Ack! Finals Week!

There's a normal post coming shortly, but with here's a short word of encouragement for everyone about to spend next week studying and taking finals. If you're sitting in the library, sleeping on a book, stressing out, or drinking your 7th cup of coffee, remember that as huge as these tests may seem, they pale in comparison to the riches of God's grace. He is always with you, and even if you fail all of these tests, His Son has already made an A+ in what really matters by providing the way back to the One who created you.

Matthew 7:25 (modified slightly for this context =D)

"[Jesus said] Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food [and finals, and good grades, and your GPA], and the body more important than clothes?"

Risen!

Today is it. Today is the day everything changed. Today one man did the unthinkable. Today a man rose Himself from the dead. Today all of His claims were validated.

He said He was God. He said He could forgive sins. He said we could now be reunited with our Maker. He was killed because He said these things. He proved these things were true when He rose from the tomb.

From this, a small band of followers could not contain themselves. They travelled around the known world not preaching a set of rules, not telling of a man's teachings, but proclaiming a man rose from the dead! Through persecution, death, torture, and pain, they would not be denied.

Today we stand nearly 2,000 years later proclaiming the same thing: that this same man, Jesus Christ, Redeemer of man, rose from the grave! Like those men in the past, we share in the hope that our sins our forgiven. We stand washed clean so that we can have fellowship with our Heavenly Father forever!

This Easter we praise God for this gift! Let us all leave this Easter with the same drive and passion as those men from 2,000 years ago.

"He is not here; He has risen! Remember how He told you, while He was still with you in Galilee: 'The Son of Man muse be delivered into the hands of sinful men, be crucified and on the third day be raised again'"
Luke 24:6-7

Treasure

An old man's family falls on hard times. His family has gone several days without food, so he turns to a last resort. Years earlier, a mysterious stranger gave him a map. The stranger told him the map would someday lead him to treasure beyond the man's wildest dreams. Although the man was skeptical when he received the map, his desperate situation leads him to his attic to retrieve it. In his old age, he cannot go on the journey, so he sends his two sons with the map and what little supplies they have left to find this treasure.

On this journey, the sons initially encounter great success. The map is extremely accurate, and every place they reach corresponds exactly to its directions. Filled with hope, they continue on their quest. As they reach more dangerous areas, a group of bandits attack the sons. The sons are left on the side of the road bloodied and robbed.

One son asks the other, "Why did we come out here? We never stood a chance of succeeding."

The other answers, "Beats me. We shouldn't have listened to dad's crazy ideas about treasure. These stories are just fairy tales. I bet the stranger that gave the map to him was one of these bandits."

As the second son speaks, the first son looks at the ground and sees a small piece of paper. Looking closer, he realizes it is the treasure map. He says, "Look! The map! The bandits must have overlooked it!"

The second son walks to the first and examines the map. Memories from the journey fill his mind and he remembers how successful it had been before the bandits. He remembers how the map never failed them, and realizes that there must be a real treasure. His brother realizes the same, and they once again set off on their journey. Sure enough, they reach the spot where the map designates the treasure, and they find more gold, treasure, and jewels than they ever could have imagined. They bring it back to their father and their family survives.

So now you ask, "what's the point?".

I don't know about you, but I've been in the situation those sons were in when they were attacked. On our journey of faith, we come to these moments where we experience failure, get persecuted, hear some really convincing counter-arguments to Christianity, or simply drift away. It doesn't matter how much God has done for us earlier (like the map had helped at the beginning of the story), this one moment brings our entire faith into question. Like the sons in the story, we begin to question, "Am I really sure about this whole God thing? Sometimes I wonder if I should just scrap the whole thing. After all, it's all just a bunch of fairy tales, right?" It's a scary time. The smallest things can create doubt, and that doubt starts threatening our entire belief system. What should we do in these times of doubt?

We do exactly what the sons did in the story. When the first son discovers their map in their time of doubt, he makes an important realization: they would not have had any hope at all if they had never seen this map. This map had been 100% accurate up until this point, so why would it not lead them to treasure?

So we do the same thing. We look to the Map that has been with us from the start: the Cross. No matter what we hear, what we experience, or what we feel, these things can never change that 2,000 years ago Jesus Christ hung on a tree. When you are doubting, step back and remember that no matter how much fog surrounds you, nothing can take away that the Son of God suffered, died and rose for you. You were once about to starve to death, but the Map brought you life!

On this Good Friday, remember that God became a man, did no wrong, and experienced pain, suffering, beatings, whips, humiliation, betrayal, desertion from his closest followers, and a slow and tortuous death. He did all these things because we deserve those things. He did them because we failed Him in our sin. He did them so you didn't have to. He did them because His love surpasses anything we can fathom.

"And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to death -- even death on a cross!"
Philippians 2:8

Ignition

(or Engines Part 2)

Quick Recap: Two posts ago we discovered that God created us in His image and with the capacity to be fulfilled. We did not figure out what fills up that capacity, so last post we discovered that we try to fill that gap with things of this world. This led us to find out that these efforts all turn out in vain, because God and only God can fill it. If we are cars designed by God, then He is the fuel that drives us.

I don't know your reaction, but after finding this out, some glaring thoughts came to my mind: If God is the gasoline that drives my engine, then why do I keep trying to run it on carrot juice?

In more detail, when we need refueling, we see two bottles on the shelf: a bottle of gasoline (God), and a bottle of carrot juice (wealth, success, a girlfriend, a boyfriend, approval from other people, the list could go on forever). We know we will only really run by fueling ourselves with God, but we still reach for the juice. We fill up, start the engine, drive a couple inches, and BAM! we sputter. Why the heck do we do that?

