Too Much Makeup or Too Little Grace?

Another Good Post from Stuff Christians Like Blog:

I know how much makeup God wants ladies to wear.

I know, pretty special right? I should really get some PR buzz out of this one. Actually, I didn’t come to the planet with that knowledge. I arrived with the ability to throw Frisbee with either hand and a unibrow that just won’t quit, but the makeup tip is something I learned fairly recently.

A friend told me actually. She’s one of those smart, sassy southern grandmothers who just says what’s on her heart, all the time. And she did at dinner one night with her new pastor.

Dining with he and his wife, she had a casual conversation about God. The pastor however, pulled out a list of his rules when it comes to faith. One of them was about how ladies shouldn’t wear makeup. My friend listened patiently, looked at the pastor’s wife and then replied, “I hear your makeup rule, but here’s the thing. Your wife wears makeup, it’s just a natural shade and lighter than mine. So at this point, we’re not arguing about faith, we’re detailing pigmentation. You don’t believe makeup is sinful, just certain types of pigmentation.”

She makes a compelling argument and I think it’s one that applies to more than just makeup. I think all too often we Christians manufacture “new sins.” We add verses and chapters to the Bible of our own creation. We edit and get wrapped up in really small things in the name of faith.

Why?

I think we’re terrified of grace.

I think we’re frustrated by grace.

I think we’re confused by grace.

It’s unlike anything else we’ve ever experienced. Grace doesn’t play by our rules and we get really mad that we can’t control it. We want to categorize it or box it up and squeeze it into a formula. But we can’t. It’s too big and messy and raw and uncontrollable, so we do what we always do when faced by things that feel out of our power, we clean our rooms.

Like a college student who on the night before a final finds a million reasons to clean their dorm room instead of studying, we clean our metaphorical rooms. We avoid writing the big paper and wrestling with grace by worrying about makeup and dancing and a million little other things that make our faith seem really little and manageable.

But grace cannot be managed.

I wish it could because things would on the surface feel easier but it can’t.

And I wish I could tell you which little things mattered and which were insignificant, but I can’t. But what I can tell you might matter more.

We don’t serve a confusing God who makes us climb mountaintops or tunnel through the crust of the earth to figure out scraps of what matters most. He comes right out with it. In Matthew 22, a Pharisee asks Jesus what the greatest commandment is. Here is what Jesus says:

“‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

I forget that sometimes. I do. I get tangled up in things that are small because sometimes I have a very small ability to handle grace. But the more time I spend with God, the less I think makeup matters.

The more I realize it’s all about grace.

We are Adopted (Just Like Addie)

Ephesians (3:14-21):

For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.

From Eugene Peterson’s new book, Practice Resurrection,

Two friends, Fred and Cheryl, went to Haiti twenty-five years ago to pick up a child they had adopted. Addie was five years old. Her parents had been killed in a traffic accident that left her without a family. As she walked across the tarmac to board the plane, the tiny orphan reached up and slipped her hands into the hands of her new parents whom she had just met. Later they told us of this “birth” moment, how the innocent, fearless trust expressed in that physical act of grasping their hands seemed almost as miraculous as the times their two sons slipped out of the birth canal 15 and 13 years earlier.

That evening, back home in Arizona, they sat down to their first supper together with their new daughter. There was a platter of pork chops and a bowl of mashed potatoes on the table. After the first serving, the two teenage boys kept refilling their plates. Soon the pork chops had disappeared and the potatoes were gone. Addie had never seen so much food on one table in her whole life. Her eyes were big as she watched her new brothers, Thatcher and Graham, satisfy their ravenous teenage appetites.

Fred and Cheryl noticed that Addie had become very quiet and realized that something was wrong—agitation…bewilderment…insecurity? Cheryl guessed that it was the disappearing food. She suspected that because Addie had grown up hungry, when food was gone from the table she might be thinking would be a day or more before there was more to eat. Cheryl had guessed right. She took Addie’s hand and led her to the bread drawer and pulled it out, showing her a back-up of three loaves. She took her to the refrigerator, opened the door, and showed her the bottles of milk and orange juice, the fresh vegetables, jars of jelly and jam and peanut butter, a carton of eggs, and a package of bacon. She took her to the pantry with its bins of potatoes, onions, and squash, and the shelves of canned goods—tomatoes and peaches and pickles. She opened the freezer and showed Addie three or four chickens, a few packages of fish, and two cartons of ice cream. All the time she was reassuring Addie that there was lots of food in the house, that no matter how much Thatcher and Graham ate and how fast they ate it, there was a lot more where that came from, she would never go hungry again.

