Lent Day 21: Turning into my Mother!

Mom, aunts, grandma!

There's this favorite picture that I have of my mom. I pull it out whenever people tell me I look young for my age, and explain that it's because people in our family typically start to look older much later in life. It's coming. Wrinkles are coming. Gray hairs are coming. Just not yet.  

Or, I'll just say "black don't crack" and keep it moving. Because that's also largely true. Have you seen Angela Bassett?

What's interesting, though, is that people generally never correctly guess which person is my mom. Probably because (in my opinion) I don't look like any of those people!

I don't bear a striking resemblance to them...but I am like them.

Everyone in our family has a particular sort of humor. I of course have it. Our mothers have a spiritual footprint, and I'm growing up to fit into their shoes. My handwriting looks like my mom's handwriting. I can talk like her when I want. I can dance like her, I can imitate her singing voice. I could do all that in front of a person who knew her, and they would say something like: "haha, you're just like your mom."

And the older I get, the more I'll turn into my mother. 

But if you don't know my mom...not even a little, then you'll never know. You won't realize who I've become. If I imitate her, I'm being weird. When I pass on a nugget of wisdom from her, it's brand new information.

But it's not new. It's recycled. I'll morph into a carbon copy of someone born in 1950 plus contributions and distributions that began in 1982. And so, at the end, I'll be somewhat different, but recognized as proceeding from a certain source. But only if you know that source.

See how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called children of God; and such we are. For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be. We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is. And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.

1 John 3:1-3

Yesterday I explained what the "world" was. It was a system. An order of sorts that operated contrary to or as a rival to God. This system only behaves in this way because it doesn't know God. It's has not yet been illumined by the rays of truth that make a person buck against the system. 

I would break down this scripture into three parts: 

1. Identification - We are the children of God. It's not just a title. It's a reality. But it's not blatantly obvious unless you know our Father. Christians have a way of looking like lunatics. I hate to say it, but it's true. And it's because we're bucking against the system. It makes us stand out as something but that something is not recognizable as "child of God." In order to know who the children are talking like, who we're imitating and whose wisdom we're disseminating, you have to know our parent.
   
2. Development - We are children of God now. In this moment!  But, we still don't know exactly what we will be like in the future. How far does this thing go?! Unknown. All we know is that when He appears, just by seeing Him...we will become like Him. It's like that last puzzle piece of knowledge and grace will converge on us and result in complete transformation into something that is blatantly recognizable as child of God, because we will be in the image of His only begotten Son (2 Corinthians 3:18).
   
3. Expectation - Our hope and desire for Christ's eventual appearance has a purifying effect on us today. When your hope is fixed on Christ, when you are focused on Christ...you're changed and continue changing...until that day when suddenly, in the twinkling of an eye, your change is complete (1 Corinthians 15:52)

 Maybe it's not such a bad thing to turn into your parent...