Absolute Grace

Our small group met up for the first time this year. It was great to see everyone, some new faces and some old faces. We are now studying Philip Yancey's The Jesus I Never Knew. What a fascinating book! I was behind on my reading so I started to catch up and didn't realize that I read past the chapter already! Yesterday we discussed Chapter 7, Message: A Sermon of Offense. We looked at 5 different interpretations of the Sermon on the Mount that was delivered by Jesus. What was interesting is how even today, we each still holds different ideas of how the Sermon should apply in our lifes.

For me as I read the chapter, what really captivated me was Tolstoy's response to critics that he has failed to live up to all of Christ's command. A few of his words stood out to me, "And I answer that I am guilty, and vile, and worthy of contempt for my failure to carry them out." He did not try to defend himself. He responded that he could not fulfill "one thousandth part of (Christian precepts)" but it is not because he did not want to but unable to. And he asked if anyone can help him escape the temptation of the world then help him do so in order to fulfill those precepts. He said, "Attack me, I do this myself, but attack me rather than the path I follow and which I point out to anyone who asks me where I think it lies." The Words of God is the truth and Jesus Sermon on the Mount is a description of God's characters. It is true that we will never be able to attain such perfection but we should certainly strive to. But as we are striving to follow Jesus teachings, we need to remember to not do it as if we are taking an exam or trying to score 100% on a test. We follow the teaching because we want to be close to God, to have a relationship with Jesus where we can walk together in good and bad times. What strikes me is the closing of this chapter when the author wrote, "we are all desperate, and that is in fact the only state appropriate to a human being who wants to know God. Having fallen from the absolute Ideal, we have nowhere to land but in the safety net of absolute grace." How true is that and how bless we are. For everytime we encounter difficulty or failure, we know it is a way the Lord is helping to strengthen us for greater things in His kingdom. And everytime we fail to live up to God's Ideal, we know that we are covered by His Love and Grace. Therefore, although we will never achieve perfection, but we should never stop striving.