Last week Lara and I went to the NCAA final four practice. I can't explain why, but Lara has been a life-long Duke Basketball fan. When we started dating she even asked me if I had anything against Duke Basketball! That was her litmus test! This means that every March, Lara emotionally oscillates between extreme madness and pure jubilation depending on how Duke is playing.
Now typically she has a calm demeanor. But she gets so hyped during the games, our Schnauzers tremble in fear. This is a picture of their concerned faces reacting to the shrieking that occurred as Duke sealed their championship win...
Just to prove Lara is a lifelong Duke fan here is a picture of her getting Christian Laettner's autograph as a teenager! This is before he ever became a college sport's icon. Understand, this moment is all I have heard about after nearly twenty years of marriage. Not the moment she met Jon Morrissette, but Christian Laettner!
So the mission last week was to go to Indianapolis and get this 24 year old photo autographed by her teenage hero. Here is a picture of our mission being accomplished! As we stood in line, Lara observed a devilish, plotting, grin sweep across my face, and she began begging, "Don't embarrass me... please don't embarrass me." But what could be more embarrassing than being a Duke Basketball fan?
The Bible tells us that one day we will stand before the throne of God. What do you imagine that will be like? How would you ever prepare to meet God face to face? Will it be like getting your superstar's autograph? Will it be like going over to grandpa's house at Christmas?
I think of the first time Moses met God. Do you remember the story? How God appeared in a burning bush? At first Moses thought, "How Cool! A bush that's on fire that's not burning up." But as he took his first step, God warned, "Do no not come any closer, take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground." The Bible says, "Moses hid his face, because he was afraid to look to God." (Exodus 3:4-6)
Later, when God visited Mount Sinai, and was about to give Moses the Ten Commandments, he told Moses, "I am going to come to you in a dense cloud, so that the people will hear me speaking with you and will always put their trust in you." But in preparation, the people are to "be consecrated", to "have their clothes washed." The Lord also said to Moses, "Go down and warn the people so they do not force their way through to see the Lord and many of them perish..." (Exodus 19:10-12, 16-19, 21).
Whenever we go to Nascar races, there is the meek and mild way of not getting autographs... but then there is the George Castanza method everyone else uses, where you brazenly force your way to the front of the line! Our approach to God isn't to be like our approach to men.
Hebrews 12:28-29 says, ". . . let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire." You don't run into God's presence, any more than you'd run into a fire. We're to approach God on his terms, with a sense of gratitude, reverence and awe. But thankful for what? Revering what? In awe of what or whom? Is God just a slob like one of us (thank you Joan Osborne), or is He altogether different? Is God not Holy, and Righteous, and Good?
At the Morrissette household you hear yelling some mornings. Whenever we let our dogs in, they always want to jump up on us. Nothing screams "clean" like that muddy mixture of dirt and dog manure clogged between their claws! They don't any different! Shouting "Muddy Feet! Muddy Feet!" is our way of warning them that they cannot jump on us, or dwell in our house, until their feet are cleaned.
As much as we want to jump up on God, and rush into his presence, we have to respect the reality that He is holy, righteous, and good... and that even though your righteousness passes your personal standards, or cultural standards, it may not pass God's standards! Isaiah 64:6, "All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away."
A verse that ought to give us pause is Romans 14:10-12, ". . . For we will all stand before God's judgment seat. It is written, ‘As surely as I live,' says the Lord, ‘every knee will bow before me; every tongue will confess to God.' So then, each of us will give an account of himself to God." Think what it will be like to give an account of yourself before God! Hebrews 4:13 says, "Nothing in all creation is hidden from God's sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account." Wow! We'll have to give an account? Nothing will be hidden?
There are definitely some wrong ways to approach God...
A wrong way to approach God is congratulating ourselves before Him
An example of bolstering ourselves can be found in Luke 18:9-12. "To some who were confident of their righteous and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable, "Two men went up to the temple, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: "God, I thank you that I am not like other men--robbers, evildoers, adulterers--or even like this tax-collector. I fast twice a week and a given a tenth of all I get."
We'll get to the tax-collector in a moment. But do you think there are still self-righteous, self-congratulating Pharisees in the church today? You bet there are! The Apostle Paul was a self-righteous Pharisee. In Philippians 3:4-6 he says, "If anyone else thinks he has reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the Law, a Pharisee; as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for legalistic righteousness, faultless."
Don't fool yourself. We all have a litmus test of what a good Christian is... and every one of us passes our own litmus test. I fast. I pray. I tithe. I've been water baptized. I'm not a murderer, adulterer, divorcer, liar, hater. . . And then there's the boast just about everyone makes these days, "Hey, I'm a good person..."
Before you congratulate yourself before God, keep Matthew 5:20 in mind where Jesus says, "I tell you the truth that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of God." Keep Matthew 5:48 in mind, "Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect." Keep James 2:10 in mind, "For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it."
