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Day 2: Jesus vs Santa

Romans 3:10-12, 20 "None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one...For by works of the law no human being will be justified in His sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin."

The Type of Jesus We Want

You better watch out. You better not cry. You better not pout, I'm tellin' you why. Santa Claus is coming to town. He sees you when you're sleeping. He knows when you're awake. He knows if you've been bad or good so be good for goodness sake!

I wonder how Paul might have reacted to that classic Christmas song. I wonder if he might have responded with Romans 3:10-20 to make sure we understood that no one can "be good for goodness sake". Unfortunately, this is how we often view Christ. We view him, as Sinclair Ferguson puts it in his book In Christ Alone, as some type of "Santa Christ".

"Santa Christ is sometimes a Pelagian Jesus. Like Santa, he simply asks us whether we have been good. More exactly, since the assumption is that we are all naturally good, Santa Christ asks us whether we have been 'good enough'." It is interesting that that when we have this type of view of Jesus that we change the standard. Deep down we know that there is a God and that we will have to answer to Him (Rom. 1:18-32). In order to soothe our conscience we attempt to make our own standards. We tell God how to judge us. And, typically, we love to say that the standard is something like we often hear today: "Well, it's the thought that counts."

Again, Ferguson is helpful here when he says, "Thus, Jesus' hand, like Santa's sack, opens only when we can give an upper-percentile answer to the none-too-weighty probe, 'Have you done your best this year?'" As long as we at least attempt something then we're good. Surely, God can't be mad at us because we tried!

No matter how "genuine" we might be (though I'm sure the Bible has some different opinions about how genuine we actually are) we still "fall short of the glory of God" (Rom. 3:23). 

 

The Type of Jesus We Need

Our situation in sin is so dire that God Himself had to come down. As Anselm said, "The debt was so great, that while man alone owed it, only God could pay it." Yes, God did so love the world but the question is when did He so love the world? Romans 5 says it was when we were "weak...ungodly...still sinners...enemies". 

The depravity in our hearts was so bad that we could not be saved unless God the Son took on flesh and "humiliated" Himself by coming to live amongst us sinners. This Jesus didn't come to give us a pep talk. He didn't come to be the next guru on self-esteem. He didn't come to give us 5 ways to a happier life. He came to live amongst us, teach to us, die for us, and rise for us. He came to be our substitute in life and in death. As Ferguson says, "It had to be thus, for He did not come merely to add something extra to life, but to deal with our spiritual insolvency and the debt of our sin."

No one gets persecuted because of getting advice from a self-help coach. Christians get persecuted because they tell people that they have been ignoring God all their life (Rom. 1:18-32), that they have played the part of the hypocrite (Rom. 2), that the totality of their being is depraved and wicked (Rom. 3:10-18), that not even their best works can earn their way to heaven (Rom. 3:19-20), that they need the works of Another who would also go and die a wrath-absorbing death in their place (Rom. 3:21-31), and that unless they trust in this Savior by faith alone (not adding any of their works) that they will have no hope of eternal life (Rom. 10). Yet, it is only when we believe in this Jesus that we will find what we long for so much.

 

The Type of Jesus For Lent

It is this Jesus, not the Santa Christ, that we need during this season. This Jesus saves us by grace rather than by works and this Jesus keeps us by grace rather than by works. As we draw one day closer to Easter, we must realize that Good Friday is also coming. There are many people who love to observe Easter but not Good Friday. We like to think about new life but not needed death. We love the happy mood and joyous "vibes" of Easter Sunday and we ignore the horror of Good Friday. But, the truth is that there is no good news on Easter unless there was bad news on Good Friday. There is no empty tomb unless three days before the skies turned black and midday. There is no freedom unless there was someone to set us free from bondage.

I do believe that if we understood this more then we would see Good Friday services much more attended than what we currently see today. Praise be to God that we don't have to "be good for goodness sake". Rather, because of the grace in Jesus Christ, we learn to repent from believing that we have to "be good for goodness sake". It is this grace in Jesus Christ that not only forgives us of our sins, clothes us in His righteousness, but also empowers us to live holy and upright lives in this world.