GRACE SO AMAZING…4/4/08
by SteveIt’s amazing to me how often I hear from folks who are upset about God’s grace! Some folks seem to think that I make it “too available,” or too easy to obtain. I wonder if they ever read Jesus’ parable of the workers who were hired at different times of the day, but were all paid exactly the same wage. I wonder if they have ever read Jesus’ story about the two men who went up to the Temple to pray, only one leaving “justified,” the one who just knew that he was a sinner. I wonder if they ever read the story of the Good Samaritan, the heretic Jesus used as an example of what it means to follow his way. I wonder if they ever read the story of the prodigal son, really a story about the amazing grace of the Father toward a totally undeserving punk. How can you read those and miss the point?
I don’t know any way to interpret these stories except to say that God’s grace toward us does not depend on us. Some folks don’t like that, usually because they feel they have “worked” to achieve God’s favor, and that everyone else should do the same. So they get angry, and mean. It’s part of our “eye for an eye” mentality that is so deeply rooted in many of us that it is extremely hard to overcome. We want to see folks get what’s coming to them, what they deserve, an attitude bearing no resemblance to that of Jesus.
One of my professors at Duke said it best: There is NOTHING you have to do. There is nothing YOU have to do. There is nothing you have to DO. If we don’t understand that, we don’t understand the God revealed in Jesus. But even if we don’t, there is still grace, undeserved, unmerited, unexpected…even for those of us under the delusion that we deserve it.
RSS
Often it comes down to how symbols, or fashion – how something _looks_. Too many people wear a cross because it’s fashionable, or come to church on Sunday morning because it looks good, or call themselves a Christian as a symbol of superiority – ‘my God’s better than your God’. How many thousands attend a Christian service every week and *never* consider the cross, that ever-present symbol, as the torturous instrument of execution it really is? How many others wrap themselves in the mantle of Christianity, look down their noses at anyone who is not a member of _their_ church, and say “…I’ve been Saved, have you?” How many politicians make a point of publicizing the church they attend, and how many voters expect a declaration of faith? When was the last time any media person pointed out the reality that *anyone* can call themselves Christian, and several organized groups do so with barely any attention to what it actually means? To tie in to yesterday’s lesson, this is what so many miss in the Gospel’s, in the crucifixion – Jesus went to the cross hearing ‘as you love me’. He did not raise his fist – and an army – against Rome, as so many imagined he would. He did not take any of the paths offered, away from his own horrible death. He walked, beaten and humiliated, to the suffering and death of the cross, with “as you love me” guiding every step. If we could only understand…
‘Christian’ is not a title. It’s not a weapon to use against others. Being one doesn’t grant any privilege, or make you a member of ‘the club’. In all reality, we should never have to speak it. Our actions, how we live our lives, should demonstrate to any who care to look that we follow the way of Jesus, and hear the call of “as you love me”. Then, when we stumble, when we lose sight of that goal, when despair, or self-pity, or arrogance and self-importance come to rule our lives – and they will – then we can find our way back, hear the whisper of those words again in our own ears, and know that we hear it through God’s grace, God’s unfailing love, and find the strength to carry that love forward, no matter the cost, by loving all people, even those undeserving.
Bj
Nicely said, Berry. I think the acid test of one’s faith is a simple one. We should ask ourselves, Am I a more compassionate, caring person than I was before? Has my faith expanded or narrowed my perspective and judgments? Those who have become more caring and had their perspective expanded,are doing it right.