20 October 2015 - more than fair

Jesus said to his disciples: 
“Gird your loins and light your lamps
and be like servants who await their master’s return from a wedding,
ready to open immediately when he comes and knocks.

We are called to be ready. The bridegroom is coming! This is very different than the threat that at any time a boss might come and look over our shoulder and see us slacking. We are indeed called to vigilance. We are indeed warned against slacking, whether burying our own treasures, our becoming abusive toward others in the absence of the boss. But the thing is that he is much more than a boss. What kind of boss girds himself to serve us after coming home from a wedding? If he were a normal boss he would return and expect us to get to work. But instead, he returns and shares the blessings and the joy of the wedding with us. Or he does so if we are awake to experience it.

He is a bridegroom that gives us more than we deserve. Through the transgression of Adam we deserve death. Yet somehow Jesus shares his own obedience with us, which we do not deserve, in order to give us life.

For just as through the disobedience of one man
the many were made sinners,
so, through the obedience of the one
the many will be made righteous.

We are servants. But we serve with much more zeal and enthusiasm when we realize that we serve the one who himself came not to be served but to serve. We are more willing and able to keep our loins girt and our lamps lit when we realize that the relationship we have with Jesus is not one of fairness where we get what we earn. That would make us slaves to sin and death. That is at best a relationship with an antagonistic boss who does not have our interests at heart. Instead of strict fairness we rely on the mercy of the bridegroom. We rely on the generosity of the one who shares his own joy, to which we are not entitled, with us just because he loves us. Our sin renders us unworthy of this joy. But he gives it nonetheless.

Where sin increased, grace overflowed all the more,
so that, as sin reigned in death,
grace also might reign through justification
for eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Let's try to realize the goodness of this bridegroom and to appreciate his mercy more today. It will help us to say more readily, "Here I am Lord; I come to do your will." We won't let our lamps flicker because we are so eager to see our master return.

May all who seek you
exult and be glad in you,
And may those who love your salvation
say ever, “The LORD be glorified.”