Tag Archives: repentance

Obliterating our sin on Good Friday

Leave a reply

Jesus died without sin. Even in the brutality of his passion he refused to sin. Even in the horrific provocation of those crucifying him, he refused to sin.

This is important because Jesus didn’t do this for himself, but for you and I. This means that you and I are going to die without sin if Jesus bestows his “dying without sin” on us. He overlays our lives with his life, so to speak, obliterating our sin. This is the gift that Jesus bestows on those who come to him – who repent.

This in turn is important because sin cannot enter Heaven. It must be purged first, or removed, or whatever word you want to use. If sin is allowed to enter Heaven intact (this is impossible but let us just imagine it is possible) Heaven and Hell are one. Sin cannot enter Heaven. Likewise the soul in sin cannot enter Heaven.

The only way sin can be removed is for it to be absorbed and overcome. Sin always involves hurt and absorbing hurt means pain. That’s what Jesus is doing today, absorbing human sinfulness, overcoming it, and still pouring out his love on humanity. All that Heaven requires in return is our love.

Thus, Heaven looks to earth today to find anybody who acknowledges this, appreciates this. Those who do not acknowledge it or appreciate it leave an impression of deep sadness in the heart of God (“what more can I do for them?” Jesus wonders) but our pausing today to remember Jesus mitigates so much of this suffering and consoles the heart of God.

Confirmation Session 5: Avoid offending God and when we have offended God, apologize

Leave a reply

There’s stuff that we do – being dishonest, unfaithful, selfish… stealing – that offends and hurts God.

Stuff that hurts God is called sin.

When we offend God it’s like offending any other person.

Imagine loving the person who has offended or hurt you…

We don’t usually do that. We’re much more likely to avoid that person, to back away.

Can you imagine God backing away in much the same way?

So let’s try to imagine that instead of backing away you walk toward the person and hug them, forgive them. Do you think that’s difficult to do?

This is how it is for God too but for God it’s on a much bigger scale.

Imagine hugging human offence on a global scale… imagine the cost!

5.1 Jesus taught us to love our enemies, to turn the other cheek, to lend without any hope of return, and lots more difficult stuff too.

He was really just saying: Be like God.

Check it out: Luke 6:27-38 but read it as a description of God.

If we lived like this, as Jesus taught us, as God-like, it’d take every bit of us, we might say it’d crucify us!

This is how God loves us and we see the cost of it in Jesus Christ crucified.

Imagine always seeking to love the person hurting you, offending you, always seeking to love your enemy and enemies, always turning the other cheek, always lending* without any hope of return, imagine the cost!

For God it’s crucifixion and lasts until the end of time or for as long as God loves us, as long as God is merciful.

When we offend God we’re causing this suffering.

When we apologize, tell God we’re sorry… we’re easing this suffering.

Simple as that.

So, when you offend God, apologize, and commit to live like him.

5.2 But also – and this is very important – if we’re dishonest, unfaithful, selfish, then God can’t give his gifts to us because God’s gifts are really little bits of Heaven and if God gives Heaven (or even a tiny piece of Heaven) to a dishonest or unfaithful or selfish person he’s actually creating hell, turning Heaven into hell.

It’s a bit like a business owner promoting a dishonest employee… disaster, the business will be lucky to survive.

So, the bottom line here is if you’re offending God you just can’t receive Heaven or God’s gifts 🎁

No, you must change your ways first.

Repent!

*God lends life without any hope of return, always, until the end of time.

Lent: Hey world leaders! Don’t you get it? The kingdom of God is for the future of the earth and its inhabitants.

2 Replies

Hey world leaders! Don’t you get it? The kingdom of God is for the earth. It’s God’s programme for the future of the earth and its inhabitants. Let me explain.

Is Jesus of Nazareth the Son of God? What do you think?

Is he the Saviour of the world?

We believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, God who is profoundly interested in our welfare, not just as individuals but as the human race – the body of humanity on the face of the earth at any given time. He’s interested in us collectively, as we evolve.

He came to give us a future. Most of us will think of that future as eternal life – somewhere to go in the end. So religion gets pushed out, worse still, so does God!

But God is equally interested in the human race as we live out our lives on earth. It’s the daily living out of our lives together that’ll decide the future, both temporal and eternal.

This is the significance of the kingdom of God. In Mark’s Gospel (today’s Gospel Mark 1:12-15) Jesus begins his public ministry with the proclamation of the kingdom of God.

The kingdom of God is the rule of God in human hearts, in human affairs. Only when God rules our hearts and our affairs – collectively – can we be sure of a future on earth that won’t end in ruin, in disaster. Thus Jesus call to repentance. The kingdom of God is about peace on earth, it’s about true prosperity. What other purpose could the Incarnation possibly have?

So, we must decide. Is the historical figure of Jesus of Nazareth the Christ, the son of the living God? Is he the Saviour of the world?

The kingdom of God is the rule of God in human affairs, the guarantee of our collective future. It's the politics of God!

The kingdom of God is the rule of God in human affairs, the guarantee of our collective future. It’s the politics of God!

If he is, then, logically, the removal of Christ from Irish public life can only mean that the perceived progress associated with his removal is nothing more than the illusion of progress. It’s progress that’ll end in disaster. The kind of progress that came disguised as the Celtic Tiger. All in the name of a republic! There’s no darkness worse than the darkness that comes disguised as light! “if then, the light inside you is darkness, what darkness that will be!” (Matthew 6:23)

Unless, of course, this Saviour intervenes again.

Now that’s an interesting thought. That’d be quite a task! Look what the world wants to do with his original intervention!

It’s Lent; time to decide: Who are we really following?