A Violent Grace
This week we begin a month-long discussion on: "I believe in Jesus Christ...suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucifed, died and was buried. He descended into Hell."Theologian and Author Michael card wrote a book about what he termed, "a Violent Grace."
The Jesus who preached love, healed the sick, held the children we can stomach. But do we have to discuss the cross? It's so barbaric, so crude, so crass, so R-Rated, so offensive, so violent. However, "by His wounds, we are healed." Within the violence of the cross, we find the grace of God.
St. Clare of Assisi said, "What a great laudable exchange." Laudable means "praiseworthy; worthy of high praise." That we might exchange our sin, our wounds, our filth, our vileness at the cross for grace, mercy, and peace is truely a great and laudable exchange. What a beautiful, horrible, violent grace is ours in the cross of Jesus Christ.
I leave you with this quote from Charles Spurgeon:
Seek fervently. Pray without ceasing. Love dearly. Examine honestly. Listen intently. And on Tuesday night come and listen to what He's done.If you reject Him
He answers you with tears.
If you wound Him,
He bleeds out cleansing.
If you kill Him, He dies to redeem.
If you bury Him,
He rises again to bring resurrection.
posted by AdamK | 7:28 PM
2 Comments:
"HOW COULD HE DO THAT FOR ME?"
(This is the title of an e-column I received the other day which connects a meditation on Jesus' suffering and death with thoughts on Christian community. The e-column in its entirety can be found at www.boundless.org. Following is the body of the article:)
Dear Professor Theophilus:
A friend asked me a question that I couldn't answer, and it's been bugging me ever since. We Christians believe that Christ paid the penalty for our sins. My question is how this "substitutionary atonement" could be just. If we're the ones who are guilty, then aren't we the ones who should pay? Suppose that I murder someone, and my mother offers to be executed in my place. Does that seem right? It doesn't make sense that she could take the consequence that I deserve.
My Dad, who is a pastor, says that in questioning God's justice I'm imagining a still higher standard of justice than God's and demanding that He live up to it. That seems true, but I'm not sure that it helps.
My brother's suggestion makes a little more sense. He says that the offended party decides how one repays him. In the case of sin, the offended party is God, so if God allows someone else to pay what I owe, that's good enough. I agree that if someone takes my money, I have a say in whether he has to compensate me, but if I let someone else pay his debt he's still guilty, isn't he? He's just not punished.
Can you clear this up? I don't want to pretend that my understanding of justice is higher than God's, but I'd like to understand, and I'd also like to be able to explain to my friend.
REPLY:
The question that your friend asks used to bug me too, and I wasn't satisfied with the answers I was given either. Take your Dad's. It's a thoughtful, excellent reply to someone who complains that God is unjust, but your friend isn't wondering about that; he's wondering whether Christianity has God's justice right. Your brother is correct that a creditor may not care who pays the price, but you're right that the debtor still didn't do what's right.
Have you ever read any of John Donne's meditations? He's the fellow who said "No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main." The line is in Meditation XVII; take the time to read the whole thing. In the old days, when I read such language I thought that it was a sentimental exaggeration. In the view I held then, by nature we are all disconnected; connection of one person with another is never more than partial, and always partly an illusion.
But I had it all backwards. What Christianity teaches is just the opposite of what I believed. Disconnection is the illusion, for by nature we are all connected. We aren't the same person, but we are so deeply identified with each other that you can't tell one man's story without telling the story of his fellows. If you think I'm only saying that a solitary human life would be unhappy, you misunderstand me. It would not be a human life at all. Yes, of course, we are individual persons, but we depend on each other so completely that without others I would never know that I am me. The most private and personal gains its meaning from what is shared and held in common. In my case, these insights were a long time coming, and came only through marrying and becoming a father. Some people get it more quickly.
Eventually I got it. For better or for worse, our true condition is connection, and connection changes everything. If we aren't connected, then when Paul writes, "For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive" (1 Cor. 15:22), he isn't making sense. Wasn't Adam the one who sinned? Then how could we die "in him"? But Adam was the representative of our shared humanity, and the dye of sin spreads in all directions. My sin is a reproach to you; yours, a reproach to me; his, a reproach to us all. Redemption works that way too. Wasn't Christ the one who died and rose? Then how could all be made alive "in Him"? But Christ was the representative of our shared guilt, and the dye of life spreads in all directions too. If, by grace, I too bear my Cross — if I allow His very identity in death and resurrection to interpenetrate my own — then this other statement of Paul makes sense too: "I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me" (Gal. 2:20).
Is it just? If by justice you mean how justice looks under the illusion of disconnection, no; it is better than justice. But the demands of justice are truly met, for a deeper reality is at work, the reality of connection. The Church is the Body of the crucified and risen Lord. We are parts of the Body of which He is the Head. That isn't metaphor but very truth.
I don't know whether your friend will get it or not. It isn't fully convincing except through experience. Some things you can know from the outside, but the living grace of Christ isn't one of them. You have to get into the river to get wet.
Peace be with you,
PROFESSOR THEOPHILUS
....By the way....I came across another reading that sent me further into some thoughts on community in general, and intentional Christian community in specific....if you're interested check out the responses to Adam's previous post....lets keep the conversation going....
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