Grace v. Entitlement

Click Here for Matthew 20 and the Parable of the Vineyard Workers

The first time I read this parable [of the vineyard owner and his workers], I must admit it struck me as being rampantly unfair. I found myself saying, “But that is not just!” After some reflection, it dawned on me that I was starting at the wrong place. If you and I had earned our way into this world or had received our existence as some sort of entitlement, then there might be validity to such a complaint. But the beginning point of this parable is grace, not entitlement, and the same is true of life as well. Birth is windfall, and life is gift. We were called out of nothing into being in an astonishing act of generosity for which we can claim no right. Once that gift becomes our central focus, it changes forever how we interpret things. If entitlement is our vantage point, we evaluate the particulars of our lives from that perspective. On the other hand, if grace is our starting point, everything begins to appear in a very different light.

       ------From Stories Jesus Still Tells by John Claypool

And Can it Be?

Perfect, Blameless and Without Fault

“One of the most important things to remember in the Christian life is that we must always live in light of who God is, what Jesus has done, and what has happened to us as a result. Usually we tend to define ourselves by our successes or failures, our reputation, our sin, our intelligence, beauty, and abilities (or lack of them). 

Moreover, we often define other people by their weaknesses, failures, and sins. Hence we are quick to gossip and condemn others. 

The good news calls us to view ourselves and other Christians very differently. Jesus now defines who we are. Through Jesus’ work on the cross we have been declared perfect, blameless, and without fault. We have been forgiven and made right with God. We have become the dearly loved children of the living God, and nothing can separate us from his love.”

 

— Neil H. Williams
Living in Light of the Gospel Story

Good Literature?

 

If Christians would really live according to the teachings of Christ, as found in the Bible, all of India would be Christian today. You Christians look after a document containing enough dynamite to blow all civilization to pieces, turn the world upside down, and bring peace to a battle-torn planet. But you treat it as though it is nothing more than a piece of good literature.

       
            -Mahatma Gandhi

In Christ Alone

And as He stands in victory
Sins curse has lost its grip on me
For I am His and He is mine
Bought with the precious blood of Christ

A Prayer for Friends Weighed Down

I love these prayers from: Heavenward by Scotty Smith

 

Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you. 1 Peter 5:7

Dear Jesus, huge snowflakes are gently falling as we meet this morning, covering my yard with a blanket of beauty. It makes me think of the cross and how you’ve washed us whiter than snow by the sacrifice of your blood. Thank you, a million times over. We are completely forgiven and now dressed in the matchless beauty of your righteousness. Nothing will ever separate us from your love. We praise and adore you…you are such a wonderful, merciful, caring Savior.

In light of your great love for us, we bring friends before you today who are weighed down with various burdens and cares. Whether it’s the cold weather or simply the winter blues, it makes no difference, Jesus, there are multiplied stories of duress, stress and struggles all around us. Where else can we go but to you? Hear our prayers for those we love.

We pray for friends dealing with health issues. All along the continuum of common colds to uncommon cancers, we ask you to bring your mercy and healing, Jesus. Whether by the special grace of divine intervention or the common grace of good medicine and health care, it makes no difference. Mete out sufficient grace in each situation. Bring great glory to yourself. Make your presence clearly felt even if your ways cannot be easily discerned.

We pray for friends struggling financially and career-wise. You don’t promise us abundance or surplus, Jesus, but you do promise to meet all our needs. We especially think of friends whose are closer to mental and emotional bankruptcy, than financial collapse. By the power of your resurrection, and for your name’s sake, open doors that seem locked and bolted. From your storehouse of everlasting goodness, bring forth the right provision at the right time. It’s most likely you will use us as a part of the answer to our prayers. May we be generous and gracious in serving our friends.

Lastly, we pray for friends who are burdened relationally. Marriage will always be a center of intense, unrelenting spiritual warfare, for this relationship is meant to tell the story of your great love for your Bride. Pour out your Spirit, Jesus. Humble the proud… bring hope to the despairing… dial down the anger… clarify the issues… supply the right counsel… grant miracles of forbearance, forgiveness and reconciliation.

