Uniquely Relational Grace

Uniquely Relational Grace

Ephesians 4:32

In this blog I want to think about how the gospel informs the value we hold at GCP of being Relational. On our website we define Relational as “Joyfully offering love and grace to everyone regardless of where they are on their spiritual journey.”

Now you might ask, and rightfully so, how is being relational, a unique value? Are not non-Christians relational? The answer to that is – YES!

Being relational on one level is not unique to followers of Jesus Christ.

Whether it’s the gathering of my neighbors for beer pong laughing loudly enough to wake the neighborhood, or the guys and girls playing football in Drexel Park, or the week end parties, or two people sitting at Green Line café with lattes and smiles on their faces, or a couple walking down the street, holding hands and talking as if they’re in a world of their own – being relational is not unique to believers. Sometimes common grace often produces better relationship than grace taken for granted.

Since all humanity bear the vestiges of being created in the image of God (the relational triune God) and since God inhis common grace has given all humanity capacity for moral behavior and giftedness for contributing to the betterment of life on earth, when we talk about being relational, we are talking about something that is similar, yet MORE than what comes from common grace. Gratitude for different aspects of life can cause people to act generously toward others. but it always has its limits. There will always be someone who falls outside the display of common grace.

After a night of beer pong, the combination of testosterone and alcohol inevitably leads to a disagreement and perhaps a fight. I’m ashamed to say that as a young pastor, my competiveness on the basketball court or football field often led to words and attitudes that hurt relationships. Two people sitting as Green Line Café can start out well as friends but leave as enemies. That lovely couple who for a moment shared joyful unity as they walked in hand can quickly turn into anger, and hurting words, and two people walking away from each other. Those of us who are married know well enough how fragile relationships are and that because of our own pride and selfishness the most intimate moments can turn to hurt, silence, and tears.

This is where the gospel raises and empowers a new standard.

So when we talk about being relational, we are talking about more than the kind of relational value that humanity in general experiences because of common grace.

When we talk about being relational we are talking about a relational value that comes from our ‘beholding the glory of Christ in the gospel and being transformed into his likeness.”

We are talking about a value that continues to function well in the midst of sin and brokenness. This is the crux of how we understand the relational value.

The New Testament contains many explicit and implicit references to how the gospel informs our relationship to others. Often the epistles, like here in Ephesians, begin with the foundation of what God has done for us in Christ before they speak about how believers relate to each other, within the family, and to those who are not believers. The Book of Romans is another example of how behavior and relationships are grounded in the gospel.

This is our brief text for this blog:

Ephesians 4:32
³² Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.

I am most interested in the final phrase – ‘forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you.’

Let me say a word about the verse in general. I need to make a few technical clarifications so bear with me.

Though the ESV has no conjunction (but, and) most manuscripts contain one that sort of sets this verse apart as not only a contrast to what immediately precedes but possibly as a summary statement of values of the Christian life.

The little word ‘Be” means ‘keep becoming.” These are qualities to pursue – to progressively grow in. (ca. “While beholding, we are being transformed” 2 Cor 3:18).

‘Keep becoming kind (Gracious, pleasant, compassionate). Only used 7x in NT. 3X to describe God’s dealings with sinners (Lk 6:35; Rom 2:4; 1 Pet 2:3); 1X it describes the yoke of Christ (Matt 11:30); 1X it describes the pleasant quality of aged wine (Lk 5:39); 1X to describe good conduct; and here a s a quality to pursue.

“keep becoming tenderhearted (compassionate). Used only 2x in the NT. Here and in 1 Pet 3:8. Both times referring to a desired quality in a believers life (Compassionate, pitiful, tender heart, kind hearted – 4 different translations). You get the point. Growing in grace makes you more caring and compassionate toward people.

We should be tenderhearted because:

… all people are broken

… all people suffer.

We all share the common effects of sin both personally and systemically in the world.

Yes, there is a special interest in the welfare of the Christian family, but our tenderheartedness goes beyond that.

