Thought for Today
Genesis 6:18 But I will establish my covenant with you; and you shall come into the ark, you, your sons, your wife, and your sons' wives with you.
Genesis 9:16 When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth."
Matthew 26:28 for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.
1 Corinthians 1:9 God is faithful; by him you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
“covenant (Heb. berith, Gr. diatheke) A formal agreement or treaty between two parties that establishes a relationship and in which obligations and mutual responsibilities may be enacted. Many biblical covenants are found, some providing only divine promises while others entail obligations.” (Westminster Dictionary of Theological Terms, pg. 64)
All allegations to the contrary, I do not ask my congregation to sing Amazing Grace each and every Sunday. It’s not even the most often sung hymn during our services (although, in honesty, I did not check my computer file on purpose . . . just in case).
Amazing Grace is, however, one of my favorite hymns. Even when it is not played on the bagpipes, it is a beautiful hymn celebrating God’s grace and covenant faithfulness. Interestingly, one of the ministers most influential on my own ministry did not like that hymn and almost never used it in worship. He felt that the words “that saved a wretch like me” alone disqualified the singing of that hymn in worship. His contention was that Christendom has for centuries focused on our unworthiness and wretchedness and that we do not need to remind anyone of any of that.
I cannot disagree with the truth that we do tend to focus on our negative aspects of our humanity. There is a certain amount of human proclivity to point out the misbehaviors and misdeeds of others. Jesus asked, “Luke 6:41 Why do you see the speck in your neighbor's eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye? 42 Or how can you say to your neighbor, 'Friend, let me take out the speck in your eye,' when you yourself do not see the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor's eye.”
However, every time I hear the bagpipes skirling, I think how that beautiful hymn speaks to God’s covenant faithfulness and to the eternal truth that only God is God. Despite all the implications we hear in all of the political discourse and advertisements, the truth is that only God is God. I am not God, neither is anyone else. Our language, all languages, lack the proper words to describe the unbridgeable abyss separating us as creatures from our Creator God. All the omni-words, all of the other adjectives we use to help us begin to understand God fall short of the reality and the totality of God.
The Bible uses words such as fear and awe to describe our reactions as we ponder on God. Calvinists talk about the total depravity of man. John Newton, in Amazing Grace, describes his being a wretch. All poor ways to articulate that immense unbridgeable abyss separating us as creatures from our Creator God.
John Newton did however, recognize God’s grace with “I once was lost, but now am found, was blind but now I see.” Amazing Grace sings to the truth the apostle Paul wrote of to the church in Ephesus, “2:8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God—”
We receive the gift of God’s grace through our faith in Jesus, by our individual echoes of Peter’s declaration, “Matthew 16:16 . . . ‘You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.’"
Our Creator God bridged that unbridgeable abyss separating us as creatures from our Creator God by sending God’s Son, Jesus, the Christ. God made a covenant, a promise, and God kept God’s promise. Our Creator God is faithful and gracious.
Amazing Grace is looping through my mind this morning, a constant hymn extoling God’s love, God’s grace and God’s covenant faithfulness to all of God’s children.
Accept God’s gift, believe, trust God,
Pastor Ray