Every Christian is meant to experience God.  The book of 1 John speaks to ways we experience Him.  In my last two blogs, we saw that one way we experience Him is that we have a new relationship with sin.  In chapter two we see we achieve stability as a ship at anchor is stabilized.  John doesn’t use the term “anchor” in 1 John 2, but the Christian life is certainly described here as anchored.

             Notice all the affirmative statements in 2:12-14.  “Your sins are forgiven.”  “You know Him.”  “You have already overcome the evil one.”  “You are strong.”  “The Word of God abides in you.”  Anchored, solid, and stable.  What a contrast to the hyper spirituality of the heresy of Gnosticism which said you need to know more and more and be more and more pure but could never tell them how much more of either.  For them the carrot of God’s love and approval was always within reach but never in the mule’s mouth.  For the Christian, God in His grace hands the carrot to His people.

             The promise of stability is a wonderful promise in a world as unstable as ours.  I hope you are growing in being anchored, but I warn you.  Unless you get anchored rightly, when things in your world get better, the anchor of Christ can start to feel like a ball and chain.  Remember, rightly anchored doesn’t mean just staying in the same place all the time.  It means you are willingly connected to Christ by faith and surrender and are being drawn to Him by the work of the Holy Spirit.  If this is not the nature of your anchoring, it may not feel like a blessing to you the way it should.

 Anchored Rightly…and NOT

             The worst possible way to be anchored is when you are rowing like crazy in another direction.  When we are dishonest, immoral, or drugged, yet we have honestly accepted Christ as our Savior, His Spirit, Word, and church are annoyances to us.  They’re more like a dog barking when we’re trying to sleep.  The problem for you is God is always right.  If you ever get right with God, you’ll be glad He didn’t say, “Oh, it’s ok.  You go ahead.  I understand.” 

             Another unhelpful way to be anchored is when Christ is like a heavy weight on the bottom that keeps you from going anywhere.  This keeps you from harm but also keeps you from growing and having any Christian dynamic about your life.  This, unfortunately, is what too often passes for Biblical Christianity.  It feels stable to us but looks stuck to others and to God.  The old song, “I Will Not Be Moved” meant I will not be shifting constantly.  It did not mean I will not change as God leads me.

             Christ, our anchor, functions in our lives like the ancient anchor post.  These were found at the ends of piers in the ancient world.  A rope passing through the anchor post was fastened to a ship so that it both kept the ship from danger and thereby made it stable but also drew it home, changing its position.  Our lives are designed to be both stable and changing.  What a reassuring and excitingly dynamic relationship with the Lord this proves to be.  In the next blog please look for anchors that are available to us that produce both stability and dynamic.