“… full of Grace and truth.” (John 1:14)
When you read that Christ, like His Father, is “full of Grace and truth,” do you feel any preference for one of these over the other? Do you find the “Grace,” you see in Jesus especially heartwarming? Are you inspired by His affirmation of God’s favor? Does it give you a surge of hope to have this confirmation of the Father’s beneficence? Do you feel loved and worthwhile just knowing this? There’s no doubt about the difference between these two aspects of our Lord’s character. “Grace,” a “Matter of the Heart,” is a term of endearment. “Truth,” in contrast, is more the stuff of the mind. It’s about reasoning, grappling with hard questions of what is “right,” and “wrong.” If popular opinion means anything “Grace,” is, in fact, preferred. Jesus messages of love have broad appeal. His insistence that we must “forgive,” if we expect to be forgiven, is not so popular. Many simply overlook it, celebrating the mercy that welcomes them and folks with shortcomings like their own, while descrying the foibles of others, demanding their exclusion from the Heavenly community. We like it when Jesus says to a woman condemned to death by a group of hypocritical men, “I don’t condemn you.” We’re not sure what to do with the rest of the story. It ends, you’ll remember, with His command, “Go and sin no more.”
Truth can be painful. For one thing, it confronts us with our “sin.” We are something less than what Our Father created us to be. For another, truth calls for change; change in the way we look at ourselves; change in the way we see God Himself. Change is difficult and often painful. So we tend to avoid it and the “truth” that calls for it.
Unfortunately, if we want the Life Christ offers, we must have “truth,” as well as “Grace.”
There’s an ancient Proverb that says, “as a man thinks in his heart so is he.” The Bible’s wisdom is that, at the core of our being, in the deepest regions of ourselves – our spirit – heart and mind interface. What matters most to us – our values, our will, our heart – determines the sort of person we are becoming. Mind – our thoughts and feelings – feeds into the heart or spirit and profoundly influences what we want more than anything else. Often it’s not clear which comes first, the thought or the will. One thing is clear. The mind matters.
A new book, “The Me I Want to Be: Becoming God’s Best Version of You …” written by John Ortberg, affirms how much your mind matters. “Becoming the best version of you … rests on one simple directive. "THINK GREAT THOUGHTS!"
“Grace,” and “truth,” … You can’t have one without the other! Until your heart embraces the truth you will never become the “TRUE YOU,” the “Vicarious Self” your Creator designed you should be initially and now seeks to restore.
Friday, February 26, 2010
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
The Vicarious Self 9 - Character Trumps the Spectacular and Popular ...
“We have seen His glory; the glory of the One and only Son who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” (John 1: 14)
“We have seen His glory …”
At first you might think that John is remembering spectacular events he and his Friends experienced while Jesus was with them. There were the times He fed thousands with only a bit of bread and some fish. Or he could be remembering occasions when Jesus performed miracles of unparalleled extremes. They’d seen Him raise the dead. Legions of demons cowered in His presence. There was that special day when John, his brother, and Peter were with Jesus on a “high,” mountain. Suddenly the Master was transformed before their eyes. He became dazzling, celestial, as brilliant as lightning frozen in blinding intensity. Two other men appeared; Moses and Elijah. John and the others couldn’t look at these Heavenly beings in their “glorious splendor.” They fell to the ground covering their faces against the “unapproachable light.” Nothing John had experienced, apart from the wonder of Christ’s first appearance on Easter Sunday, was more glorious.
But John wasn’t thinking about such things now. As a matter-of-fact he didn’t even mention the day on the mountain with Moses and Elijah anywhere in his book. The other 3 Biographers – Matthew, Mark, and Luke – did. He didn’t. There were things more important in his estimation, than even this dramatic event.
John had come to understand that “glory” is something beyond splendor. “Doxa,” the true glory of a man, is the substance of his reputation. When Jesus appeared His character was an unmistakable reflection of the Father’s reputation. He was “full of grace and truth.” Anyone who watched him saw the Grace of the Father in Him. To be with Him was to experience the Father’s favor and good-will. His love was evident in a kindness that reached out to people of every nationality and consistently overlooked social status. You felt safe in His presence. At the same time He was no pushover. He taught and lived as though there was absolute “truth.” He’s the one who declared, “You have heard that messengers in times past said … But I say …” Unapologetically He claimed to be and have the “last word from God.” “I AM the WAY; the TRUTH; and the ‘LIFE.’”
Now let’s be honest. Don’t you find this a bit conflicting? Isn’t it typically human to want the splendid? Wouldn’t we prefer to hear John’s version of what happened on that “Holy Mountain?” Wouldn’t we much rather have had our Lord unleash His Universal Power and set up a forever Empire? Wouldn’t it suit our purposes better to have Him give us – His Followers – His irresistible, endless Authority over all reality?
