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Mercy!

Written by Ben
Tuesday, 05 January 2010 11:23
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policeticketYesterday I had an experience that nobody likes to have.  I was running my mouth on the phone while driving, which distracted me enough to not realize how fast I was going.  We’ve all been there, right?  To my great shame, I was doing about 18mph over the speed limit—63mph in a 45mph zone.  And you’ve probably already guessed how I know how fast I was going.  That’s right…a policeman clocked me on his radar and then pulled me over.

As soon as I saw the blue lights come on, several things were flashing through my mind.  How fast was I going?  How much is the ticket going to be?  What is my wife going to say?  What if he tases me?!

When the officer came up to my car and told me how fast I was going, my eyes got really big and my heart began to sink.  This was going to be the biggest speeding ticket I have ever gotten.  But then something really good (at least from my perspective) happened:  he simply gave me a warning and told me to slow down.  My eyes got even bigger then, and my heart began to rejoice.  I told the officer, “Thank you!” and promised to slow down.

As I was driving away, I turned to Zachariah, my 4-year-old who was with me, and said, “Son, we just witnessed an act of mercy.”

I love mercy!  Don’t you?  Mercy happens when you don’t receive the punishment you deserve.  It’s basically having your guilt overlooked.  I was certainly guilty of a traffic violation.  I deserved a ticket, but the officer overlooked my guilt and didn’t issue a citation.  My heart and mind immediately went to thinking about God who has been merciful to us.

He certainly has been merciful to us, every person in big and small ways.  But God’s mercy goes even further.  You see, as far as the traffic violation goes, I was guilty when the officer pulled me over, and I’m guilty still.  The officer didn’t remove my guilt.  He simply overlooked it.  But God cannot overlook guilt.  Sin must be punished because God is perfectly just.  Therefore, God did something amazing.  He took all of my sin and guilt and imputed (charged) it to Jesus and took all of Jesus’ sinlessness and innocence and imputed it to me.  Jesus paid for it instead of me and gave me the favor of God, which He had earned.  That’s called being “justified,” which is to be made righteous or innocent.

Relating this spiritual truth to yesterday, it would be like the officer giving me a ticket with my name on it, then erasing my name and writing in his, and then going to the courthouse to pay the fine for me.  That’s what Jesus did for all who will believe on Him.  It only happens by grace through faith in Jesus.  As 2 Corinthians 5:21 says, “He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”  Therefore, because of Christ’s work on the cross, I believe on Him and have been declared innocent.  I am righteous according to God!  This truth, of course, leads to gratefulness and humility and worship forevermore.

I want to say that I am certainly thankful for the mercy I received yesterday from the police officer, but even more, I’m thankful for the mercy that God has given me through Jesus Christ.  Glory to God!  May you turn to Christ and be washed white as snow.

 

The Songs of Christmas – Christ

Written by Ben
Monday, 28 December 2009 15:00
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seward_-_mary__baby_jesus1This week we conclude the season of Advent by focusing on Christ.  Our 2009 Advent theme has been “The Songs of Christmas,” and each week we’ve been looking at a song from the gospel of Luke surrounding the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ.  Our final song this week comes from Luke 3:4-6.  Luke takes this prophetic psalm which was delivered originally through the prophet Isaiah and applies is to the life of John the Baptist.  This is John’s song:

4 The voice of one crying in the wilderness, ‘Make ready the way of the Lord, make His paths straight.

5 Every ravine will be filled, and every mountain and hill will be brought low; the crooked will become straight, and the rough roads smooth;

6 And all flesh will see the salvation of God.’

This week we reflect on Christ himself.  For thousands of years, man had been waiting for the Messiah, the Christ.  In fact, man had been waiting since the day Adam and all of humanity with him fell into sin.  It was on that day God gave the first glimmer of hope, the first gospel.  As God was cursing Satan who was in the form of a serpent, God said to him in Genesis 3:15, “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; he shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise him on the heel.”  Now the time was at hand.  Jesus, the seed of Eve, was soon to crush Satan’s head!

