If your favorite outfit gets ruined, you feel some pain. If your favorite television show gets cancelled, you grieve a bit. If your pet runs away, you cry. If your business implodes, you hurt deeply. If your parent passes away, you weep. And if your spouse or children are killed, you feel an unbearable ache. The more deeply attached to something you are, the greater you suffer its loss.
Now try to imagine the sort of intimacy that must have existed between Jesus and the Father if a mere three hours of separation on the Cross caused Jesus enough anguish to pay off the debt which otherwise would have required billions of people to suffer total disintegration throughout all of eternity.
It’s not that Jesus died for us that is impressive. It’s that He endured such unimaginable spiritual torture for us which is truly awe-inspiring. And that He loves us enough to consider that a bargain.
Thought of the Day 11.26.08
I have a rather unusual question for you. Consider any sinful person that you happen to know personally. Now imagine that you have to make a choice between seeing that person give up his wicked ways, clean up his life, and become moral but not know Christ or else seeing him come to Jesus but remain an immoral reprobate. Which would you prefer?
Of course the right answer is obvious to all real Christians, even those who are inclined to dispute the question’s validity. But the point here is not which answer to the question is correct, but rather how quickly it took you to arrive at it.
If you hesitated even momentarily after hearing and comprehending the options, that is substantial evidence that you are still in the clutches of hellish moralism and have not yet fully digested the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Satan doesn’t particularly like you preaching morality. But he only bothers to actually oppose you when you preach the Gospel.
Of course the right answer is obvious to all real Christians, even those who are inclined to dispute the question’s validity. But the point here is not which answer to the question is correct, but rather how quickly it took you to arrive at it.
If you hesitated even momentarily after hearing and comprehending the options, that is substantial evidence that you are still in the clutches of hellish moralism and have not yet fully digested the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Satan doesn’t particularly like you preaching morality. But he only bothers to actually oppose you when you preach the Gospel.
Thought of the Day 11.25.08
As a former teacher, I despise “default-A” grading, the idea that every student starts with a perfect score and mistakes his way down to a final grade. It always seemed absurd that a student deserved an A unless shown otherwise merely because he signed up for a class. Instead, I believe he begins with a zero and earns his way up, not being entitled to anything.
Default-A thinking also shows up in people’s ideas about sin, making them believe they naturally satisfy God until they violate a rule. But a life lived without violations is still a life lived without merit. And if you could have ever done more good things in your life than you did, then that means you haven’t scored 100 in a course where the only passing grade is perfection. Hence, you need a Savior.
Jesus wasn’t just the only Person in history to do no wrong. He was also the only Person in history to do enough good to fully satisfy God’s grading system.
Default-A thinking also shows up in people’s ideas about sin, making them believe they naturally satisfy God until they violate a rule. But a life lived without violations is still a life lived without merit. And if you could have ever done more good things in your life than you did, then that means you haven’t scored 100 in a course where the only passing grade is perfection. Hence, you need a Savior.
Jesus wasn’t just the only Person in history to do no wrong. He was also the only Person in history to do enough good to fully satisfy God’s grading system.
Thought of the Day 11.24.08
I have a friend who is going through an extremely difficult time right now because his wife is essentially abandoning him and their children. When I was talking with him recently, he told me that the hardest part about all of this is that he wants to hate her, but he can’t. He still loves her, and it kills him that he has to admit this to himself.
But this isn’t a defect. It’s a virtue. To have been married to another person for so long and to have had his hopes invested in her and to have found meaning and pleasure in a future shared with her, it would in fact have been a real statement about him lacking normal Christian virtue if he didn’t still love her. In fact, it is just such a lack which is the indictment against her.
The fact that it hurts when people betray us is a sign of goodness in us, not a problem. The fact that it hurts to move to another town is something to cherish for it indicates the loss of close relationship. And to be incapable of hating a woman who has devastated you this way is something to be proud of, not something to hide.
But this isn’t a defect. It’s a virtue. To have been married to another person for so long and to have had his hopes invested in her and to have found meaning and pleasure in a future shared with her, it would in fact have been a real statement about him lacking normal Christian virtue if he didn’t still love her. In fact, it is just such a lack which is the indictment against her.
The fact that it hurts when people betray us is a sign of goodness in us, not a problem. The fact that it hurts to move to another town is something to cherish for it indicates the loss of close relationship. And to be incapable of hating a woman who has devastated you this way is something to be proud of, not something to hide.
Thought of the Day 11.21.08
The passage of Prop 8 in California has sparked what no one is yet calling a sex war in this country. Demonstrations, fake Anthrax mailings, threats, assaults, invasions of churches, mob scenes, defacing of property, and even blacklisting are all realities in the last week. It’s really quite something. So how should Christians respond?
It’s not an easy question to answer. But we should start by remembering that Christianity must never be confused with traditional values-ism. Christians do not believe that people need to do better. We believe that people need a Savior who will lead them to do better. They need redemption, not moral improvement. And the real task of the Church is to draw people to Christ, not to convince them to clean up their act, since no act will ever be clean enough.
So we live with this awful tension between being Christians who want to draw the lost to Christ and being citizens who want to protect our culture from evil. At the very least we must be sure that our response grows prayerfully from the truth of both principles.
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