In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus shatters our illusion of self-righteousness. The standard isn't do not Murder, it's also be not angry. It's not do not commit Adultery, its do not look lustfully on another human being, its no pornography, no coveting the neighbors wife, etc. It's not just divorcing, its inciting, provoking, divorce. It's not just love, its loving your enemy, doing good to your enemies, forgiving 70x7. It's not just love, its loving God with ALL your heart, ALL your mind, ALL your strength, and ALL your soul, and loving your neighbor as yourself.
You think your clean, but your only clean if God says your clean. Muddy Feet!!
A wrong way to approach God is justifying ourselves before Him
So, a lot of people realize they have sinned, but they think they're excused because they're sin had a context. Adam and Eve were given the same commandment, but when Adam got caught his justification was, "the woman made me do it!" And when God put the spotlight on Eve, her justification was, "the devil made me do it!"
The dictionary definition of "excuse" is "to make allowance for a short-coming; to overlook; to serve as justification for; to vindicate." When we're justifying ourselves we're often judging somebody else. "I screwed up because there is somebody out there worse than me." The devil made me do it, my wife, my kids, my brother, my friends, the peer pressure, my genes, the government...
In Romans 2:1, 3 says, "You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge the other, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things." ... "So when you, a mere man, pass judgment on them and yet do the same things, do you think you will escape God's judgment?" Excuses don't matter when reality is, "Muddy Feet! Muddy Feet!"
A wrong way to approach God is diminishing ourselves before Him
When the Pharisee stood there praying, congratulating himself, Jesus tells us there was a tax collector who stood at a distance. "He could not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, "God have mercy on me, a sinner." In the parable Jesus is actually commending the Tax Collector because he humbled himself before God.
Jesus says, "I tell you that this man, rather than the [Pharisee], went home justified before God. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted." (Luke 18:13-14)
There is a fine line between "humbling" ourselves (which is the right way to approach God) and "diminishing" ourselves, which is yet another wrong way to approach God. Whenever I shout "muddy feet" at our dogs, they humble themselves. They lower their heads, approach cautiously, and submit to a good old foot washing! The pups know that their welcome into our house, but only after their washed!
This is what the Apostle Peter was faced with in the upper room, on the eve of Christ's death. Jesus began washing the disciple's feet, and drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him. As Jesus comes to Peter, Peter says, "Lord, you shall never wash my feet." But Jesus tells Peter, "unless I wash your feet, you have no part with me." So Peter was like, "ah... don't just wash my feet, wash my head as well, wash my whole body!" Peter could be a little over eager! But Jesus says, "A person who has had a bath needs only to wash his feet; his whole body is clean." (John 13)
When you have humility, you understand that God loves you, and wants you to have part in his life, and wants to welcome you into his kingdom. But you also understand that your muddy feet have to be dealt with for that to happen. Humility would have you accept whatever provision God has made.
Contrast Peter's response to Jesus in the upper room with Peter's response when Jesus first called Peter to follow him. In Luke 4:8, Peter falls on his knees and says, "Go away from me Lord, I am a sinful man!" In other words, "I'm so screwed up and stuck there's no hope for me. I'm a lost cause. I'm a poor-old, worthless fisherman. No way God could love me. No way God could use me." It isn't just pride that can keep you from God... it's also an exaggerated sense of shame, guilt, self-contempt, self-loathing, self-hatred.
You see, a humble person understands their value to God despite their sin. The Tax Collector beat his breast, and cried out to God, but he knew he had value to God, so instead of self-congratulating himself... instead of justifying his life of sin... instead of diminishing himself... the Tax Collector humbled himself before God!
Think of when you were a baby, and your momma told you to take a bath, and be sure to wash behind your ears. It's for love that your momma wished you to be clean. Just because you have a bunch of dirty skum behind your ears doesn't mean your nothing but a dirty skum! Dirty skum means one thing and one thing only... it means you need to be washed! So be washed!
So what if your "righteous acts are like filthy rags." Be washed! In Acts 22:16, Paul tells a group of believers, "What are you waiting for? Get up, be baptized and wash your sins away, calling on his name." Acts 2:38, "Repent and be baptized everyone of you, for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit."
In Galatians 3:26-27 Paul says, "You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ."
Ah muddy feet. God says, "Here, let me wash away your sin."
Ah, your righteousness is like filthy rags. God says, "No problem. Here, let me wash you and clothe you with Christ's perfect righteousness! Let me do for you what you cannot do for yourself. Let me make you holy and blameless, without spot and blemish, fully presentable and acceptable in my sight"
Humility says, "Yes Lord... Yes Lord!"
A right way to approach God is humbling ourselves before Him.
Hebrews 12:28-29 says, ". . . let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire."
Some of you have been trying to clean yourself up an awful long time. But no matter how hard you scrub, you've been stuck with muddy feet. God told Moses to take off his shoes. He told the Israelites to be consecrated, and to wash their clothes. God invites us to be baptized... that we too may be washed and forgiven of our sins... that we might set aside our filthy garments and be clothed with his righteousness...
So what will it be? Go away from me Lord I'm a sinful person.... Or Yes Lord! Yes Lord! Have mercy upon me, a sinner. You are a son of God by faith. Don't doubt how much God loves you... but don't refuse his baptism and washing either!