Spilled Milk/ Freely Justified

Our small world was not secure, disturbed by unhappiness at home, and finally divorce. My older sister and I had our maternal grandmother, our Granny, who for a few years was saddled with the daily care of us (and didn't really seem to mind). One day, waiting at her house for our mother to pick us up after her workday, a fiendish plot developed in my mind. As the time grew near for her to arrive, I asked Granny for a cup of milk. She poured one for me. I held it til my mother arrived. Then with impeccable timing, the moment she walked into the house and into the kitchen where I stood waiting, I turned the cup upside down and deliberately dumped that cold, white milk all over my Granny's clean kitchen floor.

I remembered that maneuver recently as I am trying to think, more deeply, maybe, than before, what it means that I've been justified before God by one act of righteousness, that act of the one Man, Jesus Christ: namely, his death on the Cross for sinners. Grace reigned through that righteous accomplishment, a grace that leads to eternal life. When he acted for me in this way, I didn't know him... I didn't even care about him. Yet he died for me and through that sacrifice, has reconciled me to God. No goodness of mine could have accomplished this right standing with God, for all my goodness was no better than filthy rags in his sight. He has attached no strings to this gift of complete and utter reconciliation with himself. I don't have to perform, I cannot perform... he did all the performing, all the accomplishing. I've been justified, made right with God, by his sheer grace, alone. And that same grace has removed every shred of condemnation for every misdeed, now and forever.

Maybe a child's act of dumping milk on the floor before a poor mom's tired, astonished face illustrates the need for such grace. Maybe I was being bad to see if someone else's good could overcome the wickedness I was hatching in my heart. (Maybe I was just being bad!) In any case, moms and Grannies are only human, and imperfect. But perfect God came in the flesh, that one Man, and did what no one else could do.

"For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person--though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die--but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life" (Romans 5:6-10).

I need to understand this grace much better, for there is still the immature girl in me, lacking a grasp on the hugeness, the implications of God's one-sided, unilateral act through his Son of rescuing and justifying me, a real sinner; reconciling me, truly and forever, to his good and holy Self. I still want to dabble in guilt over spilled milk. But reading slowly and thoughtfully through Romans 4-8 (with help and encouragement from the good Doctor) is making me think better of it.

Lloyd-Jones on Preaching

"Now this is the very opposite of inviting people to a quest or to a search. That idea has always been popular; this notion that a Christian is someone who is seeking and searching; someone who sets out on a journey into this vast unexplored expanse of truth. What is a Christian? "Well," people say, "Christians are men and women who do not just spend their time eating and drinking and indulging their passions. They are intelligent people and they set out in the search for truth and oh, it is thrilling; it is wonderful! The uncharted ocean, the promised land, the unknown; and off you set, with this thrill and excitement on the quest for truth." This has always been very popular. People like the idea; it appeals to their spirit of adventure and there have been those who have not hesitated to say this. Their criticism of our evangelical gospel has always been that it is too certain and too dogmatic.

The poets like saying this sort of thing, do they not? They of all people, have generally fooled themselves better than others-- "to travel hopefully is better than to arrive!" says one of them.

But life is not a game; it is not a play; it is not just play-acting. Oh, life is serious and solemn; it is real and it is earnest. And that is the sort of life of the world that we find ourselves in today. So I thank God that as I look at this, I am not invited to some great experiment or to some great search or question or journey of exploration. In the midst of my failure in life, with my heart breaking and my soul bleeding, and as I am almost giving up in despair, I suddenly hear a bugle call or a trumpet sounding, and I say, What is that? And, thank God, I hear an authoritative proclamation; I hear a man saying, "Listen, I am a herald, I have a message from the Imperial Palace; I announce to you." "Preaching!"...

But let me translate that into simpler, more ordinary language. My task [as a preacher] is to tell you that the answer to all your questions is in this one book, the Bible. If I am a herald (and, thank God, unworthy though I am, that is what I am) I am not here to tell you my theories and my ideas about life, for they are no better than yours. No, I have been given a message from the Imperial Palace and here it is. And I am here to tell you with authority, with the authority of God, that all your questions have already been answered and all your problems have already been solved. You have but to listen to this preaching, this proclamation, and you will find peace and rest for your soul.

And if you should be asked to pass from time to eternity today, you will know where you are going; you will not be alone; you will be able to say with the Apostle Paul, "I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day" (2 Timothy 1:12). Thank God for preaching--proclamation, authoritative pronouncement!"


excerpts, The Kingdom of God by Martyn Lloyd-Jones, pgs. 12-14