A Kiss from the King

Last week, I was helping a little kindergartener write about "Sleeping Beauty," which the teacher had read to the class. Studying his semi-decipherable kindergarten writing, I asked him, "What does it say?" He proudly replied, "The princess got a kiss from the king!"

Now, I don't normally promote sexist fairytales, but my kinderbaby's confidence in the king's kiss got me thinking. Women aren't meant to wait around for a human man to marry so that their lives can begin. However, as the Church, we are the bride of Christ--that's plain, black-and-white scripture. Although it's wonderful, human love cannot wake us up into our true identities, give us eternal purpose, or complete us. (Sorry, Jerry Maguire.) BUT, a kiss from the King--a life-altering encounter with the all-consuming, blazing inferno of Jesus' love--can and does do those things. In fact, it's the only thing that can.

I think, as the Church, many of us are asleep, still waiting for a kiss from the Beloved that has already come.

For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith--that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. (Ephesians 3:14-19)

That's Paul's prayer for you, Beloved. Yet a great many of us are anesthetized, like the needle-pricked princess in the story. We check the church box on Sundays, then go home and live just like the world for the rest of the week, as if Jesus never said anything that He said. We don't realize that, all along, this was the plot of the evil villain. If he can get us believing that the life of the early church no longer exists, that we are not empowered by the Holy Spirit to affect supernatural change, that the things of the world are far more attractive than an intimate walk with Christ, then his work is done. He doesn't even have to attack us.

Even more of us have a beggar mentality when it comes to prayer. Like Oliver Twist, we approach God as though we were walking up to the big, intimidating pearly gates to knock and cry out, "Please, sir, I want some more." We think we have displeased Him with our sin, and that we have to make a bargain with Him or beg Him for our basic needs. I heard a pastor say this, and I'm going to steal it: a human father would be insulted if his daughter came up to him and cried, "Please, Daddy, take care of my basic needs. Please give me food and water. Please give me a roof over my head." How much more is the heavenly Father's heart broken when His children come to Him as beggars, thinking they're displeasing and disgusting to Him, bowing their heads in shame, when He has already forgiven our every sin on the cross?

Can I rock your boat a little bit more? Sin isn't even the biggest issue to God. Yes, He hates it, because it hurts His children. But if you read through the entire Old Testament in one day (which I doubt very many people have done), you would notice that, whenever God sent a prophet to the Israelites, His biggest complaint about them wasn't that they infringed upon the Law, but that "they don't know Me."

If they had known Him, living in true, deep, meaningful, vulnerable intimacy with Him on an individual level, they wouldn't have had a sin problem in the first place. Separation from Him is what causes sin.  God's desire is that we would know Him, and He made a way for us to do that through His Son. With the Old Testament prophets, we get a shadow of New Testament reality: it is no longer your sin that separates you from God, but your separation from God that causes you to sin.

Did you catch that? The more time you waste believing you're a sinner, the more you will separate yourself from the Lord because of your shame. That separation breeds distance from the only One who loves you with a passionate love, and that distance breeds more sin.

As a believer in Jesus, YOU ARE NOT A SINNER. You have been REDEEMED. Redemption means all parts of you--even those places you have been, those sins you have committed, that make you cringe. The ones you don't even want to think about. He has forgotten them. They have been nailed to the cross (Colossians 2:14).

If you're offended by this, good. The gospel is offensive. It was so offensive to the religious people in Jesus' day--those who supposedly knew the Father--that they killed Him.

If you are shocked at what I'm saying, then I must be doing my job right.

Beloved, beloved, beloved: you are IN CHRIST. And is Christ a sinner?

Ok then.

You are worthy to approach God as a son or daughter not based on your own spotless record, but based on Jesus. What He did was enough.

My heart burns to see the Church wake up to believe this: Christ is enough.

No "buts."

Can you imagine what the world would look like if we prayed like we had the authority of sonship?

Believer, the Lord wants you to approach Him with confidence, because His eyes roam the earth, looking for those who can get beyond themselves enough to truly love Him (2 Chronicles 15:9, John 4:23-24). We have died with Christ, and we have been raised and seated in heavenly places with Him (Ephesians 2:6). We pray from the throne room, not to the throne room.

Don't get mad at me. Blame the Bible.

To bring it back around to kissing (after that totally unplanned tangent of passion...ahem...#sorrynotsorry....), take a look at the story of the prodigal son in Luke 15. The Prodigal is kind of pitiful. Even after he wastes his entire inheritance in sin, he only decides to return to his father because he wants a meal that's better than what hogs eat. As Christians, many of us come home to Jesus for the same reason: we have a preference for something better than what we have, and we still don't properly understand our identities. The Prodigal goes home as a beggar, intending to strike a bargain with his father: "Hey, Dad, if you feed me, I'll work for you."

Examine your own heart. Do you ever approach God this way?

I think we all do.

But note what the father does when he sees his son approaching from a long way off: he runs to him and kisses him. And before his son can even try to bargain with him, he slaps him with a royal robe and ring and kills the best calf for a feast.

Can you imagine the son's thoughts? Does he still believe that he is worth something to his father only through what he can do? Does he believe he is really forgiven? Does he accept his father's mercy with gladness? Or is he ashamed to wear fine clothing? Is he angry that he isn't allowed to work to regain favor?

Do you see where I'm going with this?

The truth is, the son has gotten a kiss from his father--a kiss from the king. And (at the risk of sounding weird) our King, Jesus, wants nothing more than to be that close to you--close enough for a kiss.

Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me (Revelation 3:20).

You're not a beggar who is cowering at the door of the palace, too afraid to knock. He is knocking on your door. He wants you.

Sleeping Beauty had no part in her own awakening other than to respond--involuntarily--to the love of the king. And, if you're a bride who knows who she is, you will rise to do the same with joy and confidence.