But Jesus was to have forerunner.  Someone to proclaim that the Messiah—the Christ—was at hand.  That person was John the Baptist.  He was the voice of the one crying in the wilderness, begging all man to repent of their sin and turn to God.  He was preparing the way for Jesus.  You see, it was customary for an ancient near eastern king to send a herald before him in a journey to clear away obstacles, make causeways over valleys, and level hills.  Spiritually, that’s what John was doing.  His duty was to bring back the people to obedience to the law and to remove all self-confidence, pride in national privileges, hypocrisy, and irreligion, so that they should be ready for King Jesus’ coming.

The purpose was so that “all flesh will see the salvation of God.”  And John did just that!  He pointed us brilliantly to Jesus the Messiah Christ.  Friends, God has revealed in Jesus to all mankind that there is hope for forgiveness and reconciliation with God.  Jesus is our salvation.  But He’s not only our salvation.  He’s the only savior of the entire world.  If anybody is to be forgiven of their sin and saved, it will be by grace through faith in Jesus.

God has wonderfully shown us the hope of salvation in Jesus.  Now may we experience the gift of salvation in Jesus.  Joy to the world, the Lord has come; let earth receive her King!

 

This, the Power

Written by Ben
Thursday, 18 December 2008 05:35
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Not too long ago I was driving back to Crofton from Bowling Green. Christy and Zachariah were snoozing, giving me a few and far between free reign over the radio. I don’t usually listen to music as I drive because it has a tendency to make me drowsy, but I thought I would throw in a CD that I had recently bought: Keith and Kristyn Getty’s “In Christ Alone.”

I’ve long been a fan of the music Keith has produced, but I had never bought a CD. He and his usual co-writer Stuart Townend are known for their hymnic lyric and theological depth. They’re the cream of the crop today! One song on this disc blew me away, and I can’t get it out of my spirit. Maybe it’s familiar to you. It was written in 2005, but I’ve never really heard it. It’s called “The Power of the Cross.” Check it out at Getty Music.

In the first three measures, Keith opens with the melody to “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross” and then sets the stage for his wife Kristyn to sing these lyrics:

Oh, to see the dawn
Of the darkest day:
Christ on the road to Calvary.
Tried by sinful men,
Torn and beaten, then
Nailed to a cross of wood.
__________
CHORUS
This, the pow’r of the cross:
Christ became sin for us;
Took the blame, bore the wrath–
We stand forgiven at the cross.
__________
Oh, to see the pain
Written on Your face,
Bearing the awesome weight of sin.
Ev’ry bitter thought,
Ev’ry evil deed
Crowning Your bloodstained brow.
__________
Now the daylight flees;
Now the ground beneath
Quakes as its Maker bows His head.
Curtain torn in two,
Dead are raised to life;
“Finished!” the vict’ry cry.
__________
Oh, to see my name
Written in the wounds,
For through Your suffering I am free.
Death is crushed to death;
Life is mine to live,
Won through Your selfless love.
__________
FINAL CHORUS
This, the pow’r of the cross:
Son of God–slain for us.
What a love! What a cost!
We stand forgiven at the cross

In a sentence, this song highlights how ugly sin is and how beautiful Christ is. You know, I cannot fathom the true weight of my sin. I can conceptually understand it. It’s a terrible offense to God that evokes wrath and eternally separates me from Him. But to wrap my mind around how awful it actually is, I’m at a loss. As appalling as I understand it to be, I know that it’s much worse.

And the Bible says that Jesus “became” this sin for me and all that He’s redeeming so that we might know the Father and live. As Paul writes, “[God] made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Cor 5:21). Jesus took my sin, my ugliness and gave me His righteousness, His beauty. That’s the power of the cross. It’s a stain removal instrument in the Father’s hand. In an instant, “death is crushed to death” and “life is mine to live” because of the work of Christ on the cross.

May you trust in Christ and glory in the cross!