Mark Jones – In His Dust

A few weeks ago at Prayer in Re:hope, I remember sitting there in the middle of the prayer time, adding my ‘amens’ to what people were praying, not particularly feeling ‘led’ to pray… to be honest, I just wasn’t ‘in’ it. Then pretty much at once my thought turned to the people who ‘didn’t believe the Cross was enough’. They KNEW the Cross was enough, but they didn’t believe.

I got this picture of a ball and chain in my head, and felt like people were dragging around a ball and chain (their sin, the sins done against them, hurt, guilt, shame) which Jesus had unlcoked on the cross, but they’d decided to turn around, pick it up, and drag it along anyway.

What do they want? A box of choclates on top?

I can’t sleep either. A conversation last night got me thinking about the whole thing again. People who don’t believe they are worthy. They’re not good enough. They’re not ‘loved’. They don’t ‘deserve’. They’re too ‘bad’. They’re too sinful. etc. etc.UGH.

I’m thinking – you know what, I’ve done some pretty shameful things in the past. I’ve sinned. I’ve fallen short. I sin. I’m a sinner.

In fact, I’ll go even further than that. I’m the worlds worst and not letting go of that sort of thing either. I’ll beat myself up about things in the past, what I could’ve or should’ve done differently, what could have been the result if I had changed back then, etc. Actually, so much so, that recently I was told by someone I barely know, but fully respect to take my journal, either bin it or put it away, and start afresh. To accept fully what Jesus done on the cross, has delt with my sin, and has unlocked the ball and chain, to be dragged around no more.

It angers me to see that people believe Satan’s lies about them. It angers me even more when people refuse to accept that Jesus death on the cross was enough.
Not only did Jesus take the punishment for our sins on the cross as our substitute, and cleanse us from the sins we’ve done, and that have been done against us (and the crap that comes along with that sort of thing i.e. shame), but he also made us righteous. He Justified us.

The basis of our hope for acceptance with God and eternal life is the provision of Christ for both pardon and perfection. That is, he becomes our substitute in two senses: In his suffering and death he becomes our curse and condemnation (Galatians 3:13; Romans 8:3); in his final suffering and death, and in his whole life of suffering and righteousness, he becomes our perfection (2 Corinthians 5:21). His death is the climax of his atoning sufferings, which propitiate the wrath of God against us (Romans 3:24 – 25); and his death is the climax of a perfect life or righteousness – God’s righteousness – imputed to us (2 Corinthians 5:21, Romans 4:6, 11 with 3:21-22; 5:18-19). This meets our need for more than forgiveness.

The righteousness we have is not our own, it comes as God’s good gift in Christ. But we will be righteous. Notice that this means more than being pardoned. The pardoned criminal bears no penalty, but he bears a stigma. He is criminal and he is known as a criminal, albeit an unpunished one. The justified sinner not only bears no penalty, he is righteous. He is not a man with his sins still about him.

Not only should Jesus be honoured as the one who died to pardon us, and not only should he be honoured as the one who sovereignly works faith and obedience in us, but he should also be honoured as the one who provided a perfect righteousness for us as the ground of our full acceptance by God.

We should honour Jesus as our Justifier. As our righteousness. But we also need to start accepting it. Believing it. Jesus IS my justification. Therefore, I will no longer be shaped by things of the past. No longer will I be shaped by sin and shame. Nor will I ever believe that I am not worthy, good enough or loved, for I refuse to doubt the work on the cross as being ‘enough’.