You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
It is somewhat ironic to hear the man who healed the maimed, the lame and the blind suggest people put themselves in such states, but here it is, one of the toughest of all of Jesus’ tough teachings: “If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life maimed than to have two hands and to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame than to have two feet and to be thrown into hell. And if your eye causes you to stumble, tear it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and to be thrown into hell, where their worm never dies, and the fire is never quenched.”
It is a challenge to find the Good News in this “Grand Guignol” of Jesus sayings. This is a violent wake-up call to be clear about our priorities, to be realistic about the consequences of sin – and to put God-Life first, no matter what. It is a message short on grace and forgiveness, and in its stark clarity offers a kind of tough love we might recognize from other spheres.
Think, for instance, what we might say to an addict one bender away from losing her life. In such light, this language doesn’t look so harsh. Or an oncologist telling a patient that his only hope is to cut out a tumor, even at the risk of compromising healthy tissue. We wouldn’t think twice. Often we fail to connect sin with such dire consequences in our lives – surely we have time to shape up, ask forgiveness, we think; we can get straightened out tomorrow. One more day of gossip or petty lies or gluttony won’t make that great a difference, right? That’s how we’ve gotten ourselves into our climate crisis.
If we’re willing to take sin seriously without obsessing about it, there are many more gentle measures we can take before it becomes a cancer in our lives, or a will-weakening addiction. We can adopt a practice of regular confession, not so we wallow in our sins, but to shine the light of truth upon ourselves and recognize the often unseen effects of sinful tendencies in us. We can practice forgiving others regularly, so that we don’t let resentment and judgment build up. We can cultivate compassion, which allows us to look past the damage we do or endure, and pray for the wounded person behind the actions.
Are there patterns, habits, even people in your life whom you would do well to cut off, cut out, so that you can live in greater freedom and purpose? Are there parts of yourself that need to be cut away? I was once praying about an over-dependency I had, and got an image of a big, bloody, tuberous tumor in a chest cavity, attached by numerous blood vessels, which I had to let Jesus remove and heal. Yuck – and Alleluia.
We can trust ourselves to the Great Physician, the surgeon who knows how to cut cleanly, the healer who knows how to apply balm to our wounds and restore us to wholeness.
© Kate Heichler, 2024. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Showing posts with label sin. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sin. Show all posts
6-6-24 - Is There An Unforgivable Sin?
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
There are enough of things to worry about in this life; you probably aren’t losing sleep over whether or not you’ve committed the Unforgivable Sin. But it might bother the scripture-savvy neurotic overly given to scrupulosity, the nagging worry that I have blasphemed against the Holy Spirit. (I’ve been known to tell Jesus jokes… )
Reading the passage afresh, I think I can relax. It appears that the ultimate “diss” on the Holy Spirit was accusing Jesus of having an evil spirit. “Truly I tell you, people will be forgiven for their sins and whatever blasphemies they utter; but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit can never have forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin”— for they had said, “He has an unclean spirit.”
To avoid the eternal sin, we need only refrain from naming as unholy the Spirit of God. And so we must be able to discern the Holy Spirit from evil spirits – and that’s not so hard to do. Jesus said one can identify a false prophet by his fruit (Matthew 7:15-20). John said to test those who claim to speak by the Spirit – and the test is whether or not they affirm that Jesus was fully human. (I John 4:1-3) We can also look for evidence of the Spirit in a person by what fruit they bear – are their words and work generally life-giving and God-oriented? Do we see around them the good fruit of transformed lives?
If we focus our energy on all the places and people in which we do see the Holy Spirit at work, we won’t have time to worry about unclean spirits. Getting us to look at negatives and what’s lacking is one of the evil one’s strategies. For instance, instead of worrying about whether or not we’ve committed the one unforgivable sin, how about we notice the much more startling announcement Jesus makes here: “…people will be forgiven for their sins and whatever blasphemies they utter.” Wow! Talk about grace and mercy covering a multitude of sins!
We have talked a lot this week about evil and the devil – those are big themes in this passage. But it’s worth remembering that the way the Tempter works is to distort the prohibitions and the penalties, and downplay the promises. In the Garden story (also appointed for Sunday), the man and woman are told they can eat the fruit of every tree except one. And that’s the one the tempter focuses their attention on – that one prohibition. That is still his strategy, because it works so often.
