The Partnership of Redemption
Redemption is the action of saving or being saved from sin, error or evil. When I think of redemption or think of redeeming acts two things come to mind: Jesus and the movie "Dumb and Dumber".
Yes, I'm talking about that scene in which Lloyd sells their van during their cross-country journey for a scooter that gets 70mpg. As Lloyd approaches a clearly upset and frustrated Harry, Harry responds by saying, "Just when I thought you couldn't possibly be any dumber, you go and do something like this.... and totally redeem yourself!"
Classic. Yet, as humorous as this is, I find this to be the struggle in our story of redemption. More often than not we believe that our actions, our works, our words, our thoughts, our feelings, or even our purchases can earn redemption. We think if we buy a person lots of things they love it will achieve reconciliation between us. We imagine that if we work overtime for a friend we wronged that every little detail will be fixed. We might feel that our emotions will simply show that we can totally redeem ourselves.
As good as these actions are, they are quite simply temporary. They are band-aids to a bigger issue, which is the reality that we cannot fully redeem anything by our words, thoughts or deeds. We don't have money that covers eternal costs. We don't have super-human abilities to think or work our way into everlasting life with God or even full life with those around us.
To put it plainly, we are dependent and limited beings. This does not mean we are not powerful, but it does mean that we cannot, by our own strength, accrue enough good merit to fully bridge the gap of broken relationship. We can try, strive, and fight for it, but at the end of the day, we cannot earn our way to something that is a free gift.
There is only One who can achieve the impossible activity of redemption. In fact, this is what makes redemption such a glorious endowment. The story of redemption is one in which this One I write about created all things. He breathed life (His Spirit) into humanity and perfectly formed the giraffe to look that way (yes, the long neck was no mistake). He thought out the unbelievably beautiful colors of the sunset, the epic joy of surfing waves and boarding mountains of snow, and of course, He gave us heaven's dew (also known as Mountain Dew).
In the midst of this story that seems so wonderful, Love empowered all things to have their being. Love is not loving without freedom of will, and with that freedom of will, we broke our relationships with this Creator, with each other, and with His creation. We created a gap between the Father of all things and ourselves, and we could not build a tower big enough, pay a price large enough, or heap up enough good works to redeem ourselves back into our creational purpose.
This sounds like bad news, but good news is coming. Actually, good news came and His name is Christ Jesus of Nazareth. This man walked on earth as a human being and God. He lived a perfect life, taught the world what truth was, and performed more miracles than the books of the world could contain. The greatest of these miracles was taking upon Himself the brokenness of humanity through being crucified as a criminal. And what I mean by this is He purchased what we could not so we could have what we could not earn.
In other words, Christ Jesus made a way for all to be redeemed, forgiven, and reconciled into perfect relationship with His Father and Spirit.
When I look back at what I just wrote, I see two stories. I see one in which humanity tries to redeem themselves but cannot. I see another in which God comes in flesh to redeem us and does. For many, they take the second story as a rigid truth declaring that humanity has nothing to do with redemption. This is a harsh generalization and I believe it misses the point of what redemption is truly about.
Redemption is a recovery of a lost relationship through a price only Somebody with eternal currency could pay. (A side note: if Jesus is priceless and of limitless worth, and He was the price for you, how much does that say about your's and my worth?) Redemption is something that we cannot earn, but to say redemption has nothing to do with humanity is to miss the reason why redemption was made. Jesus' redeeming love is graciously distributed to all who will receive it. It seems to me in this process and understanding of redemption there is a standard that only God can meet AND a call to partnership that only we can embrace. God's already paid for it, the question is will we receive it?
I write all this to say that redemption is all about a dynamic partnership with God.
In Exodus 34, Moses hears the Lord call him to make two new stones for Him to write upon after Moses had broken the first set of stones/commandments. Another way of saying this is God wanted to rewrite something into a broken person's story. Let me simplify even more: God wanted to redeem.
Here's the cool thing that takes place in this account. Moses meets with the Lord and hears Him declare a covenant and describe a new way of life that would set apart His people (Ex. 34:10-26). Moses' job in this is to meet with God, hear Him, and obey. Sounds familiar, right?
This is where things get interesting. After the Lord describes these patterns for a new way of life, He instructs to Moses to write down these words of the covenant that He just made with the Israelites (Ex. 34:27). Did you catch that? The Author and Perfecter of our faith (Heb. 12:1-2) calls Moses to write this story of redemption. The only One who can redeem is the Lord and when He provides redemption He beckons us to write out this story of redemption with Him.
Our story is one of redemption. We cannot earn it, so God gives us redeeming grace because He is the only One who could purchase us. Then, because God is calling us into the community of Himself as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, puts the pen into our hand to write out the story with His presence.
And let me take this one step further. When Moses received the tablets for the first time, we know that they were inscribed by the finger of God (Ex. 31:18). It might just be that when we write out this story of redemption we are writing with God's finger and we are displaying the presence of God to the world.
The question is not about if redemption has been made. The question at hand is what are you writing with the story of your life? In our partnership with God in displaying His redemption story, we are marking our world with the Divine writing of love and hope. I'd much rather broadcast an eternal truth rather than a "Dumb and Dumber" line with my story. How about you?
Yes, it is true that you cannot earn redemption. And yes, it is also true that God is the only One who redeems eternally. And the most beautiful truth yet is that in this redeeming relationship He puts the pen in your hand to write with Him. What a partnership!
Write with Jesus, beloved. His pen is love, your paper is hearts. I'm excited to read your story. From what the Lord has told me, it's quite a good one. Amen.
