God's awesome creation and re-creation of me

"Now God has us right where He wants us, with all the time in this world and the next to shower grace and kindness upon us in Christ Jesus. Saving is all His idea, and all His work. All we do is trust Him enough to let Him do it. It's God's gift from start to finish! We don't play the major role. If we did, we'd probably go around bragging that we'd done the whole thing and that we know how to do it best! No, we neither make nor save ourselves (or anyone else, for that matter. God does both the making and the saving of all of us. He creates each of us by Christ Jesus to join Him in the work He does, the good work He has gotten ready for us to do, work we had better be doing His way."
-- Ephesians 8:7-10 (The Message)

And now for an eloquent expansion on the theme of the above, sent to me yesterday by a very dear friend (and thanks so much, Lance), the theme being that what we plan and do when it comes to God's work is pretty irrelevant in the grand scheme of things, and our best bet is to surrender our own planning to pay careful attention to what He's already doing, preparing to celebrate His outrageous creativity which takes place most dramatically inside our own hearts, if we are courageous enough to allow it:

"You see, the primal lie is that 'I create me,' but the reality is that 'I damn me' (and I keep doing it over and over and over again) and 'God saves me.' And that is all a part of how 'He creates me. I’m not saved by my will, by my choice, by my judgments. I’m saved by God’s will, by God’s choice, by God’s judgment (which is grace).

As long as I think I’m saved by my judgments, I’m stuck in Hell, for my judgments are Hell. What most people mean by 'free will' is 'my will,' which is emptiness, death, and Hell. You see, when I don’t really trust God’s power, God’s judgment, I end up trusting my power, my choices, my judgment. We think at the time that this will save us, when it is precisely what we need to be saved from!

To trust God’s power is the death of my power. So we naturally don’t trust God’s power, for it’s the end of our power. God’s power is love that takes the form of grace. Nothing in all this world is as confronting and offensive as grace, for if I’m created solely by grace, it’s the death of the lie that I thought was me … the death of my pride.

We don’t trust God’s power, for we don’t understand God’s power: it’s the power of (real and unconditional) love.

God creates by giving, and we create by taking. So to make ourselves winners, we think there must be losers. To make ourselves first and best, we make others last and least (even if this means keeping them needing us in order to survive). It’s primal. We make scapegoats.

God came to earth as Christ and made Himself last and least. He made Himself the scapegoat. He said: 'Eve, take from me – body and blood, from my tree.' 'Eve, take from me – but I give me, and please forgive me, to you.' (Sin increased and grace abounded all the more.) It’s the power of surrendered power. The power of real love.

Love makes a space, and there love gives itself away. God makes a space, that you think is you – he makes it with you. Then God fills that space with Himself: The TRUE YOU. God gives you a random will, and that becomes a bad will, an empty will. Then God fills it with good will. What He takes is nothing (your emptiness) and what He gives is everything (Himself).

We are saved and created 100% by grace through faith. And you have absolutely nothing to boast about.

The cost of being created is believing 'I am created.' In other words: I’m created by 'grace through faith, and that not of myself, lest I should boast.' God freely wills that you would will Him in freedom. You have been chosen to choose, but that choice is a gift.

So you see: you’re not saved by your choice. You’re saved from your choice, by God’s choice in you."

-- excerpt from a sermon by Pastor Peter Hiett

"In life as in dance, grace glides on blistered feet."

-- Alice Abrams

Life-saving grace and being careful when seeking justice or revenge

Yesterday, I entered and fully enjoyed "a state of mind that sees God in everything," and in so doing felt touched by grace, especially in the form of two young women in their teens who seemed totally willing to be forgiven, and to forgive, and to be used as conduits of God's grace in their broken, heartsick families. It moved me deeply; it reminded me of this photograph called "Blistered Grace;" it inspired me to find more words to express my appreciation, awe, respect, and support of them.

Here's to you, A.J. & E.D.!

"He giveth more grace when the burdens grow greater,

He sendeth more strength when the labors increase;

To added affliction he addeth his mercy,

To multiplied trials, His multiplied peace."

-- Annie Johnson Flint

"The law and concerns about human justice detect sin; grace alone conquers sin."

(The "thermometer vs. thermostat" conversation, girls, remember?)

-- Saint Augustine of Hippo

"While demanding justice or seeking revenge, you might as well dig two graves - one for yourself."

-- Alane Fagin

"A state of mind that sees God in everything is evidence of growth in grace and a pure, thankful heart."

-- Charles G. Finney

"Grace is what God gives us when we don't deserve and mercy is when God doesn't give us what we do deserve."

-- Unknown

"Grace tried is sometimes even better, even more beautiful than grace mastered, for it is glory in its fragile infancy."

-- Samuel Rutherford

"Grace, the opposite of bitter, hurtful unforgiveness, is love that cares and stoops and rescues, beginning with the rescuer."

