TOPIC: Change, Growth, Integrity
REFERENCES: 2 Samuel 11:2-4 (NIV), Psalm 51:7-10 (MSG)
SERIES: It's A Brand New Year, Is It The Same Old You? | Part 3 of 6

SUMMARY
A woman brought her son to see Gandhi because he was eating too much sugar. And despite her vigilance, the boy could not seem to give up eating sugar, even though it was bad for him. And so the woman asked Gandhi if he would speak with the boy about his problem. Gandhi replied, “No, but bring him back in a week.” And so in a week the woman returned and once again petitioned Gandhi to speak with her son about his rather bad habit of eating too much sugar. Gandhi welcomed the boy and had a discussion with him about giving up sugar. The boy seemed affected by Gandhi’s advice and the woman thanked him deeply. As she turned to leave she asked him one final question, “Why did you see him today and not last week?” And Gandhi replied, “Because last week I was eating sugar.”

In any area of life you cannot lead someone where you’ve never been. And to try to do so is not living a life of integrity, of transparency. Transparency means owning your own story, not pretending to be someone else and not spinning your story to be smarter than you are or dumber than you are, poorer than you are, richer than you are, better than you are or worse than you are. Integrity is owning the story God has given us to write.

In this sermon, we will walk through some of the chapters of our stories:

Chapter 1 - We own the hand we’ve been dealt
We have not all been born with an equal set of gifts, talents, or opportunities. Integrity begins with owning the hand that we’ve been dealt.

Chapter 2 - We own our wounds
Somewhere in our story, we are bound to get hurt. Most of us are wounded forever and to disown our wound is to be untrue to ourselves. The wounds can be forgiven, and you can move past them, but the scars remain.

Chapter 3 - We own our dark side
If we are going to write an honest story, we have to factor in the dark side. Don’t pretend we don’t have that chapter. When we own our dark side we free ourselves from the constant energy drain of trying to be someone that we are not. It is enormously tiring to divert all the energy from living to pretending to live.

Chapter 4 - We own our commitments
When we start new chapters of our story we do so by making significant commitments. Our commitments define us.

MY COMMENTS
This sermon always has a way of getting under my skin. It forces me to take a close look at my own life, to self-examine my actions and to ask myself the tough questions. Am I leading a life of integrity, of transparency? Am I owning my own story or pretending to be someone else? Am I stuck in a chapter of unforgiveness? self-denial? These are some of the questions that each one of us will have to answer for ourselves. And once we do so with honesty, we will be able to make a commitment to a new life and begin a new chapter, a new journey of faith.