We all have different things that are easy for us and other things that are hard. #MathIsHard has become a slogan of sorts at my work because of our beloved leader’s propensity for computation errors. But for some people (thanks be to God!) math is easy… fun even.
In listening to Leviticus this month, I kept concluding that following the law must have been hard. But this morning I heard this passage from Leviticus 24:19-20 that made me think maybe I had been looking at it the wrong way.
Anyone who injures their neighbor is to be injured in the same manner: fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth. The one who has inflicted the injury must suffer the same injury.
Folks, that is easy. It makes sense. You punch me, I punch you. It is very clear and easy to understand. in fact much of the law makes a lot of logical sense. It is always consistent, always “fair”, and there is no room for any grey in it. That’s easy.
Now check out these words from Jesus in Matthew 5:38-39:
You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also."
Now that’s hard. Harder than obeying a set of rules, is offering grace and mercy, gentleness, patience. Human nature gravitates toward a law that says “people get what they deserve”. The law is easy…. it’s grace that’s hard.
On my way to work this morning I heard something interesting on Spirit FM (yes, I know, it’s WFH Friday and I am at the office but it's because I have to do a training and I have an adult son who is known for suddenly and without provocation screaming curse words and I couldn’t worry about that as I’m making my debut as a Strategic Partner expert in the Lynchburg community, so I’m here). But I digress :-)
The DJ was talking about Rosa Parks and how easy it would have been to just get up and move to the back of the bus. But she chose the hard thing because the hard thing was the right thing.
My message to myself and to you is: Choose the hard thing because it’s the right thing. Choose grace.
I just found this song today. It’s not “Christian” but it’s beautiful. If you haven’t heard it or even if you have, it’s worth listening to in light of today’s Scripture. And hey…. it even starts with math!
1 comment:
I know Christians are never very interested in this point -- but your interpretation of the lex talionis in Leviticus has nothing to do with how Jews or Jewish jurisprudence ever understood this statement. It's wrong to cast Jesus as being somehow anti-Law. He was involved in contemporary Jewish debates about the law, and he took a particular side in them *that was also held by some Jews of the period*. Christians have assimilated St Augustine's view on Jewish law and somehow think that actually describes what was going on in the Christian Bible four centuries earlier.
As far as whether the law is hard -- it was and is not usually hard in the sense that Christians mean it is.
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