New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson is thinking about granting a posthumous pardon to notorious outlaw, Billy the Kid, who died with his boots on when shot down at the age of 21 by Pat Garrett more than 125 years ago. Richardson's doing this for God knows why.Actually, I’m not sure God knows why.
And so this is my question: What compelling reason (and he may have one; I just don’t know what it is—I do know about the amnesty thing and “what if” history) moves Richardson to even ponder this pardon? Have pardons already been granted to Jesse James, the Dalton boys or the Clanton gang?
The relatives of Pat Garrett are urging Richardson not to grant the pardon. The Kid killed people, and not even the passing of time erases the calumny of those deeds.
So—Gov’nor? What’s moving you to consider this?
We might also ask the same question of God re the pardon God has extended toward us. God must have a compelling reason, but in this case I know what it is: God loves us and justice has been satisfied.
We’re no more worthy of consideration of a pardon than Billy the Kid, but God’s done it anyway.
http://tmerril.blogs.com/timothy_merrill/2010/08/the-pardon-of-billy-the-kid.html
2 comments:
All Reformed believers know God loves them. We base our hope of salvation upon His love freely given to unworthy sinners. So what's the big deal here?
The problem is that we Reformed are prone toward being tempted to overreact to the "greasy grace" offered by many churches. We rightly want to emphasize God's sovereignty and man's depravity, but I'm afraid that we sometimes sacrifice the great love of God in the process.
I hear some Reformed folks saying things like, "I am just a piece of dung." These folks have grasped that God is above all things and that we don't even come close to Him in any way. But instead of focusing on God's glory, they seem to focus on man's shame. Our ways are so much lower than His ways that we must call ourselves dung, or some other form of waste matter. The problem with this is that it inverts what the Bible tells us. The Bible tells us that His ways are so much higher than our ways. You see, this exalts God, while the other way devalues man. There is a difference.
The Bible does not call us dung. Paul considers his achievements dung. But he calls himself the chief of sinners, which God sent His Son to die for. He's a man God died for!
And David says that He is fearfully and wonderfully made.
It is true that our works are worthless and that we are like the grass that withers and is blown away. It is true that compared to God, we are worms. Still, though we are fallen, God so loved us that He sent His Son to die and bring about reconciliation. Doesn't this tell us something about our worth?
When God says that He proved His love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us, He is saying something about our worth to Him. He owned us already, and didn't purchase us by the blood of Christ. In giving the blood, He bestowed upon us the greatest gift that He could give. That does say something about what He thinks we are worth. God could have secured our salvation for a lesser price. He could have made things differently. Why then did he so ordain that Christ would have to die for our sins? The fact that Christ died to secure our salvation does not really change the salvation or its worth to us. Eternal life in communion with God is the highest good a man can possess, and if it were purchased at a lesser price, we couldn't be any less satisfied with it. So if Christ's death does not make eternal life of more value to us, what does it do? It tells us how much God loves us. This is what the Bible says. God proved His love for us in this!
God tells us over and over how much we are worth to Him. He calls us sons, dearly loved children, and he tells us that He will give us good gifts and discipline--he will treat us the way loving father should treat his children. What are our own sons worth to us? They are priceless. There is no amount of money that could convince us to sell them. If that is so for sinful parents, how much more is it so for God? Will He ever give us up? Can anything ever separate us from His love?
Then how is that we would bristle when someone says that we are of great worth to God?
It is one thing to keep a clear view of God's sovereignty and to emphasize that His sole purpose is not to pamper us with money and good health. It is quite another to try to purchase His superiority by claiming to be more inferior than He made us. He doesn't consider us dung. He considers us children. It is important for us to grasp this great truth. We are told that we love God because He loved us first. If we hold an impoverished view of how much He loves and values us, then I don't see how we can fully love Him. Nor will we shed His great love on others. If we hold ourselves to be dung, it is likely that we would consider others to be worse dung.
Great insight and truth about how there is predominant teaching that we are no more than dung by "Anonymous". I particularly like the statement "He owned us already, and didn't purchase us by the blood of Christ."
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