by Andrew Cromwell
Recently I came across a passage in the Bible where Jesus is telling off
the religious leaders of the day. He described how they were inventing things
for people to do to get close to God, but these things were only driving people
further away from Him. They offered people a list of to dos, when they should
have offered them a relationship with the right who.
Have you ever noticed that the only people Jesus really got mad at were
the religious? He didn’t get mad at sinners, He encouraged them to change. He
didn’t yell at His disciples when they asked Him silly questions, He explained.
And He didn’t even lose it on Judas, the very one who betrayed Him. But He was
always ticked at the religious teachers! Frankly, as a pastor, it makes me a
little nervous.
And right in the middle of the passage, Jesus makes this very
interesting statement. He’s talking about giving a designated portion of all of
the money you earn to God (the Bible calls it tithing). This was something that
the religious leaders were really good at. And Jesus told them, “it’s good that
you do that, but don’t forget to do what is even more important.”
And then He listed three things that Jesus clearly thought were
incredibly important: justice, mercy, and faithfulness.
Jesus said, go ahead and give, but don’t forget to be just. In other
words, don’t forget to be honest and fair in all of your dealings. Don’t rip
people off. Don’t have unequal standards. Don’t try to cheat in order to get
ahead of someone else. Treat everyone with respect. Stand up for the little
guy.
And don’t forget to practice mercy. Mercy forgives when forgiveness
isn’t required or even deserved. It doesn’t force people to live up to an
impossible standard but recognizes that everyone fails. My dad called mercy the
“two scoops for free” virtue. When he was a kid, he went down to Thrifty
drugstore with his brothers every Saturday. They each had fifteen cents from
their dad. They’d go to the movies with ten cents and then to Thrifty for ice
cream with the remaining nickel. One Saturday, they all had their ice cream and
as they marched out of the store, my dad tripped and his two beautiful scoops
of mint chocolate chip spilled onto the hot asphalt and began to melt. He
looked to his brother Steve. There was no mercy there. He looked to his brother
Mike. Nope. And then he heard a tap on the window. The cashier inside the store
had seen it all. She motioned him back inside and gave him two scoops for free.
Undeserved. Unpaid. That’s mercy.
And finally, Jesus said, don’t forget to practice faithfulness.
Faithfulness to God and faithfulness to people. Faithfulness doesn’t quit when
the going gets rough. Faithfulness says, “I’m committed for the long haul.”
Faithful people are the people that make a difference in their community.
They’re people who figure out how to make their marriages work. They’re the
ones you love to serve with because they show up time and again.
Justice, mercy and faithfulness—they are the qualities the Jesus said we
all should not neglect. And, wouldn’t you know, they’re the qualities that are
often the most difficult for us to follow. All too easily, we find ourselves
cutting corners for personal gain. We refuse to forgive because “they did us
wrong.” And we find ourselves faithless, because we just couldn’t stick it out.
And yet when we do practice these things, our lives are sure to rise to
the top. After all, I want to be around these kind of people because we know
these kind are the best kind. And when we start practicing these things in our
life, they make a different kind of life. A life of significance. A life that
leaves a mark.
The best news of all is that Jesus loves to
help people who are committed to living lives marked by these qualities. It’s
good news because we all need His help if we’re going to get very far!
