Working for a living

Psalm 77:11-15; Ephesians 2:8-10; James 2:14-26

Paul and James contradict one another flatly. Fear not, though, for the Psalmist straightens everything out! Paul preaches that we find our salvation not through earning it in good deeds, but simply in believing in the power of Christ to extricate us from all that breaks us. James counters that such belief in Christ is empty if it is not bolstered by deeds that reveal we get what Christ did--any doofus can say, “I believe,” but a true saint will show it by living it. The Psalmist tells us how to see that both are right. 

It is a matter of order--how Presbyterian!

Begin with the psalm.

The psalm proclaims a truth so basic and so obvious that we tend to take it utterly for granted. There is no question of the presence and reality of God--simply open your eyes. Did this wondrous world make itself? Did the infinite depth of a night sky delve itself? Did we with our fabulous imaginations and creative wills simply dream ourselves into being? No--all the cosmos exults in the creative hand of God! Its beauty, wonder, and miracle speak for themselves of the glory of God. 

Of course, Karl Barth, that theological miracle of the 20th Century, is correct in his assessment that creation sings of God, but does not name the Lord. Seeing the miracle of the world, we are to enter the story of our God--a Bible helps--and find out who this God is and what this God does for us. 

Such study gives us eyes to see and ears to hear. 

Everyone knows how much I love the mountains. I could spend a couple of lifetimes walking through the rising and falling woods. I could spend every evening of my existence seated in a wooden rocker watching the sunset bring the day into the rising night of myriad star shine. I could stand for hours by a small cascade falling through a boulder field of rhododendron. And I can hear the whispered voice of God in all of it because I know the story. The God who made all of this made me and you and everyone else in an act of love so huge and so vast it boggles the mind. I know that because the story names God. 

That God--our God--entered our existence in all its glory and all its darkness as Christ. The story says so. In that encounter, God entered all we are in order to give us the opportunity to transform and transcend ourselves. The momentary deaths of failure, missed opportunities, wrong words, hurtful action, and all else that robs life of its meaning, purpose, and intent are met and overcome. Life reigns. Hope fires here and now. God is present, waiting for us to come to our senses, finding God with us. In that moment, we find the promise of life. We can be more than we are. We can be other than our faults. It all comes through love--the love revealed by Christ that empties itself to make all else full. That is why God made us. That is why God is with us. It can be ours. The story says so.

Now enters Paul--believe it! That is his simple, blunt instruction. Believe it!

Easily said--easily done?

There is the conundrum. No, taking the story as it comes is no easy task. We seek to be sure--to reassure ourselves by shoring up the promises with tangible proofs. That is where works come to play. We believe, but just to be sure God will see us and know our belief, we decide to work ourselves silly, praying God will notice us. In Paul’s day, this effort was seen in Peter and others who felt that, just to be safe, the new community of Christ needed to go ahead and keep the Mosaic rulebook in play. What was wrong with good Torah obedience? Better safe than sorry. But, Paul argued, that means Christ did nothing. Either he saved us or he didn’t. We can’t work our way into his presence--he came, he saved, enough said. Believe it! To do anything else is to deny him. 

To see why Paul got so irked by this approach, think about this little true parable. I was twelve. I sat at dinner and my dad was visibly agitated about something. He declared that he was fed up with young people who would not work, would not commit themselves to anything, and never followed through. That cut through me. I wasn’t sure what I hadn’t done, but I needed to get right fast. After dinner, Dad went into the yard--his solace and peace. I went with him. We planted a maple that night. I think we dug it up in the woods behind the house to transplant it in the front yard. I remember throwing myself into the work. I shoveled, I trucked the wheelbarrow, I shoveled some more--I flat out killed myself. I was going to re-earn my dad’s good grace. Later, as we watched the Braves game together on TV, Dad said more about his day. Apparently, two students in his college ethics class acted like morons, revealing a contempt for school, teaching, and applied learning. That had fired my dad’s ire--all my work was for nothing really because I had never been out of grace. “See?” Paul asks, “Why work for something that is already there? What a waste of time and energy!”

We do not need to earn God’s love. It is a given. It never goes anywhere. It is always with us. Hear and believe this good news. That is the end of all that ails us.

All right, so is poor James now out in the cold?

No. Not even close.

James finishes the picture. God’s love is unquestioned. It is there. We are now left with a wondrous opportunity--live it. As we experience God’s compassion, we become compassionate. As we experience God’s grace, we become gracious. As we experience God’s mercy, we become merciful. God releases us to do so. Love is counterintuitive in our context. We live in a time defined by SELF, for whom self-emptying is anathema. As a result, others are a threat. They are reason for fear. They want what we have. They want to unseat our happiness. Christ releases us from that horror-ridden existence. Lose yourself. Empty yourself. Love. That is our freedom. Make it so, counsels James. Risk love. Risk self-emptying. See what happens. God will be deeply revealed. Life can be good. Fear recedes. Hope rises. We do not earn salvation, we realize it. It becomes us. 

So, what seems nearly existentially contradictory is in reality a process. Each step builds on the next. Love blooms and blossoms within us. 

God is good and grace abounds.