We ask the same for whole families, longstanding friendships and local churches under the siege of broken relationship and battered trust. Do way beyond what we can ask or imagine, for the only thing that counts is faith expressing itself in love. Help us, Jesus, for your glory and fame. So very Amen, we pray, in your peerless and priceless name.

A Prayer for Friends Weighed Down with Various Burdens is a post from: Heavenward by Scotty Smith

When God Forgets

By Justin Taylor

“Remember not the sins of my youth or my transgressions; according to your steadfast love remember me, for the sake of your goodness, O Lord!”—Psalm 25:7

“Do not remember against us our former iniquities; let your compassion come speedily to meet us, for we are brought very low.”—Psalm 79:8

“I, I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins.”—Isaiah 43:25

“I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”—Jeremiah 31:34

“For I will be merciful toward their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more.”—Hebrews 8:12

“I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more.”—Hebrews 10:17

DO YOU TRUST HIM?

By Max Lucado

I know God knows what’s best.
I know I don’t.
I know he cares.

Such words come easily when the water is calm. But when you’re looking at a wrecked car or a suspicious-looking mole, when war breaks out or thieves break in, do you trust him?

Scripture, from Old Testament to New, from prophets to poets to preachers, renders one unanimous chorus: God directs the affairs of humanity. No leaf falls without God’s knowledge. No dolphin gives birth without his permission. No wave crashes on the shore apart from his calculation. God has never been surprised. Not once.

I am the one who creates the light and makes the darkness. I am the one who sends good times and bad times. I, the Lord, am the one who does these things. (Isa. 45:7)

Some find the thought impossible to accept. One dear woman did. After I shared these ideas in a public setting, she asked to speak with me. Husband at her side, she related the story of her horrible childhood. First abused, then abandoned by her father. Unimaginable and undeserved hurts scar her early memories. Through tear-filled eyes she asked, “Do you mean to tell me God was watching the whole time?”

The question vibrated in the room. I shifted in my chair and answered, “Yes, he was. I don’t know why he allowed your abuse, but I do know this. He loves you and hurts with you.” She didn’t like the answer. But dare we say anything else? Dare we suggest that God dozed off? Abandoned his post? That heaven sees but can’t act? That our Father is kind but not strong, or strong but doesn’t care?

I wish she could have spoken to Joseph. His brothers abused him, selling him into slavery. Was God watching? Yes. And our sovereign God used their rebellious hearts to save a nation from famine and the family of the Messiah from extinction. As Joseph told them, “God turned into good what you meant for evil” (Gen. 50:20).

Best of all would have been a conversation with Jesus himself. He begged God for a different itinerary: a crossless death. From Gethsemane’s garden Christ pleaded for a Plan B. Redemption with no nails. “ ‘Father, if you are willing, please take this cup of suffering away from me. Yet I want your will, not mine.’ Then an angel from heaven appeared and strengthened him” (Luke 22:42–43).

Did God hear the prayer of his Son? Enough to send an angel. Did God spare his Son from death? No. The glory of God outranked the comfort of Christ. So Christ suffered, and God’s grace was displayed and deployed.

Are you called to endure a Gethsemane season? Have you “been granted for Christ’s sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake” (Phil. 1:29 NASB)?

If so, then come thirsty and drink deeply from his lordship. He authors all itineraries. He knows what is best. No struggle will come your way apart from his purpose, presence, and permission. What encouragement this brings! You are never the victim of nature or the prey of fate. Chance is eliminated. You are more than a weather vane whipped about by the winds of fortune. Would God truly abandon you to the whims of drug-crazed thieves, greedy corporate raiders, or evil leaders? Perish the thought!

When you pass through the waters, I will be with you;
And through the rivers, they will not overflow you.
When you walk through the fire, you will not be scorched,
Nor will the flame burn you.
For I am the Lord your God.
(Isa. 43:2–3 NASB)

We live beneath the protective palm of a sovereign King who superintends every circumstance of our lives and delights in doing us good.

Nothing comes your way that has not first passed through the filter of his love.
Learn well the song of sovereignty: I know God knows what’s best. Pray humbly the prayer of trust: “I trust your lordship. I belong to you. Nothing comes to me that hasn’t passed through you.”

