What does the 'T' stand for? Tough as nails I think.

The following sermon is based on Genesis 38, which can be read here: http://bit.ly/e2d5It

Mr. T was a household name in the 1980’s. He is an actor who got his big break in the film Rocky III, where he squared off against the legendary Rocky Balboa, played by Sylvester Stallone. After that, he worked on one of the more popular television shows from the 1980’s called The A-Team. It seemed his face was everywhere. On lunch boxes, t-shirts, posters, television. He even had his own Saturday morning cartoon. You could not turn around in the pop-culture scene of the 1980’s without running into Mr. T.

Once you saw Mr. T, you didn’t forget him. He had an unforgettable image. Mr. T was an extremely fit and large African-American man. He really popularized the haircut called the “mow-hawk” where the head is shaved on the left and right but the hair on the top of the head is left to grow. He also wore pounds of gold jewelry. He probably had 50 gold necklaces around his neck at any given time. When you take his physical appearance, and combine it with the assertive attitude that he almost always portrayed, you have a pretty unforgettable figure. However, what really made him unforgettable, what really etched him into the conscious of popular culture in the 80’s, was his catch-phrase. He was known for saying, “I pity the fool!” Sometimes, a fool needs pity. Other times, a fool deserves everything he or she gets.

Judah is a fool who is very difficult to pity. As we begin our story, Judah has just sold his brother off into slavery. He leaves his fragmented, dysfunctional family, heads out on his own, and marries a Canaanite woman. He marries her, and has three sons by her. Maybe you’re thinking, “Wow, this guy is a really terrible brother and son. What kind of husband and father would he be?” The text doesn’t really tell us if he’s a good husband and father or not, but it seems that he does love his sons.

After all, he finds a wife, Tamar, for his oldest son, Er. Er apparently takes after his father, because we read that Er was wicked in the sight of the LORD, and he is put to death. According to the laws of Israel’s society – laws intended to protect women like Tamar – is  owed an heir by Judah’s family. Most of us would find the practice of marrying off a young widow by her brother-in-law to be pretty repugnant. In our context, it would be. However, in this context, a woman without a man to protect and provide for her was helpless. She didn’t have a lot of career options. There were two roles that women filled at this time. Women could be faithful wives and mothers, or they could be prostitutes. They couldn’t go to the local vocational center or community college or university and learn a trade or a craft so they could change careers. Unfortunately, women were very limited by the social norms of the times. The child was considered an heir of the deceased brother, and the widow now had an acceptable role to fill as mother.

So, Judah does what is right and tells his younger son, Onan, to do his duty and get Tamar pregnant. Onan isn’t so interested in the idea though. Apparently he doesn’t care if his young sister-in-law is stuck without a child and his brother without an heir. So, he makes sure that he doesn’t get her pregnant. What he did was wicked in the eyes of the LORD, so the LORD put him to death as well.

From Judah’s perspective, Tamar must look like a “black-widow” – a woman who takes the lives of her partners. Judah is down to his last son, Shelah. If Shelah is gone, then Judah is fresh out of heirs himself. His line will end here. Let’s remember that right now, Judah is the one in line to inherit the blessing of his father Jacob. Jacob has inherited the blessing of his father, Isaac, who received the blessing of Abraham. God promised Abraham and his descendants that they would inherit the land, and that he would bring salvation to the world through their line. Judah’s three older brothers have already lost the promise of the blessing from their father Jacob. Now Judah, the one through whom the blessing is supposed to flow, turns out to be a real lowlife and not only that, he seems to be running out of people through whom to pass God’s blessing.

So, Judah decides against giving Tamar his youngest son. He sends Tamar off to live as a widow in her father’s house until Shelah is old enough to take a wife. But, Shelah will never be old enough. When Judah’s wife dies, Tamar notices that Shelah has grown up, but she still doesn’t have the child she’s owed. That child was her right. She was owed a child just as we would say a single mother is owed child support by the child’s father.

Being a smart and enterprising woman, Tamar decides that she will get what she is owed, even if Judah will not willingly give it to her. So, she dresses in a provocative way that suggests she is a prostitute and waits for her father-in-law to come riding by. She waits for him at the entrance to Enaim – or the entrance to the eyes. It’s an interesting name for the place where Judah’s eyes are closed to the truth of who this prostitute actually is.

I wonder, how did Tamar know that Judah would stop? Could it be that Judah was known to patronize the services of prostitutes? Tamar’s plan to get pregnant all hinges on Judah being willing to patronize a prostitute. Was she hoping that Judah would act out of character, or was she hoping that Judah would act according to his character and decide to taker her up on her offer? Given Judah’s track record so far, I think she was counting on him acting in character. Judah was a brother-selling, heir-denying, lying, compulsive customer of prostitutes. Who wouldn’t want this peach of guy for a father-in-law?

Then, when Judah finds out that Tamar is pregnant, he decides that her unrighteousness cannot be tolerated and she should be burned. She should be burned for her promiscuity. Never mind that Judah kidnapped and sold his brother into slavery. Never mind that he denied Tamar her rights to a child. Never mind that he lied to do so. Never mind that he is promiscuous and patronizes prostitutes shortly after the death of his wife. Never mind all that. Tamar is a prostitute, and she must die. Judah is a fool or a hypocrite or a foolish hypocrite. He is NOT what we would expect of one of God’s people. He is NOT what we would expect of one chosen to bring God’s salvation to the world.

He doesn’t have the character that we would expect out of one of God’s people, but don’t we have the same problem? As believers in Christ, we have an advantage that Judah did not have. We have the Holy Spirit of God dwelling in us. We have God’s full revelation of Christ. We have these advantages that Judah did not have, and yet we often fall short of acting the way we would expect God’s people to act – and people notice. The world sees us when we point out the sin in others, but fail to do anything about our own sin. When we rightly preach against adultery, yet have pastors who commit adultery. When we rightly speak about the centrality and sanctity of marriage, yet we have a divorce rate that is indistinguishable from the world’s. When we rightly speak about the importance of spending time with our children, yet we rely on the church or the school or television to teach them our faith.

The world notices our hypocrisy – and it inhibits our ability to be God’s means of bringing the good news of the gospel to ears that so desperately need to hear it. God chose Judah to be an ancestor of Christ. God chose Judah to be a means by which he would bring Christ into the world. We are like Judah. God chose us to bring Christ into the world. How can we do that properly if people view us as hypocrites? We can’t. We look like fools. Fools, running around, telling people that God is a God of grace, yet we don’t extend grace to others. We look like fools. Fools, running around, condemning the evil of the world without paying attention to the evil in our own lives.

Are we fools that deserve pity? Or, are we fools that deserve the world’s criticism?

Judah, the fool, the brother-selling, heir-denying, lying, compulsive customer of prostitutes, apparently had no idea that he was acting like a fool until the end of our story. From all outward appearances, Judah sees no problem with his behavior. He expresses no regret over selling his brother into slavery, or denying Tamar her rights, or lying to her, or his behavior with the ‘prostitute’. He’s a fool who is so clueless that he doesn’t even know he’s a fool.

When he met Tamar at the entrance of Enaim, the entrance of the eyes, he had no idea that Tamar was the prostitute. When he discovers she is pregnant, he condemns her to die because she is a woman under his care. A woman he didn’t actually care for. She has brought disgrace upon the family because she obviously has turned to prostitution. As far as Judah and everyone else knew, she hadn’t slept with Judah or his descendants in order to become pregnant.

He condemns her to die by burning. A pregnant woman, carrying a little life within her, condemned to die by what is an extremely painful way to die. Yet, he still seems content with his actions. It’s not until his eyes are opened that we see any regret from Judah.

At the entrance to the eyes, Judah gave Tamar his seal, cord, and staff. These trinkets are like a birth certificate, driver’s license, or a passport today. They are implements of identification. Tamar says, “I am pregnant by the man who owns these. See if you recognize whose seal and cord and staff these are.” Then, Judah’s eyes are opened.

Our NIV translation says that Judah said, “She is more righteous than I.” But, a better translation is that Judah said, “She is righteous, and I am not.” Judah has an epiphany. His eyes are opened. At the entrance to the eyes, Judah did what would eventually open his eyes to his foolishness, his sin, his fallenness.

It’s not an easy epiphany. Tamar just embarrassed Judah severely. When he saw his seal, cord, and staff, I imagine his heart sank and his jaw dropped. Suddenly, his entire worldview changed. He had acted without regard for righteousness before this moment. All he seemed to care about was himself, and he felt justified by what he did. But now, he could see his unrighteousness. He could see the hurt that he had inflicted on Tamar by denying her what she was due. He could see that he was about to do something terrible, and burn her for being something she was not. He could see that the woman he was about to burn for her unrighteousness, was in fact righteous, and he was not. He was not righteous. He was not good. He was not justified in his actions. He was a fool, but now a fool who could see he was a fool. Maybe now, a fool we could pity. (If you are looking to shorten this sermon up, you could take the first sentence of this paragraph, add and “and yet” and head straight into the next paragraph.)

