Make All Things New

There’s a guy in our neighborhood that is quite a sight to see (well, I guess there are quite few people in the neighborhood that are quite a sight to see — myself included on many occasions). This man is a crossing guard but he is oh so much more than a mere crossing guard. He wears the fluorescent yellow vest and guides the kids safely across the streets but to end there would not tell the full story. He also wears a radio that broadcasts the local police and fire activity and walks around as if he is a policeman. He looks out for suspicious people (often waiting to see if they will do anything illegal). When I have spoken with him, he talks with great authority as if he is the one who keeping the streets safe from crime and trouble. He does his job well to be sure, yet he does it with a bit of overconfidence that makes it humorous to observe. Just this morning I saw him single handedly stop a huge truck by raising his hand with all the authority of Moses parting the Red Sea. He really gets into his work!

Now, I don’t want to come down on this guy for doing a good job. We should all aspire to work with such vigor. All the same, it is funny to see someone act as though they are something they are not. His job is important and needed, valuable in and of itself yet he still pretends that he is really a policeman, acting as if that were the case. In the process, he seems a bit odd, even ridiculous.

I’ve heard Jerry Seinfeld say that “all men consider themselves as kind of a lower-level superhero.” As if we are really capable of doing things that we aren’t or we don’t have the authority to do. We tend to think we are better, greater and more important than we really are. In short we think more highly of ourselves than we ought to think (and we probably think too often of ourselves than we ought as well!).

In many ways, I’m no different then the policeman-wannabe-crossing-guard. I often think of myself as a better person than I really am. My heart grows proud because I do something good that would please God. Other times I think I am better than I really am because I actually served Jill without prompting. Or I think I am a better because I spend time teaching and praying with my children. While all of these are good things to aspire to be, they become idols when I place my worth and identity in them.

The truth is, if my identity is in my ability to do things to please God, I will ultimately come undone. If my identity is in being a husband to Jill, I will fail her and myself. And if my identity is my children or in being a parent, I will not “train them up in the way they should go.” Making any of these roles as my ultimate identity is in many ways no different from the crossing guard pretending he is really a policeman. On my own, by my own merit, I am unable to please God, love my wife or raise my children. If I make any of those roles my ultimate identity, I am set on a course for failure, disappointment and pain because I am trying to make something I am not define who I am.

But this does not lead me to despair. Because while I struggle with my natural desire to be a “lower-level superhero”, the greatest Hero ever, Jesus, has rescued me from myself – taking my sin and giving me his righteousness. My identity is no longer based on what I do or have done. My identity is the one given to me by Christ. He who knew no sin became sin so that in him we might become the righteousness of God! (2 Corinthians 5:21) If this gospel truth truly penetrates my heart, I don’t have to live or die by how I serve God but rather see that God already loves we and am compelled to serve God because of how great he is! I no longer have think I am only good if I serve Jill well but am actually freed to love her like Christ loves the church because I have experience that love through the gospel. And I don’t consider myself a better person because I teach and pray with my kids but I am humbled and excited by the opportunity to proclaim the Good News to my children and ask God to transform them through his gospel.

So maybe the the crossing guard’s issue isn’t that he is aiming too high in pretending he is a policeman. He just is failing to see that through faith in Christ, through the gospel, he’s could actually identify with something far superior!

The gospel exposes our pretending. It shows us that we’re not as good as we think we are. Yet it also tell us that because of Christ’s work on the cross, we’re actually better than we think we are. We need not try to prove that, we simply have to believe it.

This city is totally broken. That would probably lead me to utter despair if it weren’t for the hope God has given us in Christ – the hope in the things unseen versus those that are seen. (2 Corinthians 4:18) It takes very little time to see that things “aren’t the way they’re supposed to be” here in Philadelphia.

For example, just look at the amount of garbage, literal trash, that is strewn about the streets. I have lived in a few of the country’s 100 large cities (Los Angeles, San Francisco and Santa Rosa) yet Philadelphia is by far the dirtiest. The first couple of times I saw people throw their fast food bags into the streets, I admit I was a bit surprised and I really didn’t know how to respond. Do I yell at them to pick it up? Do I try to explain how damaging that can be? Do I just stand there with my mouth wide open in disbelief?

This week, I parked next to the water drain on our block, I noticed the smell was more like garbage than actually old rain water (not to mention that it was nearly filled with trash)! In many ways, the streets of our city have become the people’s trash can. The disregard for cleanliness and sanitation is saddening to me. It’s as though there is no regard for what happens when trash backs up water drains or what the consequences of garbage in the streets might be. Seemingly no thought for how their trash taints the beauty of this city. How the smells take away from the scene. How the unsightly piles of trash mar the beauty of the city’s weathered brick row homes.

Look, I write this not as a rant against Philadelphians and the municipal services nor as a call for environmental awareness (though all are probably warranted to some degree), I write this because in it I see a picture of the gospel.

Like the people throwing trash into the streets, I “throw” my garbage on God’s holiness more often than I’d like to admit. I doubt His promises. I question His goodness. I forget His faithfulness. My sin is like a pile of trash in the streets of God. I am often unsightly and not good reflection of His beauty. But God doesn’t yell “Hey! Pick that up you’re making a mess of the place!” No not at all. He steps in to my mess and cleans up my trash for me. Not only that, He empowers me to stop littering. Sure, it’s a slow process (I’m a pretty messy individual) but through His Son, I am cleaned up.

The problem in Philadelphia isn’t a lack of trash cans, it’s a lack of gospel transformation. It’s the lack of people who have been changed by the gospel, living to see others changed by the gospel. Knowing what God has done for me and in me, perhaps the proper response to seeing people throw trash on the city streets is simply to go and pick it up myself.