John broke from the pack and told us about the qualities of Christ’s character that were the indispensible aspects of His person as God’s ultimate “Word,” to us; “Grace and truth.” His reasons for this are clear in the next Chapter of his book. “Because of the miraculous signs Jesus did in Jerusalem at the Passover celebration, many began to trust in him. But Jesus didn’t trust them, because he knew human nature. No one needed to tell him what mankind is really like.” (John 2: 24 & 25 NLT)
We humans are like the devil who thought he could entice Jesus into jumping off the highest pinnacle of the temple in Jerusalem. The tempter thought he could seduce the “Son of Man,” with the thought that He’d survive the leap and, presto, become the hero of those who saw the drama. His popularity would immediately soar off the charts. He’d be pressed into the Royal status that was rightfully His. The "tide of popular opinion" would sweep Him into the establishment of an Empire; the very thing Satan and his ilk desperately wanted. We elevate men to heroic levels because of the promise of personal prestige and power. John knew Jesus teaching flew in the face of such devilish thinking and recognized that, in the Kingdom of our Lord character trumps the sensational and popular every time. Christ’s “grace and truth,” are His Divine attributes. In them is our hope. By “Grace,” through “faith” in the truth of all that He is, and teaches, we become our “TRUE SELVES.”
“We have seen His glory …”
At first you might think that John is remembering spectacular events he and his Friends experienced while Jesus was with them. There were the times He fed thousands with only a bit of bread and some fish. Or he could be remembering occasions when Jesus performed miracles of unparalleled extremes. They’d seen Him raise the dead. Legions of demons cowered in His presence. There was that special day when John, his brother, and Peter were with Jesus on a “high,” mountain. Suddenly the Master was transformed before their eyes. He became dazzling, celestial, as brilliant as lightning frozen in blinding intensity. Two other men appeared; Moses and Elijah. John and the others couldn’t look at these Heavenly beings in their “glorious splendor.” They fell to the ground covering their faces against the “unapproachable light.” Nothing John had experienced, apart from the wonder of Christ’s first appearance on Easter Sunday, was more glorious.
But John wasn’t thinking about such things now. As a matter-of-fact he didn’t even mention the day on the mountain with Moses and Elijah anywhere in his book. The other 3 Biographers – Matthew, Mark, and Luke – did. He didn’t. There were things more important in his estimation, than even this dramatic event.
John had come to understand that “glory” is something beyond splendor. “Doxa,” the true glory of a man, is the substance of his reputation. When Jesus appeared His character was an unmistakable reflection of the Father’s reputation. He was “full of grace and truth.” Anyone who watched him saw the Grace of the Father in Him. To be with Him was to experience the Father’s favor and good-will. His love was evident in a kindness that reached out to people of every nationality and consistently overlooked social status. You felt safe in His presence. At the same time He was no pushover. He taught and lived as though there was absolute “truth.” He’s the one who declared, “You have heard that messengers in times past said … But I say …” Unapologetically He claimed to be and have the “last word from God.” “I AM the WAY; the TRUTH; and the ‘LIFE.’”
Now let’s be honest. Don’t you find this a bit conflicting? Isn’t it typically human to want the splendid? Wouldn’t we prefer to hear John’s version of what happened on that “Holy Mountain?” Wouldn’t we much rather have had our Lord unleash His Universal Power and set up a forever Empire? Wouldn’t it suit our purposes better to have Him give us – His Followers – His irresistible, endless Authority over all reality?
John broke from the pack and told us about the qualities of Christ’s character that were the indispensible aspects of His person as God’s ultimate “Word,” to us; “Grace and truth.” His reasons for this are clear in the next Chapter of his book. “Because of the miraculous signs Jesus did in Jerusalem at the Passover celebration, many began to trust in him. But Jesus didn’t trust them, because he knew human nature. No one needed to tell him what mankind is really like.” (John 2: 24 & 25 NLT)
We humans are like the devil who thought he could entice Jesus into jumping off the highest pinnacle of the temple in Jerusalem. The tempter thought he could seduce the “Son of Man,” with the thought that He’d survive the leap and, presto, become the hero of those who saw the drama. His popularity would immediately soar off the charts. He’d be pressed into the Royal status that was rightfully His. The "tide of popular opinion" would sweep Him into the establishment of an Empire; the very thing Satan and his ilk desperately wanted. We elevate men to heroic levels because of the promise of personal prestige and power. John knew Jesus teaching flew in the face of such devilish thinking and recognized that, in the Kingdom of our Lord character trumps the sensational and popular every time. Christ’s “grace and truth,” are His Divine attributes. In them is our hope. By “Grace,” through “faith” in the truth of all that He is, and teaches, we become our “TRUE SELVES.”
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