This week, I scored a major orange sticker deal:
That's right folks. Your computer isn't broken, your eyesight isn't failing you, you are looking at a 2 for 1 sticker on a bag of these bad boys right here:
Mrs. May's all natural crispy veggie chips, retail price $4.64 and not.even.expired. I think I bought six bags. I lined them up when I got home and felt like I robbed a bank. I am the deal BOSS. Take a look at my fitty cent chips (great deals bring out my inner rap-star).
All week long I talked about these chips. I may have opened my pantry and shown them to you. I may have given you a bag. I read the ingredients to several unsuspecting friends and told people on the phone so they too could be rollin' in vacuum-fried goodness (I didn't even know that was a real thing).
One day, closing my pantry door, it hit me hard. When is the last time I have been this excited about the good news of Jesus?
The King of the Universe comes down, sacrifices himself for me, makes things right between God and me, and covers me in his righteousness, and I preach the Gospel of veggie chips? Really?
As I've been reflecting on why this is, here's what's struck me: I don't talk about the good news because it isn't news. Not if you're already a good girl.
If I'm being pretty honest, most days I think I'm pretty awesome. I mean, I have a couple of sponsor kids; I remember people's birthdays; I'm a pretty darn good cook. Heck, I even recycle. I've even written to teens in jail so I could feel a little better about that Matthew 25 part where the sheep who get in visited the least of these in prison.
Sure, I lose my cool, waste my time, turn up my nose, and turn my back, but it isn't really my fault. I'm just tired or usually, reacting to whatever sin you're unfortunate to have still hanging around your life.
You see, when you think you're a good girl, a good person, the news that a Savior had to come and save us from our sick, sinful selves feels distant, inconsequential, like a radio blurb of a plane crash of the coast of Bahrain. Veggie chips, how hard it is to be a mom, the latest movie I liked, the way I was slighted or taken for granted, these become my gospel because they feel more newsworthy. They are more relevant because there's so little need for Jesus in my life.
It's like flashing a smile, thinking Wow, I look amazing, with a huge piece of spinach in your teeth. Only a billion times, cosmically worse.
Isaiah 64:6 tells me that "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."
In the original language, "filthy rags" meant menstrual rags. Nasty.
Or this story, from Zechariah 3:
"Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan standing at his right side to accuse him. The Lord said to Satan, “The Lord rebuke you, Satan! The Lord, who has chosen Jerusalem, rebuke you! Is not this man a burning stick snatched from the fire?" Now Joshua was dressed in filthy clothes as he stood before the angel. The angel said to those who were standing before him, “Take off his filthy clothes.”
Joshua was the high priest, only-hope representative of an entire nation. He was in the holy of holies, the most sacred place in the temple. He would have done a purification ritual in front of crowds to even get there.
In the original language, "filthy clothes" meant excrement. Nasty.
If I am to maintain that I am a good girl, I'm going to have to do some Thomas-Jefferson-style Bible reading and cut out the verses I just read. Sorry to be graphic here, but I'm a mom and God already went there: God is comparing the most wonderful things I can do, the state of the holiest person a nation knew to bloody cloths and poop-smeared robes. If that is who I am at the core of my being, then Jesus drawing near becomes the most precious and beautiful news I have ever heard or can ever tell.
A Savior is only on your lips if you realize how dirty and desperate is your heart.
The Bible is full of those who did realize: a woman who was forgiven much pouring perfume because she was loved. The sick and blind and lame who followed Jesus because they knew there was God-power flowing through nerves and sinews that no one else would touch. The sin sick who knew they needed a doctor. These could not keep quiet.
And neither will I.
All week long I want to talk about how I deserved punishment and got the chance to be God's forgiven daughter instead.
I want to open the door to my heart and say, "Come and see." I struggle with pride and wanting to be worshiped, but Jesus, who had every right to be worshiped, is helping me to be gentle and to serve my family and friends.
I want to give you the details of how I used to be blood-boiling angry but how Jesus, who had every right to be angry chose to breathe forgiveness through clotted blood. He is teaching me to see others through eyes of compassion.
I want to read the ingredients of this sin-ridden heart to my unsuspecting friends so they will know that the only thing good in me is Jesus.
Come on over and let me tell you the news that Love Has Come. I might even have some veggie chips on hand to share.