#4-Apr. 25, 2016

"Well, you are risking grace!"

by Dave Jackson

I just finished my first extended interview about RISKING GRACE with a provocative radio talk-show host. Without having read my book, he needled me for an hour, and then declared, “Well, you are risking grace!”

So what is the risk and why would I take it? What, in fact, is the risk in trying to love anyone like Jesus loves them?

The risk is that there are highly volatile differences of opinion concerning what is, in fact, Jesus’ way of loving gay people. But traditional approaches have borne a lot of bad fruit in that they have driven people away from church and prevented some who might have sought Jesus from even venturing into church. Seeing the hurt our daughter experienced when she came out, and being less than helpful ourselves, we didn’t know what to do. We thought we were alone. But many of you are also experiencing this dilemma or observing it in the lives of others.

That radio host thinks we should be right up front with gay people and tell them, “I’m sorry, I love you, you’re welcome at our church, but you must confess your sin.” I’m all for being up front about our true intentions, but I asked him, “And how’s that working out for gay people? Are they flocking to your church?” His response was, “I don’t know because they don’t identify themselves.”

Really? They don’t identify themselves? Imagine that. Is it surprising to discover that beginning by condemning and shaming people might cause them to remain in the closet or stay away all together?

To me, scaring people away or shaming them into hiding isn’t the way Jesus related. There’s got to be more we can learn from his approach.

We searched the Scriptures again and asked questions and listened to a lot of stories (which we included in the book) and came up with some insights that have made us think. And in the end, we became willing to share our journey so perhaps you, too, will find hope and the courage to ask the questions that have no easy answers but that might inspire you to love even more.

But it is a risk. I’ll give that much to the radio host.

So did Jesus tell us anything about taking risks, any examples, any models?

In Matthew 25:14-30 he told the “Parable of the Talents” in which the master entrusted one servant with five talents (or bags of gold), one with two, and the third servant with one talent. And then he went on a long trip. When he returned and asked for an accounting, the one to whom he had entrusted five talents had multiplied them into ten. The one he’d given two, turned them into four. To each of them, the master said, “Well done, good and faithful servant!”

It’s the commendation we all hope to hear from Jesus, our master. But as for the third servant, Jesus said:

Then the man who had received one bag of gold came. “Master,” he said, “I knew that you are a hard man . . . So I was afraid and went out and hid your gold in the ground. See, here is what belongs to you.” His master replied, ‘You wicked, lazy servant! . . . Take the bag of gold from him and give it to the one who has ten bags. . . . And throw that worthless servant outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth’” (vv. 24-30).

I’m not sure I previously considered what a great risk the first two servants took, especially if this master was “a hard man.” They might have been wrong in how they invested his gold and lost it all. They might have forfeited that coveted commendation, “Well done, good and faithful servant!” The master might even have been angry with them. But in the end, the servant the master threw out was the one who was afraid to take the risk.

If we’re going to love like Jesus, this is what Jesus taught us about taking or avoiding risks!

We must throw ourselves on God’s mercy, risking that his grace will cover us. Doing so reminds me of the words to Rich Mullins’ song, “If I Stand.” He was confident God would help him stand on the promises he’d received, but he also admitted, “And if I can’t, let me fall on the grace that first brought me to You.”

Thankfully, we have a God who is “good, and ready to forgive, and abundant in mercy to all those who call upon [him]” (Psalm 86:5, nkjv). Being humbly aware that we might not be right in every point need not paralyze us. This is what “risking grace” is all about, a recognition that we cannot rely on our own righteousness (right-ness), our own intellect, our own academic degrees or scholarship, but must step out in integrity, honest belief, and faith to love like we see Jesus love.

If you are worried about risk, then count the cost that is already mounting up higher than we can imagine from the church’s traditional approach toward gay people. Our lack of love toward our gay children and brothers and sisters in Christ, the rejection they’ve experienced from family and friends, have driven far too many away from the church and even from the root of their faith in Jesus. We can no longer shut our eyes and ears to this spiritual tragedy or sit by helplessly wringing our hands when reports leak through. We must allow our hearts to be broken like God’s heart in order to be inspired by Jesus’ love and life and ministry. Why he came to earth. How he related to people. Why he took on the religious theologians of his day. And what he ultimately sacrificed . . . his very life!