“Come now, let us reason together, “ says the LORD. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.” Isaiah 1:18
I was recently reading Brennan Manning, in his book, The Importance of Being Foolish—How to think like Jesus. So far I have found many thought provoking ideas. Here is one of them:
“The only sane reaction to the evangelical standard of holiness is awe and confusion bordering on complaint. We should be embarrassed by the Word because it says much that we don’t want to hear. But why are most of us not embarrassed? Why doesn’t the Word exalt, frighten, and shock us? It’s not because we are unfamiliar with it—we hear it week in and week out. Why doesn’t it force us to reassess our lives? It comes back to our delusions. Michel Quoist says: ‘We are satisfied by our decent little life. We are pleased with our good habits; we take them for virtues. We are pleased with our little efforts; we take them for progress. We are proud of activities; they make us think we are giving ourselves. We are impressed by our influence; we imagine that it will transform lives. We are proud of what we give, though it hides what we withhold. We may even be mistaking a set of coinciding egoisms for real friendship.’ As the sincere Christian opens himself to the life proposed by Jesus—a life of constant prayer and total unselfishness, a life of buoyant, creative goodness and a purity of heart that goes beyond chastity to affect every facet of our personality—his sense of awe and wonder can quickly sour into cynicism and pessimism. The suspicion grows that the gospel ethic is impractical, impossible, and therefore irrelevant. The words are nice, but who pays them any mind? After all, I can’t be asked to do all that! I can’t survive in then jungle out there if I take Jesus’ revelation seriously. I can’t be always giving. There must be a limit. But Christ has set no limits.” (20-21)
Oh, grace is amazing. I’m so glad that Jesus saves! May love for God be fueled by the Holy Spirit’s truthful gaze and the revelation of my constant need for Jesus! Re-orient my life today to You Lord Jesus that I may be holy—holy in my thoughts and my relating to every soul I meet. May our celebration of Christ’s birth in Bethlehem give rise to His birth in the nitty-gritty of our daily grind.
