Week 18—Friday Luke 10:23-24
Week 18—FRIDAY
THE DEED AND THE DEEDS
We now turn again to the passage in Acts: “In the first book, O Theophilis, I dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach” (1:1). Note the order—“began to do and teach.” The Christian is first a doing and then a teaching. It began in a Deed—the Deed of deeds—the Deed of God’s coming to us in the Incarnation. No Deed can be imagined greater than that. Suppose you try to imagine the coming Incarnation. Someone has put it thus: “The attempt to impose divine qualities on the framework of human nature has always resulted in a monstrosity, except in the case of Jesus.” Jesus is infinite sanity, infinite balance, supernatural naturalness. Pilate cried, “Behold the man!” We don’t look as the Hindus do for a spotless incarnation—we have Jesus. And he has us. When Jesus asked his disciples as they turned back from him, “Do you also wish to go away?” Peter replied, “Lord, to whom shall we go? For you have the words of eternal life.” And the ages echo the question, “Yes, Lord, to whom shall we go?” (John 6:67-68). There is nothing else on the horizon. It is you or nothing. Your coming is the Deed of deeds.
Now this Incarnate Deed was interpreted “by all that Jesus began to do”—the Deed was illustrated and interpreted by what Jesus did—the Deed was revealed by deeds. Many of those deeds were small, but every deed revealed something more than self—the small interpreted the Big, the Universal behind the limited. In watching Jesus you see more than you see, you hear more than you hear, for the little has become great with meaning; the trivial becomes the tremendous. The shell of the outer deed cracks, and you see the kernel of Eternal meanings. And never once did his deeds cut across the Deed—the whole is a consistent whole. The deeds and the Deed fit, revealing one thing—God.
O Lord, Christ, we thank you that you did not miss your step. You showed us the Father and nothing but the Father. There are no blurs, no canceling out of one statement or deed by a contradictory statement or deed. We thank you. Amen.
AFFIRMATION FOR THE DAY: I cannot be a spotless follower of the Spotless Incarnation, but my love can be single.