“Do not lay up for
yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves
break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in Heaven, where
neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart
will be also.
Matthew 6:19-21
In the season of Lent, the Law is ever before us. We are reminded of the many things that we
have placed before God in our lives. We
are reminded that we normally have our minds and hearts fixed not on Him but on
our own pleasure and convenience. It is
easier to watch television than to pray.
It is more convenient to love gossip or the lusts of the flesh than His
cross. For family bickering, there is
always time. For His Word and a family
devotion, well, perhaps later. It is
time now for the sports page, not for a page in the Bible.
It gets worse. We imagine in our total wickedness and
depravity that we are NOT totally wicked and depraved. We
actually think that we really don’t deserve what He endured; and we yawn or are
maybe even irritated when someone points it out, especially during Lent. We vainly assume that somehow or other there
is at least a scrap of merit in us for which we should not have to suffer and
for which He should therefore not have had to suffer either.
So foolish are we, to put it another way, that we imagine
there is some good in us that does not require His journey to the cross. It’s just another way of saying that deep
down inside we think we have actually helped Him somehow, at least once in a
while, at least sometime or other. That
may be the greatest sin of all and the one we are least likely to recognize,
much less confess. It is the sin of
thinking that at least a little bit in us needs no forgiveness and, yes, is
even deserving of some eternal reward.
Yes, the Law is certainly all around us. This penitential season of Lent is the time
when we look at our sins and reflect upon them – realizing that it is those
very sins that gave Jesus the death sentence we deserve! From beginning to end, all that Jesus does
on His journey to the cross - He is doing in our place, in our stead, on our
behalf.
