Don’t Be Half-Baked!
Aug 6, 2018 4041
Don’t be half-baked!
Before my marriage, my prospective mother-in-law and sister-in-law came from overseas. Not only were they going to be at the wedding, but I knew that they were here to check me out as well. I had to be on my best behaviour and make a good impression!
So, I decided to make them pizza, from scratch, in front of them, so they could see my culinary skills up close and personal. But I wanted to impress them so much that I over-loaded the pizza with topping, and the dough never cooked. I know it’s hard to make inedible pizza, but I achieved that day! And I was so very embarrassed to have served that half-baked pizza!
One of the reasons many people reject Jesus Christ is because there’s too many half-baked Christians running around. Half-baked Christians can be the most dangerous sort of Christians.
In ancient times, flat breads were baked by placing them in the fire. first on one side, and then the “cake” was turned to cook the other side. Some Christians are like these half-baked cakes, unbalanced in their religious experience. Something similar happened to the people of Ephraim in the Old Testament. God said of them,
Ephraim compromises with the nations; he’s a half-baked cake (Hosea 7:8, ISV).
You must let the grace of God touch every part of you. Some Christians allow the grace of God to touch only some parts of their lives, and only some of their activities, relationships and thoughts. On one side of their lives, they are zealous for God to the extent of being judgmental and harsh toward others; that’s the side where they are overdone and burnt. On the other side of their lives, these people live as if they knew not the love and the grace of God at all, without true Christian principles; this is the side where they are underdone and uncooked. They’re half-baked.
Half-baked Christians can be the most dangerous sort of Christians.
However, our surrender to Christ must be complete. All rebellion must be driven out of our lives. You cannot have the appearance of holiness in one part of our lives, while we let sin reign in another.
Sadly, the appearance of self-righteous holiness often goes hand in hand with the total absence of true godliness. I have known such people professed Christians who have been burnt black with bigoted zeal in one side of their religious experience, but who are raw and untouched by true religion on the other.
A cake is not cooked until it all cooked through. Sometimes it is good to let the burnt side of our religion cool a little while we learn about our own weakness and lack of the fire of God’s grace in other parts of our lives.
Very often, half-baked Christians are those who, while professing great zeal for one aspect of the truth or another, are ungracious and unkind in their homes, and to others. If this is true of you, then your prayer should be,
O Lord, turn me in the fire of your love!
– Eliezer Gonzalez (Inspired by Charles Spurgeon)
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