Cheryl didn’t just tell her that she would never go hungry again. She showed her what was in those drawers and behind those doors, named the meats and vegetables, placed them in her hands. It was enough. Food was there, whether she could see it or not. Her brothers were no longer rivals at the table. She was home. She would never go hungry again.

My wife and I were told that story twenty-five years ago. Ever since, whenever I read and pray this prayer of Paul’s [Eph 3:14-21], I think of Cheryl gently leading Addie by the hand through a food tour of the kitchen and pantry, reassuring her of the “boundless riches” (Eph 3:8) and “all the fullness” (3:19) inherent in the household in which she now lives.

Practicing the Resurrection, pp. 159-160

Quote of the week - C.S. Lewis (Mere Fleabites)

Quote by C.S. Lewis:

There is one vice of which no man in the world is free; which every one in the world loathes when he sees it in someone else; and of which hardly any people, except Christians, ever imagine that they are guilty themselves. I have heard people admit that they are bad-tempered, or that they cannot keep their heads about girls or drink, or even that they are cowards. I do not think I have ever heard anyone who was not a Christian accuse himself of this vice. And at the same time I have very seldom met anyone, who was not a Christian, who showed the slightest mercy to it in others. There is no fault which makes a man more unpopular, and no fault which we are more unconscious of in ourselves. And the more we have it ourselves, the more we dislike it in others.

The vice I am talking of is Pride or Self-Conceit: and the virtue opposite to it, in Christian morals, is called Humility. You may remember, when I was talking about sexual morality, I warned you that the centre of Christian morals did not lie there. Well, now, we have come to the centre. According to Christian teachers, the essential vice, the utmost evil, is Pride. Unchastity, anger, greed, drunkenness, and all that, are mere fleabites in comparison: it was through Pride that the devil became the devil: Pride leads to every other vice: it is the complete anti-God state of mind.

Because Grace is Scandalous.

By Jon Acuff at Stuff Christians Like Blog.

A few weeks ago, someone emailed me a question about you.

That’s right, it was about you. Readers, folks who comment, people who peruse the halls of Stuff Christians Like. And it was nice to have a question that wasn’t about me. I get those sometimes. A person once asked me, “Do you have a theologian read what you write on your site before you post it?” I want to be honest, with over half a million words on the site, that would be one generous theologian. So I replied with, “Yes, I have a small theologian who lives in a closet under the stairs. He eats cracklin’ oat bran exclusively and reads everything I write.” OK, I didn’t respond that way. I told him I could see doing that with some Serious Wednesday posts. But that’s not the point. The point is that someone had a question about you. What was it? Here is an excerpt of what they asked:

“Have you ever noticed that frequently your comment section can go a little too far with the whole “Christians are covered by grace” thing? I’ve noticed that quite a few SCL commenters seem to see grace as a license to sin.”

Essentially the question they were asking is simple, “Do you feel like some people take grace too far?” I wrote them back and let them know I would address their really well written email on the site.

Here’s what I think:

I believe we risk a great danger when we try to say that people “go a little too far with the whole ‘Christians are covered by grace’ thing.” And the danger is simply that we downsize grace.

We establish a limit to grace and God’s love. We start to draw boundary lines on grace and it’s not the first time we’ve seen this kind of thing happen.

There was a guy in the Bible who was the worst. He was such a failure. He lied once and got an entire village murdered as a result. A priest and his family were killed because of his lies. He committed adultery. He cheated. He trusted in his own strength instead of the Lord’s. And when he did, when he failed, thousands and thousands of people died as a result. His family suffered from incest and murder and his hands were so covered with wrongfully shed blood that eventually God wouldn’t let him do something really important.

Now imagine if that person was a commenter on Stuff Christians Like. Imagine if they confessed to homicide and adultery and a laundry list of other sins. I mean there have been some crazy comments on this site, but no one has ever said, “I saw this girl online and thought she was really hot, so I slept with her, got her pregnant and then arranged on craigslist for her husband to be killed.” But this guy, the guy in the Bible, he could have left that comment. And if he did, would you or me or the writer of that email instantly think, “He didn’t take grace too far?” No, we’d be horrified. We’d be terrified.

So how is he referred to in the Bible? Here is what God says about him:

“I have found David son of Jesse a man after my own heart,”

What? Are you kidding God? David, the murderer? The adulterer? That can’t be right.

Surely David himself knows what a mess he’s made. Aren’t we all our worst critics? David knows that there is blood on his hands. How does he describe himself in Psalm 26?

“Vindicate me, O LORD, for I have led a blameless life; I have trusted in the LORD without wavering.”