The third phrase can either mean: ‘keep becoming forgiving” (i.e. it is 1 of 3 qualities) or “keep becoming kind and tenderhearted, by forgiving …” (i.e. it is the one quality that accompanies and exemplifies the other two) ‘Forgiving’ is a participle, meaning it has adjectival and verbal qualities.

1. ‘Keep becoming forgiving’ see more emphasis on the adjectival.
   
2. Keep becoming kind and tenderhearted, while or by forgiving one another, sees more emphasis on the verbal aspect.
   

I understand the second usage to be in force here (as it is used in its parallel passage in Col 3:13). “Forgiving’ is the quality that exemplifies the other two.

Now one other explanation:

The word ‘forgiving’ is not the usual word for forgive. It shaes the same root as the Greek word for ‘grace’ – and though it includes forgiveness, especially in contexts where ‘sin’ is the object, it suggests much more than forgiveness.

“Acting in grace” is an acceptable translation of the Greek word, charizomai, rendered “forgiving” in Ephesians 4:32. Acting in grace catches the essence of how God has acted toward us and our sin against Him. And because He has forgiven us, we are commanded to forgive each other (Colossians 3:13). Anybody focused on himself as the center of the universe will have a difficult time thinking kindly of others, and unity will be difficult, if not impossible. (Forerunner – John W. Ritenbaugh)

So, I don’t prefer the translation ‘forgiving’ because it is too specific and being specific, it is limited.

I prefer the translation ‘acting in grace’ – which encompasses forgiveness and more. Forgiveness is the primary expression of acting in grace.

Our problems in relationship are not just because people have sinned against us and therefore need forgiveness.

Our problems with loving and showing grace to others are more complex than ‘they have sinned against me.’

It may be that I just do not like them – for racial reasons, for reasons of history, for economic reasons, for reasons of jealousy or envy, because my friend doesn’t like them etc. I may need to show grace because they are weak, they are different, etc.

By relational we want to be forgiving and acting in grace toward others in the way that God has acted in grace toward us.

1. The gospel produces a relational value that is reflective – i.e. act in grace toward others as God has acted in grace toward you.
   
   1. Generously, undeservedly – (so great it takes the ages to come to comprehend Eph 2)
      
   2. We are being transformed into people who act in grace while beholding the one who acts in grace toward us.
2. The gospel produces a relational value that is redemptive – God acting in grace is always with the cross of Christ in view. My acting in grace toward others need always be in the context of the cross – otherwise grace will only be common grace and common grace is fragile grace. Without the cross in view, humility is replace by pride and loving others is replaced by self-interest.
   
   
3. The gospel produces a relational value that is restorative – God’s acting in grace is means to bring us into adoptive relationship, as family – sons and daughters. Acting in grace removes whatever barrier there is to true friendship and fellowship.
   

Even those of us who know and love the gospel, fail to consistently live out a gospel-informed relational value. I confess my failure. I am disappointed at times at my reactions to people. I realize that intellectually grasping the implications of the gospel is not equivalent to ‘beholding the glory of the Lord, and being transformed into that same image from glory to glory.” Sometimes, I may get the ‘point” and underline the powerful insight, and post it on Twitter, but miss the glory and when you miss the glory, you miss the transformation.

I need to continually ask, How is my growing understanding of the gospel shaping my relationships to others?

Let me close with a story that shows grace at work.

In an emotionally charged courtroom, a South African woman stood listening to white police officers acknowledge their atrocities.

Officer van de Broek acknowledged that along with others, he had shot her 18-year-old son at pointblank range. He and the others partied while they burned the son’s body, turning it over and over on the fire until it was reduced to ashes.

Eight years later, van de Broek and others returned to seize her husband. She was forced to watch her husband, bound on a woodpile, as they poured gasoline over his body and ignited the flames that consumed his body. The last words she heard her husband say were “forgive them.”

Now, van de Broek awaited judgment. South Africa’s Truth and reconciliation Commission asked the woman what she wanted.

“I want three things,” she said calmly. “I want Mr. van de Broek to take me to the place where they burned my husband’s body. I would like to gather up the dust and give him a decent burial.

