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“Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person.” – Mother Teresa February, 2020 One day recently I overheard some workmen talking who were renovating the house next door to ours. One man urged another to “Be a good Christian.” The second man replied, “I just try to be a good person.” Meanwhile, the former Baptist in me cried out silently, “But that’s not enough! You must be born again!” Methodists don’t talk about being “born again” but we do know that trying to “be a good person” is subject to squishy definitions. In Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass, Humpty Dumpty says, “When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.” In the same way, we can make being “a good Christian” mean whatever we need it to mean. For example, as long as we haven’t murdered anyone, we can rationalize that we’re being “a good Christian.” But Jesus had something different to say. In the Sermon on the Mount, he told his disciples, “‘You have heard that it was said to those of old, “You shall not murder, and whoever murders will be in danger of the judgment.” But I say to you that whoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment.’” (Matt. 5:21-22a New King James Version). Jesus was telling them—and by extension us—that God doesn’t just look at our overt actions but our thoughts and motives. In the passage above, some translations don’t include the words “without a cause.” As the New American Standard Bible renders it, “‘everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court;’” In this case, it doesn’t matter whether we have a reason for being angry or not. We’re already guilty before we even do anything overtly, because of our inward sin. The late theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote in The Cost of Discipleship, “Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession . . . Cheap grace is grace without When he was asked about “the greatest commandment,” (Matt. 22:34-36) Jesus quoted scripture (Deut. 6:4-5; Lev. 19:18), “‘“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.” This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”’” (vs. 38-39 NKJV). Loving others as we love ourselves means forgiving them as we would forgive ourselves. But it also means acknowledging that there is something to forgive. Each time we pray the Lord’s Prayer, we say, “Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.” (Matt. 6:12). If we are to be forgiven in the same measure that we forgive, we had better recognize how much there is to forgive and what repentance truly means. Repentance is expressed in the “discipleship” to which Bonhoeffer referred, and discipleship is for a lifetime. We can’t “earn” God’s forgiveness (Eph. 2:8-9) but we can spend our lives saying “Thank you.” Nancy Fulkerson writes on the Today Show parenting blog, “When you feel like your day is unraveling or you’ve been hard on yourself for whatever reason, ‘giving yourself grace’ is about giving yourself that kindness you often deserve.” But there’s a difference between the essential human kindness we deserve and the unmerited grace of God. If we feel like we’re doing okay, being “a good person,” one look at the example of Christ will bring us back down to Earth. “For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” (2 Cor. 5:21 NKJV). If we need any further convincing, there are always John’s words, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” (1 John 1:8 NKJV). But if we live as Jesus lived, and love as Jesus loved, we can be examples of what it means to be more than “a good person.” “But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), . . . For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.” (Eph. 2:4-5, 8-9 NKJV.) |
