Pastor’s Corner: “Missing the Mark”
Read the first verse of Matthew’s gospel. Jesus knew David’s ways. He witnessed the adultery, winced at the murders, and grieved at the dishonesty. But David’s failures didn’t change Jesus’ relation to David. The initial verse of the first chapter of the first gospel calls Christ “the son of David” (Matt. 1:1 KJV). The title contains no disclaimers, explanations, or asterisks. I’d have added a footnote: “This connection in no way offers approval to David’s behavior.” No such words appear. David blew it. Jesus knew it. But he claimed David anyway.
He did for David what our Father’s did for my best friend and me. Back in our elementary school days when we were about six years old, my friend Daniel and I liked to throw rocks and dirt clods. We would compete to see who had a better arm, and more often than not my friend would win. One day we were playing in my friend’s back yard next to a ditch. We discovered what fun it was to throw dirt clods and mud against the wall of the next door neighbor’s home. We were captivated by the amazing design we were creating and how the mud and dirt would spray as it hit the wall. We did this over and over for about 15 minutes before reality set in and we realized what a mess we had created and how much trouble we would be in. How did we respond? We ran and hid, hoping that no one would notice (our standard mode of operation). Within a few hours our masterpiece was discovered and somehow the neighborhood knew immediately who the perpetrators were (apparently we had a reputation). Upon being confronted by the neighbor, we denied everything and threw each other under the bus. We disowned each other, we changed our last names and claimed to be a holiday visitors from Canada. Our fathers were nobler than us. As they talked with the neighbor, these words stood out: “Yes, they are our children.” “Yes, we’ll pay for their mistakes.” And they proceeded to scrub and clean up the mess we made.
Christ says the same about you. He knows you miss the mark. He knows you can’t pay for your mistakes. But he can. “God sent Jesus to take the punishment for our sins” (Rom. 3:25 NLT). Since he was sinless, he could. Since he loves you, he did. “This is real love. It is not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins” (1 John 4:10 NLT). He became one of us to redeem all of us. “Jesus, who makes people holy, and those who are made holy are from the same family. So he is not ashamed to call them his brothers and sisters” (Heb. 2:11 NCV).
He wasn’t ashamed of David. He isn’t ashamed of you. He calls you brother; he calls you sister. The question is, do you call him Savior?
In His Grace,
Pastor Hamilton