*image courtesy of thesaint at stock.xchng
I was thinking today about mistakes. I hate mistakes, especially the ones you just can’t fix. For example, I was in downtown Richmond this afternoon and unwittingly parked illegally. It was a “No Parking Zone,” but only from 4-6pm. I saw the sign, thought I was out of the tow zone, and even backed up one parking meter to get further away from that scowling white sign with its slashy circle of scorn. Alas, I was apparently in the tow zone, and it was 4:15.
Of course.
Now, there’s no going back. I have no defense. There’s no wiggle room, there’s no making up for it, there’s no making it all go away. Instead, sixty of my hard-earned dollars will be painting a bench somewhere downtown or helping to pay some civil servants salary, probably the one who wrote my ticket.
Thankfully, we have the universal reset button: Ctrl+Z.
Yes, the “undo” feature started as a handy ability on word processing that has now spread to nearly every program I encounter. Accidentally delete a paragraph? Undo! Accidentally delete the pictures of your kid’s first birthday? Ctrl+Z! It’s truly an amazing function, and has become so ubiquitous that sometimes it’s hard to remember that it only works on computers.
I’ve often wished that life had an undo function. I’ve wished that I could simply stroke a few keys and find myself five minutes in the past, or maybe a whole day, with the chance to do it all over again. Like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day, I’d know how I failed the try before, and could do it again and again until I got things juuust right.
Until Google/Apple/Facebook/Skynet/Big Brother finds a way to implement an actual undo button for life, or we all find ourselves sucked into/uploaded into the cloud, we have to live with our analog mistakes. Now, this is a biblical blog (biblog? no, sorry, that’s dumb), so you might think this is where I pull out the Jesus card like this…
Jesus is the Eternal Undo Button!
But, you’d be wrong. And that’s ok, because you’re good enough, you’re smart enough, and darn it people like you.
No, that’s not the point I’m going to make. Ok, that’s half true. Jesus does take away your guilty standing as a rebel against the King of the Universe, don’t get me wrong. But that doesn’t necessarily mean a cosmic “undo” for all those who believe. Sometimes, there are long-lasting effects of sin in your life that simply won’t go away. (Note I used “won’t” not “can’t.”)
It goes like this…
When you put your faith and trust in Jesus, a few things could happen: God could remove all traces of a particular sin in your life, including guilty standing, temptation to repeat, and negative consequences. Or, God could remove the guilt of your sin but not the consequences of your sin. You see, the guilt part is integral to salvation. In fact, it’s what you’re believing when you put your trust in Jesus: that He can and will forgive you of your sins and restore your right standing before God if you will believe.
The other stuff, is not as sure. I’m sure you know or have heard of someone who came to Jesus and immediately put down their drugs, promiscuity, Disney movies, and all other forms of evil in their lives without ever looking back. They experienced no withdraw symptoms, never had a second thought, and could march right back into the bar/strip club/theme park without fear of relapse. Praise God, He is still at work and does mighty things for the glory of His Name!
However, sometimes God chooses, for reasons we don’t know, to not deliver someone as radically and instantaneously. I would argue that this is the norm. God gives us the words of Paul to put off the old self and put on the new (Ephesians 4:22-23). Therefore, we are urged to work together with God through the power of the Holy Spirit to strive towards obedience in this particular area.
Also, sometimes the consequences of our sin will not be removed. God has built into the fabric of the universe a cause and effect system that goes beyond physics. What we plant is what we will harvest (Galatians 6:7-9). This is the biblical counter to “what goes around comes around” or karma. The difference is that God can override this, and it doesn’t apply to our eternal state if we are in Christ. What it does apply to is our life in the here and now.
Lead a promiscuous life and you might end up with a disease. God can heal you of that, but it’s neither a guarantee nor the norm. God may bless you with a wonderful marriage down the road with a pure and holy sex life, but you may not ever get certain images out of your head. Murder someone, and God can and will forgive you for your sin. That doesn’t necessarily mean you won’t go to jail. Lie through all your B.C. years, and people might have a hard time believing you when get all truthful on them.
Just because we’re Christians doesn’t mean that we’re somehow exempt from the real world. There are still consequences to our actions. God may choose to supernaturally override the norm, but don’t count on it in every case. We don’t have an “undo” button for life, and this is the only shot we get on this earth. We will be judged for what we do here, and there will be no going back.
Whatever happened, happened.
Words of Reason 