The Power of Losing
As a conclusion to my previous two posts I turn our attention to Jesus himself. How is he the answer to the initial question about what the gospel has to say about masculinity, and what does his parable about the prodigal tell us about him?
As I suggested in my first post about the Long Shadow of Joshua (as well as many other posts on our blog), the Bible contains two words in it and the proper distinction between them is the key to understanding what God has to say to us and how he operates in our lives. The first word of the law takes the form of a demand, a requirement, a “should” upon us humans. It’s conditional and generally says, “If you keep the law, then you will be blessed. And if you don’t keep the law, then you will be cursed.” God speaks to us first in this word to open our eyes to our true situation – to give us the correct view of ourselves and humanity, which theologically is known as a low anthropology. No, this is not the stylish store of women’s clothing and interior design. Anthropology is the study of humanity. We often think that because God demands something of us in scripture through the law, that automatically implies that we have the ability to do it (aka: a high anthropology), but that is not actually the case with the law. He does not speak it to us to make us righteous, but rather to show us our unrighteousness. Jesus sums up the law in his sermon on the mount – you must be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect (Matt. 5:48). You must be perfect, that’s the demand. And none of us are.
The word of the law is actually given to kill any notion of us being able to save ourselves – Paul uses that language in Romans 7:
“I once was alive apart from the law (meaning I thought I was doing great, I was following the rules, being a good person as far as I was concerned), BUT when the commandment came sin came alive and I died. The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me.” (v. 9-11, parenthetical mine and emphasis mine).
The second word of the gospel takes the form of a promise, a gift, a declaration. It is a simple word with unfathomable implications. It is not conditional at all and says, “Because of Jesus Christ, therefore you are forgiven.” “Because he lived and died for you therefore you are given new life. You are free.” As the hymn proclaims, “Because he lives I can face tomorrow. Because he lives all fear is gone.” This is the word he speaks to us to make us righteous, to give us faith. So whenever you read the Bible you are always to look for the promise. Find the promise.
The word of promise Jesus wants you to hear in his parable of the the prodigal is that he is the father. He is the recklessly generous father to us, his naturally self-righteous and rebellious children. This is how he approaches each of us in our fear and shame. He completely goes against the world’s understanding of strength to transform us from enemies of God into his children. Jesus lost for us. He did not grasp for power, but rather gave it up. We see it from the very beginning of his ministry that he is not going to fit the world’s view of a strong and courageous leader. We see it in his temptation. Satan tempted Jesus according to the world’s definition of strength and power. He tells Jesus to show off who he was. Show your power by turning these rocks into bread. Show how important you are by throwing yourself down from the top of the temple so that God’s armies of angels show up to protect you. Then bow to me, and I’ll give you all the power and glory of all the kingdoms in the world (Matt. 4). Jesus does the exact opposite.
The Temptation in the Wilderness by Briton Rivière 1898
He was a loser according to the world’s standards. He had moments and glimpses of what the world would call success, moments of strength: preaching to large crowds, miraculous signs of healing, feeding thousands with scraps, raising the dead, the triumphal entry, etc. BUT every time he found a way to ruin it as far as the world was concerned – he didn’t capitalize on his popularity and fame. Instead, he repeatedly said off-putting and confusing things like I have to suffer and die, and you’ve got to eat my body and drink my blood, and no one can come to me unless the Father draws him, which made most of his followers leave him (John 6). And in the end, he didn’t put up a fight against the religious leaders who arrested him, he didn’t even say a word in his defense to Herod or Pilate, and every single one of his friends abandoned him. He died a criminal’s death, executed on top of a trash heap outside of the city, ridiculed by the passersby. Jesus was a loser in every sense of the word in that moment on the cross. Philippians 2 says,
“though he was in the form of God, [He] did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross” (6-8).
He did all of this for us, FOR YOU – to absorb our shame. He lost for us to take all the things we are most embarrassed about, all the secrets we hide from the world, all the regrets we carry, all the wounds and scars, all our fear from us and make it all his own. He gave up his life for us. He knew that the world’s understanding of strength and power, Satan’s understanding of strength and power, was completely inadequate. It wasn’t the real answer to our real problem. Instead, what Jesus did was to take the ultimate weapon of the enemy, death itself, and use it against him. He went right into our greatest weakness, right into our greatest fear – the thing we have no power over – sin and death itself. And he depended on true power – the true power of faith in God the Father’s promise to raise him from the dead. The Father raised him up and together they (the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit) conquered all our greatest foes – sin, death, and Satan. And He silenced the accusation of the law that Satan used to shame us.
Romans 8 declares this awesome news perfectly: “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit” (v. 1-4, emphasis mine).
This is the great news for you and me – this is the answer to all our shame – “sin will have no dominion over you, for you are not under law, but under grace” (Romans 6:14). AND this leads us into what true strength and courage are in light of the gospel. True strength and courage for both men and women is faith. Dependence on Jesus and what he has done for us. It is not trying to avoid weakness or trying to deny or hide the fact that we are weak or afraid by projecting strength. Instead faith recognizes that Jesus is strong for us.
Paul gets very specific on this for us in his second letter to the Corinthians. He shares about his thorn in his flesh and says,
“Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (v9-10).
When I am weak, then I am strong. This is completely upside down according to the world. Jesus does not deny weakness or try to hide from it, but he walks right into our weakness with us, takes our weakness, and carries us through it by the power of his Holy Spirit. Faith in Jesus Christ and his completed work of forgiveness for us sets us free to boast in our weakness. The very things that the enemy would use against us – that he would try to shame us over with the law and condemn us, to try to drive us into the isolation of self-righteousness or running away into pleasure seeking self-destruction – those very things become our testimony! They become the areas in life where we experience and know the grace of Jesus Christ more than anywhere else. And we boast in them to others telling them how we have been met by Jesus there, how we have been loved and forgiven there.
The result is people hear the strength of Jesus. They hear that he is strong enough for them in their areas of shame – he is mighty to save – there is nothing too big for him to take, there is nothing that he hasn’t already conquered in his death and resurrection. That openness and vulnerability bears the awesome fruit of giving them the permission to open up and share about their pain, weakness, and shame. That word of promise brings something new to life – it makes them strong and courageous to share their weakness. This is how Jesus’ grace and forgiveness breaks the cycle of shame in our lives and in a community. True strength and courage is being vulnerable about our weakness. This is true masculinity, true humanity – depending on Jesus Christ.
As always, we work to create the space for this word of the gospel to bear fruit in your lives – we know the Holy Spirit is moving right now – he promises that his word never returns void – he is moving through his word to bring freedom. If you are dealing with shame we encourage you to find a safe person in your life (it may be a pastor, a counselor, or a friend) to share it with and receive prayer there. And if you can’t find anyone please reach out to us through our contact page and let us know who you’d like to connect with, Kate or me, and we will begin a conversation. Shame has no place to stay when the weakness is shared and no one runs out of the room, but rather stays right there with you in it and brings it to the Lord. He already knows it and has already forgiven it and is already working in that place right now. We know that’s true because you are reading this today. He brought you here to hear his word of forgiveness for you. You are forgiven in Christ for everything and nothing can change that. Let’s walk in faith together.
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