Exceeding Reality

Have you run across the TV show called The Great British Bake Off? Multiple amateur contestants try to impress the judges with their creations. Anything from cake that looks like a beaver to pastries that look like fruit, to whatever else. There’s other shows that do the same thing – always a contest of some sort – with varying degrees of success. For those who are still too amateurish to get onto a show like this, they will often post their attempts to recreate something from one of these shows and usually in the form of a before and after picture – an “expectation” picture versus the “reality” of what they created. Usually, the reality is far from the expectation. 

Lord Have Mercy

The parable is concerned with how we understand justification. Now, in theological terms, to be justified means to be “righteous in God’s eyes.” And, justification is the word we use to describe how we become righteous in God’s eyes. That is, the word justification is all about what God sees when God looks at us, and this word – justification – is interested in explaining what it takes for any of us to become righteous in God’s eyes. How do we get there? How do we end up looking good to God?