No. No. No. David hasn’t led a blameless life. He hasn’t trusted in the Lord without wavering. He ran away and got people killed by trying to cover up his tracks when he was afraid. How can David say these things? How can God say these things?

Because grace is scandalous.

Grace does not make sense to our tiny human brains. We can’t control it. We can’t draw boundaries and borders on it. And when we try I think it breaks God’s heart.

I think we insult the cross when we act as if we can “out sin” it.

I think we wound our father when we think we can “out filth” his love.

I think we hurt our Christ when we believe that we have found the end of his grace.

I know, I know, I know that it is possible to mistreat the Lord. To blasphemy his name with our actions and our attitudes. David certainly did and he paid the consequences. I don’t think we get discipline or grace. I think we get both. I think discipline is a by product of grace and in my own life I have received large amounts of it.

But above that, I think God understood the grand risk when he offered us grace. A book called “True Faced” called it the New Testament Gamble. I think God knew the risk that we’d misunderstand grace and try to take advantage of it. I think he knew we’d try to find the limits of it with our sinfulness. Which is why he made it limitless, which is why he made grace infinite and never ending.

I don’t know what you’ve done. I don’t know your life or the bumps or bruises. Maybe you actually have murdered more people than David. I don’t know. But I do know, as many readers pointed out on this post, we serve a God who accepts our repentance and confession. We serve a God who when offered a chance to reveal himself to Moses, chose one thing to show, the most important thing, his goodness.

We serve a God who “rises to show us compassion.”

A God who delights in you.

A God who sent his son to the cross not to show the end of his grace, but rather the beginning.

My Dog Sometimes Agrees With Me

By Ray Ortlund:

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.” Proverbs 3:5

How can I tell if my trust in the Lord is wholehearted? One way is this. Do I let the Bible overrule my own thinking? It says, “Do not lean on your own understanding.” So, do I agree with the Bible, or do I obey the Bible? My dog sometimes agrees with me, but she never obeys me. If I merely agree with the Bible, then my positive response to it is not obedience but coincidence. The Bible just happens to line up with the prejudices I’ve soaked up from my culture. But what do I do when the Bible contradicts what I want to be true? If I’m looking in the Bible for excuses for what I want anyway, my heart has already drifted from the Lord. But if I trust him wholeheartedly, I will let the Bible challenge my most cherished thoughts and feelings.

The wonderful thing is, the Lord loves to be consulted. He cares about my questions and problems, and yours. He wants to speak into our lives in ways that really help. Okay.

John Mark McMillan | Death In His Grave

Though the Earth Cried out for blood
Satisfied her hunger was
Her billows calmed on raging seas
for the souls on men she craved

Sun and moon from balcony
Turned their head in disbelief
Their precious Love would taste the sting
disfigured and disdained

On Friday a thief
On Sunday a King
Laid down in grief
But awoke with keys
Of Hell on that day
The first born of the slain
The Man Jesus Christ
Laid death in his grave

So three days in darkness slept
The Morning Sun of righteousness
But rose to shame the throes of death
And over turn his rule

Now daughters and the sons of men
Would pay not their dues again
The debt of blood they owed was rent
When the day rolled a new

On Friday a thief
On Sunday a King
Laid down in grief
But awoke holding keys
To Hell on that day
The first born of the slain
The Man Jesus Christ
Laid death in his grave

On Friday a thief
On Sunday a King
Laid down in grief
But awoke with keys
Of Hell on that day
The first born of the slain
The Man Jesus Christ
Laid death in his grave

He has cheated
Hell and seated
Us above the fall
In desperate places
He paid our wages
One time once and for all

Quote of the Week - Spurgeon

“The glory of salvation is that whoever believes in the Lord Jesus is completely pardoned. It is not some of his sin that is put away, but all of it. I rejoice to look upon it ...

We are plunged into the fountain of redeeming blood and cleansed from every fear of ever being found guilty before the living God. We are accepted in the Beloved through the righteousness of Jesus Christ, justified once for all and forever before the Father’s face! Christ said, ‘It is finished,’ and finished it is. And Oh, what a bliss is this — one of the things that may well stagger those who have never heard it before. But let them not reject it because it staggers them but rather let them say, ‘This wonderful system which saves and saves completely, in an instant, simply by looking out of self to Christ, is a system worthy of divine wisdom, for it magnifies the grace of God and meets man’s deepest necessities.’”

C. H. Spurgeon, The Treasury of the New Testament (Grand Rapids, 1950), I:451-45

Jesus could do it; I can’t

Nice quote found by Trevin Wax:

It is no good giving me a play like Hamlet or King Lear, and telling me to write a play like that. Shakespeare could do it; I can’t.

