Your Goodness And Love Will Follow

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
All the days of my life;
And I will dwell in the house of the Lord
Forever.. (Psalm 23:6)

It can be easy, as a Christian, to spend a lot of time looking forward to the Afterlife. To Heaven. What could possibly sound as appealing, to those who love God, than the prospect of spending Eternity with Him? But you know, the first part of Psalm 23:6 reminds me that we don't have to wait for death to enjoy life with our Lord.

The NIV translates that section as "Surely Your goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life."

When you commit to a life following Christ, you're inviting Him to dwell with you, to share your life. That's what Christians mean when we say we have a "relationship" with Him. It means He is there. It means we can talk to Him. We can enjoy His presence. 

So often, we get so caught up in our day-to-day lives, it's easy to forget He is literally with us. Because we can't see Him by our sides, it's easy to think of Him as being far away; as being someone we can only reach during our devotions or those quiet moments of prayer. But if you allow yourself to see, you will find His goodness and mercy follows you.

You can live an abundant life, filled with the goodness, love and mercy of Christ, right now. You don't have to wait for Heaven. He is there with you, if you just look for Him. 

Let this be an encouragement. No matter what's going on today, no matter what you have to do, your Lord walks by your side. He is with you in that meeting you've been dreading at work. He's with you in the crowded grocery store, when all you want to do is pack up your kids and go back home. He's with you as He nudges you to talk to that lonely person at school or work.

He is with you, once you find Him, with all His goodness and mercy, all the days of your life.

In The Paths of Righteousness

He leads me in the paths of righteousness
For His name’s sake. (Psalm 23:3b)

Our God is marked by His grace and mercy. These two key traits are how we best know our Messiah -- they are manifestations of His great love for us. We, meanwhile, are known by our need for His grace and mercy. If you're a Christian, this is pretty basic stuff. You don't come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ without first understanding what it is you need to be saved from. 

One of the wonderful things about having a God who saves though, is that He knows our strengths and weaknesses. Take, for example, Jesus' admonition in Matthew 5:48 to "be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect." Does He really believe you and I, in our own strength, can come even close to that kind of standard? If He did, He wouldn't have needed to die. 

No. He knows you and I aren't capable of perfection. We take a couple steps toward Righteousness and are as completely lost as a ship in fog with no navigation. But He doesn't expect us to tread the path of Righteousness on our own. Instead, He leads us. 

This is part of what it means to be a shepherd. The sheep don't always know the way. They don't always have the destination in mind. They get distracted. But the Shepherd knows where He's going. He knows what the sheep need, and how to get them there. So He leads. 

And the leading, too, is a part of His grace.

The Crack In My Songlasses

 Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others.
Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. (Philippians 2:4-8)

 
I have a confession: I sometimes have a really hard time seeing people the way Jesus sees them.

I'm not talking about the poor here. Or the widows. Or orphans. I'm not talking about people who obviously need to be shown God's love in a practical way. Granted, I could do more on that score, too, but I don't have a difficult time seeing them through Christ's eyes.

But on the other side of the spectrum, you have the haughty. The proud. The rude. You have people who seem to somehow believe they are better or more important than everyone else. You see people who are selfish with their belongings, refusing to help others. You have people who cut in line, cut you off, look down their noses, judge others. The greedy, the arrogant, the self-righteous.

I confess a difficult time seeing Jesus in some people.

But the more I think of it, the more I think it has more to do with me than it does with them. I have never been homeless or orphaned. I have been proud. I have been rude. I have been arrogant and self-righteous. And, sometimes, I still am.

Maybe I have such a hard time seeing Jesus in these people, because I'm too busy seeing myself.

Happy Forgiveness Day!

Happy Forgiveness Day. No, really. Today is Forgiveness Day. This should be on every single Christian's calendar. A day to celebrate forgiveness! A day to remember that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us (Romans 5:8)!

