God is Unfair!

April 7, 2023


Holy Week 2023 Reflections

Here’s another astonishing thing about Jesus. Even while hanging from the Cross, in excruciating agony, shame, and fatigue, He was still saving people!

Case in point was the thief who was crucified beside Him. A composite reading of the Gospels will show that he started out hurling insults at Jesus and taunting Him to save Himself (Matthew 27:38-40).

Then, for some reason, he had a change of heart and asked Jesus, “[R]emember me when you come into your kingdom” (Luke 23:39-42).

Thus we have one of the Seven Last Words: “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise” (v 43).

Wait a minute. That’s unfair!

There were thousands of people who led upright lives, but this miserable criminal had the express lane to Heaven!

Shouldn’t this thief make some penance for his sins? Like make restitution, do some charity work or something? Oh, wait, he was nailed to a piece of wood.

The thief implicitly acknowledged Jesus as his King, but he was not vetted, he did not pass some tests, he had no backers or character references.

So Jesus took him into His kingdom… just like that?

It’s so unfair. But it was unfair in the thief’s favor!

That is the reality of salvation. God sacrificed His sinless Son for us sinners. Jesus got the raw deal, took the bullet, absorbed the blow, while we get to be forgiven, cleansed, and adopted as children of God. His Heavenly Father was being unfair, but He was unfair in our favor.

We are as helpless like the thief; there’s nothing we can do to deserve such grace. But it’s there.  Again like that thief, the response is a genuine repentance and embracing Jesus as our King.

“God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God (2 Corinthians 5:21).

Yes, God is unfair. But this is one instance I am grateful for it.

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Holy Week Reflections

John 13 carries an astounding yet often-missed truth.

Consider:  during what we now call the Last Supper, Jesus took off His outer clothing, wrapped a towel around His waist, poured water into a basin, and proceeded to wash His disciples’ feet, drying them with that tower around His waist.

Did that include Judas?

Yes, THAT Judas.

We have no problem with Jesus picking off the crusted dust from, say, Peter’s toes. Or John’s. Or Thomas’.

But Judas’??

We know that Jesus washed Judas’ feet too, because after washing the disciples’ feet, Jesus put His clothes back on and dropped the bombshell: “Very truly I tell you, one of you is going to betray me” (v 21).

He gave a piece of bread to Judas. After Judas had taken the bread, he left the room (v 26-27, 30).

So Judas was there. Jesus washed his feet, too.

Think of it. Our Lord already fully knew of Judas’ betrayal, but still loved him anyway to the point of taking the role of a lowest servant and washed his feet.

Reflections:

  1. Jesus sees the worst in us – all the muck and mess – but loved us anyway, proving it not by washing our feet with water, but by washing away our sins with His own blood.
  2. Jesus washed all the disciples’ feet, but it doesn’t mean all were clean (v 10). It was still up to Judas to repent or reject such grace. In the same way, let no one say that just because Jesus died for everyone, everyone will go to heaven. It is still up to each of us to repent or reject such grace.
  3. Jesus could have spared Himself of the Cross by exposing Judas and letting the other eleven disciples do the rest (if you know what I mean). But He allowed God’s plan of salvation to run its course. And we know what happened next.

What an amazing Savior! Yes, the same Jesus Who washed Judas’ feet will also wash your sins away. If you will do the very opposite of Judas:  believe, repent, and receive eternal life.

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Holy Week 2023 Reflections

“Why this waste? For this perfume might have been sold for a high price and the money given to the poor.” (Matthew 26:8-9)

Ever prioritized dinner with your family and next morning your officemates will say, “Why this waste? You could have taken a customer out last night and clinch some juicy deals”?

Ever refused to marry someone who doesn’t believe in God and your own family will say, “Why this waste? You’ll be an old maid soon if you don’t get your act together” ?

Ever dedicated your talents to the Lord, and your colleagues will say, “Why this waste? You could have fame and fortune”?

In a poignant scene in Bethany, Mary knew that in just a few days, her Friend will be taken away and killed.

Gone will be the sweet times she’d sit at His feet and hang upon His every word.

Gone will be the radiance of His love with which He loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus.

Gone will be this wonderful Man who dared describe Himself as the Resurrection and the Life, with her brother, quite literally, as the breathing, walking proof.

So Mary took the very costly perfume – a pound of pure nard – and slowly, reverently, poured it upon the head and feet of Jesus.

As the liquid trickled down His cheeks and splashed onto His garments, was she mournful that He had to go and die? Did Jesus cheer her up, saying “Let not your heart be troubled. Believe in the Father, believe also in Me”?