A word of caution: the doctrine of sovereignty challenges us. Study it gradually. Don’t share it capriciously. When someone you love faces adversity, don’t insensitively declare, “God is in control.” A cavalier tone can eclipse the right truth. Be careful.

And be encouraged. God’s ways are always right. They may not make sense to us. They may be mysterious, inexplicable, difficult, and even painful. But they are right. “And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them” (Rom. 8:28).

Thou shalt not Play

"For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say, 'He has a demon.' The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and you say, 'Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and "sinners."' But wisdom is proved right by all her children."    

            --Luke 7:33-35 (NIV)  These are Words of Jesus.

Setting aside the scandal caused by His Messianic claims and His reputation as a political firebrand, only two accusations of personal depravity seem to have been brought against Jesus of Nazareth.   First, that He was a Sabbath- breaker.  Secondly, that He was "a gluttonous man and a winebibber, a friend of publicans and sinners" --or (to drawaside the veil of Elizabethan English that makes it all sound so much more respectable) that He ate too heartily, drank too freely, and kept very disreputable company, including grafters of the lowest type and ladies who were no better than they should be. 

For nineteen and a half centuries, the Christian Churches have laboured, not without success, to remove this unfortunate impression made by their Lord and Master.  They have hustled the Magdalens from the Communion-table, founded Total Abstinence Societies in the name of Him who made the water into wine, and added improvements of their own, such as various bans and anathemas upon dancing and theatre-going.  They have transferred the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday, and, feeling that the original commandment "Thou shalt not work" was rather half-hearted, have added to it a new commandment, "Thou shalt not play."   

                

                        -------Dorothy Leigh Sayers (1893-1957)

What do you Seek?

I love this quote...It took me several times to get the fullness of it.  Read...Drink your fill...Enjoy...

“We see that our whole salvation and all its parts are comprehended in Christ. We should therefore take care not to derive the least portion of it from anywhere else. If we seek salvation, we are taught by the very name of Jesus that it is of him. If we seek any other gifts of the Spirit, they will be found in his anointing. If we seek strength, it lies in his dominion; if purity, in his conception; if gentleness, it appears in his birth. For by his birth he was made like us in all respects, that he might learn to feel our pain. If we seek redemption, it lies in his passion; if acquittal, in his condemnation; if remission of the curse, in his cross; if satisfaction, in his sacrifice; if purification, in his blood; if reconciliation, in his descent into hell; if mortification of the flesh, in his tomb; if newness of life, in his resurrection; if immortality, in the same; if inheritance of the Heavenly Kingdom, in his entrance into heaven; if protection, if security, if abundant supply of all blessings, in his Kingdom; if untroubled expectation of judgment, in the power given to him to judge. In short, since rich store of every kind of good abounds in him, let us drink our fill from this fountain, and from no other.”

-- John Calvin, Institutes, 2.16.19.

Earth(quake), Wind and Fire

And behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind tore the mountains and broke in pieces the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire the sound of a low whisper. 1 Kings 19:11-12

“Clarence Macartney told the story about Dr. John Witherspoon . . . a signer of the Declaration of Independence and president of the (then) College of New Jersey. He lived a couple of miles away from the college at Rocky Hill and drove horse and rig each day to his office at the college.

“One day one of his neighbors burst into his office, exclaiming, ‘Dr. Witherspoon, you must join me in giving thanks to God for his extraordinary providence in saving my life, for as I was driving from Rocky Hill the horse ran away and the buggy was smashed to pieces on the rocks, but I escaped unharmed!’

“Witherspoon replied, ‘Why, I can tell you a far more remarkable providence than that. I have drive over that road hundreds of times. My horse never ran away, my buggy never was smashed, I was never hurt.’

“So we must beware of thinking that God is only in the earthquake, wind, and fire; of thinking that manna but not grain is God’s food. Most of God’s gifts to his people are not dazzling and gaudy but wrapped in simple brown paper. Quiet provisions of safety on the highway, health of children, picking up a paycheck, supper with the family—all in an ordinary day’s work for our God.”

    —Dale Ralph Davis, Joshua: No Fallen Words

HT:  Justin Taylor

Spiritual Math

An infinite God can give all of himself to each of his children. He does not distribute himself that each may have a part, but to each one he gives all of himself as fully as if there were no others.
             

