ADAMANTATION

Adamantation is the persuasion one takes which is unbending, immovable, and just plain stubborn. I once was quite proud of being such. I stood for something and people would know I stood for it. This lingo filled the brotherhood airwaves as to who was in and who was "they" and "them". (Know what I mean?)

The problem with admantationistic practices is that it is so seldom like Jesus. Yes, he stood strongly to the point he died. But he stood for sinners and died for sinners. We....want to be known for standing against sin--of which Jesus did as well--yet a difference between me and him is he did so for sinners where I did it to be known (by my judgmental peers) for my stances.

Much of our church history is strewn with my ruinous story; loud against sin but involved very little with actual street-smart sinners. This has to change among us for Jesus insists upon it. When do we ever read of the religious leader and the bankrupt sinner ending with Jesus taking the side of the former? His heart-story is to align with the latter.

Fritz Kling (who quotes Richard Mouw who quotes Martin Marty) said it well when he referenced the need to follow Christ by becoming reconcilers, One of the real problems in modern life is that the people who are good at being civil often lack strong convictions and people who have strong convictions lack civility....We need to find a way of combining a civil outlook with a 'passionate intensity' about our convictions. The real challenge is to come up with a convicted civility.

Romans 14 addresses such a faith. Was Jesus adamant about anything? One theme seems to rise to the top; seeing his Father reach to blatant sinners to such an extent he would give up his own life. That is adamant, unbending, immovable, and just plain stubborn to it most righteous and wonderful peak.

May I learn to stand for the sinful people he stood for over the things I think the religious leaders want me to hold dear.