How about we stop falling for it? How about we stand so firm in our belovedness in Christ, in the amazing mercy covering our petty sins and blasphemies, that we cannot be shaken off course by distortions and lies intended to undermine us? How about we invite the Holy Spirit to be so full and thick in us that we’re much more apt to praise God than to condemn ourselves or others? The clock is running out on the power of evil – God’s love has us covered. That is our Good News.
© Kate Heichler, 2024. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
There are enough of things to worry about in this life; you probably aren’t losing sleep over whether or not you’ve committed the Unforgivable Sin. But it might bother the scripture-savvy neurotic overly given to scrupulosity, the nagging worry that I have blasphemed against the Holy Spirit. (I’ve been known to tell Jesus jokes… )
Reading the passage afresh, I think I can relax. It appears that the ultimate “diss” on the Holy Spirit was accusing Jesus of having an evil spirit. “Truly I tell you, people will be forgiven for their sins and whatever blasphemies they utter; but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit can never have forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin”— for they had said, “He has an unclean spirit.”
To avoid the eternal sin, we need only refrain from naming as unholy the Spirit of God. And so we must be able to discern the Holy Spirit from evil spirits – and that’s not so hard to do. Jesus said one can identify a false prophet by his fruit (Matthew 7:15-20). John said to test those who claim to speak by the Spirit – and the test is whether or not they affirm that Jesus was fully human. (I John 4:1-3) We can also look for evidence of the Spirit in a person by what fruit they bear – are their words and work generally life-giving and God-oriented? Do we see around them the good fruit of transformed lives?
If we focus our energy on all the places and people in which we do see the Holy Spirit at work, we won’t have time to worry about unclean spirits. Getting us to look at negatives and what’s lacking is one of the evil one’s strategies. For instance, instead of worrying about whether or not we’ve committed the one unforgivable sin, how about we notice the much more startling announcement Jesus makes here: “…people will be forgiven for their sins and whatever blasphemies they utter.” Wow! Talk about grace and mercy covering a multitude of sins!
We have talked a lot this week about evil and the devil – those are big themes in this passage. But it’s worth remembering that the way the Tempter works is to distort the prohibitions and the penalties, and downplay the promises. In the Garden story (also appointed for Sunday), the man and woman are told they can eat the fruit of every tree except one. And that’s the one the tempter focuses their attention on – that one prohibition. That is still his strategy, because it works so often.
How about we stop falling for it? How about we stand so firm in our belovedness in Christ, in the amazing mercy covering our petty sins and blasphemies, that we cannot be shaken off course by distortions and lies intended to undermine us? How about we invite the Holy Spirit to be so full and thick in us that we’re much more apt to praise God than to condemn ourselves or others? The clock is running out on the power of evil – God’s love has us covered. That is our Good News.
© Kate Heichler, 2024. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
3-4-24 - Snakes On a Pole
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Next Sunday our lectionary takes us into a conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus, a member of ruling Jewish council. He has come to learn more about this Jesus fellow who is stirring up so much trouble. Jesus tells him that the Life of God is not comprehensible by physical senses; it is a spiritual reality, and must be discerned spiritually. He chides Nicodemus, “If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you about heavenly things? No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man.”
This is a big “outing” of his Messianic identity. Jesus implies that he is this “Son of Man” who has descended from heaven. We can only imagine Nicodemus’ shock – and perhaps horror, at what sounds like megalomania or delusion or pure blasphemy. But Jesus has more in store for him. “And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.”
What on earth did he mean by “So must the Son of Man be lifted up?” From our vantage point, this meant the cross on which Jesus was to die a brutal death, suffering not only the full brunt of human cruelty, but also the full consequence of sin, separation from God. This was the penalty he took to the grave for us, and left buried there when he rose on Easter morning. But how could such a “lifting up” bring salvation, and its reward, eternal life?
To get that, we need to understand the reference to Moses lifting up the snake in the wilderness, a story from the biblical book of Numbers that Nicodemus would have known well. It’s about the Israelites’ journey after their deliverance from slavery in Egypt. Their joy at freedom had quickly turned to bitterness. They complained mightily against God and Moses, "Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we detest this miserable food." God, angry at their ingratitude, sends poisonous snakes and many die – instigating instant repentance among the survivors. They ask Moses to intercede with God to take away the snakes. And here is God's remedy: And the LORD said to Moses, “Make a poisonous serpent, and set it on a pole; and everyone who is bitten shall look at it and live.” So Moses made a serpent of bronze, and put it upon a pole; and whenever a serpent bit someone, that person would look at the serpent of bronze and live.