-A.W. Tozer

Indulge My Every Feeling

"The desire to be God rather than to serve God lies at the bottom of every sin that anyone has ever committed. Sin isn't first rooted in a philosophical debate of the appropriateness or healthiness of a certain ethic.  

 

No, sin is rooted in my unwillingness to find joy in living my life under the authority of, and for the glory of, Another.  Sin is rooted in my desire to live for me.  It's driven by my propensity to indulge my every feeling, satisfy my every desire, and meet my every need.....

 

Because sin is about the breaking of relationship, restoration of relationship is the only hope for us in our struggle with sin.   It's only because God is willing to love us in our struggle with sin.  It's only because God is willing to love us in a way that we refuse to love him that we have any hope of defeating sin.  It's through the gift of adoption into relationship with him that we find what we need to gain power over sin.  

 

And what do we need?  A greater love for him than we have for ourselves.  His love is the only thing that has the power to produce in us that kind of love for him."

- Paul Tripp, Whiter than Snow

 

HT: Whiter than Snow: Sin is a Relationship

        All of Grace Blog

Christians Need the Gospel

By Tullian Tchividjian

The story of Jonah shows us that the gospel—the good news that God relentlessly pursues sinners in order to rescue them—is just as much for Christians as it is for non-Christians. Jonah’s life proves this, because Jonah, who knows God, obviously needs divine deliverance as much as anyone else in the story. In fact, his need for rescue gets far more emphasis than anyone else’s. It’s his destitution, not that of the Ninevites, that gets the most play. That alone should be enough to convince us that God’s rescue is a continuing requirement for Christians and non-Christians alike.

The gospel isn’t simply a set of truths that non-Christians must believe in order to become saved. It’s a reality that Christians must daily embrace in order to experience being saved. The gospel not only saves us from the penalty of sin (justification), but it also saves us from the power of sin (sanctification) day after day. Or, as John Piper has said, “The cross is not only a past place of objective substitution; it is a present place of subjective execution.”  Our daily sin requires God’s daily grace—the grace that comes to us through the finished work of Jesus Christ.

Churches, for example, have for years debated whether their worship services ought to be geared toward Christians (to encourage and strengthen them) or non-Christians (to appeal to and win them). But this debate and the struggle over it are misguided. We’re asking the wrong questions and making the wrong assumptions. The truth is that our worship services should be geared to sinners in need of God’s rescue—and that includes both Christians and non-Christians. Since both groups need his deliverance, both need his gospel.

Christians need the gospel because our hearts are always prone to wander; we’re always tempted to run from God. It takes the power of the gospel to direct us back to our first love. Consciously going to the gospel ought to be a daily reality and experience for us all. It means, as Jerry Bridges reminds us, “preaching the gospel to yourself every day.”  We have to allow God to remind us every day through his Word of Christ’s finished work on behalf of sinners in order to stay convinced that the gospel is relevant.

I find that I especially need a gospel refocus to help steer me away from a constant tendency to drift into a performance-driven relationship with God. I’m not alone in that tendency; Jerry Bridges observes how pervasive it is among us all:

My observation of Christendom is that most of us tend to base our personal relationship with God on our performance instead of on His grace. If we’ve performed well—whatever “well” is in our opinion—then we expect God to bless us. If we haven’t done so well, our expectations are reduced accordingly. In this sense, we live by works rather than by grace. We are saved by grace, but we are living by the “sweat” of our own performance.

Moreover, we are always challenging ourselves and one another to “try harder.” We seem to believe success in the Christian life (however we define success) is basically up to us: our commitment, our discipline, and our zeal, with some help from God along the way. We give lip service to the attitude of the apostle Paul, “But by the grace of God I am what I am” (1 Corinthians 15:10), but our unspoken motto is, “God helps those who help themselves. The realization that my daily relationship with God is based on the infinite merit of Christ instead of on my own performance is a very freeing and joyous experience.”

As I’ve said before, the difference between living for God and living for anything else is that when we live for anything else we do so to gain acceptance, but when we live for God we do so because we are already accepted. Real freedom (the freedom that only the gospel grants) is living for something because we already have favor instead of living for something in order to gain favor.