-- John R. W. Stott

"God appoints our graces to be nurses to other men's weaknesses, and fully realizing this reveals that both are necessary for the other."

-- Henry Ward Beecher

"To be able to live peaceably with hard and perverse persons, or with the disorderly and disoriented, or with such as go totally contrary to us, is a great grace and source of lasting peace."

-- Thomas À Kempis

"I know that to banish anger and bitterness and resentment altogether from one's breast is a most difficult task. It cannot be achieved through pure personal effort. It can only be done by the fully surrendered asking, receiving, and allowing to work of God's forgiveness and grace, making total forgiveness of others the richest blessing, primarily to the one who forgives."

-- Mohandes Gandhi

"Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited. Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody. If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God's wrath, for it is written: 'It is mine to avenge; I will repay,' says the Lord. On the contrary: 'If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.' Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good."

-- Romans 12:14-21 (The Message)

Law (or Karma) and Grace

Two amazing pieces, both saying essentially the same thing, from two different angles - one contemplative, introspective, and theologically oriented, and one outspoken, public, and secularly oriented. Both powerful and clear: Spirit rules over all, even law! And loving from Spirit is the most important law there is, as is described further in James 2:16-26 at the end of this message, and the implications and ramifications of this are mind-bending, but you must have the courage, first to look, and then to spiral deep within yourself to that soul-stirring place of Truth.

"Growing up in the church, it just made sense to me to be religious. It made sense to be an external Christian, trying to keep an external set of rules. After all, that's what I had always done as a child. I couldn't do and didn't know anything else, because I had always been an external person. So were you, I'm pretty sure, because we all grew up as external people, for the most part, defining ourselves in relation to other persons, things, and events that told us who we were and what was accepted and allowed. That's why new Christians (and new students of anything) are always so prone to asking the relentless external question: 'OK (now that I get that there's something worth getting here), what should I do now?'

But there's no life in the law and trying to 'do' it. The only thing the law tells you is what you ought to do, but can't do, and what you ought not to do, but can't stop doing. It will never relinquish its demand that you ought to do it or ought not to do it, because it's a divine 'ought-to;' God gave it to Moses, after all. We'll keep ourselves under that divine ought-to, and the 'condemnation and death' ministers (2 Corinthians 3), until we learn to live from the 'Person who dwells within us.' Because there's nothing in our flesh and mind that wants to say, 'I can't do it. I can't keep the law through my own effort.' Everything in our flesh and mind says, 'I want to try to do it, and with God's help maybe I can do it.'

Like my friend Burt Rosenburg says, everything in that kind of program is designed for futility, frustration, and failure. But they don't tell you that up front, do they? When you sign up as a new Christian, no one makes this announcement:

WE'VE GOT A WONDERFUL PROGRAM HERE, THE END RESULT OF WHICH WILL BE FUTILITY, FRUSTRATION, AND FAILURE! WHEN YOU HAVE COMPLETED THE COURSE, WE WILL GIVE YOU A DIPLOMA, SAYING:

'CONGRATULATIONS, YOU HAVE FAILED!'

I remember talking to a group and proclaiming, 'We have succeeded! In what? In failing!' And everyone smiled. For we finally recognized that we had succeeded in what we were supposed to do, which was to fail. 'Everyone is telling us that we failed in what we were supposed to succeed in. But the truth is we have succeeded in what we were supposed to fail in. Now we can get on with it. Now we can get on with true life.'

We usually quote Galatians 2:20 apart from its context. It immediately follows Paul's admonition to Peter concerning the law. When Paul said, 'I have been crucified with Christ,' he was referring to his death to the law. Paul was saying, 'The old me died on the cross with Christ, and when I died, I died to trying to keep the law on my own. Trying to keep the law is living according to the flesh, with me and my efforts as my central point of reference. I died to myself as my central point of reference. Now, Christ in me is my central point of reference. He is living His life through me, upon my request.'

As true believers and followers, we no longer live under the law, looking to it to tell us what to do and what not do, then trying our best to do or to not do it. Instead, we live on the faith principle, the inner life principle, of who really is our life - Christ. We trust that He directs us, opens or closes doors for us, and speaks directly to us, giving us a message or whatever is needed for the occasion. We trust that He is living through us. We may not feel it at any given moment, but we live by faith that He is our essential life."

-- Dan Stone, in The Rest of the Gospel: When the partial Gospel has worn you out

"A friend recently sent me a link to an article about U2's Bono (http://www.christianitytoday.com/music/interviews/2005/bono-0805.html). The article is an excerpt from a book containing Bono's exchange with a French music journalist and friend of the band. Bono's Christian faith has been widely discussed, and in the excerpt he explains his view of Christ. The result is a thoughful and articulate, and sometimes a little confusing, presentation of the Gospel.

