WHICH LENS?

“I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe….” Ephesians 1:18-19

Recently I have been working with a concept that has proven to be an incredibly helpful tool for me, not only in my study of Scripture, but in my life in general, and I want to share it with you in the hope that it will be useful for you as well.  Although I have made it my own, the idea is as old as Scripture and has been expressed in many ways by many others over the centuries.

I maintain that we view all of life – our circumstances, friendships, love relationships, the authority figures in our lives and even God and Scripture – through one of two lenses, which I have called Action/Consequence and Death/Resurrection.  Let me explain what I mean.

I see Action/Consequence as being our natural, default way of viewing the world. ‘If I do this, I will get that.’ ‘If you do this, in relation to me, you will get that.’  Consequences, of course, can be either positive or negative.  For example, if I’m nice, people will like me.  If you’re a jerk to me, you will not like how I am to you.  If I work hard, my boss will notice me.  If I slack off, my boss will notice me, too, but in a different way!

The Action/Consequence model, then, is about my expectations; about what I believe I deserve in response to my actions, based on my perception of justice or fairness.  Someone once told me that we were created to live in a perfect world, but all that remains is our expectation of it in relation to ourselves.  When I put forth a positive effort, my expectation is that I will be rewarded.  If I am not rewarded, I feel that I have not been treated fairly. I do not, however, necessarily have that same sense of fairness when it comes to rewarding your positive actions; but, if your actions negatively impact me in some way, I do have a strong sense of justice in regard to the punishment I think you should receive!

Because this is our natural way of viewing the world, it is also our default way of understanding religion.  When Action/Consequence is applied to religion it will always be about me and my doing – ‘If I do this, I will receive that.’  We see this in all world religions.  When it is applied to Christianity it says, ‘If I do this/don’t do this, I will go to heaven.  If I do this/don’t do this, I will go to hell.  If we believe that we are the ones going to heaven, we will have feelings of self-righteousness and superiority.  We will look down on and judge those we feel are not living in a way that is worthy of heaven, or at least as worthy as we are.  On the other hand, if we want to go to heaven, but believe we are the ones deserving of hell, we will live in fear, despair, guilt and shame.  Both groups operate under the assumption that their salvation is won or lost based upon their actions.

Sadly, many churches which call themselves Christian, under the guise of honoring God, preach only the message of Action/Consequence.  You will hear merely a sentence or two in passing about Jesus; the idea of his dying for our sins is used only as a springboard for the real emphasis, which is about me and what I am to do.

Action/Consequence is Me centered.  It focuses on what I can achieve or gain.  It compares and competes, judges and condemns; it is tit for tat, eye for an eye, dog eat dog; it seeks gratification, recognition, glory, honor and praise for me, even at the expense of others.

The second way of viewing the world is Death/Resurrection.  This way of thinking is not natural to us; in fact, it is so completely counter intuitive that it seems upside down and backwards to the way we naturally think.  It is a point of view that comes only through the ministry of the Holy Spirit, and without his help we quickly lose the concept and revert to Action/Consequence thinking.  Whereas Action/Consequence applies to everything in life, and therefore extends to religion; the Death/Resurrection concept applies first to our understanding of our relationship to God, and then extends to our view of everything else in our lives. 

Death/Resurrection has nothing to do with my actions and achievements; it is all and only about the actions of someone else on my behalf:  ‘Because of what Jesus did for me, I will live.’

To illustrate what I mean, I refer you to the book of Ephesians, Chapter 2, verses 1-10.  Verse 1 begins, “As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world….”  First of all, what does Paul say was our condition?  Pretty sick?  Nearly dead? No, we were dead; no sign of life. When you are dead, how much can you do to save yourself?  The only hope for a dead person is resurrection, and that certainly must come from a source outside of you.

Secondly, when does Paul say we were dead?  When we “followed the ways of this world”.  Of course, “the ways of this world” can mean the list of sinful acts our minds go to when we read verses like this, or those words can refer to the default ‘way’ of the world—described as Action/Consequence above.

Verse 3 continues, “All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts.” Again, the cravings, desires and thoughts of our sinful natures are for our own gratification, recognition, glory, honor and praise. 

Then verse 3 goes on to say, “Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath”.  Along with everyone else, we deserved God’s punishment, or his wrath, to be poured out on us; not so much because of our sinful acts, but rather due to the fallen nature from which those acts came.

To sum up our condition as described in verses 1-3, we were dead, waiting for God’s final judgment, condemnation and wrath, with no ability to help ourselves in any way; a seemingly hopeless situation!

Thankfully, the passage continues in verses 4 and 5, “But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved.” That is the heart of Death/Resurrection! Because of God’s love, and God’s love alone, we were dead and then made alive with Christ!

The next verses explain more fully what God actually did for us, and why he did it, verse 6, “And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus…” Where are we already seated as a result of having been raised with Christ? With him in heaven!   As surely as you’re seated on your couch or chair at this moment, in Christ, you are already seated in heaven!  Not because you earned the right or deserved to be there, since you were dead and unable to do anything, but simply because of God’s great love and mercy!

 And, why did he do this for us? Verse 7 says, “…in order that, in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus.”  Action/Consequence thinking would expect the verse to say he raised us up so that we could do something in return for his kindness; but, instead, it says God raised us up so that he, for all of the coming ages, could show the incomparable riches of his grace to us! Instead of telling us what he expects us to do for him, he tells us that he has only begun to shower us with his incredible riches!

In verses 8 and 9, Paul makes sure that we understand there is no room for us to claim we have earned any of this; he says again, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast.” 

In the Death/Resurrection model, God is clearly the only one who deserves glory! We must come to realize that we, and all of humanity, are on the same level playing field; we are all alike in our unworthiness and need.  There is no basis for comparing and competing, judging and condemning. Whatever we have, we have received as a gift. We bring nothing to the table but our need, and who would brag about that?

I know some of you are uncomfortably asking, ‘Isn’t there anything that I’m supposed to do?’ Let’s look carefully at the end of verse 9 and then verse 10 to see how Paul addresses that issue, “…not by works so that no one can boast. For we are God’s workmanship…”  We have nothing to boast about because we are God’s workmanship.  We are not our own workmanship. We are not intended to be self-made men and women who must pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps! 

Verse 10 goes on to say, “…we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus…” In this Death/Resurrection status we are being created, by God.  We do not create ourselves; He creates us.  And how is he fashioning us, creating us? By firmly grounding us in the truth that everything we need, he has already done for us through his son, Jesus Christ!  As we humbly begin to accept and believe this incredible truth, our hearts respond with a gratitude and love that cannot be contained.  God then reveals to us his plan-- for us “to do good works which God prepared in advance for us to do.”  God has carefully and thoughtfully planned ways for each of us to share, with our neighbor, our humble, grateful love; not to earn God’s favor but because of his favor!

Because we are human, our initial way of viewing things will always be Action/Consequence.  My hope is that, by understanding and acknowledging this, we will learn to pause and allow the Holy Spirit to change our lens.