The Messy "Mop Up" Operation

A Prayer About the War Within Our Hearts is a post from: Heavenward by Scotty Smith 

In my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! Romans 7:22-25

Dear Jesus, though I’m usually conflict avoidant, this is one conflict about which I’m actually excited. The very fact there’s a war going on inside of me is a good thing, especially since the combatants are the gospel and my sinful nature. For this means the outcome of this war has already been decided. You will prevail, Jesus. Everyone righteous in you one Day will be righteous like you. O, the comfort this brings.

Yet I’m not naïve about the “mop up” operation. It’s a messy and intense process. Sometimes I humbly comply.  And sometimes I foolishly resist, especially when I forget the gospel.

In fact the only reason I now delight in God’s law is because the demands of the law exposed my need and drove me to you.  I needed a substitute and a Savior, not a model and a coach. I needed a new heart, not a second chance.  I needed your sinless record, not a clean slate. In short, I needed the gospel, and still do.

Jesus, you perfectly met all the requirements of God’s law for us and you’ve exhausted his judgment against us. There is no better news, anywhere.

The messy part comes from your zeal to make us like yourself. You’re more committed to getting “heaven” in us than getting us into heaven. I’m just very thankful to know that one Day I will be as loving and as lovely as you. Until that Day, here’s my prayer…

     

Jesus, allow me to grieve the sinfulness of sin… the sinfulness of my sins. Now that I’m no longer guilty or condemned, let me fearlessly see my sins… ruthlessly hate my sins… and relentlessly turn from of my sins. Increase my love for gospel-holiness and decrease my shame and self-contempt. Only the gospel can bring such freedom. Only by seeing more of you will I delight in this journey.

You are the end of all my wretchedness. You’re the one who’s rescuing me from this “body of death”—all the effects and residue of the fall… all the trappings of my grave clothes… every semblance of every way I’m not like you. Thank you, thank you, thank you… so very Amen, I pray, in your most powerful and loving name.

Fellowship of the Unashamed

I am a part of the fellowship of the Unashamed. I have the Holy Spirit Power. The die has been cast. I have stepped over the line. The decision has been made. I am a disciple of Jesus Christ. I won't look back, let up, slow down, back away, or be still. My past is redeemed, my present makes sense, and my future is secure. I am finished and done with low living, sight walking, small planning, smooth knees, colorless dreams, tame visions, mundane talking, chintzy giving, and dwarfed goals.

I no longer need preeminence, prosperity, position, promotions, plaudits, or popularity. I don't have to be right, first, tops, recognized, praised, regarded, or rewarded. I now live by presence, learn by faith, love by patience, lift by prayer, and labor by power.
 

My pace is set, my gait is fast, my goal is Heaven, my road is narrow, my way is rough, my companions few, my Guide is reliable, my mission is clear.  I cannot be bought, compromised, deterred, lured away, turned back, diluted, or delayed. I will not flinch in the face of sacrifice, hesitate in the presence of adversity, negotiate at the table of the enemy, ponder at the pool of popularity, or meander in the maze of mediocrity.

I won't give up, back up, let up, or shut up until I've preached up, prayed up, paid up, stored up, and stayed up for the cause of Christ. I am a disciple of Jesus Christ. I must go until He returns, give until I drop, preach until all know, and work until He comes.

Encouragement to Those Who Preach the Gospel

From: 9Marks Blog: Building Healthy Churches

I believe that if an angel were to wing his way from earth up to Heaven, and were to say that there was one poor, ragged boy, without father or mother, with no one to care for him and teach him the way of life; and if God were to ask who among them were willing to come down to this earth and live here for fifty years and lead that one to Jesus Christ, every angel in Heaven would volunteer to go. Even Gabriel, who stands in the presence of the Almighty, would say, "Let me leave my high and lofty position, and let me have the luxury of leading one soul to Jesus Christ." There is no greater honor than to be the instrument in God's hands of leading one person out of the kingdom of Satan into the glorious light of Heaven.

-- Dwight L. Moody

Going to be a Huge Crowd!!

