What Provo is Teaching Me (I)

This will probably come in two parts, one more 'theological' and one more personal. Or, this post will mutate into the sort of thing you give up on half way through...

For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.

2 Corinthians 5:21

We arrived back from Provo yesterday evening. Five days had flown by, and we came home with mixed feelings. I always want those sort of trips to be longer, i always leave feeling more burdened by what we didn't do that pleased with what we did. But we a lot for three days.

I shared with you before we left that Provo is overwhelmingly Mormon. In fact, soon Provo will be the only city in the world with two Mormon Temples. The Provo/Orem metropolitan area is literally bursting at the seems with Mormons. It's like the Bible belt on culty steroids. What is Mormonism, basically? From my far less than expert point of view, it seems that Mormonism can be summed up as a system whereby man aims to gain reward by pleasing God. This has some positive side effects. There's a great volunteer spirit in Provo, it's clean and public places are well looked after. We spent a morning picking up litter and weeding a popular running and biking trail, and didn't pick up a single fast food wrapper or beer can. But the (eternal) negatives obviously far outweigh the (temporal) positives.

I defined Mormonism as a system for man to please God. That doesn't sound like a bad thing does it? Evangelicals want to please God, no? I want, very much to please God today in my marriage and ministry. So what's the big deal? Well the big deal, Christianity is about what Jesus has done to please God, not what we must do to please God.

2 Corinthians 5:21 spells this out in slow motion. For our sake, that means, God did something for your benefit and mine that we couldn't do by ourselves. What did He do? He made Jesus to be sin. He counted to Jesus' account all the sins that we've committed today, and yesterday, and forever. And this was a big deal, because Jesus had never sinned. He is the spotless lamb, He is the true Israelite who has the law written on His heart. He is the High Priest in Melchizedek's order, He is the eternal Son of God. And His Father out all our sins on Him.

Why? What benefit does that give us? So that...we might become the righteousness of God. In the glorious economy of God the Father, He looks at you and me, and sees Jesus perfect righteousness. He doesn't see my sin, or your sin, His face doesn't flicker with anger as we approach Him, His mind doesn't weigh up whether or not our prayers deserve a hearing. We become the righteousness of God.  We approached our Father clothed in our blessed brother's robe, that we might receive a blessing from Him.

I missed out a part though. We don't become this righteousness by works. This righteousness comes in Him. In Him might be two of the most important words in the Bible. In Him, you and I are righteous. Not because we have pleased the Father, but because Jesus has. In Him, we have hope, not because we are worthy of merit, but because Jesus is. In Him, in Him, in Him!

Baptism doesn't save, vicarious baptism doesn't move relatives from Hell to Heaven. It's all in Him. We work out our salvation with fear and trembling, because we are in Him. We've been given precious treasure in pots of clay, not so that we can paint the outside of our pots but to show the surpassing power belongs to God! Not us! Not to us, only to Him.

Are you in Him? Are you connected by faith alone to Christ alone? Don't please your Father to earn His smile today, He smiles on you because of Christ, and this frees us to labour joyfully for His glory.