Abraham's Eyes | Part II | Goodness

I receive a lot of compliments on my eyes. My response is always the same: "Thanks, I get them from my Dad." 

My Dad's eyes are a sparkling, radiant blue; however, somewhat like Lincoln's, they hold both a haunted hollowness & a spirited spark in the same countenance. 

Lincoln, I learned, Inherited his grey eyes from his Mother. Nancy was described physically as being tall and slim with dark hair, dark skin, and particularly well-remembered grey eyes. It makes sense, then, that he got his grey view of the world from her as well. 

Lincoln's family had a genetic history of mental illness and scandalous Behavioral Disorders on both his mother and his father's side. While Abraham and his mother, Nancy, seemed to have struggled mostly with a Dark Depression, other family members on his father's side had more extreme Problems, such as violent mood swings and alcoholism; some were even known to have been committed to the Illinois State Hospital for the Insane. This brought a certain Reputation upon the Lincoln family known as "the Lincoln Horrors."

Despite his mother's grey eyes, he confidently stated, "All that I am, or hope to be, I owe to my angel mother." 

We've explored before the significance of a Mother's last words. As I was learning about the legacies that Nancy left to her son that so influenced him, I came upon this Mother's last words. Lean in close as she whispers it from her deathbed: 

"Be Good to one another." 

My therapist and I often use the Parable of a child in a grocery store with their parent when we are exploring emotional regulation. It goes like this: my parent and I agree that I am not to ask for anything when we go into the grocery store. Then, something catches my eye. A special edition of my favorite breakfast cereal, perhaps. I ask my parent if I can have what I want. They say no; we agreed that we wouldn't be purchasing anything extra today. 

I am left with a spectrum of possible responses, from maturely putting the cereal back, verbally expressing my disappointment to my parent, and agreeing that we did, in fact, make an agreement (if I'm feeling bold, I might propose a counteroffer of my choice of name-brand cereal next time we grocery shop); to throwing myself down on the floor, kicking and screaming and telling my parent that they are ruining my life. As most parents (and innocent bystanders) know, controlling a child's Actions when their emotions are out of control is quite the task. 

But here's what I thought being Good meant the majority of my life: Not asking for the sugary cereal. Not throwing a fit when I get told 'No'. Not running around and causing a scene.

I don't think that was the kind of Goodness that Nancy was talking about. It was less about 'Best Behavior' and more about Best Action.

Nancy taught her boys that Goodness was the following: 

"For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me." (Matthew 25:35-36)

These are Jesus' words that Nancy carried with her and gifted to Abraham as her Last when he was only 9 years old. 

This passage of scripture is found in the middle of a section in my Bible called The Judgment of the Nations. Judgment is one of those words that makes me squirm, so let's lean in and maybe we will hear a secret in the verses that surround this passage.

(Before we read, here is some context: These people lived 2,000 years ago and spent a lot of time around livestock. Jesus had to use what people Knew to get his message across to them, so this passage talks about goats and sheep. Kind of random for us today, but put your Kingdom Glasses on and See what you can See):

"All the nations will be gathered before Him, and he will Separate [Divide] the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.  

Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your Inheritance, the Kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 

For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.'

Then the Right[eous] with answer Him, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?'

The King will reply, 'Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of Mine, you did for Me.'"

Most sermons I've heard on this Parable stop there. But just after these inspiring and encouraging words from Jesus, things get really uncomfortable...let's keep reading: 

"Then He will say to those on His left, 'Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.' 

They will also answer, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?'

He will reply, 'Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for Me.'

Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life." (Matthew 25:32-46, NIV)

Juicy, right? So much packed in to this Story about farm animals. 

What stands out to me the most however, is that the Goats are not judged by what they did. They are judged by what they didn't do. Do you See the difference? 

Let us Look at this from a different Perspective. 

There was another Gospel account written by a man named Mark. He was not one of the 12 disciples, but he was buddies with the famous missionary, Paul. Unlike Dr. Luke, he didn't care so much about Jesus' Humanity; he skipped the birth story and went straight into the Action with a story about a man named John who Baptized Jesus in the Jordan River. 

Jesus' first recorded words in this Gospel: "The Time has come. The Kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and Believe the Good News!" (Mark 1:15)

Repent is another one of those words that make me squirm. Bear with me - we'll take a closer Look at it; but first, let's explore this Kingdom at hand.  

I've always heard this phrase, "at hand", and figured it meant in the future, as in, 'about to happen', 'imminent', 'approaching', or 'nearly there'. That's one definition, and it takes into account Time. 

Another definition defines "At Hand" in relation to Proximity:

At Hand [phrase of Hand] : readily available, within reach, accessible, close by 

It makes more sense that Jesus was talking about His Kingdom being at hand in the sense of Proximity; after all, He didn't say that the Time was at hand. The Time has come! It's the Kingdom of God that is at hand.

Okay. Keep all that in mind and let's go back to that word, Repent. I've often heard it defined as 'to change direction' or 'to turn around and walk the other way.' What if instead of Looking at this as traveling on a horizontal plane, we flipped everything Upside Down. In other words - to See things not as they are, but to Find the places where their opposites are not. A simple shift from "It's Dark in here" to "I wonder if it could be Lighter in here."

Let's read Jesus' words in Mark again with this new Light. Some Creative Liberty has been taken: 

"The time has come - it is here now! The Kingdom of God is readily available and accessible to you - within the reach of your Hand. Reach out and take it! Let's turn this whole thing Upside Down. Don't be so concerned about which direction you are going; if you can't See properly, you're just fumbling around in the Dark anyways. Try this: Instead of Focusing on all the ways the world is Bad, let's Look for the ways the world isn't Good - and then do something about it!" 

So we've uncovered a Hidden Kingdom blanketing this world. A Kingdom you can only Find with the right Perspective. The passage tells us that the Inheritance for the sheep on his right is the Kingdom, prepared for them since the creation of the world. A very Good Kingdom, with a very Good King. 

And as for the goats on the left? They are the ones that are Blind and Cannot See. Their Vision is covered up by the Prince of Darkness, and it says they are to Inherit an eternal fiery Hell. 

I've Seen Hell before. And it certainly wasn't a Great Lake engulfed in flames, with poor tortured souls eternally being burned but never dying somewhere else in the future. No. This is a worse kind of Hell. It's a bit more...tangible. In fact, I might even say that it is at hand. 

A good portion of my adult life, and particularly the last 7 years, has been spent feeling like I've been burning alive and never dying. It was all of the times when I was so concerned about what I would eat, what I would wear, what I drank, when I was sick and what everyone would think if they saw me behind my prison bars. Hell was brought on by a Self-Centered Fear that shrouded my View of this Beautiful, inVisible Kingdom all around us. 

But there were those who fed me...those who clothed me, those who filled my cup, those who Invited me in and took care of me when I was sick, those who would often sit with me in my Prison, sometimes just to keep me company. They are the ones who told me that such a Kingdom exists - the ones who either Saw it, or had enough Faith to tell me that it exists even when their own Eyes were grey. And that Goodness was proof enough for me to start searching for a light switch. 

So in the Spirit of our Lord's Upside Down Kingdom - let's try to Focus less on the ways this Heaven-in-Earth Kingdom is Divided, and start using our Creative Liberty by Looking for ways that we can foster Unity among our King's Beloved Citizens.