“Even as we slog through the trials, persecutions, irritations, temptations, distractions, apathy, and just plain weariness of this world, the gospel points us to heaven where our King Jesus — the Lamb of God who was crucified in our place and raised gloriously from the dead — now sits interceding for us. Not only so, but it calls us forward to that final day when heaven will be filled with the roaring noise of millions upon millions of forgiven voices hailing him as crucified Savior and risen King.”  

— Greg Gilbert
What is the Gospel?

Biting the Hand that Feeds Me

by Max Lucado

 

Your goodness can’t win God’s love. Nor can your badness lose it.  But you can resist it. We tend to do so honestly. Having been rejected so often, we fear God may reject us as well. Rejections have left us skittish and jumpy. Like my dog Salty. He sleeps next to me on the couch as I write. He’s a cranky cuss, but I like him. We’ve aged together over the last fifteen years, and he seems worse for the wear. He’s a wiry canine by nature; shave his salt-and-pepper mop, and he’d pass for a bulimic Chihuahua. He didn’t have much to start with; now the seasons have taken his energy, teeth, hearing, and all but eighteen inches’ worth of eyesight.

 

Toss him a dog treat, and he just stares at the floor through cloudy cataracts. (Or, in his case, dogaracts?) He’s nervous and edgy, quick to growl and slow to trust. As I reach out to pet him, he yanks back. Still, I pet the old coot. I know he can’t see, and I can only wonder how dark his world has become.

We are a lot like Salty. I have a feeling that most people who defy and deny God do so more out of fear than conviction. For all our chest pumping and braggadocio, we are anxious folk—can’t see a step into the future, can’t hear the one who owns us. No wonder we try to gum the hand that feeds us.

But God reaches and touches. He speaks through the immensity of the Russian plain and the density of the Amazon rain forest. Through a physician’s touch in Africa, a bowl of rice in India. Through a Japanese bow or a South American abraço. He’s even been known to touch people through paragraphs like the ones you are reading. If he is touching you, let him.

Mark it down: God loves you with an unearthly love. You can’t win it by being winsome. You can’t lose it by being a loser. But you can be blind enough to resist it.

Don’t. For heaven’s sake, don’t. For your sake, don’t.

“Take in with all Christians the extravagant dimensions of Christ’s love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God” (Eph. 3:18–19 MSG)

Staggering

“Forgiveness transcends finite human reason.  The mere thought that one’s entire sin account can be utterly eradicated is staggering.  Yet it is quite clear that the forgiveness of sins strikes at the very core of human need and experience.  It speaks of guilt gone, remorse removed, depression disappearing and emptiness of life eradicated.  What power there is in forgiveness!  And it all comes abundantly from the gracious hand of God.”

Lewis A. Drummond, quoted in The Voice from the Cross

Forgiveness is a post from: Ray Ortlund

What is Permitted?

"The truth is, of course, 

that the curtness of the 

Ten Commandments is an evidence, not of the gloom and narrowness of a religion, but, on the contrary, of its liberality and humanity. It is shorter to state the things forbidden than the things permitted: precisely because most things are permitted, and only a few things are forbidden." 

  -G.K. Chesterton

Grace Is As Dangerous As Ever

By Michael Spencer:

The last few weeks of my men’s morning Bible study has been about “Texts That Will Get You In Trouble,” and we spent two sessions on John 8, and Jesus’ words to the woman caught in adultery: “Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more.”

Read Leviticus 20:10 and the other older testament indictments of adultery and sexual sin. There’s no doubt about the woman’s sin or the stated penalty.

The Pharisees’ motives aren’t really the important fact here. Their use of the law is the focus. Even more important is “What is God like?” Does God have moral commands for human beings? Are we created in such a way that adultery is more than just a behavior consenting adults engage in; it is a violation of the sexual and marriage bonds that God considers sacred because they reflect God’s covenant love. How does God’s justice relate to his moral standards, and how do those living in community before God experience and demonstrate God’s law and God’s justice?

Often, interpreters focus on the hypocrisy of the Pharisees for not having the man present, or the double standard inherent in holding a woman more responsible for sexual sins. In fact, while these concerns may be valid, they are not the focus of this story.

This is an incident where Jesus’ understanding of God and his purposes are contrasted with the understanding of the Pharisees, who functioned as a renewal movement seeking to bring about the salvation of Israel by zealous attention to the keeping of the law. Like so many other incidents at this point in Jesus’ life, this one is meant to publicly discredit Jesus as a dangerous liberal who rejects the Law and covenant obedience.

