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Article Archive |
2008
Absolute Value
by Jim Morris
The Apostle Paul gave us a bone chilling fact: “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). And to make matters worse, he said, “For the wages of sin is death” (6:23a). However, behind all of this bad news is good news: “but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (6:23b). I pondered on how to bring this point home to others.
Meanwhile, my son, Matthew, who is an applied mathematician, described our human situation in mathematical terms in one of our family discussions. He said, “Dad, think about our deeds as human beings. Some are negative. Some are positive. Most folks think of deeds as mere elements to be added together by God so that their sum is how we will be judged.”
I could see his logic in this because I have heard all my life how some try to balance out their bad deeds by doing more good deeds. They think they can work their way into God’s favor in this way. After all, have we not patted ourselves on our own backs saying, “I’m a good person because I have done more good than bad.” But that view is not Biblical.
Matthew continued, saying, “What if our deeds are not elements to be added but factors to be multiplied. If our deeds are just elements then the formula would look something like this: 100 good deeds - one bad deed = 99 final score. That’s not too bad, eh?”
“However, if our deeds are two factors then the formula is quite different: 100 positive deeds times one negative deed = negative 100! (or, 100p X -1n = -100)” he mentioned. “Even just one negative deed would ruin us!”
I marvelled at his spiritual insight and used his illustration in Sunday morning’s sermon! It corresponded perfectly to Paul’s explanation of our human condition in the book of Romans. However, I wondered how we get from our condemned status to a saved status.
“That’s easy dad!” he said. “Jesus is our Absolute Value sign! Every number inside the brackets of the Absolute Value sign is treated as positive even if it is negative! For example, |-100| = 100. That is good news for humanity. The only thing we need to worry about is getting our lives into the Absolute Value sign – Jesus Christ.”
Wow! God’s law is positive. Sin is negative. The holy and just and good and positive law of God (Romans 7:12) shows us how negative sin is (7:7). Unfortunately, God’s law has two shortcomings: (1) It causes us to want to commit sin. “But sin, taking opportunity by the commandment, produced in me all manner of evil desire” (7:8); and, (2) Law can tell us what we’re doing wrong, but it can’t make us better. “And the commandment, which was to bring life, I found to bring death” (7:10).
Fortunately, what the law was unable to do, God accomplished through His son: “For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin” (8:3). In Christ, we are inside the Absolute Value sign of God. “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death” (8:1-2). Praise God!
10-08-08
# 41
