In His Name

BY Rebecca Faires

Have you ever watched kids wait for the bus? Our kids wait at the end of a long driveway, and somehow that distance makes them think they are surely out of my eyeshot. They imagine themselves in a Lord of the Flies world, where no adult can see them, and a child would willingly bludgeon his brother for fruit snacks. They act like the bus stop is a land of limbo where perfect impunity reigns supreme. But our driveway is just not that long.

Drinking my coffee, I watch from the window as my own children frantically blow through a punch list of morning offenses. They are in such a hurry to let it all hang out before they find themselves under the next authority: Miss Pitt, the bus driver. She will brook no nonsense in a moving vehicle. The world is a sinful place, though, and Miss Pitt isn’t always looking in her giant rearview mirror, telling them to sit back down.

My kids aren’t outliers. We all enjoy the luxury of being out from under authority, to cut loose and do what’s right in our own eyes. And we are the people the Christ came to save. Those of us who are giving noogies, slapping faces, and stealing cookies at the bus stop—those of us who are hiding our shame, returning to our sins, and feeling beaten down by what we’ve done. We are the people Christ came to save. We’re all in the same boat. We’re just better at hiding our misdeeds than children are.

The day after Jesus’s transfiguration, He came down from the mountain, into the adorable, unwashed fray of regular humans, and He immediately encountered our brokenness. “You unbelieving and perverse generation, how long will I be with you and put up with you?” (Luke 9:41). He knows that we are trying to hide from authority, but this is exactly why He came. He came down from glory to heal a broken world.

Even in the midst of His longing for our redemption, Jesus was about the business of healing, saying to the man in the crowd, “Bring your son here” (v.41). While the crowd and the disciples worried about who was supposed to be able to cast out demons, Christ had fixed His eyes upon the redemption of all things. He knew about the glory of God and was not confused by squirrely, bus-stop shenanigans. He knows that we are broken and full of terrible nonsense, but Jesus understands who He is, who His Father is, and who we are. He is not surprised that we are getting it wrong; that’s literally why He came.

Jesus came to save the lost and the broken. He shows forth the glory and greatness of God. Be astonished today, not at the misdeeds of man—that’s not surprising at all—but at the greatness of God’s love and grace for us. His name is great, and He is greatly to be praised (v.43).