Before and After

I’m sure everyone has seen advertisements with "before" and "after" photographs. They are everywhere—in magazines, newspapers, on TV. Oxyclean, Nutra System, age defying anti-wrinkle creams, Subway, hair club for men. Before and after. The photographs are always designed to show a very pronounced change. The difference between before and after is earth shaking, meant to really grab our attention. No one could possibly mistake or confuse the "before" photo with the "after" photo. And even though most of the things being advertised are gradual processes, we’re not shown that gradual transition; we’re just shown the profound, unmistakable difference between then and now, between before and after.

Today’s Scripture readings are full of "before" and "after" photos. The first we heard about involves young David in the reading from First Samuel. The anointing of David. In the "before" photo he was just a ruddy young shepherd with beautiful eyes. "After" he was the anointed of the Lord to be King of Israel, and Scripture tells us "the spirit of the Lord came mightily upon David from that day forward." From that day forward, David was changed. A real, recognizable, profound, unmistakable change. David was different after than he was before.

In the letter to the Ephesians the writer says, "Once you were darkness, but now in the Lord you are light." Before and after. As different as day and night; as different as darkness and light.

And in the gospel story of course, the man born blind is given his sight. "Before" he was blind. "After" he has his sight. Yet his transformation involves much more even than just physical sight. "Before" he was a beggar; "after" he became a disciple. And just within this brief story, we also see him transformed from one who was timid and confused to one who is quite confident and assertive, challenging and talking back to the Pharisees.

Talk about "before" and "after." In a bit, we’re going to sing "Amazing Grace." "I once was lost, but now am found, was blind but now I see." Before and after. Lost, now found. Blind before, but now I see.

Like in the TV ads, the difference between "before" and "after" in these examples from Scripture seems so clear cut. There seem to be no ambiguity, no gradations or transitions. It’s either/or, one or the other. Anointed or not anointed, dark or light, lost or found, blind or sighted.

All of this got me thinking about "being saved." Most Christians who talk about being saved point to a very specific time or event when they were saved. "Before" that time, they were not saved; "after" they were saved. A very clear-cut, unmistakable distinction. Yet I have always been a bit uncomfortable with this talk of being saved. And I’m certainly skeptical that such a profound and significant transformation can happen apparently instantaneously.

And yet we have all of this Scriptural witness this morning. And we have probably the best known and best loved of all Christian hymns. "Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me." What does it really mean to "be saved?" And does it really happen in an instant, a specific point that divides our life into "before" and "after?" Is being saved like crossing the Continental Divide, that precise and absolute separation between water flowing east and water flowing west. "You were darkness; now you are light." "I once was lost, but now am found." On June 23 I was saved. What does it mean to say those words?

Billy Graham is someone who certainly is comfortable with the language and idea of "being saved." It is his epic ministry to draw people by the thousands to the specific point, the particular moment when they can make their own affirmation, when they can claim and proclaim their salvation.

Billy Graham has been in the news quite a bit this last week. Partly because he happens to have had specials televised. I will admit I have never watched one all the way through. But in the snippets and promos I saw this week I was impressed, as I have been before, by the integrity of the gospel message of God's love that he proclaims. But Billy Graham has also been in the news this week because his voice appears in some recently released tapes from the Nixon presidency. In conversation with President Nixon, Graham makes some extremely denigrating and bigoted comments about Jews. But what has struck me most profoundly is Graham’s present day response to those words he said so many years ago. He called them sin. He confessed himself as having succumbed to the corruption of power, to the sinful desire to ally himself with power by saying what he thought the president wanted to hear. Sin. He named his words sinful. He named himself a sinner. Those are the words of a man who has been saved.

Think how many politicians would have responded if their voices had been revealed on tape making such comments. Graham didn’t accuse the press of trying to bring him down or try to shift the focus away from himself by some other counter attack. He didn’t try to explain the comments away by saying they had been taken out of context. He didn’t deny their importance or significance. He didn’t accuse Nixon of leading him on or provoking him to say things he didn’t really mean. He didn’t try to blame his apparent anti-Semitism on his parents or his teachers or anyone else.

He said, "I sinned. I am a sinner." Only someone who has been saved can say that.

Being saved is knowing that we are sinners whom only God can save.

Being saved is knowing that we have an emptiness within that only God can fill.

Being saved is knowing that we are hopelessly lost without God to guide us.

Being saved is knowing that, no matter what our vision may be, we are blind. And only God can give us sight.

To be saved doesn’t mean that we are without sin or will never sin again. In fact, to be saved is to know that we are—present tense—sinners. We are not just people who occasionally mess up or have errors in judgment that can be explained or overcome.  (Those are the words of someone who has not been saved; who does not know his need for God). To be saved is to recognize that our problem is sin.  We are sinners. But sinners who can and will be redeemed by God. To be saved does not mean that we will never feel lost or empty. But to be saved is to recognize that the emptiness we do feel cannot be filled by any human achievement. We are saved when we recognize that our emptiness is God-shaped.  The moment of salvation is when we begin the journey by which God will fill that emptiness. Being saved does not mean that we always see with shining clarity what God would have us do and say and be, but it is to affirm that such vision is possible with, but only with, God’s help.

Before and after. An unmistakable transition. The moment of salvation.  That point when we say, not that we have received the fullness of God’s grace, but that we need the fullness of God’s grace. And nothing else will do.

Listen to the prayer we say at burials as we commend a departed soul to God’s care. "Into your hands, O merciful Savior, we commend your servant. Acknowledge, we humbly beseech you, a sheep of your own fold, a lamb of your own flock, a sinner of your own redeeming."

A sinner of God’s own redeeming. That is the definition of someone who has been saved.

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