something we know is wrong. Our conscience convicts us. More is expected of us as adults than children. We are supposed to know better. Sometimes, we lie because we don’t want to admit our shortcomings. We may embellish the truth because we think it makes us look better in the eyes of our colleagues, family and friends. But that inner voice that says to us we are wrong in doing so gets more persistent. I believe that is God speaking to us that we have strayed like sheep from the kind of people He longs for us to be. Sheep can be pig-headed creatures. Just look at how exhausted a collie is after herding them, and you will know what I mean.

How many of you have noticed, though, the more you lie, the worse it gets? It’s harder to remember all the lies you told.

We try to convince ourselves they were small ones. There isn’t that much we’ve done wrong, so who really was hurt? We know as believers that we have lied first to God. If you are not of faith and if you are, you can feel guilty that you have let down yourself and others by lying.

We are on the way to becoming the people we were meant to be.

We will have days when you are progressing; other times we will fall back.

But remember we are on the road to being who God created us to be.

Our world is in a troubled state.
There is far too much hate.

There are wars in Ukraine, and with the Israelis against the people of Palestine.

Racial injustice is everywhere.

People are being judged by the color of their skin.

The words of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. come to mind. “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.”

The freedom of people of any color can’t be achieved by allowing hatred to take root. It’s like taking a slow-acting poison. Slowly but surely it erodes us. It eats away at our moral compass until we are filled with darkness. The light inside us is dimmed until we are a shell of who we once were.

God does not want this to happen to any of His children. Like the ugly caterpillar that transforms into a beautiful butterfly, God wants us to mature fully into who He created us to be.

When I was skating, I was held up that final hour by my uncle, Ben, and aunt, Mitz.

People like my mother, father, aunt, Mitz, and Uncle Ben, taught me that becoming a better person means being there for people who need your help.

We do not need to look far to see people who need our assistance. It could be your neighbor who is unemployed and needs help feeding their family and paying bills. It can be your colleague who has lost their job, because the employer needs to cut costs to avoid the company going out of business. It may be seeing a stranger at the local coffee shop who could use a cup of coffee and a sandwich. It might be that friend who lives on a meager government disability pension, who has to make the decision between the medications they can afford, and those they will have to do without.

We all need help at one time or another. We hope when we are in trouble someone will take the time to listen to and be there for us.

One day we will enter the promised land Martin Luther King Jr. envisioned. He knew God would be calling him home soon. Let us prayerfully reflect upon these words.

“We’ve got some difficult days ahead,” Martin Luther King, Jr., told an overflowing crowd in Memphis, Tennessee, on 3 April 1968, where the city’s sanitation workers were striking. “But it really doesn’t matter with me now, because I’ve been to the mountaintop … I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land” (King, “I’ve Been,” 222–223). Less than 24 hours after these prophetic words, King was assassinated by James Earl Ray.1

Martin Luther King Jr. could attest to the fact that the pathway to becoming who God calls us to be is a rough one. But he would also say He is with us with each step we take.

Think of the celebration that awaits when we greet one another in Heaven. We will rejoice as we hug one another. We will not fear getting a disease like CoVid or worse. There will be a Kingdom party as God, Jesus or whatever faith tradition you come from, no longer have differences. Hatred will not exist. There will be no more war. But most importantly, we will be elated that we will spend eternity where there is no more hatred. I picture Martin Luther King Jr. seeing people of all colors loving one another. What a smile he will have.

What a becoming party that will be!

Dr. Kevin Osborne is a Vice-President for Student Affairs for St. James the Elder University. Dr. Osborne is a doctor of theology candidate through SJTEU. He is s therapist, writer, poet, and singer. He helps people in their inner healing journey. Dr. Osborne lives in Timmins, northern Ontario, Canada, with his wife, Karen. She is the Registrar for SJTEU. Karen has a B.A. in Clinical Christian Counseling from St. James the Elder University. Karen is a writer, editor, and missionary of the heart. 

Sources:

1. https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/ive-been-mountaintop