“Second, Mr. van de Broek took all my family away from me, and I still have a lot of love to give. Twice a month, I would like for him to come to the ghetto and spend a day with me so I can be a mother to him.

“Third, I would like Mr. van de Broek to know that he is forgiven by God and that I forgive him too. I would like to embrace him so he can know my forgiveness is real.”

As the elderly woman was led across the courtroom, van de Broek fainted, overwhelmed. Someone began singing “Amazing Grace.” Gradually everyone joined in.

As you continue to grow in your understanding and experience of God’s rich mercy and grace you will cross those barriers of race, economics, and sin with not just a trickling of grace and mercy but a torrent, a flood that comes from the constant overflow of God’s grace and mercy into your life in the gospel.

The Gospel and Being Incarnational

The Gospel and Being Incarnational

Philippians 2:5-8
⁵ Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, ⁶ who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, ⁷ but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. ⁸ And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

In this post I want to talk about the value of being Incarnational and how the gospel informs and empowers that value. This text is a call to think incarnationally.

The talk of being incarnational is often in the context of how believer’s in Christ relate to the world outside the church. Among Christians you will find various approaches to how to relate to non-church culture or how they attempt to live their lives in relationship to the world outside the church.

Isolationists avoid the culture. Antagonists fight the culture. Separatists keep pure from a defiled culture. Sycncretists blend the values of the church and the culture. Triumphalists seek to control and conquer the culture. Accomodationists give in to the culture.

At Grace Church of Philly we seek to be Incarnational (to live out the values of the gospel in human skin).The gospel came in human skin, i.e. God in flesh, and the gospel continues to come in human skin, i.e. Christ living in me and through me. In being incarnational we become ‘friends of sinners’ and immersed in the culture. We believe that
if incarnational gospel values are being developed in us, then we have no fear of being completely assimilated into the culture.

… the life of Christ reminds us that incarnation does not lead to us feeling anymore at home in the kingdom of this age, that the more we incarnate into our culture, the more we will find ourselves at odds with the elements of that culture which resist God’s redemptive actions in the world (Michael Horton).

However, our interest is not only Incarnational Ministry or Living in relation to the world outside the church. We are interested primarily in the deeper internal values that drive external activity.

Being incarnational is first about inner transformation before external ministry and living.

Another way to say it is – Incarnation is less about the external context (the where I am) than it is about the internal value (the who I am).

Incarnation that begins with external activity and context rather than inner transformation is in danger of being ingenuous and powerless.

Incarnation is first about who I am becoming than what I am doing.

INCARNATIONAL AS AN INTERNAL VALUE (Keep thinking this one thing)

The call to being incarnational as an internal value is expressed in verse 5:

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus….

We are to have hearts and minds that come from reflecting on Christ’s incarnation and death on the cross.

• Being incarnational, we deny ourselves certain rights so that we can identify with others in their suffering (self-denial)
  

Jesus did not “count” equality with God as something to grasp tightly i.e. he never said, ‘I see the need of the world, but I can’t give up my form of existence. I must hold it tightly.’ Jesus could never cease to be who he was, but he could leave his throne of glory and descend to a manger and a cross. This He did. This we are called to do. We do this without surrendering who we are in Christ and we do this for the good of others. This is what good missionaries do; this is the call of all believers. This is the only way we meet the world in its suffering. This means that we may have to deny ourselves our right to the comfort of the “American Dream” in order to effectively minister in a broken and suffering world.

2 Corinthians 8:9 For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich.

Being incarnational is denying my rights and often lowering my status in bringing who I am in Christ into identity with those who suffer because they do not know Jesus.

In being incarnational I do not surrender who I am in Christ, yet there is enough about me that relates to the world I live in.

1 Corinthians 9:19-23
¹⁹ For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them. ²⁰ To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews. To those under the law I became as one under the law (though not being myself under the law) that I might win those under the law. ²¹ To those outside the law I became as one outside the law (not being outside the law of God but under the law of Christ) that I might win those outside the law. ²² To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all people, that by all means I might save some. ²³ I do it all for the sake of the gospel, that I may share with them in its blessings.