God chose Judah to be one of his people. God chose Judah to be an ancestor of Christ, and one of Tamar’s twins, Perez, is an ancestor of Christ. God took this man who was so completely unrighteous, and still used him to bring salvation to the world. Judah’s epiphany came when he hit rock bottom. He was embarrassed by what he had done. It was not an easy moment for Judah, but God had a purpose behind it.

Like Judah, many of us have to hit rock bottom before God opens our eyes. We often hear the term “rock-bottom” in connection with addiction. Alcoholics and drug addicts often say they have to hit “rock-bottom” before they can start to dig their way out of addiction. Recent scholarship shows that hitting rock bottom isn’t a necessary component in recovery, but I think that depends on what we mean by “rock-bottom”. Rock bottom for one person is different than it is for another.

A very close friend of mine recently hit rock bottom. He gave me permission to share his story with you.

I’ve known this guy pretty much my entire life. We’ve been through thick and thin together. We’ve gone in very different directions, but we are still close. He lost his job not too long ago and was without work for a couple of months. During that time, he spent a lot of time with his two little girls. He adores these little ladies. They are the lights of his life. His wife works part time, but it’s not enough for them to live on for long. Money started getting tight, he was bored, a bit depressed, and he decided that he would indulge himself a bit. To ease his boredom and depression, he smoked some marijuana. For him, at that moment, it was a little harmless fun. For a little while, he could feel good and forget his problems – with no consequences. After all, him smoking a little wouldn’t hurt anybody, right?

Well, the next day he got a call to go to work out of state. He finally had a job. At that moment, his world felt like it was about to collapse. He had his wife and his two little girls counting on him to bring home a check. He was responsible for keeping a roof over their heads. He was responsible for keeping food on the table and clothes on their backs. Now, he got this call to work out of state, where he knew he would have to take a drug test. Failing the drug test would mean that he would lose the job, possibly get kicked out of his union, and he would not only lose his paycheck, but the medical insurance that his wife and little girls counted on him to provide. In that week between him finding out about the job and getting there, he called me almost every day. He was so nervous. So scared, and you know what? There was nothing I could do to help him. He was neck deep in this situation and all I could do was tell him that I love him and would be praying for him. But it didn’t ease his anxiety. He hit rock bottom, and for the first time he saw the potential damage that even light drug use could have on his life. He saw what a fool he was in that moment.

Thankfully, he didn’t fail the test. He still has a job and is still in the union, and his wife and little girls don’t have to worry about losing their insurance or their home. This moment was terrible for my friend, but I wonder how his life will be different now after his eyes were opened to his foolishness. His little girls will never see their daddy high, or walk in on him when he’s smoking pot. He will never have to explain to them why he can’t go to work because he thought it was more important to party than to provide for them. God used this moment of crisis to show him what a fool he was. God pitied the fool. It was a moment that hurt, but it was a moment of grace. My friend hit rock-bottom in that moment, but it’s different for all of us.

Maybe rock-bottom us is that moment when we raise our voice at our children. For the first time we actually see the fear and hurt in their eyes. God uses that look to show us our poor parenting skills. We’ve been parenting like a fool, and now we know it and we can change. It’s a moment that hurts, but it’s a moment of grace.

Maybe rock-bottom is when the phone rings and on the end of the line is a bill collector. In that moment, we realize that we have not been good stewards of God’s material gifts. We’ve been spending like a fool, and now we know it and we can change. It’s a moment that hurts, but it’s a moment of grace.

Maybe rock-bottom is that moment when we visit the doctor, and discover that our cholesterol is too high. We have to start taking medication to control it. For the first time we actually see how we’ve been abusing God’s gift of life. We’ve been eating like a fool, and now we know it and we can change. It’s a moment that hurts, but it’s a moment of grace.

We have these moments that come into our lives and make us stop and look at what we’ve really been doing to ourselves and others. They are moments of grace, because God pities the fool.

On the east coast, they have this amazing refreshment called “water-ice”. It’s kind of like an ice cone, but the ice is much finer and the flavor is much stronger. It’s like they took an ice cone, kept all the good parts, and fixed what is wrong with them. It’s tastes so good. It’s cold. It’s cheap – and it’s just what the doctor ordered after a long hot day with kids. On top of being hot, I was hungry. It was one of those days at camp where we were so busy that I didn’t get a chance to have any lunch. There was a place right next to the church that served water-ice. I went in and ordered a pizza pretzel and some water-ice. I just wanted to relax and recover from the day.

While I was sitting at a table – like Jonah sitting under the shade of a vine, waiting for my pizza pretzel and enjoying my water-ice, a woman stepped out of the bathroom. She walked with a cane and wore men’s clothes. Her hair was cut very short in the style of a man. She probably had eight earrings in each ear, and when she stepped out of that bathroom, her eyes went straight to my camp shirt. It read, “Germantown Hope Community Church.” I could see that she was uncomfortable with the shirt. In Philadelphia, nobody is shy or afraid of confrontation, and she was no exception.

My shady vine was about to be devoured. She started asking me about the camp. She wanted to know if it was paid for with government money. I could see where this conversation was going. Finally, when asking about the church, she said, “It isn’t one of those strict churches, is it?” I answered by asking what she meant by a “strict church”. She said, “You know, a church that doesn’t like a loving relationship between people of the same sex.” When I told her that we believe in the scriptures and what they scriptures have to say about homosexuality, that it is a sin, she became quite agitated. Her anger was visible, and I’m not going to lie to you and tell you that I was all calm on the inside. I knew that an attack on our faith was about to get thrown at me.  I was gearing up for a vigorous defense of the Christian faith.

I would be lying to you if I told you that I was solely interested in defending Christ. My ego was involved too. When I was younger, I enjoyed getting into arguments so much that my dad thought I was going to be a lawyer. I still like to win arguments. As our conversation progressed, I’m pretty sure I won the battle. Usually when someone says they don’t want to talk about something anymore, then continue to tell you what they think, that means they lost the argument. I invited her to church. Sure, I wanted her to come, but I think I did it more out of a desire to show her own prejudice against the church than as a sincere invitation to be a part of the body of Christ. I won that battle for sure, but I lost the war. She went away angry, and probably more convinced than ever that Christians are her enemy.

This woman obviously started the conversation in an offensive mode, and she had preconceived notions about people like me. I hated her. I wanted to make her a second-class citizen. I didn’t care for her or for those she loved. All I cared about is what some ancient, obsolete book says about her loving relationship. But who can blame her? I was a walking stereotype of an evangelical Christian. I gave her no reason to think otherwise, and I certainly did not model Christ for her so that she might think differently about him.

When I met with our group, I asked the following questions: how should I have handled things differently? When I feel strong emotion, what can I do to control it better?

The group had a number of very good suggestions. Some of them are reminiscent of advice that our mothers gave us. The simplest being – take a deep breath and count to ten when you feel your emotions are getting to the point where you will regret what you say. This little tidbit of advice probably would have changed the tone of my discussion with this woman dramatically. Those ten seconds would have given me enough time to put the discussion in its proper perspective. That is – this woman and I have a disagreement. Her sin is like my sin in that it separates us from the relationship we are meant to have with God. The only difference between us is the grace of God. God is strong enough to deal with assaults on his truth. The church does not rise or fall on how well I defend that truth.

Another suggestion was that I should find something about which we could agree. It may have been a building block to establishing a meaningful relationship with her in which I could share the gospel – instead of a confrontational relationship in which she reflexively rejected the gospel. We could have discussed poverty in the inner city. Or, we could have talked about the controversy that happened at that time in Philadelphia, where it came to light that black children were being denied access to a public pool. It could have been something as simple as discussing our appreciation for the music of the recently deceased Michael Jackson. Anything would have been better to talk about, and work toward a relationship, than her sexual orientation. While it is a sinful behavior, it’s not the only thing that defines her. Everyone comes to the cross as a sinner, and we have that in common too.

That leads to the next suggestion to come from the group – a soft answer turns away wrath. Use empathy as a tool. She started the discussion angry, and she left angrier. A soft answer to her wrath may have given her a chance to count to ten, to take a breather, and to see me for who I am instead of the caricature of the evangelical Christian that I turned out to be.

Finally, I was told that I should find a place to compromise. Of course, how valid this advice is depends on what I could compromise over. I cannot compromise the truth of the gospel, that Christ alone is the way of salvation, or that homosexual behavior is a sin. Those are truths that do not depend on me for their validity, so it would be silly of me to compromise on them. So, I’m still struggling with this bit of advice and not exactly sure how I could compromise and maintain my integrity.

Leadership failures are indispensible tools in learning how to lead – if they are thoughtfully examined. No failure should ever be wasted. Through this experience, I’ve learned that even my failures have a purpose. My only wish is that I could take the lessons I learned in this situation, go back in time, and have the opportunity to encounter this woman again. By the grace of God, I will not forget these lessons the next time I encounter a similar situation.

Yet, for those of us who have been bought by the blood of the Lamb, there is no insecurity in our salvation. We know that Jesus died for us. We know that his life, death, burial, and resurrection have saved us completely. There is no sin for which we are held accountable. We can be completely secure in the knowledge of God’s love for us. We have no basis for insecurity, but many of us still deal with insecurity in this area.

