Have you ever meet a hero or legend? I have meet a few of mine in my life (Ted Kirkpatrick of Tourniquet and Alan Keyes are two that quickly come to mind), and I have meet a few more that are heros of others (mainly sports legends / heros due to my job). The thing that is always amazing about that is when you meet them they are very different then you expected them to be. They are just normal people, they are average, and they are not larger then life. The only real difference is how people respond to them.
When you watch TV it seems that the same thing holds true when you see stories about the real lives of stars, personalities, legends and heros. They are just normal people, and they have normal issues. Sure their issues are more public and visible, but fundamentally they have the same issues. Two stars get a divorced it leads on ET that night, reporters discuss the impact it will have on their careers and their kids, and the industry / society wonders how the divorce will impact the scene in Hollywood and/or New York. Two average people get divorced a few people notice, friends / family worry about the kids, and the community begins to wonder how it will impact the community, school and neighborhood. The same pattern holds true when you look at the difference between marriages, deaths, career decisions, mistakes, health issues, etc of famous and average people. So, it is not that they have different issues and problems, it is a scale issue.
That is what I want to focus on today, scale. Do we really understand the scale of 1) our sin, 2) the price Jesus paid for us, and 3) just how different Jesus is from everyone else. When we sin we try to act like it is no big deal. We almost rejoice in the fact that it is common and normal. The question I ask is would we act differently if our sin was broadcast openly ever night? I believe we would. The problem is that we do not take our sin seriously because typically, I know there are exceptions for all of us, the notability scale of our sin is small. Since our sin is typically barely visible outside of our family and close friends / co-workers we do not take it seriously. Normally, we do not even try to repent, or try / yearn to change until the sin is visible to others and it is beginning to or has become a risk to our future. Typically, and sadly, sin to most of us is merely annoying habit like bad breath, and belching.
In the same way we reduce the price that Jesus paid for us by saying - Well our sins are not as bad or as numerous as SO AND SO. Our sin is serious. Jesus SUFFERED and died on the cross for us. His act of service saved us from a eternity in Hell. Hell is serious, and my not going there has a huge impact on MY LIFE. Again, the problem / issue is one of scale. We try to justify our lives by comparing them to others. We try to reduce the price Jesus paid for us by saying we were not as bad as someone else. We may even try to reduce our guilt by scientifically explaining away or reducing the pain of some part of Jesus's suffering.
We get both the scale and impact of our sins completely out of perspective. We live our lives like we are not that bad. We act like we barely needed Christ to save us. We lose the desire to help others out of their sin problem once we have our’s solved. Sin is no longer a serious issue in our world once we are forgiven. Our walk and relationship with Christ is not suffering because we are afraid to approach Him. Our relationship with Him suffers because we refuse to place Jesus in the place He deserves to be in our lives. We follow that mistake up by refusing to acknowledge just how much we needed Him and how much He did / does for us.
That leads to my final point, we forget who Jesus is. We are meeting and talking with THE SON OF GOD. He is not like everyone else. He is different. He has existed since the beginning of time. He is involved in every part of our lives. He cares and listens when no one else does or will. Yet most of us would rather meet or talk to some "famous" person that will only turn out to be like us . We do not consider meeting Jesus special at all. Again, it is a problem of scale. We forget just how big and how unique Jesus is because He is so close to us. The fact that He is close to us makes us feel like He is like our close friends and family, i.e. there no matter what and there for us to take advantage and use as we see fit and how we want too. This is the biggest mistake of scale that we make. We forget that we are talking to the King of kings, the Lord of lords, not to "Joe" or “Josephine” our long time buddy who is the next door rag salesperson.
This post was written as much for me to remind myself about not losing perspective on who God is as to you. Do not take this as a personal attack, it is not meant as such. My hope is that it makes you think about your life, your scale, and your balance as it did me as I wrote it. It would be my prayer for you today that you have God in the proper perspective in your life. He has earned the right to be placed on the highest pedestal in our lives. Doing so is the least we can do considering what He has done for us. He deserves to be honored and respected.
In the end, we need to remember that we are still just sinners saved by grace and our sins (mine and yours) are what caused Jesus to go to the cross. We deserved that pain, not Him. A important thing to help keep our sins, His sacrifice for our sins, and Jesus in proper scale is to remember that Jesus would have been born, lived, died and rose from the dead just for OUR personal sins, if we had been the only sinner in history, simply to become OUR personal savior. That is love and that kind of love deserves to be respected, and honored. Have a great day keeping God and Jesus in their proper place and scale in your life.