And it is no good showing me a life like the life of Jesus and telling me to live a life like that. Jesus could do it; I can’t.

But if the genius of Shakespeare could come and live in me, then I could write plays like his.

And if the Spirit of Jesus could come and live in me, then I could live a life like his.

- William Temple

Loving Glenn Beck AND Keith Olbermann????

Nice Perspective from Sky McCracken, Methodist Pastor in Kentucky:

As Christians, we are always to wear the face of Christ wherever we go. It sounds good on Sunday mornings and whenever we gather as the Church. I know myself that it is very easy to be the example of Christ when I am wearing a clerical collar and suit.

But from Sunday at noon until the following Sunday at 8 AM - are we still wearing Christ? In this day and age, we are more and more transparent than ever. Our political stances and our Facebook comments are certainly public for all to see. While everyone is entitled to a political opinion and opinions in general, we have to very careful that our political stances and opinions don’t turn others off from the Gospel or our church.

When it comes to politics, I am at best a cynic. That doesn’t mean I can’t tolerate the opinions of others, though. At the end of the day, or at the end of any conversation, I think when there are disagreements among Christians, they have to end it with the words, “We will agree to disagree.” No moral judgments, no denigration. Just a difference of opinion.

Ronald Reagan once said, “Politics is the second oldest profession, but I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first.” It is a humorous quote, but with an element of truth. If we sell out ourselves to political opinions first and the Gospel second, we have told the world where our treasure lies. And the world, especially those who are nominally Christian or new to the faith, is watching us like a child. Do we really want them to think we are a Republican or Democrat first, and a Christian second? That Kentucky basketball is more important than living the Christian faith? That we spend more time playing Farmville or Mafia Wars than we do reading scripture or articles about theology, discipleship, or mission (the Web is full of these things, by the way)? Or that we place more stock in Glenn Beck or Keith Olbermann than we do Jesus Christ?

Don’t get me wrong: politics are important. And no one loves basketball more than I do. I have a Facebook page too. But none of those things are ever important enough to take the place of who Christ is… or to turn others away from Him.

Let’s be careful.
Sky+

The Box Under the Desk

Great Post by by Jon Acuff at Stuff Christians Like Blog. If you haven't visited his site, go now. Hilarious and insightful stuff:

"My first attempts at getting a job in Atlanta were a parade of colorful failures. I sent out dozens of resumes with no response. I flew from Boston one day for the sole purpose of meeting with an executive who ultimately refused to even accept my resume. He wouldn’t take it from me. He literally shot blocked me at breakfast.

And then something incredibly awkward happened.

While living in Massachusetts I would occasionally come down to Atlanta to talk with companies. One afternoon I did that with an ad agency called “Match.” They were super talented and located in a refurbished old building. (In the early 2000s, you were required by law to have exposed brick in your advertising company.)

After talking with my contact, I was taken on a tour and met a guy named Ted. He was a guru. He wasn’t on staff, he was just brought on to deliver ridiculously creative ideas. He taught at one of the local advertising schools and asked to see my portfolio.

That thing was a beast. It took days if not weeks to create and manicure and edit. So I gave it to him and he kind of frowned a little on the inside. It wasn’t a very good portfolio. It was unlikely to win me any jobs in Atlanta but I had killed myself to create it. Ted was concerned, but very generous with his time. He shared some wisdom over an hour and then had an idea.

“Here,” he said, “this is a box of all the really brilliant portfolios we’ve received from job candidates. I want you to sit and go through these to understand how they are different from you.” Then he sat me at someone’s empty desk in the middle of a busy office and I started reviewing the other portfolios.

I felt like such a loser in that moment. Employees kept walking by me and wondering, “Who is this kid?” I was wearing my fanciest clothes and sweating bullets and flipping through page after page of people who were better than me. I had a box full of real writers in front of me and I was a phony. I was a fake. I was never going to be as good as any of them.

I spent an hour doing that. Then I gave the box to the admin. She shoved it under her desk. If the real writers were just a box under a desk, what was I ever going to be? And then I left.

Sometimes, I feel like I’m not a “real Christian” in the same way I felt like I wasn’t a “real writer.” I bump into people who have big, vibrant, 3D faith and mine feels very monotone and vanilla. There’s something about them, something tangible but just out of reach that I can’t express. And my faith feels small and shallow and fake.

In those moments, I want to fix the portfolio of my faith. I want to travel back in time and fix the almost two decades I mortgaged to porn. I want to erase the drug use and the rampant cockiness and fix all the feelings and people I stepped all over.

