You Are What You Are, and You Aint What You Aint



Hyacinth Bucket:  Keeping up
 Appearances



Thomas finishes Chapter 6 with a reminder:  You are what you are, and you aint what you aint (there's a great John Prine song there, have a listen...."Dear Abby")!  In other words, as your conscience is pure, you are at peace.  And you can't be more than what the Lord has gifted you to be - and it's okay to be content with that station in life and in skill.  Keeping up appearances is vain and a waste of time.  Just ask Mrs. Bucket (pronounced boo-kay).

God asks us to walk with Him.  What else matters?

Until next time, be imitators of Christ! (not Mrs. Bucket!)

3. A disciple will easily be contented and filled with peace, whose conscience is pure. You are none the holier if you are praised, nor the worse if you are reproached.  You are what you are; and you cannot be better than God pronounces you to be.

If you consider well what you are inwardly, you will not care what others will say to you. Men look to the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart (1 Sam 16:7). Man considers on the action, but God considers the intention.

It is the token of an humble spirit always to do well, and to set little account by one’s self. To refuse comfort from any created thing is a sign of great purity and inward faithfulness.

4. The disciple that seeks no outward witness, shows plainly that commitment wholly to God. “For not he that commends himself is approved,” as St. Paul says, “but whom the Lord commends.”(2 Cor. 10:18)  To walk with God, and not to be held by any outer affections, is the state of a disciple of Christ (Mi. 6:8).