But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men; for you neither go in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in. Matthew 23:13
Christian what? Hmm, yes, Christian compression. Churches can unfortunately become quite proficient at this sort of thing. The pastor presents the molded ideal of the Christian, and then compresses everyone in the congregation to fit that mold. From that compression comes striving one against another, worry, dread, anxiety and depression since all of God's creations do not fit the mold. In these later years, culture has added another form to that mold - physical comeliness. And then one may even hear that there are a limited number of molds! We often fail to recall that the Pharisees had their ideal and 600 traditions to help them attain it, and then failed to recognize the Messiah standing right in front of their upturned noses. It may be that the better one is at fitting the molded ideal of a Christian, the more pride comes to dominate that unfortunate life. And then that one comes to sound like that publican in the parable, "Lord, I'm sure glad I'm not like that awful tax collector!"
Trust in our Lord's salvation. He may grow you too 'big' to fit in a compressed ideal!
Bucky
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