There is nothing more beautiful than seeing a simple life lived for Jesus.
Years of praying the same prayers over and over again. Reading a Bible verse with kids running everywhere. Prayers at the dinner table. Helping out a friend. Giving in secret. Loving wholeheartedly. Getting up early to pray. Going to bed late reading one more Bible verse.
It isn’t our knowledge that will carry us. Our religious track record won’t sustain us. We need faith that is deeper than intellectual understanding but results in a practical outworking of the Gospel. We must learn how to live as sons and daughters in our everyday lives.
“Who stands fast? Only the man whose final standard is not his reason, his principles, his conscience, his freedom, or his virtue, but who is ready to sacrifice all this when he is called to obedient and responsible action in faith and in exclusive allegiance to God—the responsible man, who tries to make his whole life an answer to the question and call of God.” — DIETRICH BONHOEFFER
What is our final reason? If everything is stripped away what remains? Is it Christ? What does it mean to make our whole lives an answer to the question and call of God?
THE RACE OF FAITH
In the days leading up to Jesus’ return, the Church will go through the greatest refining ever known. Our strength will be shattered1 and the Antichrist will be allowed to conquer the saints.2 However, we will be refined, purified, and made white3 as the global body of Christ. Through the intensity of this time, God is looking for one thing: faith.
Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?4
It is the kind of faith that is independent of all merit, doctrine, tradition, or good work. It is faith in Jesus alone.5
The only thing the persistent widow did in Luke 18 was keep showing up. She kept asking. She kept seeking. She kept knocking. She came on Monday. She came on Tuesday. She continually kept coming.
This life is not about winning the race, it is about running it. We don’t have to win because we weren’t qualified to run it to begin with. It is Christ that set us on this course and it is Christ that we will finish. However, it is on us to keep coming.
We don’t run to get to Jesus. It is by running that we discover He has been there all along. He is the never-ending track we have been on from the beginning. The Word that made light. The groan of all creation. The “Maranatha” cry at the end of the age.
The race is to know Him through all the bumps, turns, detours, valleys, and mountain tops life takes us. The race is to be faithful until the end. It is our short life in human flesh until we stand before the Son of Man.
They say when you are learning how to run, you run at a pace you can hold a conversation at. If you can’t hold a conversation, you are going too fast.
That is how to endure. Keep the conversation.
STONES
Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.6
We can only give mercy by receiving mercy.
In John 8, the chapter begins and ends with stones. In the beginning, we see stones of mercy. The religious elite brought an adulterous woman into the temple to see how Jesus would respond. The Law of Moses required the consequence of stoning for adultery, but instead, Jesus brings up a different proposition: Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.7 One by one the stones of condemnation bow under the rich mercy of Christ… go, and from now on sin no more.8
The chapter ends with stones being picked up to be thrown at Jesus. They are the stones of condemnation—the byproduct of the law. We are enslaved to sin until we are set free by the Son. It is under the blood of Jesus that we are released from our sentence of condemnation, and walk free as sons and daughters. The mercy of God frees us from our bondage. It takes the stones of condemnation we deserve, and transforms them into stones of mercy we can extend to others.
Mercy leads us to our weakness. It makes us see ourselves as we truly are and see God as He truly is.
A NEW WAY
But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code.9
After we are released from the law of condemnation, we are free to walk in the new way of the Spirit. There is a new way we learn to live. Our lives become a testimony of His great mercy and not our great works. The Spirit of God enables us to aim for 100% obedience to God, not out of fear of failure, but out of joy in communion with Christ. Our whole lives can now become an answer to the call of God.
There is nothing more liberating than building your life on a foundation that is entirely independent of your ability to uphold it. It is the steadfast love of God that draws us close, and keeps us close. Obedience flows from a heart that is free from condemnation. Our God is rich in mercy.10
Let not mercy and truth forsake thee: bind them about thy neck; write them upon the table of thine heart.11
The call of mercy is a call to the Merciful one. He instructs those who believe to abide in His words and continually write them inside us. We become a dwelling place for God when we build a place for His word to rest in our hearts.
Abide means to dwell or remain. The only way we abide is by staying connected to the vine, who is Jesus. He is the source of all life that Scripture bears witness to.12 There is no life in Scripture apart from Him. He is the One who carries us, sustains us, and unites all things in heaven and earth together. Through Jesus, we can stand fast. At His call, we drop our intellect, excellence, and virtue. We have to rely on Him alone.
It begins by looking into the eyes of Mercy.