“Let me get this straight, mom. You’d rather spend the evening cleaning out our old closet and dealing with our stuff than coming here and hanging out with us? Tell me you’re kidding.”

Cody, our son, just didn’t get it.  

This closet held memories of our five kids over 30 years—trophies and treasures, photos and poems, not to mention clothing and camp letters and broken wood from karate testings.  I’d saved everything, and I’d spent a solid year working up the courage to tackle it and all the feels that came with it.  And this was the day I’d finally waded in: I couldn’t stop midstream.  

“Yes, that’s it, and I know it’s insane.  Thank you so much for inviting me, but I just can’t leave now.  I’m a puddle on the floor anyway.  I wouldn’t be any good at your house like this.”

I didn’t finish the closet project that night. Though I made headway, it’s still not quite done, even today. What I missed was the chance to enjoy my grown children wanting me to be with them. What I’d give to go back and undo that mistake.

I realize now—I was the one who didn’t get it.

It’s hard to live in the present when the past feels unresolved. It’s human to want to redo it or, at the least, to tidy it up a bit. But some mistakes can’t be tidied. The only way to move forward is to live in your forgiveness.

Today’s passages tell how.

Leviticus 1-3

Meat and grain, oil and wine, incense. These were the sacrifices and offerings God told Moses to bring for sin.  He didn’t ask for exotic, hard to find things like ostrich feathers or boa constrictor skins or pricey things like gold and silver as their “I’m sorry; please forgive” offering.  He asked for common things from Israel’s food supply, Le 1:2, 9; 2:1-3; Nu 28:7.

God is specific about what to bring as a sign of repentance, but he doesn’t ask for fanfare or expense.  He wants the humble, common, everyday thing brought to him, the things you’d find in a meal.  And it’s by sharing this meal with God that they reconnect with him after confessing their lying, stealing, and cheating, et al.

Being connected with God didn’t cost an arm and a leg, either.  He even accepted the most inexpensive bird sacrifice—a pigeon.  He made repenting doable for everyone, Le 1:14-17. 

And while the rules were complicated, the reason behind it wasn’t something that needed a textbook to explain it. It was as ordinary as enjoying the fellowship of eating and drinking. Getting right-with-God was something the most common person could do with the most basic of food stuffs. I like how accessible God and his forgiveness is.

I also like the smells outside their worship tent—the meat roasting; the grain, like bread baking; the incense burning and the olive oil that heightens it. Evidently God can smell, because these aromas pleased him, too, Le 1:9, 13, 17; 2:2, 9; 3:5, 16.

Maybe the physical smells were tied to memories of God’s mercy in feeding them, reminding all involved—both sinner and God himself—that what he most wants is uninterrupted fellowship with his people, as in the easy fellowship of a meal together. But to have it, this matter of sin has to be dealt with, Lk 22:19-20; Ro 6:23.

Of course, they can never offer enough sacrifices and offerings to take away all their sins. They aren’t even aware of the majority of them. But the ones they’re aware of, God wants them to make atonement for. He doesn’t expect them to know what they don’t know–he accepts them where they are, Le 4:27-31.

Jesus came hundreds of years later and offered himself as the ultimate sacrifice, the only way to be forgiven. Even before his arrival, this ancient sacrificial system held reminders of his forgiving grace, a grace needed beyond butchered animals, ground grain, and fermented fruit, He 10:11-18.

Secret thoughts, bad attitudes, evil motivations. These sins aren’t as obvious as murder or stealing or cursing to confess, but they need forgiving, too. Just as the smoke and fragrant aromas filled their senses, their need of grace was just as pervasive. It would take God himself to provide the real-and-perfect sacrifice that truly covers them–and us, too, Ro 5:6-11.

Maybe you’re not a hardcore sinner–you haven’t actually murdered anyone. Maybe you’re actually pretty good, come to think of it. Maybe you’re like me–wanting to prove you don’t need God’s saving-plan-in-Jesus, at least, not as much as everybody else does. I spend a lot of time sifting through my sins, and this is one of my biggest, Mt 23:25-28.

