Good Morning Friends,
God gives us a gracious invitation to drink deep of the joy of life that is right here and right now in unity not separation from the love of God. And as I contemplated the role of goats and sheep, and God’s sovereignty, and eternity I really don’t like the idea of being separated from God’s presence if even for a moment. For as Einstein once pointed out, a day spent on a park bench with someone we love can seem like a moment and a moment on a hot stove can seem like an eternity. I imagine that when Christ said to Peter, “Get behind me Satan,” it must have burned for a long time. Time is relative and God is not limited by time. So today we dive into the subject of the nature of God a little deeper, meditating on the Lord’s Prayer and the Kingdom to come. Now I may regret trying to tackle this, for as I am typing now, I am not sure I have an answer, for carrots and sticks still exist and our concepts of Chronos and Kairos time still exist. But I ask anyway because I was raised to believe in miracles, and I think we all desire an answer to the challenge of preventing, not just responding to evil acts. And so, we ask in the hope of a mature understanding how to experience more joy and less guilt. So, How Does Grace And Judgement, Love And Justice Mix In the Divine Mind?
Scripture: Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and you that have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food. Incline your ear, and come to me; listen, so that you may live. I will make with you an everlasting covenant, my steadfast, sure love for David. See, I made him a witness to the peoples, a leader and commander for the peoples. See, you shall call nations that you do not know, and nations that do not know you shall run to you, because of the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, for he has glorified you. Seek the Lord while he may be found, call upon him while he is near; let the wicked forsake their way, and the unrighteous their thoughts; let them return to the Lord, that he may have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there until they have watered the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.
Isaiah 55:1-11 (NRSV)
“When you are praying, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do; for they think that they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. “Pray then in this way: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And do not bring us to the time of trial, but rescue us from the evil one. For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you; but if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
Matthew 6:7-15 (NRSV)
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.
Matthew 5:6 (NRSV)
For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic elements of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food; for everyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is unskilled in the word of righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, for those whose faculties have been trained by practice to distinguish good from evil.
Hebrews 5:12-14 (NRSV)
“For who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ.
1 Corinthians 2:16 (NRSV)
Message: I guess the simple answer to today’s question is that the grace, judgement, love, and justice of God comes together in the mind of Christ on the cross. For believing in this sacrificing act gives us the best chance to minimize evil in the world and change it into what might be more to the glory of God and more joyful. But there is more here to unpack. When we face evil, as Jesus did, we begin to see that God really has insight into the nature of human emotional and social development, and so comes to us where we are in our development. In the stream of Holy History God has interacted with humans to help them behave in a healthy way through a reward and punishment mentality, marketplace exchange rituals and through social conformity, and even a law-and-order multi-tiered judicial system. But these all require little emotional or intellectual interaction on our part. The thinking is removed from the interaction. We just must obey without an internal moral compass even needed. But when we begin doing what is right because we love, or because we are responding to principles of how reality works or we begin to understand God as a friend and actively and intelligently participate in God’s work, we need to trust our own behavior for it is not externally motivated but activated from within at the core of our being as we were created. All this requires emotional intelligence sensing our instincts. It requires us to mature. And the beauty of this is that in this growth God is as concerned with the redemption of individuals as well as the redemption of society. So too for us, having a social agenda without individual transformation is empty. Still, we believe that God’s purpose for the world will ultimately prevail… that loneliness, pain, poverty, sickness, injustice, even death will no longer mar creation.
And So, our purpose of understanding is to change our function in the world. We are to let God speak to us where we are in our development. And here in these teaching moments, notice that there is a difference between believing and supporting justice and doing just acts. Friends, we do justice when we do the right thing whether it is in harmony with our interests or not and that requires us to think about what is moral from the point of view of the mind of Christ. Sometimes what is lawful is not moral. Of course, the foundation for doing justice is loving justice more than you love yourself; and the foundation for loving justice more than yourself is loving your neighbor as you love yourself. So, we cannot claim to seek justice for others when we do not act justly in all our relationships. When we seek justice for ourselves and turn a blind eye to the injustice others face, we miss the mark of what God has in mind for us. Perhaps, if we concentrate our hearts on doing justice in all our acts, we might be better able to seek justice for others. And if we focus on doing justice, we might not be so insistent on seeking justice for ourselves. Maybe this approach of actively seeking to promote transcendent opportunities to serve moment by moment, like the life of Jesus, might minimize or even prevent some evil acts occurring in the first place. Friends, we are to have the mind of Christ.
Pray we realize what is right to do. Praywe actively seek to demonstrate God’s purpose here and now, until it is fully realized in God’s good time. Pray we are encouraged to keep reading the Bible. Pray that we keep forgiving others. Pray we find a pathway of service that honors God. Pray we realize that God is the Supreme Being of the universe. Pray we are set right with God by doing the right things for the right reasons. Pray we trust God and have the mind of Christ and trust God’s lead. Pray that we realize it is not so much about being declared right by the world as actually being right in God’s eyes that counts. Pray still we do not punish ourselves. Pray we, as the called-out assembly of God, rethink the way the world is functioning and how we are to function in it. Pray we discover a security that can be trusted. Pray we enter the fullness of God’s design. Pray we integrate our theology with scripture, science, and experiences we have been given by God. Pray when God comes to us where we are we are led to take the next step with God. Pray we realize that the marriage of God and humanity will not occur until we mature. Pray we realize that God will love us in our childlikeness but probably does not want a child bride. Pray we realize that every decree of God is eternal and does not depend upon a condition which takes place only in time. Pray we trust more and worry less.
Blessings,
John Lawson
Daily Devotionals 