I must confess, often I am one of those people who let insecurity define their relationship with God. I know that Jesus loves me to the point of death. I know it in my head. But, do I really know it? Do I know it in my heart of hearts? Do I feel it in my body and soul, or do I just understand it? Do I act as if I am secure in his salvation, or do I still let limitations define my existence? Do I really trust in his work, or am I still trying to work my way into pleasing him?

It is a fool’s errand and a lie of the devil to God’s people to believe that we can ever approach the throne of Grace with our filthy rags of goodness. My little good deeds are supposed to somehow makeup for my sinful being? No. They can’t. It’s like trying to empty the ocean with a bucket. I just cannot be done, and it’s futile to even try.

God doesn’t want us to try. It not only diminishes the Holiness of God and exults our goodness, but it hurts us. I can think of few behaviors more self-destructive than trying to please a God who cannot be pleased ! (and believe me, I’ve tried) Our Holy and Gracious God wants us to rest in the peace that he has purchased for us. We cannot please him, but he is pleased with us by the righteousness of Christ! What good news that is.

Trying is sinful. It is sinful because making God’s pleasure in us contingent upon our behavior forces us to disobey the greatest commandment: LOVE the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. How can we love a God that we are in constant fear of? How can we love a God that we know is never pleased with us? How can we love a God that we slave away for day and night? No, love cannot be a part of the equation unless there is freedom. We must be free to love God, and we can only be free when we have been released from the bondage of sin.

If you are struggling with your assurance, I beg you to put your complete trust in Jesus. IT IS FINISHED. You are free to love God. You are free to call him Daddy, and he is the best Daddy you can imagine. He will always care for you, always be there for you, and always love you even when you have done something that angers him. Enjoy that rest and assurance that has been bought for you at such a great price! Do not let insecurity define your relationship with the Lord, but let his Grace rule over your heart and mind.

“Who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? He grew up before him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground. He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.”

My wife, Gail, is an amazing woman. She’s amazing because of who she is, and I love doing things with her. One of the activities that we like to do together is watch movies. We watch all kinds of movies. Action, drama, comedy, and occasionally I can even talk her into watching a documentary with me. Whatever it is, even if the movie is bad, we enjoy being together.

Part of what I enjoy about watching a movie with her is how she reacts to gross or scary scenes in the movie. When we’re watching the movie at home she usually sits with a blanket covering her because, being my California girl, she’s always cold. When a gross scene comes, she’ll pull that blanket up over her head and hide herself from what’s going on in the film. Or, if it’s a scary scene where the sound is part of what makes the scene frightening, she holds her hands over her ears and closes her eyes. It’s a part of her that I truly love. She wouldn’t be Gail if she didn’t do these things. But, it makes me laugh.

I laugh because, first of all, she’s very cute when she does it. Another reason I laugh is because, even though her eyes and ears are covered, the scene in the movie doesn’t get any less gross or frightening. Covering her eyes doesn’t stop the movie. The movie just keeps on going. There’s a bit of an assumption that, if I don’t see it or hear it, then it’s not there. But it is still there.

Covering our faces to avoid the sight of something, to make believe as if it isn’t there, is natural. Our scripture for today talks about a man people would hide their faces from. It says that  this man of sorrows, who the NT identifies as Jesus, was “…one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.” People would turn their faces from him, he would be despised and would not be esteemed.

Certain images can make us feel sick to our stomach. The sight of blood often makes people feel sick because they are disgusted or frightened by it. Jesus would be a very bloody spectacle even before he was crucified, and that spectacle would reach its climax by the order of Pontius Pilate.

Pontius Pilate was a Roman governor who kept an eye on Palestine for the Roman Emperor. Since Israel lived under Roman rule, the law of the land was Roman, not Jewish. So, the Jewish priests and elders brought Jesus before Pilate to face judgment because they couldn’t legally do it themselves. They wanted Jesus dead, but they couldn’t just kill him. That would be murder, and they would face prosecution for murder if they didn’t go about killing Jesus legally.

When they brought Jesus to stand before Pilate, he was probably already difficult to look at. He knew for some time that he would face terrible agony. The anxiety of knowing that he would suffer and die a terrible death must have been overwhelming. As Jesus prayed on the night Jesus was betrayed, his friends witness his fear. According to the gospel of Mark, Jesus was “greatly distressed and troubled.” He told his followers, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death.” It’s so easy for us to think that Jesus stoically faced the incredibly painful and difficult death the he would endure, but he was sorrowful to the point of death over what he saw coming.

Was Jesus being weak, or was he simply being human when he begged his Father saying “Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.” Jesus certainly was not weak. No person who walks face first, voluntarily into the torture and humiliation that Jesus was going to endure could ever be considered weak. His ability to do so was a sign of his immense faith. No, he was strong, but he was completely human.

Humans worry about the future. We fret about tomorrow. If Jesus was like us, and he was, then he probably had many sleepless nights as his trial approached. He probably would have had difficulty eating thinking about what lay before him. If he was like me, he may have grinded his teeth at night as he slept. It was a difficult time for him. Humans, no matter how great our faith, feel fear in the face of death.

By the time Jesus got to Pilate, he had already been beaten. The gospels tell us that the guards, who escorted Jesus to the priests and elders, then ultimately to Pilate, had beaten and mocked him. He was human, and we humans hurt when we are hit. When we are beaten, we bleed. We bruise, and we swell. Jesus was one of us, and his fear, and the damage done to his body would have been clear to see. The sight of a beaten man is not pleasant. It’s a sight that we want to turn our faces from. We want to forget that it’s there. If we don’t see it, maybe it’ll go away. When Jesus got to Pilate, he was already bleeding, bruised, and swollen. He was already difficult to look at.

But the sight of Jesus, this scarred, bruised, bloody savior, would not improve under the judgment of Pilate. Pilate, knew that Jesus was not guilty of any crime. So, sent Jesus to be flogged instead of crucified. Maybe he thought that a good flogging would satisfy the Jewish authorities, but he was wrong. Maybe he thought that the sight of an innocent man, stripped of his cloths, and whipped to the point of near death would satisfy their need to see this man punished, but he was wrong. No, they wanted judgment and death for Jesus. They wanted this innocent man condemned to die even though he had done nothing. They wanted crucifixion.

Who could look upon such a bloody display of injustice? Who would not want to turn their face from the agony this man Jesus was enduring? Who would want to watch this beaten, whipped, humiliated man who was condemned to carry a cross to his place of execution as he stood before Pilate?

Who could argue with Isaiah? Who could say that Jesus had beauty and majesty that would attract people to him? Who would say that there was something in his appearance that made people desire him? Who could argue that he wasn’t despised and rejected by those around him, especially his own people? Who could say that Jesus was not a man of sorrow? Wasn’t he familiar with suffering? Wasn’t he despised and dishonored – just as Isaiah said he would be? Wasn’t he a man that people would turn their faces from?

Turning our faces from ugliness is natural. We would not want to look at Jesus in such a state. We hide our faces from frightening and disgusting scenes in television, and we do the same thing in real life. But, the ugliness doesn’t go away. We don’t like to look at ugliness in our lives, and there is ugliness all around us. One place we see it clearly is in abusive relationships.

A dear friend of mine, Adam, grew up in an abusive home. Adam gave me permission to share his story. Adam’s parents, Warren and Phyllis, were married for 36 years. During those 36 years, Warren was verbally, emotionally, and mentally abusive to Adam and his mother. Warren’s life didn’t turn out the way he wished it had. He wasn’t nearly as successful in business as he expected to be, and in his mind, it was because Phyllis was holding him back. Warren wasn’t afraid to share with Adam and the other kids in the family how he felt their mother sexually deprived him. Warren would get angry with Phyllis for spending money on foolish things like groceries while he was out of town working. Phyllis became the image of all the failure, disappointment, and hurt that Warren endured in his life. Phyllis became the stream through which Warren funneled his frustration with his own alcoholic, physically abusive father. Phyllis became the picture of Warren’s apathetic mother who was not afraid of letting her children know that she had favorites, and Warren wasn’t one of them. The ugliness of Warren’s upbringing was put on Phyllis, and Warren turned from it in anger. He turned from her, and turned toward other women.

One night, Warren picked Phyllis and his daughter up from the airport. They were returning from a visit with Phyllis’ mother in Florida. Warren didn’t greet them or hug either of them. He was unusually cold and distant. He loaded their things in the car and dropped them off at home. He didn’t go inside because he said he had errands to run. They walked into the house and saw that all of his things were gone. He called them from the road and said, “You’ve probably noticed that all of my things are gone. I’m leaving.” After 36 years of marriage, he left.

One amazing thing about this relationship is that if you were to ask Phyllis if she was abused, she would say no. She made excuses for his behavior. She coped with the ugliness by turning her face from it and putting a pretty mask on it. If you were to ask Warren if he was abusive, he would say no. They would agree about this at least! But, Warren didn’t see his behavior as abusive. He saw Phyllis as an enemy, and he thought the way he acted toward her is the logical way to act toward an enemy. She was the ugliness of his life – and he turned from her. Phyllis turned from the ugliness of the abuse she endured. Warren turned from the ugliness of his role as an abuser. They both turned so far from it, that they did not recognize the abuse as abuse.