Because he was willing to change his form of existence, he “made himself nothing (emptied himself)”

This action was not a divestment of Who He is as Son of God. He surrendered no attributes of deity, though as theologians say, he surrendered the independent exercise of some relative attributes, i.e. he was always omnipotent (all powerful, yet in his incarnation, he did not exercise his omnipotence but rather did all that he did in the power of the Holy Spirit.

This becoming nothing calls us to at least the following way of thinking:

• Being incarnational, we come with a desire to serve, not to dominate.
  

The desire to dominate rather than serve is a plague among Christians in churches and in the culture.

“The Word made flesh” – came not to be served but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many.

We Christians are good at words and technology today makes it possible for us to multiply our words. But too often we are only ‘talking heads.’ The world needs the word of God but it needs the word embodied in human flesh. Jesus did not simply say, ‘I love you.’ He said ‘I love you,’ then came from heaven, took on the form of a servant, and gave his life for you.

What are we doing besides talking?

• In being incarnational, we come with humility not superiority (he humbled himself)
  

Jesus will come in power and glory some day, but he first came in humility. He made himself low. Sometimes our approach to those outside for the gospel comes across as arrogant.

For example, often we approach non-believers as if we are smarter because we grasp the content and implications of the gospel. I confess that I have been there. This arrogance is a vestige of the Enlightenment where reason was exalted and when applied to theology, it often produced people with an arrogance which says to non-believers ” you’re pretty dumb if you don’t get it (the gospel).”

But think about it, why do you believe what you believe. Is there such incontrovertible evidence that is so persuasive that any reasonable person should accept it?

Or is there something so distorted about our ability to know the things of God that it takes a supernatural work of the Spirit to open our eyes and minds.

We come to those who need Jesus with humility because we know that God in His grace and through the work of His Spirit has allowed us to have ears to hear and eyes to see. “I once was blind now I see.”

In his letters (118,22) Saint Augustine wrote: “Grasp the truth of God by using the way he himself provides, since he sees the weakness of our footsteps. That way consists first, of humility, second, of humility, and third, of humility.”

• Being incarnational, we come to identify with others in their weakness and suffering (he came in the likeness of man)
  

As a man he experienced what we do. He knew the joys and sorrow, the laughter and tears, the pain and the comfort that humans experience. We cannot be incarnational without identifying and experiencing the ‘human condition’ of those who we seek to love in Jesus’ name.

We cannot do this from a distance.

• Being incarnational, we come with a heart of obedience to the mission, regardless of how costly it is. (even the death of the cross)
  

His identifying with us in our weakness of suffering in order to deliver us necessitated the cross – the only way God’s deepest love could be expressed without sacrificing His holiness and justice.

Incarnational obedience is costly. One of the costs of incarnation is that in touching others you are also touched by others. And, sometimes that touching hurts.

Jesus touched and healed many and embraced children, and felt the embrace of others, as well as the anointing of perfume and the washing of feet, but he also was touched with rejection, pummeling, and thorns, and nails and ultimately he was touched by our sin.

Isaiah 53:5 But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed.

Incarnation often involves a costly obedience.

INCARNATIONAL AS A MINISTRY MODEL (Incarnation = in flesh, i.e. eventually internal values are expressed in external ministry and living)

What we mean by “incarnational mission,” then, is a commitment to be with people, to embody the good news we preach, and through the Spirit to mediate the presence of Christ wherever He is needed. As the body of Christ, we are the continuation of His ministry; we are His presence on earth. We are the salt of the earth, the light of the world (http://www.wordmadeflesh.org/the-cry/the-cry-vol-10-no-3/incarnational/).

There is a danger with only an external incarnational focus.

We are not distinctively Christian because we do things that identify with the world in their suffering.

We are distinctively Christian because our understanding and experience of the gospel drives us to identify with people in their suffering.