Essentially, we are defective. We know exactly what is best for us, yet we choose something else. We intentionally do something that harms us. We treat other people in ways we wouldn't treat ourselves. We sputter and drive around in circles looking for answers when the real answer sits on the shelf we left behind. We are broken. Busted. Cracked. How did we break? Did God make us this way? Did someone else break us? How would a creature created by the Perfect Being become imperfect?

Enter the garden of Eden. God makes man. God makes woman. Adam and Eve "were both naked, and they felt no shame" (Genesis 2:25). In other words, Adam and Eve were in perfect fellowship with each other, and more importantly with God. They walked with Him in the garden. Everything was perfect. There was only one rule: don't eat of the tree that brings knowledge of good and evil. The punishment for breaking this rule was that "when you eat of it, you will surely die." (2:25)

Quick side note: the fact that God gave Adam and Eve the choice to disobey Him demonstrates how much He loves and prizes us as His creation. We can get into this on another post.

Anyways, at this point Adam and Eve aren't defective. Death, suffering, anger, hate, lust, and all forms of sin don't exist. Adam and Eve recognize God as their Creator and their engines always run on Him. So what goes wrong? Unfortunately, Adam and Eve are tempted to eat of the tree. They are told eating of it will make them "like God, knowing good and evil" (3:5). So, they take a bite. Game over.

Before we move further, we need to realize how unfathomably evil this act was. If we move past the "Bibleishness" of this story of Adam and Eve and examine what eating this fruit actually means, we can figure out why we are defective today.

On one side we have God, who is infinitely holy, infinitely righteous, infinitely perfect in every way. He is in fact so perfect that any imperfection in His presence cannot survive. He is the Ultimate Satisfaction. Anything or anyone that says "No" to Him for something else must be punished.

On the other side we have Adam and Eve. They begin in perfect harmony with God. God loves them so much that He gives them the opportunity to say "No" to Him in the form of that tree. They eventually say "No" when they eat that fruit. This action essentially says, "No God. We are better than You. We don't need You." They betray God. Humanity becomes a race of traitors.

Now God, being like we've described Him, has no choice but to punish us. He curses the earth, introducing the idea of Death for the first time. All things bad here on earth come from this moment. Hurricane Katrinas, tsunamis, earthquakes, and all natural disasters come into play. Worse, man is changed forever. Every man or woman born ultimately descends from Adam and Eve, and they inherit the evil that they initiated. All hate, wars, death, cancer, anger, torture, pain, suffering, lust, jealousy, rage, and sin comes from this moment in the Garden. Man is now defective. They sputter, they crash, and they drive in circles searching for meaning because their engines can't run on God anymore. Man deserves to be wiped out forever.

Well now you say, "But God didn't wipe us out. I'm still here".

Good observation! Just as God is all those things we described earlier, He is also a merciful, loving, and compassionate God. He 1) loves us too much to wipe us out, and 2) being all knowing, He knew this would come. So being God, He engineers the ultimate solution.

It starts with a group of people in the Middle East. He chooses the Jews as His people. They live by a strict code of rules so they know how to not sin against God. He eventually forms the nation of Israel, and periodically chooses people to speak on His behalf. These prophets warn Israel when they go astray, but more importantly, they speak of a time in the future when everything will change. All the rules they have to keep will be thrown out, and God will establish a new agreement with mankind. He alludes to a man that will come and lead the nation of Israel as their new King. They call Him the Messiah.

Enter Jesus of Nazereth. A man unlike any other man. He heals the sick, gives blind men sight, helps the lame walk, raises the dead, and performs all kinds of miracles. This man makes outrageous claims to be sent from God and equal with God. He also claims He can forgive everbody's sins committed at every time. Some Jews believe Him, but many plot to kill Him because of these preposterous claims. Even though He has committed no sin, they eventually sentence Him to the one of the most excruciating deaths in human history. Death on a wooden cross, hanging only by nails in your hands and feet. His followers desert Him, and His killers think they have won. After He dies, He is placed in a tomb sealed by a stone.

Easter morning. He does something He said He would do all along. The tomb is empty. He raises Himself from the dead. All of His claims to be God and from God must now be true! Begin Christianity.

Now you're saying, "Thanks for the history lesson, but how does this relate to us being defective?". Ok, back to the Garden. God punished us for sin. Under this system, we die, then live defective forever separated from God. How does God fix this? For one, He can't just give us a clean slate. This would imply that He condones sin. He cannot do this. Being God, even one sin deserves an infinite punishment.

Back to Jesus. Jesus is God. Therefore, Jesus does not sin. Even knowing this, He still endures the death on the cross. We deserve death. Jesus does not. What if Jesus' death was a sacrifice to endure the punishment that we deserve? That means God sent Jesus to die in our place! He settled the score by sacrificing His perfect Son on our behalf! We can now re-enter life with God! Hallelujah!

So where does this leave us? We, being defective, now have to go to Christ to get an engine swap. We have to accept what He did for us so that our busted parts can be replaced by His perfect ones. When we do this, it's finally possible to fill that gap again. We can now look at the shelf and pick up the bottle of God to fuel our lives! We can drive with the joy that we were meant to have all along! Even though our sin still leads to our death here on earth, we now have a hope of an eternity spent with our Maker. Through Christ, the Ultimate Satisfaction can now satisfy us.

That, my friends, is how our defects are fixed. Fixed is actually a poor word choice. Replaced would be better. Our sputtering engines are completely replaced by Christ's Perfect Engine. Even though we may still screw up along the road, when God sees us mess up, He sees His perfect Son in our place. Redemption is a beautiful thing. Christianity is a beautiful thing.

"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