Like Warren and Phyllis, we all turn from the ugliness of our sin and put a pretty face on it. We all refuse to see ourselves for who we are – the way that God sees us. We are broken in his eyes. We are fallen, and covered with the ugliness of sin. The darkness of our sin is more than skin deep. Our wretchedness permeates our entire being.

God, who is beautiful, holy, and just, does not tolerate the ugliness of sin. It is revolting to him because he is good. So, when our Lord looked down from his throne and saw his elect mired in sin, he did something about it. Our text says, starting in verse 4, “Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.”

How did he do that? He did it through his Son. The man of sorrows who people would turn their faces from. It’s about Christ! The HC, one of this church’s statements about what we believe, pictures Christ’s suffering this way (in Q&A37): “That during his whole life on earth, but especially at the end, Christ sustained in body and soul the anger of God against the sin of the whole human race. This he did in order that, by his suffering as the only atoning sacrifice, he might set us free, body and soul, from eternal condemnation, and gain for us God’s grace, righteousness, and eternal life.”

God took that ugliness, that wretchedness, that foul sinfulness, off his people and put it on his Son, Jesus. He took the beauty of his Son, his sinlessness, his perfection, and put it on his people. He turned away from our ugliness that was put on his Son, and turned toward us with his love. What we read about in Isaiah, about this man of sorrow that was despised and that people turned away from, is the result of God’s turning away. He suffered because God forsook him. He was forsaken because of our sin. His suffering was the result of our sin.

This is why grace is amazing. What any of us would have thrown away, what we would have turned from in disgust, what we would have given up on, God fixed. Instead of just throwing away a rebellious bunch of sinners, he took our stench and filth and laid them on his Son. He laid them on his Son, and then stood his Son before an unjust judge who would rule that the innocent was in fact guilty. Going back to the catechism, it asks, “Why did he (Jesus) suffer “under Pontius Pilate” as judge?” Answer. “So that he, though innocent, might be condemned by a civil judge, and so free us from the severe judgment of God that was to fall on us.” Judgment fell upon our sin, but our sin was put on Christ, so the judgment for our sin fell on Christ.

Isaiah’s prophecy couldn’t be more true. He did take up our infirmities, our weakness, our guilt. He carried our sorrows that result from the ugliness within ourselves. He was striken by God in our place. His body was pierced by a crown of thorns and the Roman whip for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The punishment that brings us peace was put upon him, and by his wounds we have been healed.

Do you feel that peace? Do you feel peace knowing that all of your sin has been completely dealt with? Are you punishing yourself for what you’ve done in the past? You don’t have to do that. First off, we cannot punish ourselves enough for what we’ve done. We are not capable of it. It is ugly beyond our ability to do justice. Secondly, every single one of our sins, past, present, and future, were justly condemned by God in his Son Jesus Christ.

We cannot flog our selfishness, but God has. We cannot crown our unrighteous hatred with thorns, but God has. We cannot beat our lust, but God. We cannot mock our greed, but God has. God has completely crushed all the stains on our soul that mar the beauty of a person made in the image of our holy, beautiful God. You ARE beautiful to him. He does not see our sin any longer, but he sees the beauty and perfection of his Son. So, REST in that peace.

I know it’s difficult for us to put our pasts behind us. Sometimes it seems impossible. Sometimes we just think we have done more than can be forgiven, even in light of the fact that Jesus took the wrath of God for our sin. I know Warren feels that way sometimes.

When Warren finally realized the mistakes he made in his marriage, it was too late. The marriage was over. He found himself alone. For a long time, Warren struggled with what he had done. He doubted that God’s forgiveness was big enough to cover a man who mentally and emotionally abused his family. God granted Warren repentance. He opened his eyes to see the damage he had done, and the mistakes of Warren’s past drove him straight to the cross. He went there because it was the only place that his sin could be properly destroyed. Christ’s suffering was the only way that justice could be done to his sin. He deserved what Jesus got, but Jesus took that ugliness from Warren. That ugliness was destroyed in the suffering of Christ. As time goes on, as Warren experiences the presence of God in his daily life, he has come to embrace the grace of God. God is showing him that justice has been done, and that he can rest in the joy of his salvation.

Phyllis has experienced God’s grace as well. She used to look in the mirror and see the woman who Warren told her she was. She saw a loser, an overweight, talentless, woman who leached the life out of her husband. By God’s grace, when she looks in the mirror now, she sees a child of God. A child with faults, but a child who is made in the image of our holy, perfect, and beautiful God. She no longer turns from her image out of disgust, but turns to it to see the reflection of Jesus.

When I met my wife, I was just astounded by how well we matched each other. It was like we were, and still are, two pieces to the same puzzle. I wish I could tell you that the most important thing that we had in common when we met was our faith. Sadly, that wouldn’t be the case with us for a number of years. Our personalities matched, our outlook on the future matched, our love for books matched, but faith was not one of those things that matched. Gail was a Christian and I was an agnostic. Another difference, and this one is much more visible, is that I am a white man and Gail is an African-American woman. When people looked at us, they didn’t see a Christian walking hand-in-hand with an agnostic. What people saw was a white man and a black woman.

That is one reason that I feel compelled to preach on this passage. Unfortunately, I have spoken with people who believe this passage condemns interracial marriage. That is not the case. In fact, this passage is not about race at all. The sin that Ezra confesses to the Lord in our reading is not the sin of marrying people of a different color. The sin is marrying people who are not God’s people.

Three times the text makes clear the fact that this intermarriage is a problem because of the people’s detestable practices. Verse 1 says, “The people of Israel, including the priests and the Levites, have not kept themselves separate from the neighboring peoples with their detestable practices, like those of the Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Jebusites, Ammonites, Moabites, Egyptians and Amorites.”  Verse 11 says, “The land you are entering to possess is a land polluted by the corruption of its peoples. By their detestable practices they have filled it with their impurity from one end to the other.” Verse 14 reads, “Shall we again break your commands and intermarry with the peoples who commit such detestable practices?” Intermarrying with the people of the land is a problem because of their detestable practices. We see the phrase “detestable practices” used three times in this chapter. Israel’s sin is the sin of bringing the pagan, detestable practices, of non-Israelites into their homes.

But Israel seems eager, throughout Scripture, to bring those detestable practices of the world into their homes. After being exiled because of their disobedience to Babylon, the Lord graciously allows them to return to their homeland. One would think that after 70 years of living in a foreign land, that God’s gracious act of allowing them to return home would engender some amount of gratitude. One would think that seeing God move in such a powerful way, by sending his people to the land he promised them, would make them zealous to follow God’s law. One would think that seeing how much God cared to preserve his people would provoke the people of Israel to preserve themselves as his people. One would be wrong.

God’s gracious mercy to his people by setting them free and giving them a homeland makes Israel’s sin all the more egregious. God’s prohibition against marrying non-Israelites was to preserve them as his people. It was to keep them from wandering away from him. It was for their good, for their welfare, and it came out of God’s love for his people. But Israel didn’t seem to care that God was interested in their welfare and happiness. It’s like the child on Christmas morning who opens his brand new Buzz Light-year toy that his parents sacrificed their time, energy, and money to get for him, and he turns to them and tells them he doesn’t like it because it’s the wrong color. Or it’s like a little girl who gets a Barbie doll, then complains because the Barbie didn’t come with the right outfit. It’s a slap in the face to the parents – and what Israel did, in intermarrying with those who do not worship him, was to slap God in the face. It was like they were saying to God, “In spite of all you’ve done for us, all that you’ve done to preserve and protect us as your people, we think we’d like to do things our own way – and we don’t think marrying non-believers is a big deal.”

But it is a big deal. Israel’s incredible betrayal is what Ezra laments in our reading. He says, starting in verse 6, “O my God, I am too ashamed and disgraced to lift up my face to you, my God, because our sins are higher than our heads and our guilt has reached to the heavens. From the days of our forefathers until now, our guilt has been great. Because of our sins, we and our kings and our priests have been subjected to the sword and captivity, to pillage and humiliation at the hand of foreign kings, as it is today.”

How different are we than the Israelites? Have God’s people suddenly outgrown our inclination to act like ungrateful children? I’m going to use my son as an example, but he’s not alone in ungratefulness. In fact, he does a pretty good job of reminding me of my own ungratefulness to God. Every night that I take Noah to bed, I ask him two questions. The first question is, “What are you thankful for today?” The second question is, “What would you like to ask God for today?” It’s not too surprising that a five or six-year-old boy would often reply that he isn’t thankful for anything today. He doesn’t want to ask God for anything today. As a parent, I know he should be thankful for something. After all, he’s six, and a six-year-old can’t provide anything for himself. So, I ask him, “Are you thankful that you have two legs? Are you thankful that you can breathe? Are you thankful that the sun rose this morning?”

