Quote Originally Posted by sport_122 View Post
another interesting thread.

the only thing you have to remember is that the Christian faith openly says that we cannot live up to the standard which is held before us. This to the person on the outside looking in is always where people like to play the gotcha game. When the truth of the Christian faith is that we all come from a place of where we have struggled and wrestled with our short comings and we will continue to do so.

In many cases, the legalism that some believers display is another one of these problems. Unfortunately, many of us still act like the Christian faith is about us living our lives to a certain standard and it isn't. It is however about us not being able to live our lives to the standard that is laid out before us and being in desperate need of grace. I often wonder if that is a place where the believer and the non-believer can start to agree? The place that says, no matter the standard I set for myself or the standard that God has set for me, I am going to need grace because I cannot live up to that standard.
People can live up to the standard that they set for themselves quite easily. Go to a trailer park and have a look around. A lot of those people want no more than what they have. The same can said for CEOs of business. Living to a standard that you set and continually change for yourself is very powerful - bc you can see progress and can even "arrive" if you set your mark low enuff. You don't need "grace" from an invisible character to do so. You don't need words from another "man" (bible) to do so either.