Sins as White as Snow!

Well it snowed "again" and now I'm in the role of a kind of School Superintendent who has to decide if there will be school (church) "tomorrow" or will the "kiddies" have another play day. Alas the scripture came to me, "Come let us reason together; though your sins are like scarlet they shall be white as snow." Trust me, just because I am a minister does not mean that I sit around all day with scriptures simply "coming to me." I'm actually kind of a worldly guy who neither thinks in technicolor nor in scripture sound bites...but...with all the snow this blast from the past came cascading my way.

So, hey, here is another reason to come to church on a "snow day." You can get your sins "snowed away" for heaven's sake...so to speak. I did not make this stuff up. It seems that old Isaiah says that God feels this way.(Isaiah 1: 18) Maybe it was some snowy afternoon when God "said" those words; "come let us reason together...though you've messed up really bad...have a seat and let's talk. I could see red and be all mad at you since your list of transgressions are like scarlet, but I'm going to give you a pass and...well...take a look at some of my snow...I'll make them like that. You're forgiven."

It's like a "get out of jail" card or something. Some folks have trouble with what is called in Christian code words, "the doctrine of the Atonement." I may be one of those people. As a child I did not like the constant reminder to me that "Jesus had to die for my sins." If God is a father, what kind of dad needs his child to die so that I can live? I thought even back then that God needed a good dose of some expanded imagination to come up with a better plan.

No one ever told me that all this "blood of Jesus" stuff comes from a very Jewish understanding of "fixing things" when someone messes up. It seems that in Jesus' day if you wanted to say, "I'm sorry" something had to die and some blood had to be spilled...you know to show that you were really serious and really sorry.

The Bible is written so that it seems Jesus had no choice but to "go along with the plan." Well, most of them were Jewish after all so it made sense. Quite frankly it does not make sense to me and never has, but then God did not ask me. I do think, however, that Jesus did have a choice. He actually begged to live that night in the garden when his best buddies were sleeping off too much wine and too many words. I think of all the people who have ever lived that Jesus loved life more than any of us. I also believe he could have lived on and shown us how to love life as he loved it. I think that is what he was asking for that night in the garden...and when he said, "But not my will but your will be done"...it was really not that he had to die but that if God did not stop it...intervene...then Jesus was going to die. Jesus did "offer" his life in the sense that he would not back down from the way of love and sacrifice.

Love to be love has to have a choice. The choice was there. They/we could have accepted this new way of life that Jesus offered. But he poked the religious types in the eye and he offered a way of risk and sacrifice that turned over all sorts of tables. He spoke about the need to "let go...(or die if you want to really get serious)...to an old way of seeing and being in order to be born into a whole different world/kingdom.

I believe everything could have changed and God did have the kind of imagination to not make someone die in order to atone for our addiction to selfish, ego-centered living. But Jesus did die and ever since that cloudy Friday afternoon religious folks have been coming up with various "theories of the atonement" to explain why he "had" to die and what that death "did" to "get us right with God." One can debate which of these theories makes most since or if any of them do, but this is what I am sure of: The world and its ways nailed Jesus' kind of love down so that it would not disrupt business as usual. God did not stop it but God sure said, "I'm going to do something with this death that changes everything." I think God was very "affected" by all this and the death of Jesus became an investment into the very fabric of existence.(If you think I'm really off base here you can find something called Process Theology that says something like what I am suggesting.) Jesus did "die for us" and "with us." He was hung out to dry for us so that our suffering is now "redeemed." See I did get around to using a religious "code" word.

God "used" Jesus' death in a big way. I know some of this may not be "politically" correct or even sound a bit heretical to some people, but I believe that God was pulling for his boy the week that we now call Holy Week. What father would not want things to go different for his child. O I know, God "knew" it would come out the way it did because God knows us. But I believe that the love of God was agonizing with Jesus that week. Even God hopes and loves, you know. My heart tells my mind that God wanted Jesus to "live" for our sins but God knew that his very special child would lay his life on the line...and he did.

After God spent three days grieving and crying, God simply raised Jesus from the dead. (I know this is "commentary" and not scriptural but I warned you that I do not always think in scriptural ways.) So now God can really say to us, "Come here my child and sit down and let's talk. You keep messing up but I want you to be whole again. I long to forgive you...My own son came to live with you and for you...and even die with and 'for' you so let's reason together...and besides look it's snowing outside...."
Bless you,
jody