New Coat Racks
Romans 9:32 (New Living Translation)
32 ...Because they were trying to get right with God by keeping the law instead of by trusting in him. They stumbled over the great rock in their path.
Our son Peter is a theologian at heart. That means that long and interesting conversations are par for the course whenever we connect and since he is also the father of four of our six dear grandchildren--our conversations are usually interspersed with interesting sounds and admonitions.
Yesterday evening little Emily, almost one, was trying out her voice as we spoke--"Hmm, hmm, hmm," she sang happily on her daddy's shoulder as we talked.
Our words wove in and around Emily's singing and somewhere along the way I grabbed my pen and started taking notes--I wanted to capture the thoughts.
We were talking about the move to "principle based" ways of operating in the business world--that out of a set of values, workers would be responsible to conduct themselves in an appropriate way. This is in contrast to being prescriptive and rules based, the result of which is having to apply more and more rules to different situations--and it being impossible to keep up.
"Exactly, "I said, "That's like the Pharisees. They had a rule for every situation, and somewhere along the way they forgot the reason for the rules and the rules themselves became their focus."
Peter said, "Yes. Jesus said, I'm not giving you the law, I'm giving you my character and my values and helping you see the truth from my perspective."
Then he started talking about coat racks. He said that Jesus gave them a new coat rack. The way you organize the coats is different to the way you used to--you're still looking at the same coats, but viewing them differently. If Peter is reading this he's probably groaning at how I've muddled his analogy, but I hope some of the insight comes through in spite of that.
Prayer: Lord I thank you for the law that revealed our need of a Saviour--and I thank you for planning all along to be the answer to our need. Thank you for Jesus and thank you for "new coat racks"!
32 ...Because they were trying to get right with God by keeping the law instead of by trusting in him. They stumbled over the great rock in their path.
Our son Peter is a theologian at heart. That means that long and interesting conversations are par for the course whenever we connect and since he is also the father of four of our six dear grandchildren--our conversations are usually interspersed with interesting sounds and admonitions.
Yesterday evening little Emily, almost one, was trying out her voice as we spoke--"Hmm, hmm, hmm," she sang happily on her daddy's shoulder as we talked.
Our words wove in and around Emily's singing and somewhere along the way I grabbed my pen and started taking notes--I wanted to capture the thoughts.
We were talking about the move to "principle based" ways of operating in the business world--that out of a set of values, workers would be responsible to conduct themselves in an appropriate way. This is in contrast to being prescriptive and rules based, the result of which is having to apply more and more rules to different situations--and it being impossible to keep up.
"Exactly, "I said, "That's like the Pharisees. They had a rule for every situation, and somewhere along the way they forgot the reason for the rules and the rules themselves became their focus."
Peter said, "Yes. Jesus said, I'm not giving you the law, I'm giving you my character and my values and helping you see the truth from my perspective."
Then he started talking about coat racks. He said that Jesus gave them a new coat rack. The way you organize the coats is different to the way you used to--you're still looking at the same coats, but viewing them differently. If Peter is reading this he's probably groaning at how I've muddled his analogy, but I hope some of the insight comes through in spite of that.
Prayer: Lord I thank you for the law that revealed our need of a Saviour--and I thank you for planning all along to be the answer to our need. Thank you for Jesus and thank you for "new coat racks"!
Comments
I don't know if he'll read your comment unless you contact him directly. He did read this at church this morning and said laughingly that instead of writing himself, maybe he should just tell me everything so that I'll write about it!