As she emptied the alabaster jar over His feet, and wiped them with her own hair, was she praying that God will change His plans, so Jesus will remain with them after all?

Love doesn’t always have to be practical. Just look at men buying flowers for their sweethearts, knowing that in a few days those flowers will only wither and die.

A waste of money, you might say. And yet this was exactly what Mary did. In pouring out her perfume, she was pouring out her adoration for Jesus.

But it seemed a criminal waste to others.

Have we become coldly calculating in our service for the King? Fussing over the impact of our endeavors, yet forgetting the pleasure of our Lord?

If Jesus were to ask for your alabaster jar of costly perfume, would you lavish it at His feet with what Oswald Chambers called “reckless abandon”? Or would you clutch it tightly against your chest, and say you have a better use for it than Jesus?

Whatever your “costly perfume” is… your dreams, your talents, your treasures, your valuable time, whatever you hold dear…offer it all to the Lord with a fresh love for Him.

And we have His assurance that no good thing we’ve done — simply because we love Him — will be erased from the memory of Eternity.

Is your life an outpouring of adoration, like Mary’s perfume?

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The Curse

April 4, 2023


Holy Week 2023 Reflection

Honestly, when I first read this passage, I didn’t know what to make of it.

In Matthew 21:18-19, we read that Jesus was hungry and went up to a fig tree. But the fig tree bore no fruit, it was all leaves. So He cursed it, “May you never bear fruit again!” Immediately the fig tree withered.

Wait. Wasn’t that a tad harsh? Couldn’t He just tell the tree to produce fruit?

It was as of Jesus was not just hungry but hangry.

One scholarly interpretation is that the fig tree represented fruitless Israel. In the Old Testament, the nation of Israel was likened to a vineyard or tree. It was supposed to be a blessing to the world (Isaiah 27:6), but God found it to be barren. In fact, it found itself under Roman subjugation. Fruitlessness was seen as a divine curse (Deuteronomy 11:17) and Jesus only made the picture starker.

We are under the same peril.  We all have broken God’s laws. I doubt there’s someone who can say he has perfectly obeyed the Ten Commandments. Therefore, we are cursed (Galatians 3:10).

But the astonishing Good News is that instead of Jesus cursing us as He did with the fig tree, He took up the curse Himself. “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a pole” (v 13). In other translations, the last word is not “pole” but “tree.”

Think about it:

  1. Jesus has every right to curse us for our sins. But instead, He took up the curse so we have every right to become children of God.
  2. Jesus cursed a fig tree. But to become a curse for us, He had to hang from a “tree”, the Cross.
  3. If we can get to heaven on our own, then why did Jesus have to take up that curse? Therefore, we receive eternal life not by our works, but by faith.

 

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Holy Week 2023 Reflections

We usually think of Jesus as this meek and mild person, radiating so much love and gentleness, that you can feel perfectly at ease with Him.

But that’s not how the Passion narratives paint Him.

In the Monday right after Palm Sunday (Mark 11:12), Jesus was outraged at what He saw at the Temple. It was meant to be a holy place where people can commune with God, but it was converted into a marketplace where people do commerce with goods.

It made His blood boil so much that He overturned tables of the money changers and benches of those selling doves. What’s more, He even barricaded merchandise from entering the temple courts.

He raised a ruckus so big that the chief priests and the teachers of the law connived how to kill him. Mind you, not just how to stop Him, but how to remove Him from the face of the earth.

Make no mistake. This is a Jesus Who is not meek and mild, but mean and wild!

Reflections:

1.  Actually, at the end of Palm Sunday, Jesus visited the temple and likely saw what He saw the following Monday (Mark 11:11). But because it was late, He did nothing.

When we are doing something wrong and God is not apparently calling our attention, never mistake the silence as His approval.

2. The same Mark 11:11 says that Jesus looked around at everything on the Temple courts. In the same way, Jesus sees everything about us.

Would there be something that will make His blood boil? Why wait for that to happen? Why not start ordering our hearts right with God?

3. When I think about it, it is good Jesus is not a softie Savior. I am glad that He strove for what is right when He drove the money changers away.

Because it means that He strove for what is right for ME when He died on the Cross to take my iniquities away.

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Holy Week 2023 Reflections

Imagine with me that you have a car inside your garage. Two strangers come up and ask you for the car keys. Startled, you ask why. The two strangers reply, deadpan, “The Lord needs it.”

I don’t know about you, but I will be calling the cops.