There we were, enemies of God (Romans 5:10), but reconciled to Him through the willing sacrifice of His son. If it hasn't struck you how amazing this idea is, consider: have you ever had an enemy? Somebody you just can't get along with, no matter how hard you try? You may not even call them an "enemy" (I mean, who even uses that word anymore?)... but they certainly aren't your friends. Sure, if they asked you to, you'd happily forgive them for however they wronged you... but would you go after them? Would you be the one to take that step at restoration? Would you be the first one to reach out and offer forgiveness -- and truly mean it? And, if they failed to see that they did anything wrong, if they persisted in denying you, if they still talked about you behind your back or undermined what you did with your life... would you still be willing to die to save their lives?

Would you do that? Because that's what Jesus did. That's what God still does! And, what's more, He chases after those who still deny Him by using those of us who are already beneficiaries of His grace to do so! And, He expects those who have been forgiven to also forgive. That person I mentioned earlier? That enemy? Forgiveness of that person isn't an option -- whether they ask for it or not.

Consider the Lord's Prayer (Matthew 6:9-13):

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 forgive our debtors.
And do not lead us into temptation,
But deliver us from the evil one.
For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. (Emphasis mine)

Did you catch that? Forgive us as we forgive! And lest we think that means something other than what it means, Jesus is sure to clarify: 

For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. (Matthew 6:14-15)

Does that thought scare or comfort you? That when we ask God to forgive us as -- in the same way -- we forgive others, He just might? 

We are forgiven in our imperfection. Let's celebrate that today -- and every day -- by imitating our Savior and doing likewise!

Social Justice, God's Way

Today is, according to the United Nations, the World Day of Social Justice. The term, "social justice," has different meanings depending on who you talk to. In recent days, the idea of "justice" has been rather distorted to mean many things it just doesn't mean. But what is social justice? Maybe the easiest way to define it is the way it's defined in business law. That is to say, "the fair and proper administration of laws conforming to the natural law that all persons, irrespective of ethnic origin, gender, possessions, race, religion, etc., are to be treated equally and without prejudice."

Actually, our just God agrees: Exodus 23:6, for example, says, "Do not deny justice to your poor people in their lawsuits." Leviticus 19:15 is even more explicit: "Do not pervert justice; do not show partiality to the poor or favoritism to the great, but judge your neighbor fairly."

God Himself treats us equally, as Jesus reminds us in Matthew 5:44-45.

But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 

The truth is, we don't live in a world capable of total social justice. We live instead in a world that is fallen and incapable of the grace of Christ. But, in Him, we can treat one another with equality and justice. We can be kind to our neighbors and pray for and love our enemies. This is justice, God's way.

As often as we cry out for the heads of those who hurt us, God's justice is one tempered with mercy.

 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. (John 3:16-17)

We are a condemned people -- and under God's justice, we ought to be. But he adds to His justice grace and mercy. The price must be paid, but our God has paid it Himself, for all who believe. That's not the World's justice -- but it ought to be ours. 

Social justice, God's way: equal grace, equal mercy. Love for friend and foe alike. Pointing all, no matter who they are, how much money they make, or what they've done, to the cross of Christ.

 

Not Who I Am Anymore

A quick story: My younger brother spent a good chunk of his life as the so-called "black sheep" of the family. Even in school, his tendency to talk first and consider the consequences later would draw the ire of teachers and administrators alike. He'd spend a Summer learning how to calm himself down, only to face another school year of the same old trouble.

The real problem wasn't in his behavior from the onset of the year, but with his reputation from the year before. Trouble was expected. He was treated like a troublemaker, and so acted like one. He expressed this frustration to me on more than one occasion: how can I hope to change my ways if they won't LET me -- and why should I bother?

In fairness to the school system, they had no way of knowing how he had matured during those summers, or the decisions he made to at least try to behave. All they had to go on was the past.

With God, it's different:

And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.

So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. (2 Corinthians 5:15-19)

Since it was Christ Himself who remade us, He no longer holds our past against us. In fact, as Psalm 103:12 says, he has removed it from us, "as far as the East is from the West."

Our past is no longer a part of who we are. He literally cannot hold our past against us, once He has taken it away, because we are no longer the same person! We are, thanks to the mercy and sacrifice of Christ, an entirely NEW creation!