Today’s Word from Pastor Jim…
Christianity is about putting us in our place and slapping us down with grace.
Putting Us in Our Place
We are the children of God, created in the image of God, blessed and chosen. Children do not understand most of what happens around them. The behavior of adults is often curious to children. Why do we need bedtimes, why can’t we have ice cream for dinner, why must we put on a coat to play in the cold? We are children. We do not understand, and will not understand, the complexities of this universe or the mysterious moving of our God. We do not have good answers for the most troubling and terrifying questions of our existence. We are children; we could not survive on our own, we think the world revolves around us, and we cry when we do not get our way.
Children of God created in the image of God. We are creatures, created by God. Life is a gift to us; we did not create ourselves or bring ourselves into being. We are simply creatures like the birds of the air or the animals that roam the earth. Creatures, and yet we have a unique place among the creatures. We were created in God’s image, blessed to be a blessing. Capable of higher thinking, we have limited free will and we have been entrusted with the care of creation.
Slapping Us Down With Grace
There is no room for self-righteousness in Christianity. We are all human; we have all sinned and fallen short of God’s calling. We are strong and weak, faithful and unfaithful, saint sometimes and wayward sinner often. There is no room for self-righteousness in Christianity. We are saved by grace. We are forgiven by grace. We exist by grace. By grace we have been saved.
We did nothing to merit our time in the womb, the air that we breathe, seasons in the sun, the gift of human love, or our salvation. We have done nothing in our lives that has enhanced God’s view of us. Grace, grace, grace. Jesus welcomed home every prodigal child, every bum and adulterer, every leper and tax collector. Your intellect, your IRA balance, your worship attendance, your higher education, your athletic prowess, your voting record, does not impress God. It is all about grace; we have no chance without grace, we cannot earn God’s love.
Christianity is about putting us in our place and slapping us down with grace.
Remember, the sin of the garden had nothing to do with the apple; it was about denying our place as creatures. Eat and you will have knowledge like God, and you will no longer have to settle for being mere mortals. Remember, sinners never bothered Jesus, it was the self-righteous religious people who made his blood boil.
I am trying to be fine just being me, a sometimes happy, sometimes depressed, 190-pound bag of bones. I am trying to get comfortable with faith like a child. I do not need to understand it all to trust the one who gave me life as a gift.
One day closer,
Pastor Jim