While it’s not a bad idea to peek-in, I tend to fall-in. Sometimes I’m so swamped, I can’t enjoy forgiveness. I’m too busy trying to clean it all up, because deep down, I think I can be my own Jesus. At least some of me does.

But I can never find all of the sins–let alone get rid of them–and in the meantime, I miss the praise party God wants me to enter, the one that celebrates because Jesus has already done the work that needs doing, while I’m busy trying to earn it. “I’ll be right there,” I say to him, but like my closet clean-up, I can’t get myself tidied up well enough to celebrate, Lu 15.

You’ve gotta keep working when you’re proving you can be your own Jesus. It’s easier to clean up than to trust, really trust, that you’re already accepted because of Jesus and those sins are paid for, whether or not you ever find them all. [I’m breathing deep just writing that last sentence.]

I’m also secretly ticked that what Jesus died to give me I can never be good enough to deserve, and that what he’s done is so wide-and-deep, I’ll never even know how enormous it is—that’s how enormous it is, Ps 31:19; Ro 11:33-36.

All the saving work required for me and you, God does. Only he can enable us to leave our striving, receive his mercy, and enter the party we keep postponing, because we’re just too darn busy over here. God can handle do-gooders like us, and he tends to wait until we’re worn out. And then he overwhelms us with his love.

#1: Accept grace to live like you’re forgiven.

Mark 2

This chapter could be titled, “Sticking it to the Goody Goodies.” In every story, Jesus does something the Pharisees don’t approve of—he heals a lame man on a stretcher and says his sins are forgiven, too; he hangs out with the riff-riff who’ve become his followers; he and his disciples break Sabbath rules.

Jesus didn’t come to rubber stamp the religion of his day. He didn’t come to make people feel good about their goodness in our day either. He came to radically change the way we think about wholeness and goodness, to loosen up our picking-and-choosing of who’s in and who’s out based on rule following rather than simply loving.

The Pharisees’ main sin was their failure to love God and people, which is the greatest sin, since it’s breaking The Greatest Commandment.  “Be on guard against the yeast of the pharisees,” Jesus warned his men.  Their rule following to be right-with-God is insidious—and contagious.  It’s also the hardest sin to detect because it blinds us, masquerading as goodness but is actually just the opposite, Mt 16:5-12, ch 23; Mk 12:28-31.

Who are you in these stories? Who am I? I tend to be the diligent one, who does religious things but doesn’t celebrate very much. But whoever we are, we can let go of our striving, get up off our stretchers, enjoy our lives and other people…and all, because we’re forgiven through Jesus.

#2: Embrace freedom to live like you’re forgiven.

Psalm 36

Bad guys may seem powerful and prosperous, but they’re low on the totem pole compared to God.  He’s the one bigger than life and yet holds all the small stuff, “never a man, not a mouse, slips through the cracks,” Ps 36:1-6.

David asks God to keep “loving your friends,” to keep “doing your work in welcoming hearts,” and to keep putting David’s enemies “flat on their faces in the mud.” Because we’re naturally oblivious, it takes God’s light to see his love and work inside us. It also takes his light to see our enemies as human beings, Ps 36:10-12.

David prayed against his enemies, but Jesus said to love and pray for them. Paul shows us how to put the two together: by treating them well, we unload hot coals on their heads. That leaves their punishment up to God, which is where David left it, too, Ro 12:20.

It’s tempting to mistreat someone who’s mistreated you. But God balances the scales between you, if you leave it to him. I’ve experienced this leveling with a frenemy, and it was both a glorious and sobering experience. My takeaway is this: I won’t put a toe on the path to payback. God is not someone to mess with.

#3: Forgive your enemies to live like you’re forgiven.

Prayer 

God, Forgive me for thinking what you’ve done about sin isn’t enough—that I need to add my effort to what Jesus did. Keep reminding me of my need of him–forgiving enemies certainly does–and keep lifting my eyes to you.

In Jesus’ name.

Proverbs 9:13-18

Like Lady Wisdom, Little-Miss-Good-Time calls out, too. She’ll make you think she’s all fun-and-games, and no one needs to know about it, but the price-tag is fatal. She’s just not worth it.

Passages from Leviticus, Mark, Psalms, and Proverbs are selected for today in The Yearly Bible.