Freely Forgiven Free to Love

“Therefore, I say to you, her sins which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much. But to whom little is forgiven, the same loves little.” Luke 7:47


This is what Jesus says to the Pharisee about the woman who interrupts their dinner party. The woman had just emptied an alabaster flask of fragrant oil on Jesus’ feet. She also emptied her tears onto his feet as well. This statement of Jesus kind of bothers me. I mean, what is Jesus really saying? I want to love more-- I want to be a more loving man to my family; my brothers and sisters in Christ; my neighbor. I really desire to have a Christ-like love flowing from my heart. But, it would seem, by this statement of Jesus that I need to have many sins. Should I sin more so that I can be forgiven more?

The Pharisee was kind of upset about the whole thing. He questioned Jesus’ ability to know people but saying in his mind: if Jesus really knew who this woman was he wouldn’t allow this to go on.

The woman however was responding to Jesus presence. And it was a proper response. The Pharisee did not give a proper response to Jesus presence. “You did not give me water for my feet; you did not greet me with a kiss… But this woman…” Jesus then goes on to make comparison of the Pharisee’s response and the woman’s response. Jesus in this bothersome statement was, as usual, simply stating an observable fact to the Pharisee. The woman realized her great need for forgiveness and showed her appreciation. The one showing more love and mercy here is the one who has genuinely received love and mercy from the Lord. It is not about the amount of sin we commit—for we have all sinned and who can count the times we have fallen short of God’s glory? The focus is really one of realization, at the deepest level of our heart, that we have great need of forgiveness of our sins. And once those sins have been forgiven; once we have been truly cleansed of our sin the response will be one of unselfconscious love.

This woman was very conscious of her sins—but she was more conscious (to the point of not being conscious of anyone else) of the One who could truly forgive and cleanse her of sin. This set the woman free, truly free, to love Jesus in an extremely unselfconscious way.

William Barclay puts it nicely in his commentary on this passage: “It is true to say that the greatest of sins is to be conscious of no sin…”

Life not Lineage

When John the Baptist spoke to the Jews of his day he warned them not to rely on their racial heritage to get them into good grace with God. Check it out in Luke 3:8,9. “So then the people asked him, saying, ‘what shall we do?’” Then John launches into issues of justice. They would have known the biblical injunction to “do justice, love mercy, walk humbly with your God.” He tells the person who has more than enough to share with those in need. He tells the tax collector to not collect any more taxes than required. He tells the soldiers to stop intimidating people; to be content with their wages.
Us Christians are not much different then the Jews of John’s time are we? We have just changed the wording a bit. Now, instead of looking to racial privilege we are puffed up with pride because we have “said the prayer.” Now we have “Jesus in our heart.” We think that this somehow gives us a free ticket into heaven. Here’s a question for you: what would John the Baptist say to Christians today?
This causes me to ask questions of myself. Like, how can I do justice in the context of my life? It really is not such a stretch to think of ways that I can do justice in my job; in the arts, in my family, in my church. When John the Baptist told the people what they should do, he began right where they were in the context of their life. While I would love to go to other countries and preach the gospel and feed the hungry I realize that I am responsible for where I am right now; the life I live right now.
One thing I have noticed about the way God works. He doesn’t often convict me based on the grand ideas that I have about serving Him. In some ways it is easier for me to comfort myself by thinking about these things and saying that they are just out of my reach anyway. The Holy Spirit, though, puts his probing finger right on the spot where I am today in this very moment.
Where are you? It is the question God asked Adam just after he took the fruit from the forbidden tree. It was not as if God didn’t know Adam’s geographical location, God was asking him, just as he is asking us today: Where are you in your life? Where are you in your heart? Start there. Meet God there. Allow Him to speak to you right now.  Go ahead, ask him, “What shall I do?”

Glory and Beauty

“…to dwell in the house of the Lord… to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord…” Ps. 27:4
“And thou shalt make holy garments for Aaron thy brother for glory and for beauty…” Exodus 28:2ff

Where is the house of the Lord now? When David was writing this he was speaking to Jews, who would have understood house of the Lord to mean the Temple. It was the place where they would go to meet with God.

How does one gaze on the beauty of the Lord when He is invisible? Perhaps David is referring to the use of imagination. We can imagine what the Lord might look like. Isaiah saw the Lord in His temple on His throne and described him as high and lifted up, the train of his robe filled the temple.
Perhaps one can gaze on the beauty of the Lord through objects that point to the Lord. The Bible describes several objects that are rich with symbolism that points to God. Church and art history is full of the use of visual art; of icons to help the worshipper cast his or her “gaze” upon the Lord.
In order to understand what David meant we must first understand the Hebrew notion of beauty. To the Jew beauty was not just something that was pretty. I was not just something that hangs on a wall or sits on a pedestal. If a thing was beautiful, in the eyes of a Jew that thing worked; it functioned in the way it was intended. A picture of a flower to the western mind is beautiful because of its pretty colors, delicate petals. The picture of a flower in the Jewish mind was beautiful because of what it meant: life is fleeting, it has a beginning as a small seed, it lives and blooms beautiful for awhile, it fades, then it goes away, back into the earth.  So, we could say that to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord is to meditate on what He does, on what He intends.

What about this notion of glory? What exactly does that mean? Perhaps you have, on occasion heard this word used in a church setting. It is just not a word used much in our secular society. In some ways I must say that I kind of like that. It makes the word special to me. But, what exactly does it mean? What makes it so special? I believe you can think of it from the standpoint of art. When I go to an art museum or gallery I see all the paintings hanging on the wall, but I also see something else; I see the frames of the paintings. I don’t go to the museum to see the frames; I go there to see the paintings. And yet, my experience of the paintings is not the same without the frames. The function of the frames is for the purpose of drawing my attention to the paintings. The frames bring glory to the painting. We are to bring glory to God with our lives, so that others will see His beauty. 
Where is the temple of God now? Paul says in one of his letters to the Corinthians that we are the temple of the Holy Spirit of God. We by our lives bring glory to God, we show forth the beauty of God.