These are things that he takes for granted, and I do too! When we pray at night, it reminds me of how much God does for me on a daily basis. Little Noah’s ungratefulness is in fact a blessing to me because it keeps me asking the question, what should I be thankful for? The answer is always the same. I should be thankful for everything.

When life seems difficult, and I get frustrated with the daily grind of work, I should be thankful to have a life to live. When I wake up in the morning and can’t see until I put on my glasses, or put my cold, wet contacts into my eyes, I should be thankful for the ability to see. When my ears ring, or noise outside my window keeps me from sleep, I should be thankful for the ability to hear. When I’m not enjoying a meal because it doesn’t fit my taste, I should be thankful that I have a sense of taste. I should be thankful that I have a full stomach when so many go to bed hungry every night. When I fret about the condition of my modest home, I should be thankful that I have a roof over my head. I should be thankful, instead of irritated, when my children interrupt my work and ask me to play with them. When my car breaks, I should be thankful that I have a car to break.

Most of all, by all rights I should be in constant awe of God’s grace. He extended grace to me by saving me through the blood of Christ. I should be so thankful that he has made me one of his particular people. I should be so thankful for his law that preserves me, and I should be so grateful – that I never transgress it. But I do transgress it – all of us do. Every single day, we betray God’s grace by sinning against him. We turn up our noses up at his commands – commands that he gave us out of his love for us. We are all like the Israelites who, though we have more than enough reason to be holy as our Father in heaven is holy, constantly transgress his law as if we were spoiled children.

We are spoiled children, but we are God’s spoiled children. In spite of our ungratefulness, our greed, our self-centeredness, and our pervasive sinfulness, God preserves us. Ezra’s prayer begins with a lament of Israel’s behavior, but continues in verse 8 to extol the grace of God to his people. Ezra says, “But now, for a brief moment, the Lord our God has been gracious in leaving us a remnant and giving us a firm place in his sanctuary, and so our God gives light to our eyes and a little relief in our bondage. Though we are slaves, our God has not deserted us in our bondage. He has shown us kindness in the sight of the kings of Persia: He has granted us new life to rebuild the house of our God and repair its ruins, and he has given us a wall of protection in Judah and Jerusalem.”

Israel, in spite of their transgressions, has been given a firm place in his sanctuary. Even though they have taken the self-destructive step of inviting pagans, with their detestable practices, into their homes. They are given a firm place in God’s sanctuary, a place of safety, protection, a holy place where they continue to be in God’s presence.

God has given them light to their eyes. They can see the world in its proper perspective. That is, the world is created by the LORD, and they are a people who are called to dwell with him. God gave them sight to see the seriousness of their sin and their need for his strength, power, and salvation. Ultimately, God would give people the sight to see their need for the salvation offered through his Son, Jesus Christ. What a wonderful gift sight is!

They have been given relief from their bondage. Whereas they were once slaves, they are now free. Even when they were slaves, God was with them. Even when their situation seemed hopeless, God was with them, preserving them, caring for their needs. They were never alone in Babylon, and they are not alone now. God granted them new life to rebuild the house of God. It’s a new life that is infinitely better than the old life. It is a life in his presence.

Finally, God has protected them. He protects them from destruction from within by prohibiting the intermarriage between his people and pagans, and he protects them from destruction from without by giving them a wall of protection around Judah and Jerusalem. They will be preserved. God will not withdraw his love for them. He will not abandon them. They may be disciplined, but they will never be abandoned. He is always with them.

God was with my wonderful wife in those years that I did not share her faith. Often, she didn’t feel like God was there at all. There were many nights that she went to bed, would curl up, and cry herself to sleep. The situation seemed hopeless. We never argued unless we were arguing over faith, and boy, did those arguments ever get heated. When we met, I told her I could care less about faith, but I did. I didn’t lie to her. At the time, it didn’t matter to me. She could do what she wanted, but over time, her faith got in my way. It seemed like she was always with those church people, with their hypocrisy and holier-than-thou attitude. My anger at God, my hatred for his Son, was so intense that it seemed I would never share her faith.

Sure, we were different colors, but color never presented much of a problem. Yes, I grew up listening to Nirvana and Led Zeppelin, and she grew up listening to Boys-2-Men and Salt-n-Peppa, but we could work around that. My mother cooked without much seasoning, and Gail considered it bland. Gail’s mother fried everything and I considered much of it a heart attack waiting to happen, but we could figure out what to eat together. Yes, there were differences, but none of the color related differences even approached the difference that we faced due to our disagreement about who Jesus is. If people didn’t like the fact that we were married because she’s dark and I’m light, then that was their problem. But, she hadn’t just invited a white man into her home. She had invited one of the pagans into her home, with my detestable practices – and that was our problem.

She should not have married me. She shouldn’t have considered marrying a man who would not share her faith, who would not raise her children in the knowledge of our Lord, but she did, and it hurt her. She stopped going to church. She became angry with God. How could he do this to her! After a while, her only prayers were prayers said in anger. But, she still prayed, and when she prayed in anger she asked the LORD to give me eyes to see. She prayed that I be set free from my bondage. She prayed that he preserve her in her faith. Thankfully, God works even in situations where we disobey his commands.

He preserved her. Her prayers, though angry, were still prayers. She still trusted that she was being heard, even if she felt she had to yell to be heard. She had been given a firm place in his sanctuary. Once she was cleansed by the blood of Christ, she became one of God’s children. Yes, she was a spoiled child, but she was his child, and he would never let her go. By his grace, he gave me eyes to see. By his grace, I saw my sin, and my need for a savior. I could see that he had created this beautiful world and that it what I could see was only the beginning of his glory. He set me free from the bondage of my sin, and I was finally free to serve him out of love and gratitude, not out of an obligation to avoid punishment. Even when I was God’s enemy, when I was in self-imposed exile, he was with me. God preserved his little girl, Gail, and he continues to preserve our little multi-racial little family to this day.

I wrote the following short reflection after reading about half of “God’s Passion for His Glory: Living the Vision of Jonathan Edwards” by Dr. John Piper. There is much more I could write about this book, but we are limited to one page reflections for my Edwards class. I hope you find it edifying…

Piper describes sin as suicidal. What an amazing and appropriate word to use in describing sin. Suicide is willful, self-destructive, and irrational behavior that does not recognize the grace of God. It is an act that comes out of a total absence of hope. Even after recognizing what sin is, we find that we participate in it on a daily basis. Adam’s sin in the garden had such immense ramifications, but all he did was eat fruit from a tree – he disobeyed. Adam’s disobedience was so serious, that it plunged all of his progeny into fallenness that prefers spiritual suicide to eternal life. That’s serious!

We forget so easily how serious our sin is in the eyes of God – that is, if we ever really know. I wonder if we can ever really know how serious our sin is? Edwards tries to put sin into its proper perspective. He posits that sin in is so abhorrent to God that justice is never done – even in eternity in hell. He says that there is no particular moment where one can say to the reprobate in hell – “Now justice is done.” I wonder if that’s true. Can we really say that God’s justice is never done? If it isn’t, then can we say that eternal torment balances the scale of justice?

Maybe part of the problem is our inability to think outside of time. We don’t know what eternity in time actually is – let alone eternity outside of time. I don’t imagine that we’ll be looking at our watches in eternity. Whatever the case, sin is serious and any amount of time spent pondering sin in the eyes of God should send us screaming to the cross in repentance.

As some of you may know, I converted to Islam and lived as a Muslim for three years. During that time, I studied it constantly. I enjoyed the intellectual approach to faith that I heard so many teachers of Islam espouse. Hamza Yusuf was one of my favorite lecturers. I’d never heard preaching that engaged my intellect as well as his teaching.

He and I had more than a few things in common. We were both American, white-male converts to Islam. He came from a family that was probably a bit better off than mine, but neither of us was poor or exceedingly rich. Before he changed his name to Hamza Yusuf, his last name was Hanson, just like mine.

Now, why do I bring up Hamza Yusuf? He is an example of a knowledgeable, peaceful Muslim. He was educated in sharia in the Middle East and spent time living in Eritrea. He is one of the most respected moderate Muslims in the United States. But, there is something about Hamza Yusuf that I think would shock most Americans. He unabashedly advocates the imposition of sharia law in the United States.

Now, his version of sharia doesn’t look like the version you may see implemented in Afghanistan or Saudi Arabia. His version of sharia has a more than a tinge of leftist ideology in it. In Yusuf’s sharia there is democracy. There is freedom of speech. There is equality between genders. Yusuf is a poster child for moderate American Muslims, because he has taken the name of Islam and slapped it together with the norms and common ideology of much of American society. None of these classically liberal positions resemble the way any Islamic society in history has ever been run.

So, we should ask ourselves, why the disparity between Yusuf’s idea of sharia and the way it is implemented everywhere else in the world? Why does Yusuf openly admit that his ideas would catch him a beating or a lynching in most of the Islamic world?

It’s because his ideas are not what the Qur’an or ahadith teach. Certainly, he bases his arguments upon the Qur’an and ahadith. He has his interpretation and Osama bin Laden has his, but are all interpretations created equal? Though he is a hero to many moderate, American Muslims, his ideas are considered radical or heretical in the Islamic world. Hamza Yusuf and his followers do not represent Islam – they represent a liberalized Western version of Islam.

