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In my February 26th sermon in this series, I said that Jesus shows us how we shift our demands of people from believe-behave-belong, to one of belong-believe-behave. In response, one of you wrote the following, which I share with you gladly:

I have another Be-word to add to the list:  becoming.

“Behave” sounds very much like it should be in bold print, followed by “or else” and an exclamation point!  It’s a command.  It may need to move to the end of the line of Be-words, but you know, the last shall be first…..   Behaving will clamor for attention, just like it did to the Pharisees.

“Become” has process built right into it.  Change comes incrementally, over time.  It’s a journey, with all the fits and starts of many journeys.  Update Pilgrim’s Progress to 21st century America, and it will be filled with flat tires and empty gas tanks, speeding tickets and maybe a DUI charge or two, a hurricane or tornado, losing your GPS signal in the desert and ending up in Las Vegas for a few days of prodigal gambling, emptying your precious drinking water into your overheated radiator, and on and on.  All you can do is follow the Son as your compass.  Eventually you will arrive at the City of Angels!  Well, okay, so that’s pushing it.  Analogies, like racehorses, break down when ridden too hard.

But there’s a second, older meaning to “become.”  Do you know the old hymn “Look, you saints, the sight is glorious….”?  The last line of the first verse reads, “Crown him, crown him, crowns become the victor’s brow.”  That stumped me as a child.  How can a crown change into something entirely different?  Until I learned that other older meaning:  crowns are befitting (there’s another Be-word!) for the head of a conqueror.  They make that head more majestic, more regal.

If I say to my friend, “That’s a lovely sweater you’re wearing,” I am commenting on the beauty of the sweater and maybe complimenting her on her good taste.  But if I say, “That sweater is so becoming on you,” the emphasis shifts from the sweater’s beauty to what it does to enhance my friend’s beauty.

Put both meanings in one sentence:  as we become more Christ-like, we become God.  We actually enhance God’s beauty and majesty and grace to those around us when we become more Christ-like!  The emphasis shifts away from us and our good deeds to how God is glorified in them.  What an amazing thought:  we are God’s ornaments!

Prayer: Holy Spirit, enable me to become more like Jesus today, and everyday.

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