I have the great privilege to be in a Life Group with a group of amazing guys. We have been meeting for about a year now and we have gotten really close. It is one of those groups were we don’t only just meet on Monday nights, but it was turned into a network of friends who hang out outside of Mondays and genuinely care about each others well being and a place where we can keep each other accountable. I love these guys so much and it is amazing that we get to hang out and grow in life and grow spiritually as well.
We are going through the Johns for our small group: 1, 2, 3 John and then going through the Gospel of John. Last night we went though 1 John 1&2 and these two verses stuck out to me like how Shaq would stick out in Midget Town:
1 John 2:5-6 (New International Version, ©2010)
5 But if anyone obeys his word, love for God is truly made complete in them. This is how we know we are in him: 6 Whoever claims to live in him must live as Jesus did.
This is how we KNOW we are in him… we must live as Jesus did. OUCH! This punched me in the face like how Mike Tyson did to Allen in the Hangover for stealing his tiger. Who ever claims to live in Him (which I do) must live as Jesus did (which I do not). I try…I try really hard but I fail miserably.
The bar is set really high. And I didn’t know how I could reach that. But as we were talking we started to think about how we almost need to be thankful for our shortcomings because its only then how much we need to look to Jesus. We fall short, and we look to Jesus to take the rest, because that is what he did on the cross.
If you remember Jesus in the garden, he was sweating blood before he was arrested. People say that he was just so anxious for getting arrested and dying on the cross. I think there is more than that. I think Jesus knew from the very beginning what he was going to do and he was not really worried about that. I think it was more along the lines that Jesus was about to take the whole world’s sins on His shoulders. The prayer of “Father, take this cup from me” is more on the lines like, “Father, I am about to have the entire world’s sins from the past and the future poured onto me right now, take it from me.” That’s why he was sweating blood. That is a lot to take.
To think that we, who deserve the punishment, fall short because we sin, and Jesus taking my punishment for me. It is like if we were to be standing in front of a huge 200 foot tall dam and the dam breached and millions of gallons of water came rushing at you. Scary. Then as soon as the water was about to hit you, a huge opening in the earth started at your feet and all of the water poured down the crack instead of hitting you like a truck… that is what Jesus did for us with our sin. THAT’S NUTS.
How am I supposed to live as he did? How am I supposed to walk in the light if that’s the light I am supposed to walk in? GRACE. That’s how. We have a God who does not sit on top of a mountain and waits for us to come to Him and find the right path to Him. He is a God that comes down to meet us where we are at and he did through Jesus, His Son, who died for me and who died for us so that we are able to live as He did. Even though we will not be able to fully live as Jesus did, His grace for us will allow us to be viewed in favor when we meet the Father in Heaven.
And that is amazing grace.
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