Now, what really gets my goat is when I hear that people who oppose Islam are ‘ignorant’ of the faith. The funny thing is, most of the people who make this accusation couldn’t tell you the difference between the Qur’an and ahadith. They couldn’t tell you what the hijrah was, or what salat is, or tawheed is. They couldn’t tell you the origin of the Sunni/Shia schism, or who the first three caliphs were.  Yet, they claim to know for a fact that Islam is a peaceful religion. Interesting, no?

Let’s get a few things ironed out here.

1. Muslims do not equal Islam (oh, and Christians do not equal Christianity as well). People can claim to be whatever they want. I could claim to be the flying spaghetti monster, but claiming it does not make it so. Likewise, a person can claim to be a Muslim, but not follow the tenants of the Islamic faith. A person can call himself or herself a Muslim, and never perform salat – which by definition in Islam makes him or her an unbeliever. There is an Islamic ideal, and some people are close to it, while others are distant. Those who are close to is are ‘more Islamic’ than those who are far away. Who’s closest to the Islamic ideal? Hamza Yusuf or Osama bin Laden?
2. Disagreement with an ideology does not imply hatred of that ideology’s adherents. People disagree all the time. Does a Democrat necessarily hate a Republican? Does a Protestant necessarily hate a Roman Catholic? In both cases, people disagree. Yet, when a Christian disagrees with a Muslim, it’s hatred. Sorry, I ain’t buying it.
3. Some interpretations of a text are better than others. A common refrain in our day is to say that a way of reading the Bible is simply “your interpretation” and nothing more. Taken to its logical conclusion, this saps any text of meaning. It is to say that the author had no intent in writing the text. If I read the US Constitution, and tell you it’s about Big Bird on Sesame Street, then it’s obvious that I’ve made a poor interpretation of the text. Texts have meaning (unless they are meant to be meaningless). If this is not true, then the idea of ‘Islam’ becomes meaningless – rendering any ‘tolerance’ toward Islam meaningless as well.
4. Tolerance is a myth. The people who scream the loudest about tolerating Islam are, by no coincidence, the very same people who criticize those of us who have a problem with Islam. So, all ideas can be tolerated unless that idea is intolerant. Inconsistent? You bet.

Wouldn’t it be nice if people like Hamza Yusuf were accurate representatives of true Islam? Granted, it would still be a false religion, but it would be a much less dangerous false religion. The fact is that Islamic primary sources do advocate violent jihad. They do advocate war with non-Muslims until they submit to Islam. The ahadith are filled with murders perpetrated, ordered, and pardoned by Muhammad (the most frightening case being that of a pregnant woman killed in her sleep for speaking against Muhammad). The Qur’an and ahadith do call for the subjugation of non-Muslims in an Islamic society. These are the teachings that will prevail in the war of ideologies within the Muslim world because the true believers are not afraid to silence their opponents through violence and intimidation. Who ever heard of a ‘moderate’ dying for anything?

I can say all of the above while still having a deep love for the Muslim people. I can say all the above and not feel the need to attack Muslims because of their faith. I can say all of the above, and not treat Muslims as I would be treated in an Islamic state. Any claim to the contrary is based on ignorance, emotion, or both – it certainly isn’t based on a reasonable assessment of the situation.

The question isn’t whether or not people like Hamza Yusuf would use force and violence to implement their ideology. The question is whether or not Islam advocates force and violence to implement sharia. Given that the consistent interpretation of the Islamic primary sources throughout history more closely resembles the ideology of Osama bin Laden than it does the ideology of Hamza Yusuf, the answer to that question is a resounding YES.

1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was with God in the beginning.

3Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4In him was life, and that life was the light of men. 5The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.

6There came a man who was sent from God; his name was John. 7He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all men might believe. 8He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light. 9The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world.

10He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him.11He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. 12Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— 13children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.

14The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

Have you ever heard the song by the Dave Matthew’s Band called So Much to Say? One of the lines from that song goes like this: “I find, sometimes it’s easy to be myself. Sometimes I find it’s better to be somebody else.” Who hasn’t felt that way before? I can remember many times when I was young and was in un-eager expectation of my father’s discipline, thinking, it really would be better to be somebody else right now.

It wasn’t just when I was facing discipline that I wanted to be somebody else. Mom will appreciate this story. When I was six or seven years old, I got a pretty bad burn on my hand. Mom made potpies for dinner. You know, the frozen ones that take like an hour to cook? I love potpies, and when that thing was finally done, I was ready to eat it. It smelled so good, after that long wait my stomach was rumbling with hunger, but I had to be careful eating it because it was still very hot.

We got to eat in front of the television that night, and I went into our basement where the television was. As I went to sit down and eat my potpie and watch Welcome Back Cotter, I spilled the very hot potpie on my hand, and it burned a nice bit of skin off my thumb. Mom called her sister, my aunt who is a nurse, and she advised mom to take me to the ER. She told mom that they would probably have to give me a tetanus shot.

It’s important to know that when I was a kid, I hated shots. They scared me terribly. I’m much better with them now, but when I was a kid, I’d do just about anything to get out of getting a shot.

So, on my aunt’s advice, we went to the hospital, and of course, we waited forever. Every moment waiting in that hospital was pure agony. From what my aunt said, not only was I going to have to deal with this burn on my hand, which seemed to hurt more with every passing minute, but I was going to have to endure a shot too. The whole time, I was wishing that I could have been somebody else. I always think that when I’m in hospitals – how lucky are these healthy doctors and nurses? They don’t have burns or have to get shots.

Finally we were shown to a room. The doctor came in and removed the burned skin from my hand, and it was a very painful process. Much more painful than getting a shot, but I managed to get through it. I was “very brave.” After the skin was removed, they put cream on it and bandaged it. I remember when they put the cream on, how it felt like it was sucking heat out of my skin. It felt so good. I was feeling better, and thought I may escape this whole shot thing.

Then, they brought in the syringe, and I knew the jig was up. They were going to stick that thing in me, and I don’t like that! After all I had been through, they were going to add insult to injury and subject me to a needle. I really wanted to be somebody else. So, the nurse came to give me the shot. I can still remember the cold sensation and smell of the alcohol she rubbed on my skin. When you smell that alcohol smell, you know what comes next. I decided to take matters into my own hands. I took off running.

I remember the nurse chasing me around a table or a bed that was in the room. I even went so far as to get under the table and crawl to the other side to escape. If I remember correctly, they never did catch me. It was mom who finally talked me into submitting to the shot. When it came, I think the nurse pinched my arm a bit harder than she had to because she was upset with me. I’ll bet when the nurse was chasing me around that ER, she wanted to be somebody else too. Not to mention my poor mother, who probably wished I were somebody else’s child at that point.

You know, there are a lot of people in the world who wish Jesus could be somebody else. There surely were people who wanted Jesus to be someone other than who he claimed to be when he was alive. As John sat down to write his gospel, he wanted the reader to know up front who Jesus is. John doesn’t leave the reader to guess about the identity of Jesus. He wants us to read his gospel through the lens of the revelation that Jesus is God made flesh. He tells us this shocking revelation up front. He tells us something that people find offensive. He tells us that Jesus is God.

Where does he say that? We just read through the text, and there is no sentence or phrase that says, “Jesus is God!” It does say, “The Word was God”. What is the Word? For the Greeks, the Word was an “ordering force that gave harmony to the universe” (James White). It was an impersonal force, like gravity or magnetism. It felt no emotion. It could not relate to humans on a personal level. It could not love or care. John uses the Greek understanding of the Word, but personalizes it. He’s not adopting Greek philosophy to create a trinitarian understanding of God, but using the language and categories of his audience to communicate who Jesus is.

He says the Word was in the beginning. Remember that phrase “In the beginning”? It’s there in Genesis 1 – the story of creation. Creation had a beginning. Is John telling us that the Word had a beginning as well? Our English translations fall a bit short here. The Greek word that we translate as “was” is in the imperfect tense. The imperfect tense means it was a continuous action in the past. The Word was ALWAYS there, and was there at the beginning of everything else. In fact, the Word was the agent of creation. John tells us “Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.”^[1]

The Word was God and the Word was with God? Come again? Isn’t that like me saying that I was with me and I was me? Doesn’t being with something necessarily mean that there are two different things? We can conclude one of three things from John’s writing at this point. Either he is delusional, or a bad writer, or he is communicating something to us that is beyond our ability to understand completely. He is saying that Jesus was with God, and that Jesus was God. This passage is essential in formulating the doctrine of the trinity.

I want to give a brief definition of the trinity. It comes from Dr. James White’s book The Forgotten Trinity. This definition is functional, but ultimately not comprehensive. It is, after all, attempting to explain the unexplainable. It says: “Within the one Being that is God, there exists eternally three coequal and coeternal persons, namely, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.” In this definition, we differentiate between a Being and a Person. For us, we are one being per person. I am Andy, a single human being. There is only one person in my being. God, believe it or not, is different from us. God is one Being. Within his one Being, there exist three Persons. So, when John says the Word was with God, and the Word was God, he’s not being illogical or delusional. He’s revealing something to us about the very nature of God.

