The Lights of Tenth Street (37 page)

The messenger’s eyes blazed. “But the Lamb of God sacrificed Himself to take away the sins of the world! That message must be shared and received! Your Body has been chosen by the Almighty One to bear this message to a lost lamb, a lamb on whom much depends. But they are not ready to receive this one. They must be broken, must be awakened!”

Steven had so many questions, but they were all stilled. So many thoughts, but they were put aside. He was insignificant, a vapor … and yet precious, and priceless beyond words.

“It is such an honor—” he found himself choking up, and fought to regain control. “Such an honor that the Lord would choose to speak to me.”

With shock, he realized that the great figure was leaning down, resting a hand on his shoulder. “You, Steven, are greatly beloved of God, just like your namesake, a man full of His grace and power. You have walked through the fire and the valley, and have been chosen for this time. You must choose to sacrifice yourself and minister this message to your flock, and they in turn must choose to sacrifice themselves, and minister Christ’s love to the lost lamb that is coming. Much depends on it.”

Steven bowed his head, somehow sure of what he must say. He closed his eyes, and quieted his heart. “May it be unto me, as you have said.”

The light disappeared, and he was again in the quiet and the stillness, surrounded by green.

The rain beat on the roof of the church as the congregation finished singing and remained standing, awaiting the pastor’s familiar prayer.

Pastor Steven looked out on his flock, at the freshly scrubbed upturned faces, and breathed a quiet prayer as he reached the lectern and opened his notes.

“May the words of my mouth, and the meditations of all our hearts, be pleasing in thy sight O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.” He couldn’t remember ever meaning the words more.

He motioned for the people to take their seats. Someone remained standing off to the side, and Steven glanced over. It was his wife, arrayed in brilliant blue, on the front row. She was looking at him, waiting to catch his eye. She put her hand on her heart and mouthed the words,
I love you
.

He nearly lost it, felt the tears rising perilously close to the surface. Then his wife took her seat and gave him a saucy wink, as if to say “we’re in this together.”

“Good morning, everyone. Sorry about that little interruption there, but I just realized that my wife was making eyes at me.”

There were many titters and outright laughs as people settled in for what was clearly an unusual start to a sermon.

Steven quieted his heart. It was before him now, he had the mandate of the Lord, and that was all he needed. The results were in God’s hands.

“I have a special message to share with you today. One I believe the Lord has given me for just such a time as this. It may be difficult to hear and challenging at times, but please bear with me. And in case there are still any children in the room, a fair warning for all you parents: We will be talking about some adult matters.”

A few people got up here and there, ushering their young children out. The other faces were quiet, intent, and even more curious.

“Please turn with me to our texts for today. First, Matthew chapter seven. Listen to the words of Jesus. “ ‘Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.” ’ ”

Steven looked up from his Bible. “Please keep a marker on this place. We’ll come back to it. Next, let’s look at Luke chapter eighteen, starting with verse nine. ‘To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable: “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’

“ ‘But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, “God, have mercy on me, a sinner.” ’ ”

Steven raised a hand for emphasis. “And then Jesus goes on to say something remarkable. Look at this. ‘I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted, ’ ”

Steven laid aside his Bible and looked out at the congregation. “Many of us have heard that story, many times. And most of us think, ‘Thank God I’m not like that Pharisee!’ Well, I have news for each and every one of us. Even by thinking that, we
are
being like that Pharisee. And we’re proving Jesus’ point!

“We as Christians in our day often act like the religious leaders of Jesus’ day. We don’t mean to or intend to. But you know what? The Pharisees probably didn’t mean to or intend to either. They thought they were doing what God required. So Jesus came along to challenge them, to show them that they were putting the law and all their many rules ahead of God’s heart. His purpose wasn’t to condemn but to correct. But many of them wouldn’t listen.”

Steven looked up, and he caught the congregation in a powerful gaze. “So this is my question for each one of us today. Are we willing to listen? I believe God has given me a special message for us as a church body. Of course, we must always test a message to see if it’s consistent with the Word of God. But if it is, it will be up to each one of us whether we’ll listen and accept the message, or close our minds and reject it.”

There was a profound silence in the room, an intent waiting, punctuated only by the soft drumming of the Creator’s rain on the roof. Steven was overwhelmed by the powerful, electric certainty that the Holy Spirit was there, that the Lord was anointing the words of his mouth.

“I have often missed the point of this story because I focused on the arrogant words of the Pharisee and assumed this parable was simply about the dangers of pride in one’s self. After all, who prays like
that?

“Well, I realized something this week: This story is not just about that sort of pride. It’s about exactly what the Bible says it’s about in the introduction! It’s about one way pride is demonstrated, about what happens when we are confident of our own righteousness:
We look down on everybody else
.

“And this is where the hard challenge comes in. Today, in this church, we have to confront whether we are guilty of exactly that, and whether as a result, we drive away the very people we want to reach—the lost, the hurting, the little lambs that Jesus pleaded for. We make those who
know
they are sinners feel uncomfortable among us, who are confident of our own righteousness!”

He saw some faces awakening to shock at his challenging tone, and he relaxed a little, giving a disarming smile.

