There is forgiveness of wrongs, resurrection of dead things, mercies that are new every morning. Check out the other gods’ lists of expectations. Nowhere else can you come and be loved in your brokenness, be embraced as family in your debt, and be invited into a new start for your precious life. We are to call one another on to follow His ways of living and to trust in His ability to strengthen and heal and restore. It’s hardest to be vulnerable and honest with one another.
One problem is that we’d like to be part of our own solution and have a way to crawl out of our holes to earn our place. When it comes down to it, we aren’t so comfortable with free gifts of mercy and grace and so are inclined to keep records of wrongs and stay in our measly tally system, trying to manage our own account and resisting the bottom line of our great need. By ourselves we will always come out in the red. And astonishingly, He poured red completely and adequately over us...His own blood to cover what our own sacrifices and efforts could never have accomplished.
We will never change the basics of His way, the extravagant gift and blazingly honest one: “Blessed are the poor in spirit [those who are aware of their great need], for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. “ The only ones who get the kingdom are those who will receive it. It is why, even after “significant sin” David was called “a man after my own heart.” This great earthly king, minced no words about his actions and ran back to the heart of a Father (read his cry in Psalm 51) who would receive His prodigal son in a heartbeat.
Photograph from morguefile.com by AlexandreHenryAlves
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