In the forty years since our revival, the Jesus Movement, I’ve heard a lot of theories about so-called “separation.”

No one would argue that Christians should live separate from sin, but the solution is not to live separate from sinners.

Jesus sure didn’t do that. He gained a reputation as a friend of sinners. He purposefully touched the unclean, hung out with the outcasts, and even entered a pagan Gentile’s home.

“Scandalous,” His critics cried. They even spread rumors that He was a glutton and a drunkard.

Did Jesus care?

Not a bit. Every time He made contact with the ones the religious culture tried to quarantine good Jews from interacting with, they were transformed.

That’s the way it was in the Jesus Movement. We didn’t separate, we penetrated. We didn’t run from sinners, we watched God run them down with His mercy and grace.

As Walter Wink put it so eloquently, “The contagion of holiness overcomes the contagion of uncleanness.”

Question: How has a false view of separation quarantined you from the very ones Jesus wants you to love in His name?

In the forty years since our revival, the Jesus Movement, I’ve heard a lot of theories about so-called “separation.”

No one would argue that Christians should live separate from sin, but the solution is not to live separate from sinners.

Jesus sure didn’t do that. He gained a reputation as a friend of sinners. He purposefully touched the unclean, hung out with the outcasts, and even entered a pagan Gentile’s home.

“Scandalous,” His critics cried. They even spread rumors that He was a glutton and a drunkard.

Did Jesus care?

Not a bit. Every time He made contact with the ones the religious culture tried to quarantine good Jews from interacting with, they were transformed.

That’s the way it was in the Jesus Movement. We didn’t separate, we penetrated. We didn’t run from sinners, we watched God run them down with His mercy and grace.

As Walter Wink put it so eloquently, “The contagion of holiness overcomes the contagion of uncleanness.”

Question: How has a false view of separation quarantined you from the very ones Jesus wants you to love in His name?

We Can’t Know What We Don’t Know!

Many years ago Judy and I were facing our most traumatic and hurtful trial of faith. Our world as we knew it was falling apart, and there was nothing we could do to put the pieces of our lives back together again.

Kevin Butcher and his wife Carla helped us through with words of encouragement, counsel, and their usual warm friendship. As two of our closest friends who understand the challenges and heartaches of local church ministry, their support comforted us greatly.

Four years later, Kevin and Carla faced the exact same crisis, the exact same heartache in their own church. I’ll never forget Kevin’s words to me in the middle of his own battle, “Ed, I never knew. I just didn’t understand. I wish I could have helped you more, but now that I’m going through it myself, I get it. There’s so much more I should have said, so much more I could have done.”

I assured my friend that he had not failed us in any way and reminded him of a truth we often have to rehearse: “I can’t know what I don’t know.” There was no way Kevin could have drawn wisdom from an experience he had never known personally.

Jesus Knows!

When I hung up the phone, I thought of Hebrews 4:14-16 and immediately thanked the Lord Jesus for this precious promise. Because of His willingness to come to earth and to experience life as a man, He now sits in heaven with personal knowledge of what it feels like to be me. Every heartache, every trial and even every temptation.

Kevin’s friendship means so much to me. But there are times when even he has to say, “I just didn’t understand all that you were going through. I couldn’t know how you felt, how terrible it was, how much it hurt or how alone you must have been.”

But there is another Friend. A friend of sinners, who sits at the right hand of the Father. His name is Jesus, and I will never hear Him say, “I just didn’t understand.”

“Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need (Hebrews 4:14-16).

Formula Christianity?

A few years ago a friend I respect a lot asked me to elaborate on a sentence from a Sunday sermon: Jesus will teach you to appreciate His presence in your life more than you worry about the circumstances of your life.

I appreciate her honesty when she said this is a difficult sentence for her. It should be for anyone who really understands the implications. Most of us come to Christ knowing very little about Him except that He promises to get us to heaven when we die, and to be involved in our lives somehow.

There’s nothing wrong with that expectation because He never lies, and His promises are irrevocable (Romans 8:29). He will get everyone who trusts in Him to heaven when we die and He will be involved in every believer’s life.

The question is, “How will He be involved?” An extremely popular answer to that question is, “Oh, He’s going to make everything just right for you. There are formulas to believe and prayers to pray correctly, and then He will make you totally happy, and you’ll have no problems in life…IF YOU GET IT RIGHT!!!!!”

(more…)

I’m deep into the Greek text of Galatians. The difference between Jesus’ message to the world, what Paul calls the gospel of Christ, and what religion tells the world about God are not the same. Not even close!

I’ve been preaching grace for forty years. Believe me, if I wasn’t convinced that the gospel of grace were true, I would have stopped preaching a long time ago. More people have marched up to me after a sermon or responded to one of my books or blogs by charging me with teaching “cheap grace” than I care to count. But I can’t stop, because it’s what Jesus said.

Here are three striking contrasts between Jesus’ message of grace and religion’s message of works:

1. Religion says, “God is good, you’re bad; get better.” Jesus says, “I’m good, you’re bad; I love you!”
2. Religion says, “Get a new start in life.” Jesus says, “I’ll give you a new life to start with.”
3. Religion says, “God is waiting for you to do some good things for a change.” Jesus says, “God is waiting for you to believe He can change you.”

Question: What have religionists and moralists said to you that Jesus would never say?

It doesn’t add up.

The God of the Universe sent His only Son to die for me so that He could give me His life, care for me, teach me, and encourage me to follow Him.

It just doesn’t add up.

I’m a failing failure.

I was a totally hopeless failure when it came to holiness before I met Jesus.

And even with all the growth and healing Jesus has brought into my life, I continue to fail Him.

Just last week I told Him I felt like my life was a hopeless, sinful, joke. I told Him it was a mistake to ever give me eternal life. I told Him I didn’t think I could go on and that He should find some other follower to represent Him.

I mean, really, how does He tolerate someone who’s been a Christian so long and still has these nights of deep depression, these bouts with anger and doubt, these envious-of-other-Christians’-better-deal-in-life pity parties, and this less-than-I-really-want-to-be-for-you life?

Guess I’ll just have to give up and receive His love, and risk it that He’s telling the truth when He says that I’m His special concern.

Despite all my sinfulness and the messiness of my stumbling steps of following Him, I don’t have anyone else to go to.

He has the words of eternal life.

I’m just going to go ahead and keep risking everything on Jesus.

Since our son-in-law David went down with a terrible and debilitating disease a month ago, a lot of Judy and mine’s life has been dedicated to “Zach duty.”

Zachary is our grandson—David and Celia’s fat-cheeked bundle of smiles whose energy stretches my almost 60-year-old body to its limits. He’s a robust, squirmy adventurer who chafes at every limitation.

But the one attribute that’s on my mind during this season we Christians commemorate the birth of Jesus is Zach’s dependence.

Without someone to love him and care for him, he’s totally helpless. He can’t feed himself, clean himself or protect himself. He doesn’t even know how to go to sleep on his own.

Watching Zach during this season helps me appreciate the humility of our Lord Jesus.

It was love for me—love for you—that moved the Creator of heaven and earth to be born on this little marble of a planet. It was mercy that moved Him to show up in a baby’s soft skin, totally helpless, totally dependent.

“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory o the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14).