Have you ever felt like that? In the midst of regret or feeling fake, have you ever wished you could fix things? Do you ever wonder, “what if I hadn’t gotten that divorce?” or “What if I hadn’t taken that job or done that thing, that wrecked all the other things?”

I have, but I realized something recently that is challenging me.

I think satan wants us to think our past is fixable. God wants us to know our past is forgivable.

There’s a world of difference between those two words, fixable and forgivable. One is about human effort and sweat and heartache and staying in the mud. One is about grace and mercy and white snow and sacrifice we can’t imagine.

I don’t know if you’re someone sitting with what feels like a box full of “real Christians” in front of you. Maybe you’ve never struggled with the dynamic of fixable vs. forgivable. The truth is that God can fix anything he wants, but we as small humans can’t go back and fix things perfectly.

But there is something I am starting to believe about our pasts. It’s something I saw in Psalm 103:12. It’s a pretty well known verse. It says, “as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.”

Have you ever thought about why God did that? Why the distance? Why so far away? I think God put our transgressions so far away because he knew if they were close we would be tempted to “fix them.” We would tinker with our pasts. We’d get lost in fixable and forget the truth of forgivable.

They’re far away. They’re separated for a reason. And you can’t fix them. You can apologize and should own the consequences and take responsibility, but the road to sanctification and peace is never paid with the fixed. It’s paid with the forgiven.

You? Me? The fix is in.

We’re forgiven."

All This Makes the World Nervous

From Simple Faith by Charles Swindoll:

God exalts the humble, but the world exalts the proud. God ascribes greatness, not to masters, but to servants. God is impressed, not with noise or size or wealth, but with quiet things . . . things done in secret-the inner motives, the true heart condition. God sends away the arrogant and the rich empty-handed, but He gathers to Himself the lowly, the broken, the prisoner, the prostitute, the repentant. The world honors the handsome and the gifted and the brilliant. God smiles on the crippled, the ones who can't keep up. All this makes the world nervous. p. 36

Saved from What?

From Justin at Gospel Coalition:

As you talk about “salvation” with your kids—or with anyone!—here is a clarifying question: What are we saved from?

In his book Saved from What? R.C. Sproul recounts an encounter he had when teaching theology at Temple University back in the sixties.

On one such day I sought an hour’s solace and quietude from this cacophony in the faculty dining room. I stretched my lunch hour to the limit in order to squeeze out every moment of peace I could enjoy.

As the noon hour ended, I deposited my lunch tray in the bin and began my trek across the plaza to my classroom. I was walking briskly to avoid being late. I was alone, minding my own business. Suddenly, apparently out of nowhere, a gentleman appeared in front of me, blocking my forward progress. He looked me in the eye and asked directly, “Are you saved?”

I wasn’t quite sure how to respond to this intrusion. I uttered in response the first words that came into my mind: “Saved from what?” What I was thinking, but had the grace not to say, was, “I’m certainly not saved from strangers buttonholing me and asking me questions like yours.” But when I said, “Saved from what?” I think the man who stopped me that day was as surprised by my question as I had been by his. He began to stammer and stutter. Obviously he wasn’t quite sure how to respond.

“Saved from what? Well, you know what I mean. You know, do you know Jesus?” Then he tried to give me a brief summary of the gospel.

This serendipitous encounter left an impression on me. I experienced real ambivalence. On the one hand, I was delighted in my soul that someone cared enough about me, even though I was a stranger, to stop me and ask about my salvation. But it was clear that, though this man had a zeal for salvation, he had little understanding of what salvation is. He was using Christian jargon. The words fell from his lips without being processed by his mind. As a result, his words were empty of content. Clearly, the man had a love for Christ and a concern for people. Few Christians have the courage to engage perfect strangers in evangelistic discussion. But sadly, he had little understanding of what he was so zealously trying to communicate.

For a full answer to the question of “saved from what?” you can read Sproul’s book. But here’s the upshot:

We are saved by God, for God, from God.

Isn’t this what Paul is saying in 1 Thessalonians 1:9-10: “You turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.”

This is something I try to keep my eye on when hearing gospel presentations. How is the “problem” being described? Is it merely “broken shalom,” or does it also include the judgment and wrath of God?

Lord, teach me to be generous.

Lord, teach me to be generous.

Teach me to serve you as you deserve;
to give and not to count the cost,
to fight and not to heed the wounds,
to toil and not to seek for rest,
to labor and not to ask for reward,
save that of knowing that I do your will.

- Ignatius, 1491-1556