People don’t like to hear this. They don’t like the idea that Jesus was God. When Jesus made claims to forgive sins, something only God can do, people said he was blaspheming God. God is not a man! But John tells us that the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. Later in John’s gospel, they even tried to stone Jesus for his claims. John 10 reads, “I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand. I and the Father are one.” Again the Jews picked up stones to stone him, but Jesus said to them, “I have shown you many great miracles from the Father. For which of these do you stone me?” ”We are not stoning you for any of these,” replied the Jews, “but for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God.”

They didn’t like Jesus’ claims of divinity. They didn’t like it to the point that they picked up stones to kill him. The Jews weren’t the only ones to fight against Jesus’ claims of divinity. The Gnostics came along later and claimed that Jesus was a god, or an emanation of God. They couldn’t accept the idea that Jesus was fully God and fully man, so they demoted him to demigod status and took away his humanity. Jesus, according to the Gnostics, did not have flesh, but only appeared to be a man.

The ancient world also had to deal with the Arian heresy. They believed that there was a time when Jesus did not exist. That he came into being and is not eternal. At one point, the majority of the church and the church’s leadership believed the Arian heresy to be the orthodox teaching of scripture. We still see the Arian heresy today. It is the Jehovah’s Witness’ Christology.

The church has also had to deal with the Sabellian heresy. The Sabellian heresy says that Jesus is the Father. That is, God the Father changed his appearance to become God the Son. Of course, we already saw that Jesus is not the same Person as the Father, but the same Being. We can also see this heresy today. Oneness Pentecostalism holds to Sabellian Christology. T.D. Jakes, one of the most popular preachers in the country, is an Oneness Pentecostal.

Now, I’m throwing around a lot of big words here. We’re talking about some very heady ideas. Our own biology is extremely complicated, and science still has a long way to go in understanding how our bodies work. Why is it important to discuss the nature of God’s Being? What difference does it make? Aren’t these things that seminary students and professors talk about? What does all of this have to do with me? After all, the scriptures say that all people need to do to be saved is profess that Jesus is Lord and believe in him, right?

Yes, that’s true. But, who is Jesus? Is Jesus who he says he is in the scriptures, or do people sometimes feel it’s better that he be somebody else. Did Jesus really come in the flesh? Did he really suffer on the cross, or was it all just an act? Did he bleed real blood? Did he cry real tears? Was he really born of a woman? Isn’t that below God? Our Muslim friends would have us believe that it is below God to enter his creation. God wore a diaper? God suffered and died on a cross? Never!

The implications of these seemingly minor differences in theology have a far-reaching impact into our understanding of salvation, the church, and even the relationship between men and women in marriage. Jesus came in the flesh as the second Adam. We are all naturally children of Adam. We inherit the sinful nature that he passed on to us. We become children of the living God by becoming children of the second Adam, Jesus. John tells us in today’s scripture that, “Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.”^[2] Our new nature as children of God is inherited from the human Jesus Christ.

It’s also important that Jesus be fully God. The Heidelberg Catechism Q&A 14 asks: “Can there be found anywhere, one, who is a mere creature, able to satisfy (God’s wrath) for us?” It answers: “None; for, first, God will not punish any other creature for the sin which man has committed; and further, no mere creature can sustain the burden of God’s eternal wrath against sin, so as to deliver others from it.” No mere man can take our sins upon himself – yet only a man can take our sins. Sounds like bad news, doesn’t it? That’s why the Word became flesh. Jesus is 100% God, and 100% man. His flesh is like ours, and so his punishment on the cross can be ours. He is God, and so he is able to sustain the infinite wrath and justice of our Holy God. ONLY Jesus can do that!

Today you don’t have to go far to hear people talk about Jesus. People, almost universally will agree that Jesus was a good man. They will say that he was a radical innovator who brought humanity forward. They may even say that he was a prophet who spoke the mind of God. They will say he was a great teacher. But, that’s all they want him to be. They will say that he, among many other teachers, shows us A WAY to God. But what did Jesus teach? Jesus taught the HE is THE way, the truth, and the life, and that none can come to the Father except through him. Jesus taught the HE and the Father are one. Jesus taught that we cannot please God on our own because we are fallen beyond our ability to save ourselves.

And that, brothers and sisters, is why people feel it would be better if he could be somebody else. People don’t like the exclusive message of the gospel. Jesus can’t be God, sent to die for the sins of a particular people. Because if he is, then he is the only way. If he’s the only way, then that isn’t fair. But, it is just.

If the gospel is true, then we are seriously broken. People don’t want to believe they’re broken. If the gospel is true, then God is perfectly just. He doesn’t let sin off the hook because he’s a nice guy. The scriptures do not anywhere call God a nice guy! If you read the gospels, you will not find Jesus being a “nice guy.” People want a god who is a nice guy. They don’t want a God who is perfectly holy. People feel it would be better if Jesus could be somebody else.

If the gospel is true, then we really do have to answer to a God who cannot be budged by our pleading, or our trying to do better, or our helping old ladies across the street to build up our good works. If the gospel is true, then the only way to be saved is through the sovereign decree of God working through the blood and resurrection of Jesus Christ. People don’t like the idea of God being the one who accomplishes our salvation. We want to do it ourselves, so we can puff up ourselves in self-righteousness. People feel it would be better if Jesus could be somebody else, because it makes them feel better about who they are.

Our scripture in verses 17 and 18 reads: “For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father’s side, has made him known.”^[3] God gave his law through Moses. He gave a law that was not intended to make people feel better about themselves. The law he gave was intended to show us how much we need Jesus Christ. Grace and truth come from Jesus Christ. He is God the One and Only who sits at the Father’s side. He has made our Father’s grace known to us. It is not a nice guy grace. It is not a grace that depends on the niceness of someone, but on the cross and the resurrection of Jesus. Since God gave his Son, who was fully God and fully man, as a substitute for us, we can trust that our salvation is complete. We can KNOW with CERTAINTY that we are forgiven. Jesus did not die for nothing. He died for his people who he loves dearly. No, our God isn’t a nice guy – and aren’t we glad that he isn’t somebody else? Aren’t we glad that instead of a nice God, we have a God whose mercy is as real as his justice? Aren’t we glad that instead of a nice God, we have a God whose love is as real as his wrath?

Ephesians 2:1-10 – Made Alive in Christ

1As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, 2in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. 3All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. 4But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. 6And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, 7in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. 8For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9not by works, so that no one can boast. 10For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

You’ve probably noticed in the last few weeks that the days have gotten much shorter. It’s also started getting a little chilly, especially in the morning. It’s at this time of the year that football shows up on the television schedule. The other day, I had lunch at some friends’ house, and they had fresh apple cider to drink. Nothing beats that tangy apple cider. It’s during this time of the year that my six-year old and four-year old boys and I love to gather around our table and make caramel apples. Yes, that’s right, it’s fall.

The scent of fresh Michigan grown apples fills the produce aisle at the grocery store. The leaves in the trees that were a lush green only a few weeks ago are now red and brown and gold – and they start to fall off the trees. The kids are no longer in shorts, but put on their hoodies to go play in piles of fallen leaves or head off to their first days of school. It’s a really beautiful time of the year.

Along with this beauty, however, comes a bit of ugliness. On October 31, in addition to celebrating Reformation Day, you may see little ghosts and goblins running around your neighborhood. Yes, fall means Halloween. Some Christians love Halloween, while others despise it. We can disagree about such things, but one thing I think all Christians would agree on is that costumes of skeletons, ghosts, and devils are ugly. No, they’re not very frightening. In fact, many of them look so silly that we’re more likely to laugh at them then cower away from them in fear.

These Halloween costumes take what would be terribly frightening in real life, a reanimated skeleton, a ghost, or a devil, and make them palatable. In a sense, by creating our own versions of skeletons, ghosts and devils, we gain control over them.

Skeletons, ghosts, and devils are frightening because they represent death to us. Our skeletons only become visible when we die. Ghosts are disembodied spirits. Devils are part of the spiritual realm, which is rightfully unfamiliar and frightening to us. So, when people dress up like this on Halloween, in many ways it becomes a way of gaining control over death itself. Not a very effective way, but we do what we can. It is a way of trivializing the seriousness and permanence of death. It takes the distasteful, bitter thought of death – and adds a bit of sugar to it. We often want to add a little sugar to the bitterness of death. It helps us swallow it and still get through our days not thinking about it constantly.

When we read a passage like our text today, we also want to lighten up the language of death – but Paul is talking seriously about the real nature of death. He’s not talking about some dress up, ‘mostly dead’, Night of the Living Dead type of death. He’s talking about real, permanent, physical, and spiritual death.

Death has haunted humanity since Adam and Eve disobeyed God in the garden. We read in Genesis that, “The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. And the LORD God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.” The wages of sin is death. When the serpent tempted Eve, he trivialized death. He said something to the effect of, “Pffft. Die? Yeah right. You ain’t gonna to die. Don’t be silly!” Eve looked up at the fruit and it looked so good. She took the serpent’s lead and decided that death wasn’t that serious, if it was going to happen at all. God’s warning was not to be taken seriously either. He would understand. He’d been so nice to them up to now, why wouldn’t he continue to be nice?

