Are You Comfortable with the Human Predicament?

Being comfortable with a slight or a shortcoming can take a couple of forms, and it’s ironic that comfort itself can be either good or bad. Think about the following situation: you are overwhelmed with a workload or struggling to keep up with daily demands, whether it’s work or just life related. You can stay in this stressful state, or you can get comfortable with it and accept it for what it is. That comfort can go one of two ways. The unhealthy comfort takes the form of complacent familiarity and saying, “yeah, here we go again. I usually fall behind here, but it’s not possible to keep up with this and I shouldn’t be expected to…as long as I accept it, I won’t be stressed. I’m still doing better than some people.” Conversely, the healthy comfort takes the form of confidence and says, “yeah, I’ve been here before, I always feel this way and struggle, but somehow I pull through. I’ll get this right sooner or later.” Usually, our past experiences determine our “comfort” form. If we’ve repeatedly failed, we might take the first stance of getting too comfortable with failure to the point that we don’t even question it. We make excuses by comparing ourselves to others who have failed or sighting some unfairness in the situation. We accept the fate of failure as something beyond our control and try to find some sort of peace in it. That is one response to stress or setback. If our past experiences are more of successes, especially success in the midst of adversity, and even more especially if we’ve experienced success in the face of what we thought was certain failure, then we’re more likely to take the latter example of comfort and confidence. And of course, it is valuable to recognize when we need to seek additional outside help.

The above speaks to confidence or lack thereof in our own abilities and experiences. However, I would like to extend the idea of comfort to a much broader application: the problem with being human verses the holy perfection of God. The problem is that we are inherently imperfect, as sin entered human nature in the Garden of Eden.

Jesus in Mark 10:18 – “No one is good—except God alone.” Again, Romans 3:23 – “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”

We are not gods or demigods. We have no perfection in us ourselves, and any perfect moments that we aspire to experience are not from ourselves but from outside ourselves. So we have this constant conflict—a desire to be something we’re not. And when we do occasionally experience this perfection in doing good in God’s sight, we have to embrace it as beyond ourselves as we are, or we quickly find out just how imperfect we are—and thinking that we are independently perfect is actually just another confirmation of how imperfect we truly are, for cancerous pride has entered us in that moment.

But life goes on…imperfect life, life of struggle and failure. Life with successes and “perfect” moments, yet still riddled with tiny little failures or huge, life-altering ones. How do we cope? How do we go on without stressing out and worrying a hole in our stomachs? We cannot trust ourselves—most of us have proven that, and the rest will see it proven either sooner or later. I think we have to get comfortable with being human. I mentioned the practical example above as a caution of the contrast between a healthy and unhealthy comfort in being human. Extending the example, an unhealthy comfort says “I’m only human. I make mistakes and sin and it’s ok. I can’t expect to get it right and no one else can either, so what does it matter? I’ll probably always carry on this way and I better get used to it sooner or later. I will never get past it…besides, look at all those people who are even worse than me!” Be careful there—“those people” can be changed in an instant, reborn, and meanwhile you’re still the same or deteriorating. Try to realize that God sees us in our present, but He also sees our futures and our potential. Time does not bind Him, so seeing the past, present, and future looks the same to Him. You are not removed from your past or future in this present moment. This may be an uncomfortable thought, given our sinful pasts, or instead an inspiration, given what we hope to be…but I think it shows just how marvelous God’s grace is. He knows your past sins, present struggles, and future temptations—He sees all of these at the same “time” (if time meant anything to Him, a timeless being), yet He forgives you yesterday, today, and forever. Once you’ve chosen Jesus Christ as your savior, you are forgiven.

Romans 3:21-26: “But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. 22This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, 23for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. 25God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood. He did this to demonstrate his justice, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— 26he did it to demonstrate his justice at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.”

So what do we do? Do we take comfort in our humanness and let our desires run free? Or do we take comfort in our humanness with confidence—knowing that we’ve been tried before and God has saved us. That our failures don’t prohibit us from success. As in the previous example, we can grow confident that God has proven Himself faithful and full of grace to us countless times, and to our ancestors even more countless times. We can then get comfortable with the temptations that cross our minds…not that we accept them…no, that we know we have the power to reject them through the Holy Spirit. Not that we say, “well, here’s that temptation again and I’ll probably always give in…I’m human.” Instead we say, “ah ha…I see you, Temptation…you don’t own me, God does. Satan cannot have me. God has claimed me as His holy vessel.”

1 Cor 3:16-17 – “Don't you know that you yourselves are God's temple and that God's Spirit lives in you? 17If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him; for God's temple is sacred, and you are that temple.”

At this point we stop being so scared of our deepest temptations or inadvertent “in the moment” sins…we instead recognize that we’re only human…and Satan the tempter is sub-deity…so temptation is either “only human” or another form of sub-deity…what power can it hold over Almighty God?

Can you gain this healthy comfort in your human nature? You can, and you’ll find more strength in it. It is a fruit of knowing just who God is, a confidence in Him and therefore in yourself, a reserved temple of the Holy Spirit. “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” (Phil 4:13)