Jesus brings the focus away from the particular sin of the woman in violation of the covenant law, and puts the focus on the universal fact that God is in covenant with a sinful people who constantly depend on his mercy. God has been working to bring about redemption in a sinful world from the beginning. The universal sinfulness of the human race has been the backdrop of all God has done in his covenant, both for Israel and for the world.

Listen to Yahweh in the book of Deuteronomy:

Deut. 9:4 “Do not say in your heart, after the LORD your God has thrust them out before you, ‘It is because of my righteousness that the LORD has brought me in to possess this land,’ whereas it is because of the wickedness of these nations that the LORD is driving them out before you. 5 Not because of your righteousness or the uprightness of your heart are you going in to possess their land, but because of the wickedness of these nations the LORD your God is driving them out from before you, and that he may confirm the word that the LORD swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. Deut. 9:6 “Know, therefore, that the LORD your God is not giving you this good land to possess because of your righteousness, for you are a stubborn people. 7 Remember and do not forget how you provoked the LORD your God to wrath in the wilderness. From the day you came out of the land of Egypt until you came to this place, you have been rebellious against the LORD.

God never gave the Pharisees permission to think that the covenant depended on anything but God’s gracious involvement with people who, as individuals and as a nation, deserved his wrath and justice like the rest of the world.

This explains why Jesus takes the “small circle” of the woman’s adultery and turns it into the “large circle” of “let the one who is without sin cast the first stone.” He isn’t minimizing adultery or saying God does not desire that we honor the law. He is saying that God is not on the side of religious zealots putting themselves in the place of God as if they were somehow deputized to play God. For Jesus, the mark of those who are in the covenant is their gratitude for God’s mercies to include sinners of all kinds within the boundaries of “his people.”

The second part of the text is Jesus’ conversation with the woman, a conversation that focuses on the word condemnation. There is the inadequate and flawed human condemnation of the woman, and there is the justified and appropriate divine condemnation of a guilty adulteress.

Those who would have singled out this woman’s sin have dispersed. None of us can stand in the place of God in the condemnation of another person unless we have been divinely authorized to do so (and the Pharisees were not given that position.)

Jesus, however, was different. He had the authority of his heavenly Father. He has the authority to judge. He is righteous. He is the author of the law. He has the power, the right, the insight and the ability to condemn an adulteress. In fact, if he does not do so, he must answer the legitimate question “why not?”

“Neither do I condemn you. Now go, and sin no more.”

When the quality of God’s mercy in the Gospel no longer amazes you, you will begin to justify the dilution of amazing grace into religious grace, or moral grace, or grace in response to something.

Real grace is simply inexplicable, inappropriate, out of the box, out of bounds, offensive, excessive, too much, given to the wrong people and all those things.

When God’s grace meets us, Jesus has to order away the accusers of our conscience. Satan. Religion. Parents. Church members. Culture. Morality. Legalism. Civility. The oughts. The shoulds. The of course we know thats. The I’d like to but I just can’ts.

Jesus orders them away so he can tell us that grace is doing what only grace can do, and we must go and live in the reverberation of forgiveness. We must live with the reality of grace when it makes no sense at all, can’t be explained and won’t be commodified or turned into some form of medicine.

You may not know that this story is a bit of a homeless story, banging around various manuscripts of the New Testament with no real home. It comes to rest in John 8, but it’s not part of the original. It’s a story that the Jewish leaders of early Christianity wouldn’t have liked, and recovering Pharisees would probably have been happy to lose it.

But it persisted, and is in our New Testament, I believe, because at the heart of true Christian experience is this inexplicable, annoyingly inappropriate, wondrously superlative experience of Jesus saying, “I don’t condemn you. Go and live your life.”

He says it to the divorced. To the expelled. To the unemployed. He says it to criminals. To perverts. To the damaged and the worthless. He says it to cutters, to whores, to greedy businessmen, to unfaithful husbands, to porn addicts and thieves. He says it to the lazy, the unholy, the confused and even the religious. He says it to you and to me.