The fruit looked good. The thought of eating the fruit developed into a desire, a craving. So she reached up, plucked that tasty looking fruit from the tree. She ate it, and shared it with her husband Adam. Their disobedience did in fact lead to death. Real death. Serious death. In fact, if you are a child of Adam and Eve, you will die too.

Paul says that the Ephesians were DEAD in their trespasses and sins. But not just the Ephesians, he says, “All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath.” Paul makes a universal application. Everybody, all, were dead in trespasses and sins.

So, what does it mean to be ‘dead in trespasses and sins’? What does it mean to be dead? I know this is unpleasant, and I’m not putting any sugar on the idea, but consider a corpse. What does a corpse do? A corpse is devoid of conscious thought. A corpse is unable to do anything, but be dead. A corpse cannot, by its own will, even lift a finger. It cannot see the light of day, or taste the sweetness of honey, or smell the scent of mom’s apple pie baking in the oven, or hear the music of Mozart, or touch the softness of a baby’s cheek. It is a state of hopelessness. It is permanent paralysis. It is paralysis of thought and feeling. It is the unnatural result of cravings, desires, and thoughts, which are sinful. Paul says the Ephesians are dead in trespasses and sins. They are powerless to escape sinfulness. They are paralyzed in their sinful nature. They cannot sense the goodness of God, or his presence in their lives – just as a corpse cannot sense the beauty of the physical world around it.

They are dead, and in fact are happy to stay dead. They crave and desire separation from God. In the book of John we read that, “Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed.” They LOVE the darkness – and out of that love comes their cravings and desires for sin. That love for darkness compelled them to be dead to God.

Do you remember Jesus standing before Pilate? Pilate gave the people a choice. You can free Jesus: the man who gave sight to the blind, the man who cured the lame, the man who healed lepers, the man who raised the dead to life. Or, you can free Barabbas: the man who led a rebellion, the man who was a notorious criminal, the man who was a killer. Free the man who gave life and flourishing, or free the man who brought destruction and death. What did the crowd do? They loved the darkness. They loved death – and they cheered for life to go to the cross so that it may be dead.

Paul could have very well written this letter to us today. The world we live in does not love the light brothers and sisters. At one time in America, people at least had shame about their sin. They were not proud of the fact that they were addicted, or that they had committed adultery, or that they had lied, or that they had stolen from others. People loved their sin, but not so much that they bragged about it. It was kept under wraps. Sin was something that you did with other people who loved the same sin, but not something that was publicized, or made an integral part of our public identity. But, today we celebrate sin because of how much we love it.

About a year ago, a famous television personality made a confession on his television show. To his credit, he felt that he needed to confess that he had an affair outside of his marriage. He humbly went on stage, and with his head hung low, told the audience that he had cheated on his wife. Who knows what he expected to happen after he admitted his affair? Maybe, he expected to hear silence. Maybe, he expected to be booed. Maybe he expected to hear a gasp from the audience. Whatever he expected, he was visibly surprised by the response he did get. The people started to applaud. What was obvious from the context of his confession and his surprise was that the crowd was not applauding the confession itself. The crowd was not registering approval of his integrity in stepping forward and taking responsibility for his actions. They were not supportive of his repentance. They were applauding the fact that he was ‘courageous enough’ to cheat on his wife.

Now, before we get all high and mighty – holier than thou, let’s remember what Paul said. He said we were ALL dead in our trespasses and sin. He said that we ALL followed the desires and cravings of our sinful nature. He said that we were ALL objects of God’s wrath. You and me are not exempt from this crowd. In fact, we’d fit in just fine with all the other spiritual corpses, hiding from the light – taking refuge from the reality of the seriousness of our sin. Sin, that we still love. Sin that we find hard to put down. We still have those wicked thoughts, cravings, and desires. Even after being thrown out of the garden, that forbidden fruit still looks good to us. We, like the crowd before Pilate, would cry out for Barabbas. Does our spirit appear dead, or is it alive?

Is it alive? To whom is this letter intended? Paul says WE WERE dead in our trespasses and sins. That would imply that those he’s writing to are no longer dead. In fact, he goes on to say just that. He says, “But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus.”

We have been made alive with Christ? Let’s consider that for a moment. After Pilate examined Jesus, and the crowd chose to spare Barabbas, Jesus was sent to the cross where he died. We know he was dead because of the terrible torture he had endured before he even went to the cross. We know he was dead because he spent hours naked and exposed on the cross, with nails driven into his hands and his feet. We know he was dead because the Roman guards made sure he was dead, by piercing him with a spear. He was then buried. He wasn’t mostly dead. He wasn’t fake dead like we may see on television where dead characters seem to come back out of nowhere. He wasn’t Halloween dead. He was dead and buried. Then what happened?

He rose from the dead. Not like a zombie or a vampire. He rose from the dead and was still himself. Somehow, Jesus had victory over death. Somehow, death could not keep him down. The wages of sin is death, but Jesus never sinned. Jesus lived a perfect life so that death could not keep a hold on him. He was no slave to sin, who followed wicked thoughts, cravings, and desires. Paul is saying to the Ephesians, you were dead, hopeless, powerless, and this Jesus who rose from the dead – who has victory and power over death – brought you back from the dead when he rose.

He rose from the dead without a miracle worker or doctor. Dead people don’t just bring themselves back to life. Remember? Dead means you are powerless, hopeless. When Jesus brought Lazarus back from the dead, did Lazarus help? Lazarus was really dead. Not mostly dead. Not movie or television or Halloween dead, but really dead. How do we know? The KJV tells us that when Jesus went to Lazarus’ tomb he was told, “…by this time he stinketh: for he hath been dead four days.” He wasn’t in the tomb crying out for Jesus to help him. He didn’t just need a hand to pull himself from death into life. He needed a savior. He needed someone to do it for him. But Jesus, who is in eternal communion with his Father was raised by the power of God.

Paul recognizes that need a savior when he writes, “And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.”

Paul says to the Ephesians, Jesus brought you back from the dead. He brought you back when you were hopeless. When you were helpless, he reached out, he initiated, and he saved you. God did that so that he may show the incomparable riches of his grace. Don’t think that you can boast about your salvation, because God did it. He is such an amazing God that he saves the un-savable. He loves those who hate him. He brought you into the light and he made you clean. Why? He is so merciful, and so gracious, and his grace and mercy are glorified when he works the impossible by his grace and mercy.

You see, God specializes in hopeless causes. That’s one way we know he’s God. Where anyone else would look at the dead, and say, “I got nothin…” our God says, “Arise. I can and I will save the un-savable.” When anyone else would recoil from or avoid someone who hates them, our God says, “ I love you.” And in doing so, we come to love him.

His grace is unstoppable. He works in impossible situations and brings about impossible solutions to impossible problems. Next month I am visiting Angola prison in LA. God is pouring his salvation and grace upon the men of Angola prison through the grace of Jesus Christ. Angola is full of the hardest of criminals: murderers, rapists, thieves, and child molesters. They are dead men walking – 90% of them will never see the light of day outside of prison walls again. They are dead to the world, and most likely spiritually dead when they committed their crimes. But, the walls of a prison do not stop the grace of God in Jesus Christ. They can’t save themselves, but Jesus can.

The power of Jesus Christ has taken over that prison. Revival has spread through Angola, and lives are being changed by the pure, undeserved grace of God through our Savior Jesus Christ. Men who had no hope now have hope in Jesus Christ. While their hearts beat, they may never set foot outside the prison gates, but they are free. They are alive!

The power of God’s grace is not found not only through their hope, but also through their actions. Before this revival started happening, the prison experienced an average of 346 inmate-on-inmate assaults with weapons each year. Imagine that, almost one assault with a weapon every day in a population of only 5,000. Since the revival, that number has dropped to 134. Jesus is working. Jesus is saving. Jesus is changing and loving people. Jesus is giving hope to the hopeless.

Jesus isn’t content to have these men behind bars living better lives. He’s using them to bring his grace to others. Out of the 5,000 men at Angola, 200 of them are now Bible college educated pastors. When Hurricane Katrina hit LA, prisoners from a jail were moved to Angola because Katrina damaged the jail. While they were there, those 200 pastors and other Christians behind bars led 200 of those new inmates to Christ. We can never overestimate the grace, mercy, and love of our Lord. He brings the dead to life. He does for us what we cannot do for ourselves.

So, when we feel that we are beyond hope. When we feel that there is no way God could love us. When we feel that we are damaged goods and that grace is for other people, because grace for good people, we need to remember that God can raise the dead. Through Jesus Christ, even the enemies of God can be reconciled to him. God can bring murderers, rapists, and child molesters back to life. God can bring you back to life.

God is taking skeletons, and zombies, and bringing us back to life every day. We died and rose with Christ, and we continue to die and rise on a daily basis. We are no longer the living dead – we are by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ truly alive.