Jan 23 - Isaiah 60:10

In my wrath I struck you down, but

in my favor I have had mercy on you.

Isaiah 60:10

In my source for scripture lessons, two verses are usually paired together. I’m glad that today had as it’s pair Hebrews 4:16 – “Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

There are four key words in Isaiah 60:10. I like two – favor and mercy. I don’t like the other two – striking-down and wrath.

With just the Old Testament – i.e. before the coming of Jesus – I can understand the world’s uncertainty toward God. There was … mercy and wrath … kindness and discipline … forgiveness and judgment.

It’s how I describe parents. In order to raise children of faith, hope, and character, good parents have to carefully calibrate law and gospel. They have to love passionately. They also have to discipline consistently. Too heavy a hand often crushes a child’s spirit. But it’s the parent who refuses to discipline who often cripples a child more. Half the criminals with whom I’ve worked say, “My mother is the greatest woman alive. She never raised her voice.” I cry silently inside – “I wish she had raised her voice.” (The other half of the criminals with whom I’ve worked tend talk about the violence of their father.) Yes, good parents carefully calibrate law and gospel.

“What tips the balance for the child,” I like to say, “is the grandparents. If the parents are doing their job, the grandparents get to be pure grace!” Have you ever heard a grandparent say, “I’m spoiling my grandchildren.” That’s grace! A parent that spoils their children is, in the long-run, not showing grace. They’re usually creating a self-centered brat! But if the parents are doing a good job with law and gospel, grace-filled grandparents tip the balance and complete the child’s faith, hope, and character.

Jesus tips the balance. God is a good father – indeed, the perfect Father! We can trust that he carefully calibrates law and gospel, mercy and discipline. But lest any human heart had any doubt about God’s true heart, Jesus tips the balance! He is the testimony of pure grace. “Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

In Christ’s Love,

a guy who’s nearing the end

of his law and gospel days as a parent

and can’t wait, in the next ten year,

for the pleasure of being the old guy

who gets to pour out pure grace!!!

(In fact, today’s my middle son’s 21^st birthday.

Happy Birthday, Jay!!!)