But that’s essentially what happened so Jesus can do the Triumphant Entry, the event which we celebrate as Palm Sunday.

Jesus told two of His disciples, “Go to the village ahead of you, and just as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, which no one has ever ridden. Untie it and bring it here. If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you doing this?’ say, ‘The Lord needs it and will send it back here shortly.’” They went and found a colt outside in the street, tied at a doorway. As they untied it, some people standing there asked, “What are you doing, untying that colt?” (Mark 11:2-5)

Now imagine the people, especially the fellow who owned that donkey, calling the cops. Or Roman centurions.

The astonishing thing was that the disciples answered as Jesus had told them to, and the people let them go (v 6). No police alerts. No road blocks. No cease and desist order.

We rightly focus on the King Who rode on that donkey on His way to Jerusalem. But I wonder what we can learn from the fact that the donkey was borrowed under unusual circumstances.

First, the Lord is sovereign over everything. Would it be possible that someone will stop Him from getting that donkey?

Second, if the Lord wants something from us, would we have surrendered it to Him whole-heartedly?

Third, think about what we surrender to the Lord. Can it be that the Lord will use it to further His Kingship?

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Recall the context: While Moses was up on a mountain, the Israelites had fashioned and were worshipping a golden calf. God was so incensed that He told Moses that He will utterly destroy the people (32:7-10). If there was a time that God made up His mind, it was this one!

Insight #1. Prayer relates us to God in human terms

Brother Andrew of “God’s Smuggler” fame wrote a book with the intriguing title: And God Changed His Mind. It challenged my notion that God is an inflexible and stubborn Deity, as if you have to twist His arm to get what you want.

Yet in the Exodus account, it seemed just that. God was going to wipe out Israel, but Moses talked Him out of it! He basically argued: “Look, God, what will happen to Your reputation? The Egyptians will say that You went through all this trouble to rescue us from Egypt, only to kill us in the middle of nowhere!” (vv 11-13).

And then we read this amazing passage: “Then the Lord relented and did not bring on his people the disaster he had threatened” (v 14).

Hold on! Wasn’t God sure of what He was going to do? Did Moses used shrewd negotiation? Do we imagine the Lord slapping His forehead and exclaiming, “Wow, Moses, that’s a great point! Why didn’t I see it that way? Okay, request granted”?

The answer is that Scripture shows God relating to people as if He Himself were human, that is, bound by linear time and literal space. Otherwise, no real relationship between a transcendental, infinite God and a temporal, finite man can be possible. In His omniscience, He already knew what Moses was going to say. He was never caught surprised. But He allowed this conversation to happen in linear time and literal space.

On closer analysis, God had have two options:  judgment due to His holiness or forgiveness due to His mercy. The tension is held by a general principle that says: God renders judgment but may bestow mercy if one appeals to it. Each side is consistent with His character. Moses astutely knew this and prayed accordingly.

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Consider Jesus’s words: “And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him” (Matthew 6:7-8).

You don’t have to be a five-year-old to ask the logical question, “If God knows what we need before we ask Him, then why ask in the first place?” After all, Psalm 115:3 asserts that “Our God is in heaven. He does as He pleases.”

I admit there are times when I feel prayer is like a cosmic lottery. You place your bet. You may win the jackpot. Then again, you may wind up with lemons. But I picked up a few insights along the way. Let me share three of them based on Exodus 32-34.

There was a time when I was jobless and broke for two arduous years. My savings went down to zero and my self-esteem went down to negative. I never felt so useless and ashamed in my life. You can imagine how earnestly I pleaded with God to restore my broken career.

Then out of the blue, I was summoned to a job interview. With bated breath, I wondered if God was at last granting my request.

But before I went to the prospective employer, I stopped by my church and shared my pain with two pastors. The two gave me some sort of pep talk and prayed over me. What they didn’t know was that, afterwards, I locked myself inside an empty office. There, I broke down and wept. I blubbered, “Please, God, I am so tired. I can’t take another disappointment. Give me this job. I claim it by faith.”

I didn’t get the job.

Can you imagine the seismic shock this had on my prayer life? Didn’t God hear those two pastors? Didn’t He see my hot tears? For quite some time, my spiritual walk was in a blue funk, which I had chronicled in my latest book Broken Faith (OMF Lit, 2022).

It has been over twenty years since that crushing disappointment. I suppose it still hounds me. I kept wrestling with the question: if God is sovereign, then He has decreed that I won’t get this job. So why bother with prayer at all?

I picked up a few insights along the way. Let me share three profound truths based on Exodus 32-34…

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