The Elusively Simple Solution

I spent almost a day and a half on a really simple problem at work this week.

My Excel charts didn't turn out right ... and I couldn't fix the problem. I blamed all the usual suspects: new Office 2007; Microsoft (of course); the lack of response from the campus Excel "expert". I turned elsewhere for solutions and managed to get a helpful soul at Computing Services who offered to devote her afternoon to trying to solve "my" problem.

In the end, the solution was almost elusively simple. Moving column B to column C solved every chart problem I had fought for the better part of 2 days. I praised God for rescuing me, called the friendly lady at Computing Services, and finished my charts.

Isn't that how we are with God sometimes? When we were separated from Him, we looked everywhere we could for the solution to our soul-problem. We blamed everyone and everything; we turned elsewhere for solutions; we failed miserably at finding a solution because it was elusively simple: look to the cross and trust Christ alone.

But even after salvation we can be stubbornly insistent on making things harder than they have to be. The fact is, God's Word contains everything God deemed important for us to know about this thing called the Christian life. We underestimate the power in us through the gift of the Holy Spirit. Really, God calls us to get out of the way so that He can make it clear that He is at work instead of us! He calls it the crucified life - death to self, living to Him (Gal. 2:20).

The book of Colossians is an eloquent reminder of the simplicity of the Gospel, the simplicity of the Christ-life. Paul elevates Christ as pre-eminent over all things, and reminds us that our role is one of a faith-walk, not a frenzied pursuit of knowledge or fastidious keeping of rules and regulations. Simply put, Paul reminds us that it's all about Jesus.

Your life on the field is filled with challenging problems. Issues of contextualization, administrative details, theological questions I can only imagine, political dilemmas - all can press upon you to make it seem like the problems are overwhelming. Tonight, remember the simplicity of the answer: Christ in you, the hope of glory.

Col. 1:27 To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.