I need a day off...

Tim Keller is right when he says that work is an idol and I gave into that sin big time this week. Give me one tight deadline and everything else goes out the window, and I noticed this time that what suffered most of all was my relationship with my little girl. Her best friend last week was Mr. TV and though I felt like the baddest mum in the world I didn’t quit working, I just didn’t like it. 

It got me thinking about idols. The Israelites gave up on their gracious God, the one true God who is full of mercy and compassion to run off with the false gods of the nations around them. Why did they do it? I always assumed it was only because these gods promised them great things, similar to the promises work has for me: money, independence and creative expression. That would have been the start of things for sure but when you mess with idols you get burned. The Israelites found themselves trapped by idols that demanded the lives of their children and other horrible things. They didn’t like it but they had to stay there for fear of what the false god might do. To a lesser extent I found myself sacrificing the good of my child to worship my work for fear of losing my job and everything that comes with it (see above). I realized that idolatry is not always something we do because we enjoy it but we do it because we feel we HAVE to do it (or else).

So what is the solution for me? Surely it isn’t to tell me to stop working and be a good mum, I have already failed at that. Instead it is to tell me about the only God who rescues me from my idolatry, the God who came to earth to die for my idolatry on the cross. His name is Jesus Christ. When I look at the cross I see how selfish I am and how much Jesus suffered for me. The Holy Spirit reminds me of the cross to (slowly) change my heart from serving work to serving Jesus and my family. “For what great nation has a god as near to them as the Lord our God is near to us when we call on him?” (Deut 4:7).

a God I can love

About once a year the Hub and I break out the 2003 version of Luther: the movie. It’s a wonderful overview of one of the great pillars of the faith. But one quote in particular struck me this week as I was preparing some lessons for kid’s church.

“Martin, what is it you seek?”

 “A merciful God! A God whom I can love. A God who loves me.”

I have struggled for a long time to get a handle on Jesus. I am ashamed to admit that I have for a long time viewed His work for me on the Cross as only a cut and dried legal transaction rather than a work of great love by a huge God. It was only in the last few weeks when I have been forced to examine His life and works that I have been shocked at my feelings of superiority towards my Saviour.

I guess because I grew up in the church I have had a caricature of Jesus in my head. Various pastors have tried to teach me that Jesus was not just meek and mild, He was exciting but then they presented a picture of Jesus meek and mild. And let’s be frank, that’s not too thrilling is it. That’s not a person you can fear or respect. He always seemed more like a pushover to me. 

As a consequence I had not read the first four books of the New Testament in a very long time. And with the deadline for the kid’s church lessons looming I was forced to confront Jesus. What I discovered in the book of Luke shocked me. Finally I found in Jesus the God that Luther found “A God whom I can love” and actually admire.

Jesus has such great power that with one word he can heal a paralytic, still a storm, and cast out a demon. When He raises Jairus’ daughter, He tells her to get up, just as though He were her dad getting her out of bed in the morning. It all seems so effortless, like death is nothing to Him. And Jesus being God and all, of course it is effortless! Duh! Yet for Jesus to be able to forgive sins and conquer death it will cost Him His life. And He did this willingly for us, even arrogant old me.