From a previous post, ‘The Threat of Grace:’. . . Timothy Keller shares, “You anticipate whatever pleases and delights them. There’s no coercion or sense of obligation, yet your behavior has been radically changed by the mind and heart of the person you love.
No one put this more vividly than Victor Hugo in Les Misérables. His main character, Jean Valjean, is a bitter ex-convict. He steals silver from a bishop who has already shown him kindness. He is caught by the gendarmes, and is brought back under arrest to the bishop’s home. In an act of radical grace the bishop gives Valjean the silver and releases him from arrest. This act of mercy shakes him to the core. In the following chapter Hugo spells out how threatening the grace was. . . .(continuing)
To this celestial kindness [of the bishop] he opposed pride, which is the fortress of evil within us. He was distinctly conscious that the pardon of this priest was the greatest and the most formidable attack which had moved him yet; that his obduracy(1) was finally settled if he resisted this clemency; that if he yielded he would be obliged to renounce that hatred with which the actions of other men had filled his soul through so many years, and which pleased him; that this time it was necessary to conquer or be conquered; and that a struggle, a colossal and final struggle, had been begun between his viciousness and the goodness of that man.5
Valjean chooses to let grace have its way with him. He gives up his deep self-pity and bitterness and begins to live a life of graciousness toward others. He is changed at the root of his being.
The other main character in the novel is the police officer Javert, who has built his entire life on his understanding of rewards and punishments. He relentlessly and self-righteously pursues Valjean throughout the book, even though it is wrecking his own life. Finally, Javert falls into Valjean’s hands. Instead of killing him, Valjean lets his enemy go. This act of radical grace is deeply troubling to Javert. He realizes that to appropriately respond to this gesture will require a complete change in his worldview. Rather than make that change, he throws himself into the Seine.
This may be the greatest paradox of all. The most liberating act of free unconditional grace demands that the recipient gives up his or her life. Is that a contradiction?. . . . We are not in control of our lives. We are all living for something and we are controlled by that, the true Lord of our lives. If it is not God., it will endlessly oppress us. It is only grace that frees us from the slavery of self that lurks even in the middle of mortality and religion. Grace is only a threat to the illusion that we are free, autonomous selves, living life as we choose.
The gospel makes it possible to have such a radically different life. Christians, however, often fail to make use of the resources of the gospel to live the lives they are capable of in Christ. It is critical for anyone reading this book (The Reason for God) to recognize this fundamental difference between the gospel and religion. Christianity’s basic message differs at root with the assumptions of traditional religion. The founders of every other major religion essentially came as teachers, not saviors. They came to say: “Do this and you will find the divine.” But Jesus came essentially as a savior rather than a teacher (though he was that as well). Jesus says: “I am the divine come to you, to do for you what you could not do for yourselves.” The Christian message is that we are saved not by our record, but by Christ’s record. So Christianity is no religion or irreligion. It is something else.~Timothy Keller, The Reason for God (New York, New York: Penguin Books 2008,2018), 189-192