This story is where we get our symbol for the medical profession. We can see this principle at work in vaccines and homeopathic remedies – a small amount of toxin introduced into the body can build resistance. But how would it work on sin? How did Jesus’ crucifixion set us free? Here’s a stab at answering that mammoth question.
If we are indeed slaves to sin – wired to act for ourselves at the expense of others, which is one way to define sin – then to stare at an image of the crucified Lord is to look at the full effect of sin, the worst case, all the sin of all the self-seeking, creation-exploiting, God-ignoring human beings that ever lived. Yet I believe the healing power of the cross goes beyond a “scared straight” mentality. We are invited to gaze upon, draw near to the healing love of Christ, demonstrated supremely in his taking on this sin-sickness for us. He did not have to. He did it for love, to set us free.
If we think we have no sin, this makes no sense. But if we’ve ever hurt another living creature, or ourselves, and felt that dull ache of shame at our actions… we know. We were suffering a terminal illness. And now we are healed.
© Kate Heichler, 2024. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Next Sunday our lectionary takes us into a conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus, a member of ruling Jewish council. He has come to learn more about this Jesus fellow who is stirring up so much trouble. Jesus tells him that the Life of God is not comprehensible by physical senses; it is a spiritual reality, and must be discerned spiritually. He chides Nicodemus, “If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you about heavenly things? No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man.”
This is a big “outing” of his Messianic identity. Jesus implies that he is this “Son of Man” who has descended from heaven. We can only imagine Nicodemus’ shock – and perhaps horror, at what sounds like megalomania or delusion or pure blasphemy. But Jesus has more in store for him. “And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.”
What on earth did he mean by “So must the Son of Man be lifted up?” From our vantage point, this meant the cross on which Jesus was to die a brutal death, suffering not only the full brunt of human cruelty, but also the full consequence of sin, separation from God. This was the penalty he took to the grave for us, and left buried there when he rose on Easter morning. But how could such a “lifting up” bring salvation, and its reward, eternal life?
To get that, we need to understand the reference to Moses lifting up the snake in the wilderness, a story from the biblical book of Numbers that Nicodemus would have known well. It’s about the Israelites’ journey after their deliverance from slavery in Egypt. Their joy at freedom had quickly turned to bitterness. They complained mightily against God and Moses, "Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we detest this miserable food." God, angry at their ingratitude, sends poisonous snakes and many die – instigating instant repentance among the survivors. They ask Moses to intercede with God to take away the snakes. And here is God's remedy: And the LORD said to Moses, “Make a poisonous serpent, and set it on a pole; and everyone who is bitten shall look at it and live.” So Moses made a serpent of bronze, and put it upon a pole; and whenever a serpent bit someone, that person would look at the serpent of bronze and live.
This story is where we get our symbol for the medical profession. We can see this principle at work in vaccines and homeopathic remedies – a small amount of toxin introduced into the body can build resistance. But how would it work on sin? How did Jesus’ crucifixion set us free? Here’s a stab at answering that mammoth question.
If we are indeed slaves to sin – wired to act for ourselves at the expense of others, which is one way to define sin – then to stare at an image of the crucified Lord is to look at the full effect of sin, the worst case, all the sin of all the self-seeking, creation-exploiting, God-ignoring human beings that ever lived. Yet I believe the healing power of the cross goes beyond a “scared straight” mentality. We are invited to gaze upon, draw near to the healing love of Christ, demonstrated supremely in his taking on this sin-sickness for us. He did not have to. He did it for love, to set us free.
If we think we have no sin, this makes no sense. But if we’ve ever hurt another living creature, or ourselves, and felt that dull ache of shame at our actions… we know. We were suffering a terminal illness. And now we are healed.
© Kate Heichler, 2024. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
6-29-23 - God's Free Gift
You can listen to this reflection here.
For the rest of the week we turn to Sunday’s passage from Roman, which is such a deep and complex work of theology, it’s a hard to just take a quick dip in it. But let’s jump in anyway, because it contains a beautiful invitation to freedom in Christ – freedom both from sin, and from the effort to claw our way into God’s good graces.
Thus far, Paul has been unfolding an argument to support his contention that we are saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ, not through our own efforts. It is Christ’s sacrifice that sets us free, not our own will-power or ability to modify our behaviors… indeed, behavior change comes as we accept with relief the free gift of forgiveness and grace: But now that you have been freed from sin and enslaved to God, the advantage you get is sanctification. The end is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
In order to truly receive the free gift of God’s eternal life – which begins now, not just when we die – we need to allow God to free us from sin. Paul is concerned lest his listeners think this extravagant grace invites us to more sin. “Should we sin the more, that grace may abound?” he asks rhetorically, offering a resounding “No!” to the question. Rather, we should allow the gift of God’s grace to loosen sin’s grip on us.
