Musings of a "not so good" Christian

 i have heard over and over that as a christian we need to have a balance in how we see and live out our faith.  this is particularly true when it comes to talking about the grace of God.

if balance is the message of christianity, then there is nothing unique about the gospel, all religions say that there is a give and take exchange between diety and  human, if the human does this, then the deity does that.  if the human obeys, then the deity blesses, if the human obeys, then the deity answers his or her prayer.  if the human is martyred then the deity rewards them in the hereafter. if the human tithes then the deity gives them more money and prospers them. the list could go on forever. sadly, i think this is the general thinking of most christians today. but what if this was not christianity at all, but a works based religion. but what does Jesus say…

“love your enemies and do good to them and pray for them…”
“if someone slaps your face, let them slap both sides…”
“if someone takes your stuff, make sure you give them more of it…”
“give up everything and follow me…”
“love everybody as much as you love yourself…” (that means love them a lot more than we do now)

That does not sound very balanced to me! could it be that Jesus is not advocating for the american christian mindset after all?

Now lets look at what our balanced God did for us.

“While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”

Vile, sinful, god hating humans, happily wallowing around in a  slimy pit. enjoying our “lives”, doing our own thing, content. never thinking of the Creator, living as if our lives were the pinnacle of human existence.

“for God so loved the world that He gave His only Son…”

in the midst of our sin God sends His Holy Spirit to us, to convict us, to open our eyes, eyes that had been blinded by the evil one. He causes us to see…..and we see….and we weep…for now we see there is no hope BUT

“whosoever believes in Him has entered into eternal life”

we fall at the cross, we cling to Jesus, and our sin is gone…forever.

not only that, but we are now justified, completely righteous, holy and perfect in the sight of God. and every day He lavishes us with His love and grace, EVERY DAY, AND EVERY MOMENT OF EVERY DAY. He is never angry with us again, and in fact He is quite fond of us, His children, whom He had called before a star was placed in the sky.

God’s salvation is not balanced, it is all from Him, Jesus’ teachings were not balanced, they were radical, they were disturbing, they were truth. the gospel is  unique, the gospel, the good news, is that God’s love for us in unbalanced because we did not earn it.

i will not stop speaking of His love and grace, for it is foundational to everything else….maybe that is not balanced, maybe it was not meant to be.