I need to begin today with a confession.
Deadly clashes have erupted in Iran as demonstrations sparked by anger over the rising cost of living entered their second week. Unlike those in past years, these protests are seeking regime change and taking down regime symbols, posters, and statues.
At least 285 locations in ninety-two cities have witnessed protest gatherings. At this writing, more than two thousand citizens have been arrested, and at least thirty-four protesters have been killed. If Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s forces fail to quell dissent, he has reportedly made plans to flee to Moscow.
I am old enough to remember the 1979 Iranian hostage crisis vividly. I have written often about Iran’s horrific jihadist ideology and have called its leaders “the world’s most dangerous regime.” It would be in the best interest of Iran, Israel, the Middle East, and the world for them to fall and flee.
But while I believe I have reacted to this news with the right analysis, I have done so in the wrong spirit. The same has been true with regard to recent events in Venezuela.
Let me explain.
The alliance of transcendence and immanence
Religions across human history have focused on transcendence or imminence, but not both. To the Greeks and Romans, the gods lived atop Mt. Olympus and used humans for their personal, often nefarious ends. To Muslims, Allah is remote and removed from the human condition. To Hindus and Buddhists, by contrast, there is no personal Ultimate Being; the focus is on personal enlightenment and oneness with reality. The mystery religions of the Greco-Roman world similarly centered on rites and rituals intended to lead to personal empowerment.
Then came the prophetic declaration fulfilled by the birth of Christ: “‘Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel’ (which means, God with us)” (Matthew 1:23, fulfilling Isaiah 7:14). This transcendent God who was with us became immanently one of us.
In one sense, his earthly life could not have been more lowly:
- He was born to a peasant teenage girl and adopted by a peasant carpenter father.
- His birth was attended by field hands so ritually unclean that they could not attend synagogue or temple services.
- He grew up in a town so obscure that it is not mentioned even once in the Old Testament.
- He was baptized among sinners.
- He experienced temptation, hunger, thirst, weariness, and pain.
- He lived in a friend’s home because he had “nowhere to lay his head” (Luke 9:58).
- He died a criminal’s death between condemned prisoners.
- He was buried in a borrowed tomb.
In another sense, however, his life could not have been more exalted:
- His birth was celebrated by angels.
- His baptism was marked by the Spirit’s descent and the Father’s affirmation (Matthew 3:16–17).
- He regularly demonstrated divine omniscience, omnibenevolence, and omnipotence.
- His death was marked by “darkness over all the land,” the rending of the temple curtain, a violent earthquake, and the opening of tombs (Matthew 27:45–53).
- His burial led to his glorious resurrection and ascension to heaven.
Across his ministry, he interacted with every dimension of the cultural spectrum:
- He befriended tax collectors and “sinners” (cf. Matthew 9:11).
- He touched lepers and healed demoniacs.
- He engaged with Gentiles, Samaritans, and Jews.
- He ministered to a Roman centurion, taught a member of the Jewish Sanhedrin, and witnessed to the highest officials in the country.
Now he continues his earthly ministry as he prays for us (Romans 8:34) while his Spirit dwells within us (1 Corinthians 3:16) and empowers us as the “body of Christ” in the world today (1 Corinthians 12:27).
No other religion in history has conceived of such an astounding combination of immanence and transcendence—all of it for us.
“Sons of your Father in heaven”
Now there is no temptation we cannot trust to our Savior, knowing that he has been “tempted as we are” and will empower our victory over our common enemy (Hebrews 4:15). There is no problem we cannot bring to him, knowing that we can “with confidence draw near to the throne of grace” where we will “receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (v. 16).
And there is no soul on earth with whom we should not stand in compassion and solidarity.
Jesus loves even Ali Khamenei and Nicolás Maduro. Our Savior would have died just for them. The more they and others like them reject God’s word and will, the more they need our intercession, witness, and ministry. And the more we pay forward the grace we have received, the more we give our broken world what it can find nowhere else.
Jesus assured us that when we “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,” we demonstrate that we are “sons of your Father in heaven” (Matthew 5:44–45). Then, though we live “in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation,” we “shine as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life” (Philippians 2:15–16).
“The goal of a materialistic Utopia”
By contrast, our broken culture can claim neither divine transcendence nor immanence. Secular society has no God who is for us, much less a God who lives in us and works through us.
George Orwell’s 1937 book The Road to Wigan Pier describes socialists in a way that is just as true of secularists today: “With their eyes glued to economic facts, [they] have proceeded on the assumption that man has no soul, and explicitly or implicitly they have set up the goal of a materialistic Utopia.”
You and I know better. We know that a “materialistic Utopia” is a contradiction in terms. We know that man not only has a soul but is a soul. We know that God’s love can change any heart in this world for the next.
But we also know that such love has to be incarnated to be believed, first in Christ and now in “Christ in you” (Colossians 1:27).
You may not have the chance to be the presence of Christ to world leaders, though you can and should pray for them to follow Jesus. But you can demonstrate the grace of Christ today to someone you are tempted to reject but called to love.
Philip Yancey noted,
“Grace, like water, flows to the lowest part.”
So should we.
Quote for the day:
“‘Tis grace has brought me safe thus far, and grace will lead me home.” —John Newton
Our latest website resources:
Denison Forum
DAILY DEVOTIONS, NEWS AND INFORMATION 