It’s how he changes lives, and it’s as dangerous as ever.

Baptism

Dangerous, Uncomfortable, Peaceful or Joyful

By Michael Kelley at Forward Progress.

Jesus was a relatively new figure on the religious landscape. There were rumors surrounding Him – His birth, His teaching, His power – but by far, the big draw was still John the Baptist. John, with his wild beard and locust-popping habits. John, the fearless who called the Pharisees to task. John, the eccentric.

But John had caused a different kind of ripple. The previous day, Jesus had approached the Jordan River. John stopped what he was doing to make a mysterious but powerful declaration: “Behold! the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” It left his disciples wondering.

Then, when the same thing happened the next day, two of those disciples wanted to inquire further:

“Again the next day, John was standing with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, ‘Look! The Lamb of God!’ The two disciples heard him say this and followed Jesus. When Jesus turned and noticed them following Him, He asked them, ‘What are you looking for?’” (John 1:35-38).

Valid question. Here were two men who were followers of John. Jesus comes walking up, and suddenly he’s got two hangers-on. So what were they looking for?

Their answer seems to say, “We don’t know,” for at first glance the didn’t even give an answer. They turn to each other. Then, instead of answering the question, they ask another question to Jesus: “Teacher, where are you staying?”

Now that’s a good question. It’s not because it redirected the question of Jesus, buying them some time to think of a better answer. It’s a good one because of the word “staying.”

The word is the same word we find in John 15:4, this time spoken by Jesus: “Abide in Me, and I in you. Just as a branch is unable to produce fruit by itself unless it abides on the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me.”

That’s what the men asked: “Where are You abiding?” Where are You remaining? Where are You dwelling? Where are You going to be, because that’s where we want to go. To be with You. To remain with You. To abide with You.”

That’s the question I want to ask: “Jesus, where are you abiding? Because that’s where I want to abide. I want to dwell with You. To fellowship with You. You are my prize, so wherever You are, be it dangerous or uncomfortable or peaceful or joyful, that’s where I want to abide.

But there’s one other detail in the Scripture that pushes the idea. John goes on to record that the two men did indeed go with Jesus. And they “stayed with Him that day.” Then John records the actual time they were there, as if to say, “And can you believe it? When we looked up the whole day was gone!”

That’s what abiding is like. It’s being so caught up in the being that you lose track of time. May it be so.

Close the Door

"It is always just possible that Jesus Christ meant what he said when he told us to seek the secret place and to close the door.”

     C.S. Lewis

Barbarians and Rhinos

"...most groups of animals have unique names or designations when they dwell together. With insects most of us know that bees are called swarms, and ants are called colonies... But my favorite of all is the group designation for rhinos.

You see, rhinos can run thirty miles an hour, which is pretty fast when you consider how much weight they’re pulling. Just one problem with this phenomenon. Rhinos can see only thirty feet in front of them. Can you imagine something that large moving in concert as a group, plowing ahead at thirty miles an hour with no idea what’s at thirty-one feet?

You would think that they would be far too timid to pick up full steam, that their inability to see far enough ahead would paralyze them to immobility. But with that horn pointing the way, rhinos run forward full steam ahead without apprehension, which leads us to their name. Rhinos moving together at full speed are known as a crash. Even when they’re just hanging around enjoying the watershed, they’re called a crash because of their potential.

You’ve got to love that. I think that’s what the Church is supposed to be. That’s what happens when we become barbarians and shake free of domestication and civility. The church becomes a crash. We become an unstoppable force. We don’t have to pretend we know the future. Who cares that we can see only thirty feet ahead? Whatever’s at thirty-one feet needs to care that we’re coming and better get out of the way. We need to move together as God’s people, a barbarian tribe, and become the human version of the rhino crash.

The future is uncertain, but we need to move toward it with confidence. We need to stop wasting our time and stop being afraid of what we cannot see and do not know. We need to move forward full force because of what we do know. We may not be able to see what’s at thirty-one feet, but we don’t have to be blind to what’s right in front of us. There’s a world that desperately needs God, a world filled with loneliness, hopelessness, and fear. We have somehow become deaf to a cry that reaches heaven coming from the souls of men. But God hears."

                          - Erwin McManus, The Barbarian Way