Finish Lines

I make a motion that we convert all our “deadlines” to “finish lines.” “Deadline” just seems so negative. While I understand there must be some cutoff point to projects, I feel like “finish line” insinuates successful completion. On the other hand, “deadline” conjures up images of hyper-caffeinated college students staring bleary-eyed at their computers trying to create coherent sentences at 3:00am. And no, this is thankfully not me at the moment…

Last night, Jason talked about an article he’s writing that got me to thinking about lines in general. We tell people to “get in line.” There’s the line between good and evil, lines we draw in the sand, lines we’re towing, grocery lines, gas lines, quotable lines, pick-up lines… you get the picture.

Then a certain Scripture passage that used to freak me out came to mind. Matthew 7:21-23 talks about some people who die and meet Jesus. They come to him with various lines as to why they should be allowed into heaven: “Hey Lord, Lord! I prophesied in your name!” “Lord Jesus, I cast out demons in your name!” “Hey, in your name I even performed miracles!”

Those sound like some pretty impressive lines. Great people doing great shiny stuff in the name of Jesus. But there’s a big difference between slapping the name of Jesus on some good deed and walking in an obedient relationship with Him. For all their glimmering religious resumes, Jesus turns to these fellas and says, “I never knew you. Depart from me, you who practice lawlessness.”

Ouch. These prim and proper so-called saints based their eternal hope on how well they could perform, not on knowing the Savior. In verse 21, Jesus says, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in Heaven will enter.”

Jesus then talks about the wisdom of people who hear His words and act on them - a.k.a. faith. In John’s gospel (6:29b & 40), Jesus spells out the will of God even further: “This is the work of God, that you believe in Him who He has sent… For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him will have eternal life, and I Myself will raise him up on the last day.”

So, in other words, it’s not my faithfulness to God, my ability to keep the rules, or my accomplishing really great Christian stuff that enables me to know Jesus or gets me into heaven.

Rather, it’s God’s faithfulness to me, His Spirit freeing me from my condemned sinful nature, and His grace that I don’t deserve and can’t earn that saves me. It’s looking to the perfect, dead, and raised person of Christ for my spiritual sufficiency. It’s not believing in myself to be a good person, it’s believing in Christ - the only perfect person to make me right with God. And once I’m connected to Him in relationship, then He can empower me to do the whole obedience thing.

And if I’m His, I can be confident that my life’s deadline will truly be a finish line.