“Sin” can be defined in many ways, but one way Paul uses the term is to name the purely human, self-oriented nature that exists in us. All those things we label as “sins” grow out of that basic orientation toward self that can cause us to see other people as objects for our gratification, and God’s creation as something to be exploited. When Paul says we have been freed from sin, that is an “already” gift, given at baptism, secured by Christ’s sacrifice, made real in his resurrection. As we let that reality seep into our bones we are freed to choose the Spirit-led life Jesus won for us. The fancy word for that is “sanctification," becoming holy.
Paul adds, provocatively, that we exchange one bondage for another, as we now “become enslaved to God.” Yet such a voluntary relinquishing of our self-will and prerogatives invites us into a freedom unlike any other. It is a freedom that allows us to love beyond our capacity, to forgive more than we think possible, to walk into God’s dreams for mission, to offer healing and ministry in Jesus’ name that enriches our lives beyond measure and transforms others. That’s the free gift of eternal life we have already received in Christ Jesus. Let's not leave it on the closet shelf.
For the rest of the week we turn to Sunday’s passage from Roman, which is such a deep and complex work of theology, it’s a hard to just take a quick dip in it. But let’s jump in anyway, because it contains a beautiful invitation to freedom in Christ – freedom both from sin, and from the effort to claw our way into God’s good graces.
Thus far, Paul has been unfolding an argument to support his contention that we are saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ, not through our own efforts. It is Christ’s sacrifice that sets us free, not our own will-power or ability to modify our behaviors… indeed, behavior change comes as we accept with relief the free gift of forgiveness and grace: But now that you have been freed from sin and enslaved to God, the advantage you get is sanctification. The end is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
In order to truly receive the free gift of God’s eternal life – which begins now, not just when we die – we need to allow God to free us from sin. Paul is concerned lest his listeners think this extravagant grace invites us to more sin. “Should we sin the more, that grace may abound?” he asks rhetorically, offering a resounding “No!” to the question. Rather, we should allow the gift of God’s grace to loosen sin’s grip on us.
“Sin” can be defined in many ways, but one way Paul uses the term is to name the purely human, self-oriented nature that exists in us. All those things we label as “sins” grow out of that basic orientation toward self that can cause us to see other people as objects for our gratification, and God’s creation as something to be exploited. When Paul says we have been freed from sin, that is an “already” gift, given at baptism, secured by Christ’s sacrifice, made real in his resurrection. As we let that reality seep into our bones we are freed to choose the Spirit-led life Jesus won for us. The fancy word for that is “sanctification," becoming holy.
Paul adds, provocatively, that we exchange one bondage for another, as we now “become enslaved to God.” Yet such a voluntary relinquishing of our self-will and prerogatives invites us into a freedom unlike any other. It is a freedom that allows us to love beyond our capacity, to forgive more than we think possible, to walk into God’s dreams for mission, to offer healing and ministry in Jesus’ name that enriches our lives beyond measure and transforms others. That’s the free gift of eternal life we have already received in Christ Jesus. Let's not leave it on the closet shelf.
10-24-13 - Justified
“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?” What does it mean that the more “sinful” tax collector is 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 can get a clue from how we format our documents – left, right- or center-justified. We often use the word as a defense – “Well, I was justified in saying that…” The law even has a category called “justifiable homicide.”
As a theological term, though, it goes even deeper– it means to be made righteous, aligned. It is not something we can do for ourselves – it 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 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 does 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, but beloved children of God, reclaimed and redeemed at great cost. God didn’t send a check for us – He sent a Son, whom we know as Jesus the Christ; who came so 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.
That's how Jesus ends his story. What does he mean by “justified?” What does it mean that the more “sinful” tax collector is 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 can get a clue from how we format our documents – left, right- or center-justified. We often use the word as a defense – “Well, I was justified in saying that…” The law even has a category called “justifiable homicide.”
As a theological term, though, it goes even deeper– it means to be made righteous, aligned. It is not something we can do for ourselves – it 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 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 does 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, but beloved children of God, reclaimed and redeemed at great cost. God didn’t send a check for us – He sent a Son, whom we know as Jesus the Christ; who came so 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.
