A Safe Person
One who has unreliable friends soon comes to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother. (Proverbs 18:24)
My definition of a safe person is an individual who can see and listen to your pain without passing judgment. They don’t offer trite recipes for “the fix you need,” and they trust the work of the Holy Spirit in your life. That’s a friend…a real friend. Does that mean they will always agree with you or justify your sinful choices? Of course not! As “truth speakers,” they know “when,” “how” and in “what tone” to speak truth to you.
A safe person is one who is well acquainted with grace, but not solely in an academic way. Their intimacy with the theological concept is from personal experience and not just a mental acceptance of the dry definition, “God’s unmerited favor.” Because they have been down a path of pain themselves, they have personally sensed God’s powerful touch of healing, and they haven’t forgotten the experience. They still bask in the warmth of being truly cared about by a sovereign, yet personal Lord. A safe person is a rare gift in your life, who you should never take for granted. They came into your life when the whole world rushed out like a pre-tsunami tide.
The big question today is this: Are you a safe person? Do you have the right words for someone? Standing on fundamental, biblical truth is helpful, but information alone doesn’t give a person the “diploma of safeness.” If information alone could have saved us, God would have just sent a manual. That would have spared His Only Son, but He did not send a manual! The path of Christ winds toward the disenfranchised, the lonely, the broken, and even to the broken who don’t know they are broken.
In Christ’s presence, men knew they could be honest with their struggles and wrestle publicly with their pain. He was safe, and He still is! His true followers and His true church should be, also. Although it is not always the case, it is God’s plan that His children reflect His character.
Being a safe person means that you are willing to walk all the way through to the other side of healing in someone’s life. It is more than being a doorman or a valet in a hospital. It is looking into someone’s heart and loving the person who God created them to be, not looking at them with a view toward rearranging their wardrobe.
How do you get there? Don’t look for a course to take, just be in love with Jesus. Dance to the melody of His grace in your life right now. Do not shy away from your personal pain or private sin battles; walk through them, trusting that, if you need one, He will send a safe person to enter your life. Remember how they treated you, and how you felt around them. Do the same thing when your time comes to be a safe person for someone who wanders, with God’s direction into your life. There is music there and notes to be sung that you never imagined you could sing…and “in-tune” at that!
My definition of a safe person is an individual who can see and listen to your pain without passing judgment. They don’t offer trite recipes for “the fix you need,” and they trust the work of the Holy Spirit in your life. That’s a friend…a real friend. Does that mean they will always agree with you or justify your sinful choices? Of course not! As “truth speakers,” they know “when,” “how” and in “what tone” to speak truth to you.
A safe person is one who is well acquainted with grace, but not solely in an academic way. Their intimacy with the theological concept is from personal experience and not just a mental acceptance of the dry definition, “God’s unmerited favor.” Because they have been down a path of pain themselves, they have personally sensed God’s powerful touch of healing, and they haven’t forgotten the experience. They still bask in the warmth of being truly cared about by a sovereign, yet personal Lord. A safe person is a rare gift in your life, who you should never take for granted. They came into your life when the whole world rushed out like a pre-tsunami tide.
The big question today is this: Are you a safe person? Do you have the right words for someone? Standing on fundamental, biblical truth is helpful, but information alone doesn’t give a person the “diploma of safeness.” If information alone could have saved us, God would have just sent a manual. That would have spared His Only Son, but He did not send a manual! The path of Christ winds toward the disenfranchised, the lonely, the broken, and even to the broken who don’t know they are broken.
In Christ’s presence, men knew they could be honest with their struggles and wrestle publicly with their pain. He was safe, and He still is! His true followers and His true church should be, also. Although it is not always the case, it is God’s plan that His children reflect His character.
Being a safe person means that you are willing to walk all the way through to the other side of healing in someone’s life. It is more than being a doorman or a valet in a hospital. It is looking into someone’s heart and loving the person who God created them to be, not looking at them with a view toward rearranging their wardrobe.
How do you get there? Don’t look for a course to take, just be in love with Jesus. Dance to the melody of His grace in your life right now. Do not shy away from your personal pain or private sin battles; walk through them, trusting that, if you need one, He will send a safe person to enter your life. Remember how they treated you, and how you felt around them. Do the same thing when your time comes to be a safe person for someone who wanders, with God’s direction into your life. There is music there and notes to be sung that you never imagined you could sing…and “in-tune” at that!
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