Acting As If...

From Rev Dr Tom Nibbe

...a touch of humor here from Mencken...
"Puritanism: the haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy." H. L. Mencken
 
It gets better as we grow in faith despite what we are feeling...it happens when we act as if... "...you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ..." 1 Peter 2:5
 
"...to awaken something in the heart is greater than giving knowledge and expounding facts..." Anonymous

...think about this particular saying of Jesus of Nazareth... "If then the light within you is darkess...it is, indeed, a profound darkness." Jesus in Matthew 6:23b
 
"Nothing is a waste of time if you use the experience wisely." Auguste Rodin

​"...the secret and source of all true greatness and achievement is faith...faith sees the invisible, believes the incredible and receives the impossible..." William E. Thorn

"...this then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in His presence...whenever our hearts condemn us...God is greater than our hearts...and He knows everything..." 1 John 3:19-20
 
"I have fallen in love with someone who is hiding inside of you." Hafiz
 
Prayer
Lord God, we praise you for what you are doing in the midst of worldwide pandemic, and a diminished economy. You are at work. We affirm it. We pray for all those who have been ill with the coronavirus and their loved ones. We pray for those who grieve because of those who have been lost. We pray for our nation and ask that you swiftly to bring about appropriate order, justice, and peace. We claim it.
 
In addition, Lord, make us aware of the opportunities we have --- ACTING AS IF. Help us live modestly but well. As we do this, may we be more like you. Show us the way, Lord, how we can think and act in a way pleasing to you. Show us how we can experience genuine, healthy relationships with others and bring many to you? Show us how we can help friends and neighbors? Lead the way. We will follow. Sometimes we need to lean heavily upon your Holy Spirit to show us the way of Christ. We want our lives to be solidly grounded in patience and your wisdom. We want to be examples of the life Jesus lived. In His holy name. Amen.

The Message
There are forces at work within us and forces from without. It seems as though, these days, a person can go wrong, having spent an entire life trying to do the right thing. We need to be informed about what's  going on. We need to hear both sides of any equation. We need to take time in meditation and prayer to be confident as we make our decisions.

More than any time prior, we need to read and discuss the Bible. We'll never go wrong there. We've arrived at a day and time when the confidence that many Americans have of Christians and their faith has diminished. For many, we are no longer friends, but enemies of the current American dream and enterprise. The Bible suggests that we need to be as wise as serpents and as innocent as doves (Matthew 10:16). I'm inclined to believe this is true.
 
Presently, we're facing a time unparalleled in American history. We all have our own opinions on what's been going on and what's been happening. Expressing our opinions and feelings doesn't help or matter. Sometimes we share an opinion without thinking, and we're surprised for some reason, it was a big mistake. Some of us have come to realize that our opinion really doesn't matter. What the Bible says, does matter! Today it's my intention to present a topic related to what my seminary professor used to call... 
...faking it until you make it...or...acting as if...

The notion of what we may call "faking it until you make it" or "acting as if" is really a very powerful concept. ACTING AS IF --- is the method employed to practice "the positive" when a goal seems out of reach. It's a positive way of pretending...but don't play it cheap. It's a powerful tool to be used when we need to be motivated. It's used when we get the notion we're just not up to the challenge at hand and we need to act. 

​When we make a conscious decision to ACT AS IF we're positing in our mind that we're doing just fine and everything is going to be just fine.

God is with us. We're just not going to be deterred. Sometimes we really need to lighten the load and do what must be done. Have you been there? We think and act as if the thing we're facing simply has been taken care of and we're just mopping up---so we can go on with our lives.
 
Disengaging in life because we are overwhelmed, just seems to make it--not worse--but impossible to overcome. It just seems to "set in" and take over. I've been there. Maybe you've been there, too!
 
There are many situations which come up where ACTING AS IF --- combined with other tricks of the 
trade that come to mind will set the stage for overcoming...
 
We can love ourselves nonetheless...and then get back in there...
 
We can be patient with ourselves, disregarding our apprehensions, doubts, and fears...
...until the negatively about motivation catches up with the kind of reality we seek...
 
ACTING AS IF...is the positive way to overcome our fears, our doubts, our low self-esteem.
As our seminary professor used to say...you don't have to tell everybody what's going on...
just fake it until you make it...
 
Listen...
 
When we're employing this methodology, we're not telling a lie...
 
We're not being dishonest with ourselves...
 
We're simply "opening doors" to the positive results needed to complete the work to be done.
Sometimes things come over us...we don't know what it is exactly...but it really holds us back...
ACTING AS IF is more powerful than the negative feelings that hold us back...and it works...
What we are feeling and our current condition is swallowed up...by letting go and letting God.
 
ACTING AS IF takes us from the insecurity of the shaky present and puts us on solid ground.
 
When talking about ACTING AS IF, I am talking about how faith in Jesus get us out of the ditch.

Cordially, Tom