The Lenten Journey Day 41

Today’s reading is a combined effort of writings from Christian reformer Toyohiko Kagawa and missionary from India named Sadhu Sundar Singh. Both write about the blood of Jesus. Kagawa from the comparative perspective of blood’s restorative work in the human body and the restorative work of Christ’s blood shed on the cross. Singh speaks more directly about the spiritual blood and it’s complete work not just in the forgiveness of sins, but the restoration of the full, righteous life for which we were intended.

I’ve always been a bit squeamish about talking about the blood of Jesus. I am turned off by horror movies and sensationalized tales of the blood rituals and sacrificial ceremonies. When I accepted Christ, had I had to be a part of anything with real blood present I am quite sure that I would not have participated in the least.

Christ’s blood was really given, his earthly life was brought to an abrupt and excruciating end. The purpose in His pain was to unleash His love to all humanity and as both writers say to offer redemption for what is lost. So, the invitation is not to a bloody ceremony but a surrender to love unleashed and life given. This cannot be fully accepted in a stroll down the sanctuary aisle. It is a lifetime walk out of sin into life. As Sing writes, “Indeed, he came to us for this very purpose.”

The Lenten Journey Day 40

In his essay, Brennan Manning, sets out to illustrate the “great affection” of Jesus. He does so in three forms. The first is a relayed story of an old man by the Ganges river. The second is a personal experience that Manning had with an Amish family in the Mid-1980s. The final picture is from a play written by an East German pastor entitled The Sign of Jonah. Each one is a compelling picture of love coming from the source of Jesus not out of obligation but out His nature.

For whatever reason I am drawn to the first picture, the old man at the Ganges river. The old man sees a scorpion floating by helplessly in the river. He attempts to rescue the creature and is fiercely bitten twice with the second causing swelling in his hand and a great deal of pain. A passerby chides the old man for attempting to save something that is not only ungrateful but is inflicting suffering upon the man trying to save it. The old man responds, “My friend, just because it is the scorpion’s nature to sting, that does not change my nature to save.”

The correlation between this simple story and the story of Christ on the cross is perhaps predictable and maybe trite on some level. But the scorpions nature to sting reminds me of my human propensity to hurt even that which helps me the most. Thanks be to God that His nature to save is not effected by my nature to sting. We are saved by His affection, His nature.

The Lenten Journey Day 39

In today’s essay John Stott succinctly points out the struggle with the cross. Stott states simply that our human problem with Christ on the cross is our human pride. Stott gets at the heart with where our pride really comes in to play. It is not that we would deny our own sin, it is that we would deny that it required and received the sacrifice of God as atonement. From Stott’s own words,

“We cannot stand the humiliation of acknowledging our bankruptcy and allowing somebody else to pay for us. The notion that this somebody else should be God himself is just too much to take. We would rather perish than repent, rather lose ourselves than humble ourselves.”

A lot is said and made about our human tendency to categorize sin. It is Biblically true that different sins carry different consequences and it is also Biblically true that any and all sin separate us from God. What is overarchingly true is that Christ is the only remedy for any and all sin. I end with where Stott begins his essay, “The essence of sin is man substituting himself for God, while the essence of salvation is God substituting himself for man.”

The Lenten Journey Day 38

The distance that Simon Weil speaks of in his essay with the same title is the expansive gap between humanity and God. Weil answers that the gap is filled by God’s initiating love that He has created and that He supplies. That love is seen most clearly in the disturbing suffering of the cross.

Weil contributes to the Lenten conversation by emphasizing some already observed themes. It is the theme of how Christ’s suffering informs our own suffering, the necessity of the cross, and the depth of evil that has been overcome. What Weil brings out so brilliantly is the breadth of love, to quote the hymn, “it reaches to the highest mountain, it flows to the lowest valley.” Weil sums it up with this, “It is thus the soul, starting from the opposite end, makes the same journey that God made toward it. And that is the cross” What a blessed reassurance that God, possessor and creator of supreme love, brought that love to us. Choosing not to hoard His love and make us come get it, but to bring His love toward us in its fullest extent. To quote another hymn, “O, love that will not let me go.”

The Lenten Journey Day 37

“In this cross this level of our being has thrust itself up out of its deepest underground cellar so that we humans may see what is in all of us and take heed. The cross is crucial because it shows what possibilities for evil lie hidden in human beings”- Morton T. Kelsey

This is the thesis statement of Kelsey’s essay and today’s reading. When we see, truly see, Christ on the cross we truly see ourselves. Kelsey gives examples of the depth of human evil showing how seemingly normal, good people can get to the point of committing hellish atrocities. He might over simplify the examples but Kelsey’s assertion that when we look at the cross we should see what we are capable of, yet can be saved from is poignant. Kelsey closes with a look at some of the notorious characters at the cross, Pilate, Caiaphas, Judas, and even the carpenter who fashioned the cross. He paints them to be relatively “good” people with a slight flaw that is expanded within the pressure and scope of the events surrounding Jesus resulting in their roles in the evils of the cross.

The cross reminds us of our own propensity for evil but also points to victory. Kelsey ends with this encouraging summation, “The empty cross is planted there to remind us that suffering is real but not the end, that victory is still possible if we strive on.”