The Beach Ball Brigade

Summer time and the swimming is easy. I can remember that if I ever saw a calm, undisturbed swimming pool it was like a vacuum, something to be abhorred. Summer, swimming pools, and beach balls. They go together like love and marriage. Who hasn't taken a beach ball into a swimming pool for unrestrained throwing, the harder, the better?

Beach balls have another pool use - they create deep within us a desire to try to keep them under water. Who hasn't put a beach ball under water and tried to stand on it, with a balancing act like some aquatic acrobat? Stand on it, sit on it, or try to hold a beach ball in a state of permanent baptism and you soon discover a truism: water abhors a beach ball and will always throw it back in your face. We can't keep it under. We can try, but it's one of those mission impossibles, like putting toothpaste back in the tube or striking a match on a wet cake of soap.

We all have our own personal beach ball, one outside the water, and the thing is, we try to keep it a secret. The reason we try to keep it secret is because our beach ball isn't pretty like the colored ones poolside. Our personal beach ball is dark, even stygian. We try to keep it submerged, but we can't, it's always there. If it's not hitting us in the face, it's always trying to push its way to the surface, and sometimes when it does, it hits others in the face.

Let's face it - there are no heroes. We yearn for them, but they only exist in the old-time celluloid westerns. When Isaiah looked in the mirror, he didn't see a hero, he saw of man "of unclean lips." When Abraham saw his reflection, he saw a liar whose calculated lies put his wife in danger twice. When Isaac last looked in the glass, he saw a rebel against God's covenant, a rebel with a cause-Esau. If someone had taken a Polaroid of Jacob, out would have come a portrait of a con man who schemed his way through most of his energy-of-the- flesh life.

There are no heroes. Each has his own sin nature (Ephesians 2) which, although he tries to keep it submerged, zooms to the surface at speeds that would surprise Chuck Yeager.

David? Solomon? Both card-carrying members of the beach ball brigade. Paul? He called himself the president of the beach ball brigade (I Timothy 1:15). Peter? No. Peter's beach ball careened to the surface when he refused to eat with the gentiles because he was scared, thus putting himself back under the Mosaic Law which God had told him was gone (Acts 10 and Galatians 2:11-14). John? John said it plainly: "We are all members of the beach ball brigade and if we say we're not members, we're deceiving ourselves and making God a liar" (I John 1:8). It's important to note that John wrote that to Christians and about Christians, himself included. Such a statement leaves us no room to maneuver.

So we can (and maybe should) say every so often, "I'm not perfect; I sin regularly." Once we realize that, we take a great deal of pressure off ourselves and others. Such knowledge puts a stake through the heart of perfectionism. We're not perfect and we're not going to be this side of glory. The pressure is off because we can stop trying to become the perfect person and have the perfect family; they've all got their beach balls too.

We can stop trying to find the perfect friend and the perfect mate, and we can stop hoping for the perfect relatives. We can stop trying to find the perfect organization and the perfect plan, and stop agonizing over not living the perfect life when our beach balls start zooming to the surface. We can stop trying to nag our kids into perfection, thus saving wear and tear on them and us. We can stop looking for the perfect political candidate; he hasn't ever existed east of Eden.

There are no heroes. Except One. The One who came into the human race with no beach ball. The One who dared His enemies to find just one sin in His life and not one could, although they would have loved to have done so.

It's this One who loved the beach ball brigade and died for it. The great thing is, when any member of the beach ball brigade relies on Jesus for the forgiveness of sin and for eternal life, that member gets something free - he gets the righteousness of Jesus credited to his account, so that when God looks at him, He doesn't see a card-carrying member of the beach ball brigade, He sees the righteousness of Christ (Romans 3:21-22,28; 5:17; Galatians 2:16). Even though the believer continues to have his beach ball, God still sees the righteousness of Christ.

Christ's righteousness for those who aren't perfect and who (still) sin regularly. What do we call that? Grace! Grace to the beach ball brigade!

Dr. Mike Halsey, Pastor

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