Monday, April 10, 2017
543 - Conditioned Reflex
Spirituality
Column No. 543
April 11, 2017
Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary
April 11, 2017
Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary
Conditioned Reflex
By
Bob Walters
God’s love is unconditional, Christ’s forgiveness is
unconditional, our acceptance into the Kingdom is unconditional, and our need
to complicate things is unconditional.
When will
we ever learn?
We hear
“It’s a free gift,” and then sing about how much it cost.
We hear
“Once for all,” and then worry if it’s enough and includes me.
We hear “I am your peace and
strength,” and then in anxious weakness, doubt.
We hear “Nothing can separate us,”
and then conclude sin separates us.
In our quid pro quo culture of marketing and merchandizing; of “can do”
confidence and intellectual self-sufficiency, it is perhaps our toughest,
practical, human theological hurdle to take Jesus at His word and God at His
love. His kingdom, glory and eternity
are ours in Christ. Sin separates us
from God? Jesus came for sinners, not the
righteous. That’s God’s grace. We
once were lost, but now are found. Done
deal.
Through the Bible the Holy Spirit
heralds this Good News to each of us: “You
are in.” There is nothing we can do,
say or believe that undoes the divine side of that truth. Jesus has erased our sins and we are
righteous before God. Welcome home.
Certainly, the secular, atheist, modern, post-modern “smarter than God”
world thinks the whole idea is nuts. But
that doesn’t change God. The Bible is
pretty clear that only a few folks will actually embrace the truth of Christ
even though it applies to everyone. You
cannot point to one person in all of history Jesus did not come to save, but
there remains a broad sweeping swath of humanity that without eyes to see or
ears to hear, remains lost. As for Christians,
well, we believe, but often want to edit and “conditionalize” the simple, joyous
unconditional truth of salvation in Christ.
We recently got into this topic of
“unconditional” in our Wednesday night E91 Bible study with Bible stalwart Dr.
George Bebawi. Most of us recoiled and
pondered: Aren’t our own personal acceptances of Jesus and responses of
repentance, faith, baptism, confession, love and obedience all “conditions” of
our salvation?
George smiled and sparred with us,
noting that a “condition” is a negative, something that takes away from freedom
and love; that we place conditions on God usually due to our own guilt. We figure God is mad at us when the obvious,
entire truth of the New Testament is: Jesus
came to heal us. Accepting that truth is “a condition”?
One classmate noted, “It’s like a
free restaurant; all you have to do is go in and eat.” Free delivery, too. It occurred to me later that we operate our
smart phones and computers, if we can, in the way that works best – not in
obedience but in thankful, enthusiastic agreement. In the E91 pulpit last Sunday longtime friend
and preacher Dave Faust talked about loving God, believing Jesus, reading the
Bible, going to church, etc., in freedom
because we “get to,” we want to; not
because we have to.
Amen to that.
Our condition in Christ is
freedom. We should take that thought
captive.
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