Don’t Draw the Line

I peer into the oven at a cake that won't rise, pretty sure I left out an essential ingredient. And as I wash dishes from last night’s dinner of chicken and crunchy rice (aka undercooked), I remember I left a bag of perishable groceries in my car overnight. Just one day removed from joyous, hope-filled worship, this trifecta of mishaps gives me the perfect opportunity to ponder what Easter has to do with my ordinary life.

Years ago, my daughter came home with a "Fifth Grade Blue Card." She started each week with 10 points and received a reward if she maintained them without deductions. As she pulled the card out of her folder, I noticed "Grace" instead of "Grade" in the bold heading. The stem of the letter d in Grade had faded, and the letter looked like a c instead.

As I studied the card, it struck me how slight is the difference between the words "Grade" and "Grace" in print. Just one little line, a mere downward stroke. Conceptually, though, grade and grace are complete opposites.

In the stem of the letter d which turns grace into grade, I see a yardstick which indicates how far I am from the person I want to be. I draw this line when I tell myself:

"You’re failing."

"You can't change."

Sometimes I wield that same stem of criticism against others, silently or aloud:

"What's wrong with you?"

"You'll never understand.”

Yet, the lines of Jesus’ cross stand in place of all the marks I hold against myself and others. As Amy Julia Becker says, “God brought Jesus back to life for all sorts of reasons starting with the big and important ones like vindicating Jesus’ life and his peaceful kingdom. But God also brought Jesus back to life so that he can live in us, so he can whisper to us on those rainy, cranky, not-feeling-holy-at-all days.”

I hear His whisper, “Don’t draw the line.”

A free, fully accepted life in Christ is not something we achieve through what we do or don’t do. We receive this freedom through what He has done. Jesus’ sacrifice and resurrection erase the line between grade and grace, between achieving and receiving, every single, ordinary, mundane day of the year.

I experience daily moments, of course, when the line could be drawn not for an inadvertent mishap but for a serious sin that I’ve committed out of anger, disobedience, pride, or selfishness. Even then, I know Jesus as the one whose fingers carved the Ten Commandments and whose fingers scribbled in the dirt when the Pharisees presented him with the woman caught in adultery. We don’t know what His fingers traced through the dirt, but we know for sure that it wasn’t a line of condemnation. If there was any grading that day, it was only for the Jewish leaders who had to acknowledge that they could throw no stones. When I recognize my sin for what it is, and realize that Jesus does too, what peace is mine to know I am forgiven and released to “go and sin no more” (John 8:11).

Truly, the same power that raised Jesus from the dead transforms us into receivers and releasers. God’s love satisfies and spills from us as grace to our people. Ephesians 1:20 tells us that resurrection power is alive in us, calling us to a glorious inheritance and the strength to believe and to love and to forgive on Easter Monday and all other Mondays. When we’re tempted to draw the line, may we receive and reflect the resurrection as a future promise and a present, daily declaration of our freedom and peace with God through Jesus Christ.

Jesus, thank You -

We're loved!

We're accepted!

We're chosen!

We're forgiven!

We're Yours!

You are Alive, Alleluia!

"We all get to choose where we set up the stage of our lives — before the Crowds, the Court, the Congregation, the Critics (inner or otherwise)-– or the Cross of Christ. All except One will assess your performance. Only One will accept you before your performance … Only in Jesus is there 100% acceptance before even 1% performance." - Ann Voskamp