Psalm 63 – Anything I Want?
What a rich Psalm…..maybe someone should write a song…with some of the lines from it.
Something that correlates to a book that I am reading jumped out at me this morning. Verse 3 says;
Because your love is better than life, my lips will glorify you.
I am at a point in my faith life…that including folks who have not had a faith journey before, is becoming more and more natural. But there are so many times that I have acted like a bull in a china shop….and I did anything BUT glorify God.
There was this line in the book The Reason for God….where Keller is talking about people initially making the distinction between “religion” and the Gospel….and we’ve all heard this from someone who is not a Christ Follower…..”that is too easy….you mean, all I gotta do is have this relationship with God and I can do anything I want?”
The religious (or the Pharisee) might take this as an opportunity to jump down the throat of the irreligious…(and I have done this) to say, “No way sinner! you don’t keep on sinning so that grace is multiplied” (which is somewhat scriptural) you don’t trample on the free grace of God. What a stupid thought….seriously!”
The problem with that answer…is that it is spoken from a defensive posture. The Pharisee is more substantiated by his religiousness…than by God’s grace…therefore, he feels compelled to make another Pharisee than a Christ Follower living under grace.
And it came to me this morning….that nope…that type of talk was reserved for believers. When speaking to someone about Christ….with no faith background, we should just say yes….sure….you can do anything you want. Say yes so that this person may taste and see that Lord is good. What happens after that, as we all know…..Christ changes our wants.
The question that the seeker is asking is “spoken outside of an experience of radical Grace” (according to Keller). And I am not saying we should soft sell the Gospel….but our posture needs to continually be inclusive…and not exclusive. Because I truly believe that God’s love is better than life….
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
2 comments:
This is part of the reason that this was my favorite chapter of Keller's book so far (although the next one's really good too! Yeah, I read ahead again!). When your heart has changed, you don't *want* to do "anything"... you want to honor the gift of Christ's grace by following his instructions. And, when you screw it up, you don't have that overwhelming guilt, because Jesus has already dealt with your sin and forgiven you. Glory to God indeed!
Takes the pressure off. it's amazing how frozen we become when we feel condemned and not "living up to" the standard. Wrong motivation, eh? Like Keller said, that's the difference between feeling we are saved by our moral ability (religion) verses his undeserving grace (gospel).
Post a Comment