Friday, February 10, 2012

The Law

I don't love God or my neighbor nearly enough and I need Jesus. I was thinking about the law this week and reading some of the Old Testament verses about the law and realized that there was no way I could even keep the one, best law. This especially became evident as I came home last night and immediately got after my kids about stuff they had not done...stuff I had not asked them to do...stuff I thought they should just see and do. Crazy. I hate it when people do that to me but here I am doing it to them without so much as a hello and how was your day. We talked later about how overwhelmed I have felt lately and how sick I have been and how I have felt the events of the recent past have hit me once again and they were gracious to forgive me. But I thought about how impossible it all is, to love like Jesus does. And after we get through treating our with love our neighbors and family we are instructed in the New Testament to love our enemies. Now, I don't have the kind of enemies that are out to destroy me, but if I did Jesus would say to love them. You see, the law is a mirror. It reflects to us our problem, our condition, our need, and our death. The law is good because it shows us reality. And the reality is that I cannot keep even the 1 law, let alone the hundreds of laws that make up the Old Testament law. In Mark 10:26 the disciples, upon hearing how difficult it would be for a rich man to be saved ask a question, "Who then can be saved?" And it is in Jesus answer that I understand...it is impossible, only God can do it. The point of the law and the gospel and my bad moods is that keeping the law and being saved by keeping it is impossible, but grace, salvation by God alone is what God did for us sacrificing His Son on the cross. Everything is possible with God.

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