The Bloody Coup

Until we see the fullness of our depravity, taste  the sludge spewing out from the depths of our heart, we will not grasp the enormity of risk Jesus took to save us.  The humiliation we feel at the sight of our temper spewing poisonous wrath upon some stunned family member or careless co-worker is the edge at which we can get at the real crisis we face.  When a well-shrouded lust takes control of our moral piety, we are at the precipice of the most critical discovery.     We are filthy and corrupt at the core and it is needless trying to make something of our selves.  Our critical need is not self-assessment and adjustment; it is the rush of life Jesus gives us at the Cross.  We are not fixable; but we are destructible.  The sooner we see our true condition, the quicker we will be able to turn away from bandages when we need resurrection.  Jesus did not come to fix us but rather to raise us from the dead.   We are irretrievably ruined by sin and that becomes obvious when we blow up at our four year-old for smearing lipstick on her face just as we are about to leave for the wedding.    The entire town of Sodom may have been self-righteously unaware of the filth it was gathering but Lot knew what was there and although he tried his best to ignore the elephant in the room, he at the point of destruction had to face it squarely.    You are not fixable, but you are redeemable.  The difference in the two is as wide as the grave.  Only the life of Christ can remake the cities leveled in your heart by sin.  Only He can give you life that will turn sinless as He works all through you.  You will never be able to live with the filth inside you; at least not like the lovely woman going into Victoria's Secret hoping to lure her boss away from his wife.  You won't be able to make heads or tails of the tumult you know rages within you until you pursue Christ for your condition.  The woman who grasped after Jesus' garment to stem the flow of blood knew what the rest of the gawking crowd did not but you must decide is so as she did.  Jesus really is the only hope you have and you must choose  to reach after Him yourself and ignore the skeptics who blindly disregard how badly they are bleeding too.

For if, when we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!   Romans 5:10-11 NIV

The Road Not Taken...Yet

How often have I wished I didn’t have to talk with a sales rep?  Not yesterday.  Victoria and her assistant (I made up Victoria’s name) found me even though they tried to come in through the wrong door.  Victoria’s father is a Hindu priest and her mother converted to Hinduism from Christianity.  As the Lord opened the way for us to discuss religion, I fumbled about for a while trying to make it reasonable for a bright, charming, educated, lovely, young woman see that she should at least give Christianity a good look before she walked away from it.  Later I wondered how our conversation would have turned if I was her uncle or professor rather than a potential customer for her company.  Perhaps not any better or worse but I know how I would have proceeded.  I would have explained to her as our great friend C.S. Lewis has noted that there really are only two strands of religion in the world and every other one is merely a warping of one or the other.  Hinduism is the first strand but not in terms of time or priority, only as it comes around for discussion.  With Hinduism, there are many, many gods and goddesses all with their own distinct personalities and corruptions.  Some are wickedly good and others are deceptively bad.  They weave in and out of rightness and selfishness and moral depravity.  The universe is built upon the foundation of justice only and every bit of badness gets squeezed out of the soul until there is nothing left to it…even if it takes thousands of reincarnations to get it done.

Christianity is the second strand but not in terms of time or priority.  There is only one Christian God who is perfectly moral and full of kindness and love.  The universe is built upon the foundations of righteousness and mercy and badness is not whipped out of us by our own suffering; it is wooed out of us by the suffering of God who loves us.  We live not to die and live and die and live until we dissolve but we live to live and to know the God who loves us like a bride in a love marriage that always boils with rising heat and desire.  Suffering does come to us as a result of badness we do but it is God Himself who suffers the pain our badness set in motion.  Rather than paying us back for what we have done, God is paid back for what we have done.  Whipped and beaten and broken by the people He came to rescue from eternal death, He died with the sins of us all buried in His own body.  And then, only then Jesus Christ, God in flesh and blood rose from the dead, eternally our only way to eternal life.  It is with this God, this God who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit that we find our way and make it home, always alive, always the one who is beloved and known and never oblivion.  

The truth is I might even now be botching it trying to get the truth squared away for my friend.  In the end, it really boils down to this one verse.  For God so loved the world that He gave His one of a kind Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.  I hope Victoria finds it.  She at least got to the right door.