Redemption

Do you ever feel like Jean Valjean, the character from Les Miserables? Have you ever thought about it? At the beginning of the story, as presented in the stage production, Valjean is a prisoner of the state because he stole a loaf of bread to feed his sister’s children. He then tried to escape two or three times, which lengthened his prison term. Upon receiving his parole, he could not make a decent wage because he was always branded as a convict…until one night when he dined and stayed at a Bishop’s house. After the Bishop’s household was in bed, Valjean arose and stole the silver and fled, acting in a way consistent with how others perceived him—as a criminal. Valjean was caught with the silver but told the police that the Bishop had given him the silver. The police brought him and the silver back to the Bishop to inquire whether this was true. In an exercise of grace, the Bishop confirmed Valjean’s story and then gave him the silver candle stick holders as well. The police withdrew because according to the Bishop no crime had been committed, but Valjean was confronted with the desperation of his guilt and what he had become. He was also confronted with the love and sacrifice of the Bishop, showing him inexplicable grace. Valjean tried to give the silver back, but the Bishop told him to keep it, to use it in his new life that he would live to God, and leave his life of crime.

And that is what Valjean did. He broke his parole and began a new life under an assumed identity, eventually becoming a successful factory owner and mayor of the town. Through it all he sought to exercise the same grace which was given to him. The criminal Valjean was no more than a memory until Inspector Javert, who had been hunting for Valjean since he broke his parole, arrested a man whom he believed to be Valjean. Having compassion on this innocent man Valjean went to court and testified that he was Valjean and not the man accused. Confirmation of this fact causes Valjean to flee from his past and from Inspector Javert. In the process of fleeing, and as an expression of mercy, Valjean takes into his care Cosset, who has been orphaned by the death of her mother, for which Valjean feels responsible. The girl and Valjean flee together to Paris, and live relatively unnoticed until years later when Cosset is a young woman and Inspector Javert is drawn to Paris on his search for Valjean. Many other events occur, Valjean and Javert struggling back and forth. In the end, Javert is confronted with the righteousness of Valjean’s life of sacrifice and love; this criminal who no longer behaves like a criminal. Unable to harmonize his views justice with the grace shown by Valjean, Javert throws himself into the river and drowns.

Isn’t this the same struggle that Jesus Christ had with the Pharisees? The Pharisees only wanted to give grace to those who deserved it, but Jesus showed love and grace to all who asked of him. And there are times when we might be Javert, unable to understand that what is past is past, and things are made new, consumed with earning the favor of God, and not accepting the grace so freely provided. When we cannot fully accept this grace, we also have difficulty fully offering it to others. Then we look at others who might be more like Valjean, who receive this grace and understand that others are equally in need of it, yet feel the distain and misunderstanding of those who discount the sincerity of their motives.

Les Miserables is a story about tragedy in the lives of many, and yet it is a story of redemption. A story of what a life arrested by the grace of God can do in the lives of others. Valjean was trapped in the mire of his guilt and of his past, yet the gesture of the Bishop, extending grace and love of God that no one else would offer struck at his heart and he was not the same man. Valjean’s life was not easy. Surrounded by so many questions about his past he disappeared so that Cosset could live free from his shadow. Yet Valjean did all this in love and dignity.

Lord, grant us the courage to extend to others this same sacrificial love.

Meet Frederick

This is my friend Frederick. I just thought I would introduce you (and reassure those of you who had never heard of him that he really does exist).
This picture was taken from Frederick's Fables by Leo Leonni.

Phoenix Rising

According to The New International Webster’s Comprehensive Dictionary of the English Language, the phoenix was a bird of great beauty, which was supposed to live 500 or 600 years in the Arabian Desert and then consume itself by fire, rising again from its ashes young and beautiful to live through another cycle. The phoenix was a symbol of immortality for several cultures, and as I think about it, I identify with the phoenix. As a believer in Jesus Christ as the way to know God, I believe that there is eternal substance to my being, but even more than that, in my life I have come upon troubles and difficulties which have been as fire to my soul.
I am a graduate student in Human Development and Family Studies, which is a cross between psychology and sociology (quick explanation), and is not to be confused with clinical psychology. When I leave my program I am supposed to be a qualitatively different person than I was when I arrived. I am supposed to have skills and knowledge that I did not have upon entering my graduate program. Through my course work and my internship, which is commonly called an assistantship, I am run over the coals, as a sort of trial by fire to teach me all I can in, what seems to be the shortest period of time possible. It is very difficult. One semester I was in two classes, and a grant writing seminar, while also holding an assistantship which required about 20 hours of my week, plus I had to find time to work on my thesis. I have since learned to downsize my aspirations for each semester, but the whole point is to make me something that I did not used to be—college professor material.
It is the same way with the Christian walk…or at last it has been for me. It seems that I go for a while not necessarily complacent, but not exactly challenged either, and then something happens that I did not expect or wasn’t according to my plan. Whatever my aspirations were became the heap of ashes that I am sitting in, surrounded by a dense fog of smoke. During these times I turn to God for answers, turn to the Holy Spirit for guidance, and find some new part of me that was hidden, that was walled off, and would not have been found if the fire had never started. Peter writes in his first letter, that trials come “so that your faith – of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire – may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.” Gold is purified by flames, which first reveal the impurities that float to the top of the liquefied gold, and then incinerates these impurities. As much as I know trials are for my good, I can’t say I enjoy the whole experience of the flames. And yet, I have learned so much about myself and my God just by letting the flames consume the unnecessary pride and insecurity of my life, and allowing Father to show me the redecorating He has done with my heart. And just as the phoenix rises from the flames a new bird, so I also become a new person, stepping even closer to that person that God desires me to be.