Says Bono: 'There's nothing hippie about my picture of Christ. The Gospels paint a picture of a very demanding, sometimes divisive love, but love it is. … The way we would see it, those of us who are trying to figure out our great Christian conundrum, is that the God of the Old Testament is like the journey from stern father to friend. When you're a child, you need clear directions and some strict rules. But with Christ, we have access in a one-to-one relationship, for, as in the Old Testament, it was more one of worship and awe, a vertical relationship. The New Testament, on the other hand, we look across the table at a Jesus who looks familiar, horizontal. The combination is what makes the Cross so compelling.'

Bono's summary seems consistent with a Reformed view of the Testaments, though the language gets a little fuzzy. Another intriguing but puzzling discussion involves the idea of Karma vs. Grace. Bono believes we've moved out of the realm of Karma into one of Grace:

'You see, at the center of all religions is the idea of Karma. You know, what you put out comes back to you: an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, or in physics –in physical laws – every action is met by an equal or opposite reaction. It's intellectually clear to me that Karma is at the very heart of the universe. I'm absolutely sure of it. And yet, along comes this idea (and some occasional experiences) called Grace to upend all that 'as you reap, so you will sow' stuff. Grace seems to defy reason and logic, claiming that love can interrupt, if you like, the consequences of your actions….'

Bono's absolutely right to say that, in grace, God gives us what we don't deserve. But it's not true that the consequences of sin have simply been passed over, a la the dispensationalist view of a 'new law.' The biblical answer is that Christ has actually 'borne' our consequences – our Karma, if you will – in our place.

He seems to then agree with this a little later: 'I'd be in big trouble if Karma was going to finally be my judge…. I'm holding out for Grace. I'm holding out that Jesus took my sins onto the Cross, because I know who I am (in my flesh, at least), and I hope I don't have to depend on my own religiosity.'

Bono's comment about how 'grace seems to defy reason and logic' is a little problematic, but easily rectified by viewing it through a different lens. Paul declared that the whole idea of the cross is 'foolishness' to those who believed in their own perishing. To the Jews it was scandalous, and to the Greeks it just made no sense at all. But what makes it foolish to these folks is that it cuts diametrically against an existing way of thinking, and that's all. It challenges whole systems of thought and worldviews.

The idea is not that grace defies the rules of logic, as if logic belonged to only those who believe a certain way, while we're just hanging on to 'faith.' The issue, instead, is over the proper use of the term, 'logic.' From what message and paradigm are we going to logically reason? From the message of the cross, or from worldly wisdom? Your starting point determines where you end up, and what's logical truly depends on your perspective, and with the cross as the central point of reference, 'grace' is the most 'logical' divine response to our human challenges and griefs that there could be."

-- Chris Alexion

Logical as this response from God may be under the new paradigm of the cross, it still remains the most elusive and hardest to fully receive response, due primarily to our intellectual, "karmic" conditioning, which life then becomes totally about "unlearning."

And for some useful commentary on a very relevant Bible passage (from the very confronting book of James, in Chapter 2 - http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=James%202%20;&version=65;) that delves even further into this phenomenon:

"Questioning ourselves is of great use in every part of the holy life. Let us be more frequent in this, and in every thing take occasion to discourse with our souls. As places of worship cannot be built or maintained without expense, it may be proper that those who contribute thereto should be accommodated accordingly; but were all persons more spiritually-minded, the lowly, poor, and sick would be treated with more loving attention than usually is the case in worshipping congregations. A lowly state is most favourable for inward peace and for growth in holiness. God would give to all believers riches and honours of this world, if these would do them good, seeing that He has chosen them to be rich in faith, and made them heirs of His kingdom, which He promised to bestow on all who love Him. Consider how often riches lead to vice and mischief, and what great reproaches are thrown upon God and religion by men of wealth, power, and worldly greatness; and it will make this sin appear very sinful and foolish. The Scripture gives as a law, to love our neighbour as ourselves. This law is a Royal law, it comes from the King of kings; and if Christians act unjustly, they are convicted by the law as transgressors. To think that our good deeds will atone for our bad attitude, plainly puts us upon looking for another atonement. According to the covenant of works, one breach of any command brings a man under condemnation for violation of all of them, from which no obedience, past, present, or future, can deliver him. This shows us the happiness of those who are living in Christ, or, more accurately, who have allowed Christ to live through them. We may serve him calmly without slavish fear. God's restraints are not meant as a bondage, but our own corruptions are so. The doom passed upon impenitent sinners, at last, will be judgment without mercy (our karmic reality). But God deems it His glory and joy to pardon, bless, and bestow grace upon those who might justly be condemned at His tribunal; and His grace teaches those who humbly partake of His mercy to copy it into their conduct as a way of being."

-- from Bible Gateway's commentary on James 2