10-23-13 - Sin and Self-Esteem
“God, be merciful to me, a sinner.” This is what the tax-collector in Jesus’ parable prays. It forms the heart of what has become known as the Jesus Prayer, practiced by hesychasts striving to pray without ceasing. (Should I make you look it up? Naah – I’ll tell you: hesychasm is the “prayer of the heart,” a spiritual discipline that seeks to make prayer constant, internalized on the breath and beneath daily activity. It is what Franny was attempting in J.D. Salinger’s classic Franny and Zooey, a favorite of mine.)
The fuller Jesus Prayer is “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a [miserable] sinner.” It is short and clearly evokes the differential between us and Christ. To our ears, though, it can smack of low self-esteem and guilt and shame and all those icky feelings that have made Christianity so unappealing to so many. What happened to “You are so precious?” Is Jesus really commending self-degradation?
I think Jesus commends self-appraisal. This is a prayer from the gut at a moment of self-realization. It represents one stage of repentance, well-described by another theological term: compunction. Compunction is so often accompanied by its buddy, “dread,” that I think of them in tandem, a sort of cabaret act of the soul – “And now, let’s welcome to our spotlight, ‘Compunction and Dread!’”
Compunction is that sick feeling in our gut when we realize we’ve hurt someone, or something we’ve done or said has been exposed, or we feel inwardly convicted. It is not fun – which is why dread comes swimming up close behind it, bringing the fear of consequences to the surface. At such moments we are most keenly aware of our need for mercy.
That’s the heart of repentance, or – look out, here comes another theological term – “metanoia, ” literally, turning. We turn from patterns and behaviors and thinking that lead to pain and separation from God, ourselves, and others. We turn toward the source of mercy, grace and truth. In some ancient baptismal liturgies, the candidates actually faced west while renouncing their past and turned toward the east in affirming Christ as Lord, to embody this turning toward the light.
Repentance does not mean labeling ourselves unworthy or usurping God’s role as judge. It is truth-telling, house-cleaning, pointing out places of pain or self-reliance, inviting the Holy Physician to heal what is diseased in our spirits. Because we are able to call ourselves sinners, we can also call ourselves beloved, saints of God. There’s another great nightclub duo, “Sinners and Saints.” Simul justus et peccator, Luther said, “At once justified (or, righteous) and sinner.”
In prayer today, ask the Spirit to show you where you feel shameful, guilty or scared. Sometimes these are irrational, not tied to any real areas of sin in us; sometimes they’re legit and we need to own them. There is something bracing and energizing about facing ourselves and inviting God into the shadow places. If that sense of compunction comes up – ask God to lift it, to fill you with love and grace.
“Sinner” is not the last word on who we are. It’s just a step along the way to transparency.
God has the last word, and it is “beloved.”
The fuller Jesus Prayer is “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a [miserable] sinner.” It is short and clearly evokes the differential between us and Christ. To our ears, though, it can smack of low self-esteem and guilt and shame and all those icky feelings that have made Christianity so unappealing to so many. What happened to “You are so precious?” Is Jesus really commending self-degradation?
I think Jesus commends self-appraisal. This is a prayer from the gut at a moment of self-realization. It represents one stage of repentance, well-described by another theological term: compunction. Compunction is so often accompanied by its buddy, “dread,” that I think of them in tandem, a sort of cabaret act of the soul – “And now, let’s welcome to our spotlight, ‘Compunction and Dread!’”
Compunction is that sick feeling in our gut when we realize we’ve hurt someone, or something we’ve done or said has been exposed, or we feel inwardly convicted. It is not fun – which is why dread comes swimming up close behind it, bringing the fear of consequences to the surface. At such moments we are most keenly aware of our need for mercy.
That’s the heart of repentance, or – look out, here comes another theological term – “metanoia, ” literally, turning. We turn from patterns and behaviors and thinking that lead to pain and separation from God, ourselves, and others. We turn toward the source of mercy, grace and truth. In some ancient baptismal liturgies, the candidates actually faced west while renouncing their past and turned toward the east in affirming Christ as Lord, to embody this turning toward the light.
Repentance does not mean labeling ourselves unworthy or usurping God’s role as judge. It is truth-telling, house-cleaning, pointing out places of pain or self-reliance, inviting the Holy Physician to heal what is diseased in our spirits. Because we are able to call ourselves sinners, we can also call ourselves beloved, saints of God. There’s another great nightclub duo, “Sinners and Saints.” Simul justus et peccator, Luther said, “At once justified (or, righteous) and sinner.”
