10-24-19 - Justified

(You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.)

“I tell you, this man went down to his home justified rather than the other…” That's how Jesus ends his story. What does he mean by “justified?” Why is the more “sinful” tax collector justified and the self-righteous Pharisee is not?

Justification is a key term for understanding what it means to be saved by God’s grace. Justification has to do with being “set right.” We get a clue from how we format documents – left, right- or center-justified. We often use the word as a defense – “Well, I was justified in saying that…” The law even allows for “justifiable homicide.”

As a theological term, though, it goes even deeper. It means to be made righteous, aligned. We cannot align ourselves – that is God’s work. And it is Christ’s righteousness that is conferred upon us, not our own. That’s why the “sinful” man was justified – in his humility and repentance, he was able to receive, where the contemptuous "righteous" man could not.

Martin Luther had a wonderful image for this – he called it the “The Glorious Exchange,” in which Christ, the King and Lord of all, left his glory and took on our beggars’ clothes, our sin and self-orientation. But in this exchange Christ does more than take on our lowly status – he gives us his. He takes our rags and dresses us instead in his royal robes of silk and velvet, his perfect righteousness. We get clothed in his holiness; it covers us, redefines us. That’s how God sees us, through Christ, as already holy.

How might it feel to put on a royal robe – or the finest clothing you can think of? 

Imagine it, in prayer. How might you walk differently today, knowing you are secretly royalty? 

How might you talk differently?

What do you pray about, knowing you have handed off everything that mars your inner beauty and received a cosmic make-over? What would it take to believe we have received such a gift?

We are not recipients of a hand-out; we are beloved children of God, reclaimed and redeemed at great cost. God didn’t send a check for us; God sent a Son, whom we know as Jesus the Christ; who came that we might know Life. As we receive the gift, we get to be Christ, his Body, his hands and feet and eyes and voice bearing light to a world that needs it.

We can’t earn this gift, or repay it – we can only receive it. Rumi, the 13th century Persian poet, theologian and Sufi mystic, wrote: “God accepts counterfeit money.”
And God exchanges it for gold: You. Me. Infinitely precious, forever justified.

To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Sunday’s readings are  here.