February 14

Day 247: Above All Nations

In Deuteronomy 24, Moses begins to wind up his very long sermon. He's intended on reminding the people that they are God's people. They will be God's people living in a land God is giving them. They are to live like God's people.

In so doing, God promises them that if they keep His commandments, He will "set them in praise and fame and in honor far above all nations." Sounds heady enough. Also sounds conditional.

He tells them they will be, because they already are His "treasured possession." Not conditional. But there are these many, exacting commandments; instructions given, so they will be distinctly distinct. Noticeably different.

In giving these commands, God was setting up, for the first time in word history, a just society. A society where every citizen would be aware of the other citizens. Where no one would be permitted to live in self-serving autonomy. Where one's impact on others would have to be consistently considered.

But reading in Judges. Or anywhere in the Old Testament. Or at any time in world history, we know it didn't work. It never has worked. It doesn't work today. No society is fully just.

Where there is law, there is failure to keep the law. Because where there are people, there is sin. And in these current days, it seems as if right is now considered wrong, and wrong is now considered to be right.

It may be that some of us old enough to remember might say, "I don't even recognize our society any more." I'll bet God could be tempted to say that every day. All day.

Grace is a word we Christians use. A lot. We celebrate God's grace, every Sunday morning, at least. Grace does not eliminate law; but it does cover the affects of not meeting the standards of the law.

So often we are spiritual schizophrenics. We look at others through the lens of the law, while we want (even demand) others look at us through the lens of grace. I can quickly condemn you. And appeal to your grace toward me, all in the same breath.

I tend to respond to others as a prosecutor, instead of as an instrument of God's mercy. Often I attempt to usurp God's rightful authority, and take for myself the dual roles of judge and jury.

But if for just one day God suspended His mercy, and all I had was the standard of His law, I would not be able to sustain myself under His judgment.

So here is my Sunday morning reality check. No one gives mercy, no one extends grace to others better than the one who realizes he or she has received much more grace and mercy.

No one who's received God's grace can look at the standards of His law, and think himself anything other than a habitual violator of that same law. But, a violator who's been forgiven. The volumes of records of violations covered over, never to be brought up again.

Keeping God's law is impossible. Rewriting God's laws to suit us is not an option. The law was given to be a teacher. Teaching us we couldn't and wouldn't keep the law.

And leading us to beg for mercy, to appeal to God's grace. And it is those who have begged and appealed who are learning to be that just society God intended, and will eventually bring into being.

The Church, living short of the standards of the law. Sometimes more dysfunctional than functional, is still God's preview of what it will be to be "Set in praise and fame and in honor far above all nations."