Eventually being moved by the gospel to think incarnationally has an impact on how we relate to society, to communities, to culture.

When we think about being incarnational, we need to think about how we as Christians relate to each other and culture outside the church.

Since being incarnational is more about internal transformation than activity, it is evident first in the church and that’s point of Philippians 2.

Incarnational living is not a rejection of the church, but a reflection to the world outside the church of those values that characterize the body of Christ.

Since GCP is committed ‘showing God’s grace to a great city” – we seek to express these values in a way explained by Tim Keller.

1. Christians should live long-term in the city. The city is an intense crucible of culture formation. Cultural trends tend to be generated in the city and flow outward into the rest of society. Therefore, people who live in the large urban cultural centers (working in their institutions, taking jobs in the arts, business, academia, the helping professions, and the media) tend to have greater impact on how things are done in a culture. If a far greater percentage of the people living in cities long-term were Christians, Christ’s values would have a greater influence on the culture. In his book Two Cities: Two Loves, he [James Boice] argued that evangelicals should live in cities in at least the same percentage as the general population. If we do not, we should not expect much influence in society.

2. Christians should be a dynamic counter-culture in the city. It will not be enough for Christians to simply live as individuals in the city. They must live as a particular kind of community. The Bible tells us that the history of the world is a ‘tale of two cities.’ The ‘city of man’ is built on the principle of individual self-aggrandizement (Gen 11:1-4- “Let us make a name for ourselves”). What God wants is different. “In the city of our God, his holy mountain is beautiful in elevation–the joy of the whole earth” (Psalm 48:2). In other words, the urban society God wants is based on service rather than selfishness, and on bringing joy to the whole world, not just to the individuals within it. Jesus probably had Psalm 48:2 in mind when he told his disciples that they were ‘a city on a hill’ whose life and action showed God’s glory to the world (Matt 5:14-17). That is us! We
Christians are called to be an alternate city within every earthly city, an alternate human culture
within every human culture, to show how sex, money, and power can be used in non-destructive
ways; to show how classes and races who cannot get along outside of Christ can get along in
him; and to show how it is possible to produce art that brings hope rather than despair or
titillation.

3. Christians should be a community radically committed to the good of the city as a whole. It is insufficient for Christians to form a culture that only ‘counters’ the values of the city. We must then turn, with all the resources of our faith and life, to sacrificially serve the good of the whole city, and especially the poor. Christians work for the peace, security, justice, and prosperity of their neighbors, loving them in word and deed, whether they believe what we do or not. In Jeremiah 29:7, the Jews were called not just to live in the city but to love it and work for it’s ‘shalom’—its economic, social, and spiritual flourishing. Christians are, indeed, citizens of God’s heavenly city. But the citizens of God’s city are always the best possible citizens of their earthly city. They walk in the steps of the One who laid down his life for his opponents. In the end, Christians will not be attractive within our culture through power plays and coercion, but through sacrificial service to people regardless of their beliefs. We do not live here simply to increase the prosperity of our own tribe and group, but for the good of all the peoples of the city.

4. Christians should be a people who integrate their faith with their work. There is a fourth, crucial component to our plan for relating Christians to culture. As we said above, all work proceeds from beliefs about the ‘big questions’ regarding what life means, what human beings are, and what are the most important things in life. We call the answers to these big questions a ‘worldview.’

Conclusion:

This text calls us to have thinking that comes from focusing on the incarnation of Jesus Christ. As we focus on Christ (2 Cor 3:18 –while beholding his glory, we are being transformed into his image), the values of his incarnation (self-denial, serving others, humility, identity, costly obedience) are progressively instilled in us by the Spirit of God.

Even as we seek to have these values instilled in us and these values expressed in real ministry that touches the lives of others, we make no mistake in thinking that our being incarnational is the answer for the world’s ultimate need.

When our incarnation of the gospel purports to exhibit perfection or in itself is seen as the gospel, it masks the gospel of grace (and tells a lie).

Our incarnation of the gospel is always deficient which is why we always point to the one who alone truly embodies the gospel.