Hearts and healing

 Today has been another miracle day. I continue to feel good, even as my blood counts go down and my native immunity nears zero. Jill and I had a lovely walk and shared lunch in my room. I took a nap, too, and I don't quite know whether I felt recharged because I slept or because my blood sugar was up after lunch. I don't have to know. It's all a gift to me from God and the miracle body He gave me. 

In "stir," as I call it, one has time and motivation to muse about many things, and so have I. As I have walked daily with the Creator for over twenty years, His words as found in the Bible have gradually taken on new meanings for me and made me a wiser, better person.  My upbringing was in a home that valued good behavior and being kind. Such behavior was not, in my mind, founded on anything other than my parents' authority. I knew better than to misbehave, because there would be a price to pay, and it would reflect badly on the family. 

It was an effective system to help keep me on the straight and narrow, although, like many a youngster, I had my moments when I thought no one was watching that I strayed from the script I had been taught. If I got caught, I felt really bad, and there was penance. If I didn't get caught, I also felt bad, because in my heart I knew that I had been disobedient. 

As you no doubt know, the Bible is a long book full of innumerable stories. If you haven't read them, you might be surprised to learn that most of the stories are not about saintly people going around doing the right thing and being "good kids." In fact, most of the stories are about disobedient, ungrateful, whiny people who are often cowardly and unjust. 

King David, revered by the Jewish people as their most impressive king, was a murderer and an adulterer. He had a dysfunctional household full of offspring who were manipulators and connivers and worse. God called him "a man after My own heart." (Acts 13:22) Moses, too, was a murderer. He fled the authorities in the land where he was born and raised in the luxury of the king's palace after he murdered an Egyptian citizen. Forty years later, God called on him to lead the Hebrew people out of their Egyptian captivity. And these two guys were some of the "good guys" in the Bible. 

How can all of this be? My upbringing taught me that when I was out of line in my behavior, I was also out of favor with my parents, the authorities, at least temporarily. But in the Bible, I see God looking past the behavior to the heart and soul of His children. Does that mean He condones murder and adultery? Not according to the Sixth and Seventh Commandments. So, what gives?

What I have learned from Him is that He cares about our hearts and our motivations more than our behavior. Jesus said it this way, "You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’  But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment..." (Matthew 5:21-22) "You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’  But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart." (Matthew 5:27-28) I guess you could say, "wishing makes it so." 

When we live by the law of moral dos and don'ts, we are striving to control our behavior  by force of will,  or fear of retribution. God desires for our behavior to be governed by a clean heart full of good will toward our fellow man. He knows that we are fallen human beings and likely to stumble, but He is not waiting to pounce on us and punish us. He is waiting for us to surrender our hearts to His wisdom and love and mercy. When we do, we become a little more like Him, and our behavior is modified by His wisdom and love and mercy. 

Jesus was not popular with the religious leaders of His day. They did everything they could to trip Him up or catch Him in some kind of religious error. One day He was teaching in the Temple and some of them decided to trap Him into saying something they could use against Him in court. Here's the story:

And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him.  “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?”  And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment.  And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 22:36-40, emphasis added) 

Notice that not only did Jesus not name ONE of the Ten Commandments. He essentially named them all: 

1. You shall have no other Gods before me.

2. You shall not make for yourself a carved idol.

3. You shall not take the name of the Lord in vain.

4 You shall honor the Sabbath Day to keep it holy. 

These four Commandments are all about loving God. 

5. Honor your Father and Mother

6. You shall not commit murder.

7. You shall not commit adultery. 

8. You shall not steal. 

9. You shall not falsely swear against your neighbor. 

10. You shall not covet your neighbor's possessions. 

These six Commandments are all about loving your neighbor as yourself.  

Jesus finished by saying that "All of the Law and the Prophets," which to first century Jewish ears meant all of their Scriptures, depend on the two Commandments: "Love God, and love your neighbor." That heavy tome that may sit in a place of honor in your family home, or the smaller version that gathers dust on the bookshelf can be summarized in these six words. 

I didn't set out to write a sermon, but rather to tell you how my heart has been changed and molded by my experience in the oncology department at Club Sunnyside. I will continue with that part of the story next. Do come back.