In prayer today, ask the Spirit to show you where you feel shameful, guilty or scared. Sometimes these are irrational, not tied to any real areas of sin in us; sometimes they’re legit and we need to own them. There is something bracing and energizing about facing ourselves and inviting God into the shadow places. If that sense of compunction comes up – ask God to lift it, to fill you with love and grace.
“Sinner” is not the last word on who we are. It’s just a step along the way to transparency.
God has the last word, and it is “beloved.”
10-22-13 - Good and Sorry
We can see two models of righteousness in this week’s story: one based on doing the right things, the other based on repenting for doing the wrong things. Jesus clearly stands with the second, suggesting that the way into the Life of God is through clear-eyed humility, not legalistic moral rigor. This message was so radical, we might say it got him killed. It is still radical, and often ignored most by those who call themselves his followers.
Legalism is often easier than humility. We humans tend to like success better than failure, rules better than ambiguity. To be honest about the ways we mess up “in thought, word and deed” is much tougher than pushing those realities away and counting up all the rules we’ve managed to keep. The Pharisee in Jesus’ parable extolls his good works, his fasting and tithing – and the fact that he is not a thief, rogue, adulterer or extortioner. Hey, those are easy sins to peg. Jesus goes deeper, suggesting that, in his pride and contempt for those weaker than himself, the Pharisee is actually less righteous than the low-life tax collector.
Of course, it’s not either/or. Good works and repentance are both integral to being a follower of Christ. The question is, what comes first? A focus on “keeping the rules” puts the emphasis on our action, not God’s. It often leads to anxiety and pride.
If we start from repentance, though, the action is with God, whose grace and forgiveness we need. And as we receive God’s grace in gratitude, we often respond with greater compassion for those around us. I would say repentance often leads to good works, but good works rarely lead to repentance.
Are you ready for a little inventory today? Make two columns. On one write everything you think makes you a “good person.” On the other, everything you feel ashamed of or insecure about. Can you live with knowing both columns tell a truth about you? Not the whole truth, but truth?
How about offering God the “sin” column, trusting that God’s forgiveness was there before you even confessed. Can you receive it? Pray for the power of love in you to move you out of some of those habits of the heart and mind.
Now, the “good works” column – take a good look. Do you do all those things from your heart, or because you think you’re “supposed to?” What would you take out of that list if you followed your heart? (I admit, I'm afraid to do this exercise!)
We can choose to be self-righteous, or self-aware – but generally not at the same time. Seeing ourselves clearly makes it a little difficult to be self-righteous. And why work that hard anyway, when God’s giving it away for free?
Legalism is often easier than humility. We humans tend to like success better than failure, rules better than ambiguity. To be honest about the ways we mess up “in thought, word and deed” is much tougher than pushing those realities away and counting up all the rules we’ve managed to keep. The Pharisee in Jesus’ parable extolls his good works, his fasting and tithing – and the fact that he is not a thief, rogue, adulterer or extortioner. Hey, those are easy sins to peg. Jesus goes deeper, suggesting that, in his pride and contempt for those weaker than himself, the Pharisee is actually less righteous than the low-life tax collector.
Of course, it’s not either/or. Good works and repentance are both integral to being a follower of Christ. The question is, what comes first? A focus on “keeping the rules” puts the emphasis on our action, not God’s. It often leads to anxiety and pride.
If we start from repentance, though, the action is with God, whose grace and forgiveness we need. And as we receive God’s grace in gratitude, we often respond with greater compassion for those around us. I would say repentance often leads to good works, but good works rarely lead to repentance.
Are you ready for a little inventory today? Make two columns. On one write everything you think makes you a “good person.” On the other, everything you feel ashamed of or insecure about. Can you live with knowing both columns tell a truth about you? Not the whole truth, but truth?
How about offering God the “sin” column, trusting that God’s forgiveness was there before you even confessed. Can you receive it? Pray for the power of love in you to move you out of some of those habits of the heart and mind.
Now, the “good works” column – take a good look. Do you do all those things from your heart, or because you think you’re “supposed to?” What would you take out of that list if you followed your heart? (I admit, I'm afraid to do this exercise!)
We can choose to be self-righteous, or self-aware – but generally not at the same time. Seeing ourselves clearly makes it a little difficult to be self-righteous. And why work that hard anyway, when God’s giving it away for free?
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