“Now you, like me, may think you’d never do that, but let me illustrate the point with a real-life example. I’m going to tell you a true story of a man I used to know. And I want you to be aware of your reactions as I go. What are you thinking in your heart of hearts as you hear this man’s tale? Because what you’re thinking as you hear the story is probably about the same thing you’d be thinking if you actually met him. And he would sense your reaction.

“So here’s the story. This man professed to be a Christian from a young age. He got married, had kids, and eventually became the pastor of a large, prestigious church. He was sold-out for Christ, had a television program, wrote a couple of books, and ministered to thousands every week. He looked wonderful on the outside, and everyone loved and respected him. But on the inside he had a dirty secret. He was addicted to pornography.”

In a flash, Steven saw a range of expressions on the faces before him. Distaste, condemnation, compassion … and flickers of guilt.

“This man was so into the filth of pornography that he began lying to his wife and his staff! He’d lie about his whereabouts when he was off buying his trash at porn shops and bookstores. Then he actually hid those disgusting magazines in his church office, just so he could look at them during the day and satisfy his secret cravings.

“Now let me ask you—what would you say about this man? Be honest. If you’re like most of us, your feelings at this point are not kind. In fact, they’re judgmental. ‘How dare he?’ you ask, with righteous anger. ‘There’s no way a man of God could behave in such a depraved way?’ ‘Is he even a
Christian?
’ ‘I would
never
do that!’ ‘He should be immediately removed as pastor.’

“And on that last one, I’d probably agree with you, for reasons I’ll get to later. But let me push back a bit. You’ve heard about his
behavior
, now let me describe what was going on in his head and his heart. What if after telling you that story, I now explain that this pastor was anguished over his sin. He knew he was a sinner, and he desperately wanted to stop. He groaned for God’s help and mercy.”

He looked up and cocked an eyebrow. “It perhaps makes a little difference to your indignant thoughts, but not much. I bet that at least half of you are thinking, ‘Who cares if he was anguished? He could stop if he really wanted to!’

“That’s really the crux, isn’t it? We judge someone who’s sinning because we think, ‘They could stop if they really wanted to.’ And sometimes that’s probably right. And sometimes it may not be. But it doesn’t really matter, does it? When we ourselves don’t struggle with that particular problem, it’s easy to ‘be confident of our
own righteousness and look down on everybody else.’

“But should we? I say no, and for one much-overlooked reason. People often quote the passage where Jesus said, ‘Do not judge,’ but in the context it’s clear that Jesus commanded us not to judge
hypocritically
. ‘First take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.’ What I’m arguing today is that for us sinful humans, it is very, very difficult to judge purely and not hypocritically. We have an awful time seeing that log in our own eye, much less removing it. And you know something? Once we go through the pain, self-examination, humility, and heartache of removing that log, suddenly we really don’t feel like bashing the guy next door for his speck of sawdust.

“We often think it’s our right—sometimes even our duty—to point out where others are sinning. Now, the Bible is very clear that there’s a distinction between trying to correct Christians who are in sin, and trying to correct those in the world.

“In 1 Corinthians 5, Paul has some pretty strong words about this. ‘I have written you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people—not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world. But now I am writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother, but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat. What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside. “Expel the wicked man from among you.” ’

“In other words, look first to the sin inside the body of Christ and deal with that. ‘Okay,’ you say, ‘I can do that.’ ” Pastor Steven rubbed his hands together in mock glee. “ ‘I’ve been waiting to sharpen my claws on that person who’s addicted to pornography; let me at him!’

“Oh, but wait. Aren’t you forgetting something? Do you have a log that needs to be dealt with first? Hmm … let’s look at all the other things on this 1 Corinthians list besides sexual immorality. What’s next? Greed.”

“Uh-oh …” Steven’s voice deepened portentously and despite themselves, the frozen congregation laughed.

“Well, let’s skip greed. I know I worry about money a little too much, am a little too attached to my stuff. Let’s just go on down the list. Surely nothing else in the list applies to me, and I can get on with skewering that poor pornography addict.”

Steven ran his finger down the list. “Idolatry.
Doh!
” Steven slapped his hand to his head. “Do I lean on anything other than God to sustain me? Do I ever rely on my intellect, my money, my marriage, my work ethic instead of my sovereign Lord?
Okaaay, this exercise isn’t working out the way we thought it would, is it? Let’s just-move on down that list.

“Slander. Do I ever gossip? Do I ever talk about someone behind his back? Do I make myself look good, but stir up dissent against others? Am I critical of my boss, my coworkers, or those in leadership, having never walked in their shoes?” Steven looked out over the congregation, wishing he could just for a moment be spiteful and call out a few names of those who had made his life miserable.

“I think you get the point. What Jesus is saying is that we have to be constantly aware of our own sinfulness and at least be trying to deal with it in humility before we go confront others about their sin. That’s the solution for being ‘confident of our own self-righteousness and looking down on everybody else.’ And inside the church, there’s a clear biblical pattern for discipline that’s not designed to bash the sinner and make him or her feel awful—and make us feel self-righteous for pointing it out—but is designed to bring the sinner to repentance, to make that person whole again.

“Jesus came to this earth not to make us feel good, but to save us from our sins. That was the whole point. And unless we come to a real understanding of our own sin, we will
never
fully understand or accept what our Lord and Savior did for us. We will continue to believe—however secretly—that we can work our way into heaven. That He owes us a place in heaven, because we’ve been a pretty darned good person, thank you very much.