The Bad News

Speaking truth usually makes me feel free. But today the truth that sets me free could either put others on the track to freedom or could put them in a life-threatening, soul-threatening bind.

In a group of needy people, all of us in need of one another in our own brokenness and for our own growth, I said what for me brings life. "What if our lives shouldn't be lived according to rules?" Granted, I had been reading Romans approximately an hour before and was thinking in my head that we as Christians do not live by the law. Christ fulfilled the law so that we might be free. But what does that mean for those who may not know Christ?

They will be stuck with the bad news. We are law-breakers. No one wants to admit that and as a control freak I know that I can only admit that because the Bible tells me so. The cross proves that being a law-breaker is serious business.

For me, the bad news is bearable because I know that Christ has made gospel out of the terrible news. I am a lawbreaker. I am not perfect. I am broken. I am a sinner. How can one bear that burden of knowledge if they do not have a safe place to put their sin and sinful identity? Without being told the good news of Jesus one is left with the option of despair or throwing their hands up and saying well I can't stop sinning so I'll just do whatever I want.

Do you leave someone with the bad, but all too true news that we are sinners? Do we tell them that they can't live by rules--that it is unhealthy and that we weren't meant to live that way? Or do we leave them with the relatively blissful ignorance that they are in control and can have control?

Unfortunately, it seems that ultimately the "bad news" will get worse. As my professor says, one day Job will come. Our world of easy living and following simplistic rules will be challenged. Perhaps it is best to carve out a place for grace so that the bad news does not have to do all the plowing. Sometimes it is better to live with the truth, the horrible truth, before we can get to the hope of saving truth.