Lent

Who is this Jesus we serve?

I know the answers most are likely to come up with for this...Savior, Sacrifice, Son of God, Son of Man--the list goes on and on.

But, really, do our hearts really know Him? I think we have our moments of recognition, but it is so hard to know Him all the time...we are so small and limited.

I think if we understood who He is, all our fears would melt away, our worries vanish, into the great, all-encompassing perfect Love that He is.

During Lent, if you celebrate it, you are made to think of sacrifice, to be sober in imitation of Christ, to bring your heart back to Him. Even if you do not, you are probably aware of at least a concept like this. It is interesting to think about the Sacrifice of Jesus. We focus on it, in some fashion, a lot. Usually it has something to do with atonement for our sin: something, of course, very real and very central to His death. But I think we miss the fullness of it, most of the time. It is to be expected, I suppose, because of our imperfect understanding, our tendency to only see certain things in our nearsightedness. And yet, if sometimes, if only sometimes, we can truly grasp at least a little more than we normally do in our Savior's sacrifice, it will do our souls good...it will feed us, heal us, rest us, each as we need it.
Again, this season of Lent, before Easter and the celebration of the Ressurection, is a time of sober reflection on sacrifice, but also of joyful devotion and union with Christ in His sufferings. I realize this last phrase may strike a little chord of anxiety in some (as it has for me before), but just bear with me for a second. I truly believe that this season, rather than being meant to depress us with somber thoughts of death, suffering, and sin, is meant to free us from sin in a special way, to soothe our sufferings with very precious and sustaining reminders, and to give us a healthy perspective again of life on this earth. How it should do this I suppose I will try to explain, as well as I can...even if I don't claim in any way to be a spiritual leader in the subject. I simply want to share what has been dawning on me very slowly, and will probably continue to dawn on me until I die.
First of all, especially for those of us who have been raised evangelical, I think we have a strange aversion to Christ's death. Why would I say something like this? Well, tell me what your first thought is when you picture a crucifix. If my guess is right, you're probably a bit taken aback by it, maybe offended in some way, and perhaps the thought that occurs to you is "No, but we serve a risen Savior!"
Now, think again. Of course we serve a risen Savior...but do we not also serve a Savior whose torturous death is the cause of our new life? Yes, His death means nothing if there is no Resurrection, but what does His Resurrection mean without His death? We are atoned by His blood...when we take communion it reminds us not of his ressurection but of His death. And how can we appreciate the Ressurection if we will not dwell on His death and suffering? He endured something terrible, real, and long...for us and for our salvation. At the very least, does it not seem fitting to pay deep respects to that same suffering, and, yes, death? Our Christ was dead, for two days--His resurrection came on the third day.
This time of Lent is a time to remember that death, in a special way.
Now, think again of that crucifix. Is there not something powerful in gazing upon the lifeless form of a beautiful Savior...something that makes real for you His sacrifice in a way no memorized words can do? Of course a form, a painting, a reenactment are all just representations--but representations of what? They are representations of the most beautiful act of love in the world, and sometimes I think it is fitting to quiet down all our Sunday-school verses and learned salvation-talk and just look. Understand without words, in your very soul, the truth of that beautiful Body hanging lifeless, because of perfect love.
But it goes so much beyond this. If you remember, I mentioned how, when we mention the Crucifixion, we usually mention it in reference to atonement. Again I say that this is a powerful truth, but the whole truth is so much more dumbfounding than that, and so unimaginably beautiful. Do you remember what happened to us when our nature fell? Through the sin of one man and one woman, death came over us--and sin, gripping us in a vice hold, and sickness and brokenness and confusion. Our very nature was mortally wounded in that moment. Somewhere we still kept some vestige of the image of God, but it became so intermingled with our brokenness that it was without hope of being set free. When we sin, we realize that it comes from this fall...but also when we fear, or hurt, or are deeply confused, or are sick...all these are afflictions from that first sin. And so Jesus, in dying, not only suffered the pain of the flog and the thorns and nails, but also every instant of every sin, or crisis, or confusion, or fear, or anxiety or pain that ever had been or ever would be suffered. He came, yes, for our forgiveness, but not just that. He came to heal us, to take on every thing that had come to us as a result of our accursed fallen nature. So in the Cross we not only find atonement for sin, but everything we ever need to become whole again. We find healing for our pain, and for every other thing that afflicts us.
Remember how we are in a season of Lent right now? I said earlier that part of the purpose for that season is to unite us to Christ's sufferings. Now for me, who am a naturally anxious person, that phrase has often sent little spears of fear through me. Does this means Jesus wants me to suffer because He did? I think perhaps to say that is to take the wrong angle entirely. Have you ever thought, in a moment of deep pain or great struggle, of the fact that Jesus experienced that exact moment of suffering? And I mean that completely literally. In His death, that beautiful act that was our salvation, he became the High Priest who not only loved us but could sympathize with our weakness--not it general, but in every instance of temptation, sin, or struggle, for every man ever born or to be born.
He has been through the most unimaginable pain you can suffer...and far worse. And as He suffered that, the earth shook with the magnitude of what was being done. The curtain in the Temple tore as the chasm between God and His children was closed.
And I think that is at least one meaning of taking fellowship in the sufferings of Christ--you are joined to Him by an unfathomable bond. No wonder Paul counted it joy to be worthy of the sufferings of Christ! Are we worthy to suffer a part of what our Savior suffered that dark day?
This is a beautiful comfort to me, and I really wanted to share it with whoever wants to read it.
I think I will end this post for now, but I would like to come back soon and post more during the season of Lent...there is so much richness we can take away from it.

Until then, blessings in His glorious love.