Jekyll and Hyde

Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde[1] is a novella written by the Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson and first published in 1886. It is about a London lawyer who investigates strange occurrences between his old friend, Dr. Henry Jekyll[2], and the misanthropic Mr. Edward Hyde.
The work is known for its vivid portrayal of a split personality, split in the sense that within the same person there is both an apparently good and an evil personality each being quite distinct from each other. The novella's impact is such that it has become a part of the language with the very phrase "Jekyll and Hyde" coming to mean a person who is vastly different in moral character from one situation to the next.
Sadly this duality is often found in churches, CFs and any where the Christian body is located. Clearly this is not something unusual for Paul has vividly described of his own struggles in the book of Romans in the Bible. But Paul did not end with a voice of defeat. Rather if you continue to read, he offers hope to live a real authentic Christian life which is anchored in Christ and not in our own abilities or good intentions.
We need to break out of this weekend Christian mould and fully embrace the liberty as God’s children. Not that I’m advocating immorality or freedom to do whatever we feel like doing. Far from that! What we as the Living Body of our Lord Jesus Christ should strive for is to stop any kind of pretension and desire to live holy, authentic Christ like lives. By doing this others will see that true transformation is possible.
Please do not feel discourage if you fail for our Lord is ever gracious to forgive if we truly repent. The temptation will always be to retreat back to our comfortable weekend Christian mould. We must resist that! Remember it is Christ that has brought you out of sin and given you the Holy Spirit to live out your new life. You’re not fighting this battle alone. Further more we as Christians should always offer grace instead of condemnation to our brothers and sisters in Christ.
The struggle to live an authentic Christ like life is not easy. There are times of victories and also times of failure we rather hide or even forget. These are real stories of God’s work in our lives. Please share these stories with us so that others will be encouraged and inspired.

Practice to Notice

“Our culture has influenced us to see, hear, and notice certain things and ignore others. We tend to notice temporal things like new cars, consumer products that will improve our lives… – isn’t it amazing how we can notice discount? We notice people’s faults and sometimes enjoy poking fun at those faults… We notice successful people yet fail to notice that behind the veneer of confidence and certitude are often brokenness and dysfunction. As people who desire to live more intently in tune with God, the challenge is to retrain our eyes, our hearts and our ears to see life differently from what the world puts on our platter. When we begin to see life differently and more deeply, I believe we will find ourselves challenged to live more faithfully, passionately, and intentionally…”

The above are excerpts from a book titled Spotting the Sacred by Bruce Main.

Living in the city, one cannot escape the reality of being stuck in queues. I found myself at the post office waiting to be served. So I decided to read the book mentioned above. As I was reading the part about children, the lady beside me started to complain about the rowdy kids that a couple brought, to her companion. She scoffed at how the parents brought the whole family and was having an outing there. The children were loud, noisy and basically there were just being… themselves. Irritation began to build within me when all her comments were just disapproving the children and the parents. I finally decided to put away my book and look at the children. Sure they were loud; sure the kid cried but soon he was himself again.

Yet I realized they were spontaneous, speaking their minds, contented, and curious even with what seems to be an outing to the post office. They were alive compared to the lady beside me that could not see beyond the irritating, energy sapping children. I must have waited almost 30 minutes when my turn came. I was told my documentation was incomplete hence I could not proceed. I found myself holding my tongue. Instead of fuming at my mistake or blaming the personnel for time wasted, I became aware of how less alive I’ve become as compared to the children.

A mundane trip to the post office became a lesson about life and God calling me back to live- that was spirituality for me. A call to notice, that even in the ordinary, God is at work and continues to call us, if only we will retrain senses to notice such lessons wrapped in ordinariness!

Have you any stories or people to hold up that could help us to retrain our senses? Let’s help each other to notice the sacredness in the ordinary… that’s spirituality!