How Do You Categorize Yourself?

I am presently employed by a law firm here in Downtown Macon, Georgia. My first couple of weeks working I was terrified of breaking the imagined barrier that stood at the threshold of most of the Senior and Junior partners’ office doors. In their presence I felt less. I felt less than them by a lot. It wasn’t that I knew their salary, but I knew mine. Especially since I’ve watched far too many episodes of Boston Legal, in my mind there is a certain glamor and immediate status uppage when you’re a lawyer. And I am not.

We all do this in some ways. I still get slightly stressed out if someone comes through the doors wearing chic clothes. My thoughts: ‘Man, that’s so cool. I wish I could afford to dress like theat. I bet they are makin some serious cheese! Why can’t I do that?’ and the thoughts drain out in like manor.

For awhile in college I wanted to be Dr. Greg House from the TV show House. He dressed in a relaxed way, typically with a band T-shirt and a sweet blazer. Or the new James Bond... aside from a dumb sweater he wore in one of the films, he has class. Pierce as Bond was a shmuck in comparison.

Maybe it is just physical, God-given looks. I don’t want to see some pretty gal come out of the same office that I’m about to go into to have MY interview. I know how this works, especially if the interviewer is a guy. I want some loser to come out of those doors so I can feel better about my chances to nab the job I’m hoping to fill.

A lot of us care about cars. We have the ‘If I had a billion dollars to spend I’d have a ____’ idea already in mind. We care about our houses and what they convey about us. I walked into a house a few months ago that can be categorized as nothing less than a mini-castle. Everything was awesome. Nothing was broken or warn (unless it was designed to look that way). Again the thought inched into my mind, ‘What am I doing with my life. This is incredible.’

The issue is we perceive status by our eyes and ideals.

John, in one of his wordy letters, says that all that is in the world is the desire of the eyes and pride in life. Don’t get hung up and hear what he is not saying. He is not saying this earth we live in is a burning piece of fire with nothing good or redeemable. RATHER, he is saying that the world, the way that is not God’s way, is dictated by our eyes and tainted desires. John gets it. He is old at this time. He knows how things work. After infancy we do not suddenly STOP seeing then reacting with an internal ‘Oooooooo, I want that!’ We just hide it better now. And it is not always bad either!

Was Satan Telling the Truth?

In the Old Testament book of Genesis the third chapter gives the events of the Devil (Satan, Lucifer, the Father of Lies so on and so forth) tempting our first mom, Eve. He is trying to get Eve to consume the one thing in a land of lush plenty which God told Eve and her husband, Adam, not to consume. Contrary to the bit in the movie Walk the Line by the character Jerry Lee Lewis, Adam and Eve could look and touch and think about touching this death-bringing fruit, but they were clearly and definitely not to eat it.

Satan tempted Eve with likeness: 'God knows that when you eat of [the fruit] your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.' The interesting part is when we turn all the way to the New Testament book of 1st John, the third chapter in verse 2 it reads, 'but we know that when [Jesus] appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.'

Satan's temptation of Eve with being like God was evil but in 1st John we are PROMISED to be like God. What is the deal? Was the Father of Lies saying a good thing for once? Is God changing his mind here--eh, maybe they will be like me? Is the Apostle John unfamiliar with the Old Testament? Does he not care about the Old Testament? What's going on?

Perhaps the point that slithers away from us in all this is that God told Adam and Eve not to eat of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. What is it that Adam and Eve lacked in their likeness of God? Were they unsatisfied or did they just want more? The couple, it seems, did not want to be merely human, but actually God. In 1st John the promise is for God to make us like Jesus. In Genesis humanity is abandoned for divinity; in 1st John humanity is completely fulfilled and echoes divinity; in Genesis disobedience brought shame and corruption; in 1st John perfect obedience in Jesus Christ brings redemption and perfection; in Genesis death is born; in 1st John death is forever dead because of Jesus' conquering of it.

In a way Satan was telling the truth in his temptation of Eve, but being the deceiver he is, it was a truth that was a lie: God gave Adam and Eve all he desired them to have and withheld all that they were unable to know. In god's image man was made and in his manor humanity is meant to live, but no where is the human race told to BE God. Man is to reflect God's image by mirroring God in ways, we are not to play or portray God by trying to be him.