Ever just experienced so much relief when you just got it all out there? When All the secrets, all the failures, all the hidden thoughts, all the unspoken tension and frustration were out in the open? Did you just feel better when you laid all the cards out on the table? I don’t want to diminish the risk; of course, there is fear that grips you as you face this jeopardizing admission or exposure. But there is something to be said when you find out the worst that could have happened did not happen. And the worst you thought could have happened, did happen. But it didn’t quite devastate you the way you feared that it would. What’s that you say? How do I know it didn’t devastate you? Well, because you’re still here!
If you recall R.Kelly’s Trapped in the Closet Series, well, this is Caught in the Act: a series of thoughts on the beauty of shameful exposure!
John 8:3-4 The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery and “placing her in the midst”, they said to him, “Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery.”
First of all, Jesus was teaching in the temple and here goes your church friends on some completely irrelevant stuff: tattlin’ on you to the preacher, to the church folk. Now if you would sit down and let the WORD do His work, it probably wouldn’t be a need for your secret intelligence. Check it out:
1Corinthians 4:5So don’t make judgments about anyone ahead of time—before the Lord returns. For he will bring our darkest secrets to light and will reveal our private motives. Proverbs 20:27 The spirit of man is the lamp of the LORD, searching all his innermost parts. 1Corinthians 14:24-25But if all of you are prophesying, and unbelievers or people who don’t understand these things come into your meeting…as they listen, their secret thoughts will be exposed, and they will fall to their knees and worship God, declaring, “God is truly here among you.” So we really don’t need the C(hurch)IA on the job if you make sure that: THE WORD is penetrating, the Spirit of a man is edified and engaged, and activate prophetic anointing through worship and in operation in all the saints—>Ain’t too much to tell that I won’t tell on my own!
But imagine this: Church leaders distracting the WORD with issues and rumors of humanity rather than illuminating the DIVINE! And by the way Rev. Mother Sister Deacon Brother Pastor Bishop if she was caught IN THE ACT, clearly you must have been right there in the ACT with her. I was joking with a friend and said: Only a lie can tell a lie; the truth can’t tell a lie. That’s why I believe 1Corinthians 13 says the LOVE believes all things and hopes for all things. It’s not that God is gullible, it’s just that He has so much confidence and trust in the power of love and who has designed you to be that He believes for all things to work together (knowing that all things work together for the good to them that LOVE the Lord and are called according to His purpose); so He doesn’t worry and bug out when you’re in the act. BUT, I digress. The point is if you caught her in the act, then you were at the scene of the crime which makes you a SUSPECT too!
It’s so beautiful that having been caught in the act by these purveyors of ill-will places this woman in the best possible place of her life: IN THE MIDST of Christ. In the midst of the sanctuary. In the midst of the community of believers and worshippers who should affirm her worth among them rather than side with evil reporters. In the midst of Jesus, the Living Word, in the midst of compassion and a love so strong that it compels NEW CREATION.
Your indiscretion, your hallmark of shame, the thing you have been caught in the act of saying, thinking, doing, avoiding has the potential to PLACE you in the same space for transformation which is: In the company and full attention and presence of God. The downside of getting caught is the embarrassment before men; the upside of getting caught is the GREAT ATTENTION and AUDIENCE you find before Mercy! It’s the best thing that could have ever happened to her and to me…
Join me for the next blog entry of Caught in the Act @ corydbradley.com
Outstanding!
Thanks bro!! From the core of my life.
C Bradley, thanks again for a greater reavelation of what bieng “Caught in the Act” really is.. But LOVE abounds even more…..
Ray! Thanks so much for your comment and for sharing this space with me!
Wow Cory this is great. I will be sharing this link on my Twitter and Facebook networks. Everyone needs to read this! Thanks for continuing to be a vessel that God can speak through.
This really answered my problem, thank you!
Throughout the awesome smeche of things you actually receive a B+ for effort and hard work. Where exactly you actually lost everybody was on all the particulars. You know, it is said, details make or break the argument.. And it couldn’t be more correct in this article. Having said that, let me inform you what exactly did give good results. The writing is definitely highly persuasive and this is probably the reason why I am taking an effort in order to opine. I do not make it a regular habit of doing that. 2nd, while I can certainly notice a leaps in logic you come up with, I am not confident of how you appear to connect your ideas which help to make the final result. For now I shall yield to your point but hope in the future you connect your dots better.