By: W.L. Boone/ACMTC
[EMPHASIS/PUNCT. ADDED]
WE ARE GOING to have to come to the realization THAT GREATNESS WITH GOD IS NOT OUR UNDERSTANDING OF IT AT ALL. We will not only have to change our definition of greatness, BUT ACTUALLY DEVELOP AN ENTIRE NEW SET OF MEASUREMENTS. This is a powerful concept! The measurements of grace are as unique as they are wonderful! The greatness of humankind is in conflict with God’s greatness. Take the reference of Jesus about humility for an example.
We are raised from childhood with the teaching that meekness is weakness and humility is wimpishness. Listed here are some startling realizations, God is intrinsically an humble Being. The universe is literally filled from end to end with humble beings. Arrogance and pride are peculiar to the earth and its inhabitants. Sin is the result of pride (See Ezekiel 28:17)…
You see, the reason why we initially reject the concept of God’s humility is that WE EQUATE TRUE HUMILITY WITH EARTH’S (THUS SOCIETY’S) CONCEPT OF IT, WHICH IS NON-AGGRESSIVE, NON-CONFRONTATIONAL, FEARFUL, FLACCID, WEAK, DOCILE, AND WIMPY. NOTHING COULD BE MORE ERRONEOUS, and Jesus was directly trying to correct such an error. I urge us to take a long look at our Savior when we are inclined to equate true humility with fearfulness or weakness or non-confrontation.
Jesus seemed to be always “in the faces” of the hypocrites and religious liars. Jesus stood “toe to toe” with them and named their infamous pedigrees without a hint of fearfulness. HIS STINGING, INFLAMMATORY JUDGMENTS of their veiled, empty hypocrisies were anything but weak and wimpy! I have emotionally preached for a lifetime that Jesus Christ was a man among men, and have vigorously rejected an effeminate, sallow, acquiescent, stoop-shouldered, “tiptoe-through-the-tulips” wimpy kind of a Lord and Savior!
Jesus always stood up for what was right, and good, and holy, and proper, and virtuous, AND NO MAN OR WOMAN CAN DO THAT IN WEAKNESS, AND FEAR, AND TREPIDATION!! Our Lord’s self-description ought to quell any contrary voice relating to His intrinsic humility; [this] is established in His statement in Matthew 11:29: “I am meek and lowly in heart…”
There is no conflict with humility and all other good in God or redeemed mankind. True humility is compatible with all other good. The intrinsic meekness of Jesus did not suffer at all as He excoriated the duplicity of the Pharisees. The lowliness of Jesus did not depreciate at all as He hammered the unbelievers of Capernaum. The humility of Jesus was not abandoned as He drove out the crooks from the temple.
WE HAVE TO CHANGE OUR MINDS ABOUT MEEKNESS BEING WEAKNESS, AND LOWLINESS BEING NON-ASSERTIVE, AND HUMILITY BEING NON-CONFRONTATIONAL [Emphasis the author’s]. Greatness with God is not merely the opposite from our ideas about it — it is different…
That is a major reason for a Great White Throne judgment before God. (See The Revelation 20:11). God will call every human being into one, vast judgment arena TO MAKE RIGHT ALL WRONGS. God’s judgment throne is not primarily “to give those beggars what is coming to them,” or is it a Divine, gleeful pronouncement of damnation to the disbelieving and disobedient. IT IS PRIMARILY THE MAINTENANCE OF THE RIGHT. Everything within and about the character of God is right and true and genuine…
We have to see that everything about Who and what God is, IS A FACT, and the recognition of it does not validate it; it only proclaims it. Who He is, is intact whether we choose to believe it or not. The point of all this rationale is that GREATNESS WITH GOD AND BEFORE GOD DOES NOT PRIMARILY INVOLVE POSITION AND ACCLAIM FOR HIMSELF OR ANY OTHER BEING. That God, or any other being He has created, is acclaimed or honored to any degree HAS TO DO WITH THE ACTUAL CHARACTER AND NATURE OF BEING, or beings.
In heaven there will be nothing hidden or unknown. Heaven is a transparency. Did you catch that truth in The Revelation 21:27? that (in heaven) “…there shall in no wise enter into it anything that…maketh a lie…”? There will be no deceit, no ambiguity, no ulteriority, no innuendo, no subterfuge, no hidden meanings, NOTHING FAKE OR SHAM OR UNREAL! Such truth should make any thinking person homesick for heaven, when every inhabitant will be exactly who and what they really are and not what is thought or supposed to be. Praise the Lord!…
The only imaginable reason why God would give so much that cost Him so much is because of His grace. (He is a Person Who WANTS to give something—valuable and precious and wonderful to another person.) All we have to do is think of the person we love the most and how much we nearly burst with desire to give them gifts and do things for them. We can’t even put into words the deep, moving feelings of desire and love and devotion we have for them.
You see, grace doesn’t measure or weigh in cost. Results don’t figure into the nature of grace. Grace has no motive. God didn’t calculate the cost of mankind. He simply WANTED to share Himself. The final reason why GOD’S GRACE IS SO AMAZING IS THAT HE INTENDS FOR US TO MANIFEST IT IN OUR LIVES AND BY OUR CONDUCT. The plan is for us to be small replicas of His grace. He wants to change our naturally selfish attitudes, and absorb our thinking, and saturate our purposes so consistently that we will find ourselves functioning in gracious ways towards others.
A person can be good, but fail to be gracious. One can be loyal and genuine, but not gracious. We may live a lifetime of integrity and lack this grace. Some people can be consistently proper, and socially accurate, and miss entirely the beauty of graciousness…Is it possible to give and give and give as God does? Can we actually live in an atmosphere of caring and doing for others? Isn’t that too high of a standard? Doesn’t that ask too much? Isn’t that unrealistic? Not at all if we are OF and IN His grace. The surprise would be if it did not work that way.
THE FACT IS THAT IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO BE OF HIM AND NOT BE LIKE HIM. We become like what or whom we hang around. How quickly we acquire the idioms and voice inflections and gesticulations of those we admire and spend large amounts of time with. Chips off of the old block, so to speak. We pattern our heroes and we imitate their ways. We acclimate to our environment. Even so, any person who hangs around God’s wonderful grace takes on the same.