Like a lot of people, maybe most people, perhaps all people, I don’t like to admit I’m wrong or to have my errors pointed out.
It’s very uncomfortable and we become very defensive. It’s a human weakness that goes right back to the beginning of Creation. Adam and Eve sinned and when God confronted them, they both pointed the finger away from themselves. Adam even blaming God along with his wife Eve. “The woman YOU gave me, she made me eat. Eve, in turn – don’t look at me – it was the snake, he tricked me. I’m not suggesting things would have turned out differently but what if Adam and Eve fell on their knees searching for God’s mercy and admitted their error instead of hiding and denying their blame. It seems to be a natural defense mode to deny responsibility and look for ways to justify our actions. It can manifest itself in several ways.
We can deny any wrong doing – it wasn’t me. We can compare ourselves to others – at least I’m not as bad as that person.
We can point the finger at other people and blame them: Children love that one – well, he started it. We can even justify ourselves – everyone is doing it.
And it is this principle that is at the heart of the Reformation. The Reformers had a term for it – Incurvatus in se – that we are curved in on ourselves. And so Luther, when he was dealing with his sinfulness that drove him to despair – looked within himself for relief. To balance his sin with good deeds trying to prove to himself that he was worthy of God’s acceptance. But the more he looked inside himself the more despair he discovered. Luther in fact began to despise Jesus through this as a tyrant. It was said that the only way to appease this vengeful Jesus, as taught by the church, was to seek the kind and beneficent intercession of his mother Mary. Luther went to the ‘Mother of God’, who, unlike her vindictive son, was full of tenderness and compassion. Mary became the sole refuge for the terrified monk. Until he discovered the glorious truth of salvation by grace through faith. The message of the book of Romans.
Luther discovered what St Paul discovered in his writing to the Roman Church – no one will be declared righteous in God’s sight by the works of the law; that the righteousness of God has been made known and that righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. Luther discovered that comfort for our sin was not found in ourselves but rather outside of ourselves. This is so counterculture because it’s not inbred in us by birth and by society. To many it would seem like weakness to admit to a fault in yourself. Jesus had this discussion with the Pharisees. They looked to themselves for justification before God: We are Abraham’s descendants. But that was not going to give them any true peace. Instead, Jesus said – “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed”.
Luther finally discovered true peace that came not by trying to meet an unobtainable standard before God. Not by trying to justify himself before God as Adam and Eve tried to. Not by trying to justify himself by comparing himself to others – in fact he discovered what Paul said in Romans – for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Not by his credentials as if somehow they might balance in his favour as the Pharisees did with their “we are children of Abraham” comment. But by discovering God’s grace and mercy in Jesus Christ and the truth that all are justified freely by his grace through Christ Jesus.
So, just all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God – so too, Jesus Christ has justified us freely by his grace. And it was THAT truth that set him free. That was the beginning of the Reformation.
We live in a world where there are so many expectations placed on us. Whether it be financially, socially, career, sporting achievement. There is the expectation to succeed that is causing so much mental strain on children trying to achieve expectations placed on them. Especially at this time with exams and tertiary entrance scores to see if you’re accepted. But how freeing it is that when it comes to God there are no expectations when it comes to accepting us as his children.
Before God there are no distinctions as Paul said in Romans – There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, or any other classification. All have been created in God’s image. All have been saved by grace through Jesus. It is only we who make those expectations, be they on ourselves or on other people. How truly freeing it is knowing that we are loved by God so much.
Sometimes that is hard to understand when we look in the mirror and can’t even love ourselves and yet God, the creator of the universe actually loves us. He loves us because he created us in order to love. That is something we should never doubt because God is love.
The Reformation was an historic event in the church. It began a new movement of Protestant Churches. But more than that it reinstated in the minds of the common person that God loved them unconditionally. That God would remember our sins no more and neither should we. As Paul says in 1 Corinthians – love keeps no record of wrongs. There is only one person who remembers sin – and that is Satan – the accuser. He will have you believe that there is nothing lovely in you – that there is nothing loveable in you when it comes to God. But just as God said to Israel he says to us: The Lord did not set his heart on you and choose you because you were more numerous than other nations, for you were the smallest of all nations! Rather, it was simply that the Lord loves you. And the Lord loves you and has given his Son for you so that you may live in Heaven with him.
Jesus is the way, the truth and the life – and his truth truly sets us free.
