I have a bone to pick with our modern, evangelical understanding of salvation. I've expressed frequently my distaste for our created imagery of Jesus being in our heart, as if he were something little, physical and furry. But, today, I'm going back further than that, I have an issue with the terminology that defines it. "Salvation" is wrong.
I am sitting in Panera, my hideaway on mornings when community is the last thing I desire. Opening my Bible to Mark, I begin to throw questions at the text, asking every possible thing I can and roughhousing the pages, hoping for an answer to emerge.
Coming to the final story in Mark 1, of Jesus healing a leper who can't keep his mouth shut, I wondered how I should feel about this leper's defiance. Jesus told him, sternly, to tell no one. Instead, he tells everyone, freely, as the text would word it.
And I wondered why Jesus cared so much. I concluded that Jesus didn't want these healed people to talk because it made it about what he could do instead of who he was. I mean, Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, the only perfect human being ever alive. He deserves the attention, but not because he changed the leper's spots or he can make your party costs go down by turning water into wine. Logically, then, Jesus would be aggravated, irritated, annoyed with crowds of people who come to him asking for things. Either they want to be healed or they want to see people be healed. They want something from him. They want what he can do, not who he is.
Then it dawned on me. We do this all the time. We want what Jesus offers. What is the heart of Western Christianity? SALVATION. What is salvation? What Jesus did for me. Its Jesus' WORK on the cross. Why do people come to faith? Because they want what Jesus has to offer. We've turned it into a business transaction. I'll say some prayers, stop sleeping around and go to church in exchange for eternal life in a mansion on a golden street and I heard something about some crowns too. Sounds like I've got the good end of the deal.
And it is that which drives me insane. Why are we Christians? Well, by the way we talk about it, we're Christians because we've decided to accept a deal with Christ.
Why was the Messianic secret such a big thing in the Gospels? Because Jesus didnt' want people to come to him wanting something.
So here's my point. We look at Jesus wrong. Why is our soteriology so much higher than our Christology? What if we took time to look at Jesus for who he is, and not what he did?
Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, the Chosen One. Jesus is God. He can do all things. He had a hand in creation, and he will have a hand in the destruction of this world as well. In him we live and move and have our being.
Our Jesus has proven himself worthy of worship. Even if he did not choose to save us (and I do believe that was the choice of the triune God, not inherently necessary), we should still bow down before him. We should worship God and be Christians not because of anything he has done for us, but simply for who he is.
So, for all of those people who want assurance of their salvation, I have this to say. It doesn't matter. You want to be assured you'll get into heaven? You're looking at his work and not at him. Worship him with all that you are because he deserves it. If somehow, you are not saved, Jesus is still worthy of praise and honor.
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Friday, March 19, 2010
Sour Wine for a Suffering Savior
I have been thinking about bit roles lately. I have been lavishing my attention on the two verse characters of Matthew; the people who we overlook, acting as if they are merely a part of the plot, rather than beautiful creatures of God.
It so is, that this quiet Friday night, I'm reading the Crucifixion story hoping to read it with virgin eyes, desiring to not gloss the text as one who has heard the account over and over again. I wanted to read it as it is, for its beauty in literary form; for all that it was written to be and no more.
And there it is. A bit role that unfolds an image of reverence that we overlook. In Matthew 27:46, Christ cries out in agony. The crowds, we're told in verse 47, are confused. Yet one man runs to soak a sponge in sour wine.
Its a funny image, if you think about it. Here is this unidentified man who we are to assume is a part of this ground who does not understand what Jesus just said. Yet, seeing this man hanging on a cross, crying out in pain, he is moved to provide comfort. He finds a sponge, who knows where, and dips it in sour wine.
Sour wine, as I learned from Google, is really vinegar. Its likely that what this man was offering to Jesus was the same as what the guards had earlier offered. This vinegar was a painkiller of sorts, a way to lessen the pain.
So this man, who doesn't know Jesus, sees his pain and runs to provide something for it. He knows he can't save him, but he wants to offer something.
This man is left standing there with a vinegar soaked sponge, as Jesus dies.
That's all we have of this man. We know nothing of what he does after, nothing of his encounter with Christ's death, only that he aimed to comfort Christ in his last moments. He came to offer something Christ did not need, something that he likely knew was a small consolation in terms of the great agony of the Cross, yet he was moved to try anyways.
That's me. That's me most days to be honest. I see the work Christ has done and want to cut him a deal. I want to pitch in and do my part to make it ever so easier for him. I'm standing at the Cross with a Mary Poppins bag, asking Jesus what might make his day a little easier.
And to be honest, Christ would be the same with me or without me. He would carry the same weight, feel the same agonizing pain of true death, and he would rise and conquer it all in the same way.
Yet, there is something unexplainably beautiful about that man on the Cross that I seem to identify with. Its foolishness, sure, but its compassion. The others in the ground were content to wait and see. They beckon him to step away from the Cross and observe. Yet this one man betrays his friends and seeks out comfort for a stranger.
So when I sit at the foot of the Cross with my purse full of contraptions, I may never be able to help God out, but I will be demonstrating compassion and love.
It so is, that this quiet Friday night, I'm reading the Crucifixion story hoping to read it with virgin eyes, desiring to not gloss the text as one who has heard the account over and over again. I wanted to read it as it is, for its beauty in literary form; for all that it was written to be and no more.
And there it is. A bit role that unfolds an image of reverence that we overlook. In Matthew 27:46, Christ cries out in agony. The crowds, we're told in verse 47, are confused. Yet one man runs to soak a sponge in sour wine.
Its a funny image, if you think about it. Here is this unidentified man who we are to assume is a part of this ground who does not understand what Jesus just said. Yet, seeing this man hanging on a cross, crying out in pain, he is moved to provide comfort. He finds a sponge, who knows where, and dips it in sour wine.
Sour wine, as I learned from Google, is really vinegar. Its likely that what this man was offering to Jesus was the same as what the guards had earlier offered. This vinegar was a painkiller of sorts, a way to lessen the pain.
So this man, who doesn't know Jesus, sees his pain and runs to provide something for it. He knows he can't save him, but he wants to offer something.
This man is left standing there with a vinegar soaked sponge, as Jesus dies.
That's all we have of this man. We know nothing of what he does after, nothing of his encounter with Christ's death, only that he aimed to comfort Christ in his last moments. He came to offer something Christ did not need, something that he likely knew was a small consolation in terms of the great agony of the Cross, yet he was moved to try anyways.
That's me. That's me most days to be honest. I see the work Christ has done and want to cut him a deal. I want to pitch in and do my part to make it ever so easier for him. I'm standing at the Cross with a Mary Poppins bag, asking Jesus what might make his day a little easier.
And to be honest, Christ would be the same with me or without me. He would carry the same weight, feel the same agonizing pain of true death, and he would rise and conquer it all in the same way.
Yet, there is something unexplainably beautiful about that man on the Cross that I seem to identify with. Its foolishness, sure, but its compassion. The others in the ground were content to wait and see. They beckon him to step away from the Cross and observe. Yet this one man betrays his friends and seeks out comfort for a stranger.
So when I sit at the foot of the Cross with my purse full of contraptions, I may never be able to help God out, but I will be demonstrating compassion and love.
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