” Each of us has something – some more, others less – of the Happy Moralist in him or her. We all lower God’s standards to something we are able to accomplish. For the Galatians it was circumcision; for others it might be avoiding R-rated movies or music that wasn’t written before the 1800s. The problem, of course, is that God is the law giver (James 4:12), not we, and his law is utterly impossible for fallen, flawed people like us to obey perfectly. His law is easy to remember but impossible to do. Here it is again:

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets. (Matt. 22:37-40)

           

            There hasn’t been one minute of one day in our entire lives that we have ever really obeyed this command. Because it’s so hard to do, we replace it with other easier rules so that we can stay happy and complacent, our self-esteem intact. The problem, of course, is that we are never made deeply joyful by the gospel because we have never been deeply crushed by it. We haven’t known death, so we can’t know life. We are still trying to assure our hearts that we really are quite competent and, ‘doggone it, people like us.’

            If the Love of God bores you, you are a Happy Moralist. Take yourself to Calvary and see what your sin has wrought. But don’t stand there thinking you are an innocent bystander. Instead, let Luther’s words pierce your soul:

            Are you beginning to despair of being worthy of his love? Yes? Good. Now, let the love of Christ richly soothe your troubled conscience and humbly admit, along with the hymn writer, Augustus Toplady, ‘nothing in my hands I bring, simply to thy cross I cling.’ How does this love of God look to you now? Is it still boring?”