The Get-Out-of-Jail Free Card

Anyone who has played the game of Monopoly knows the value of having a Get-Out-of-Jail Free card.  While a bad roll of the dice can suddenly land a player in jail, presenting this special card allows the holder to continue the game instead of languishing in lost turns while the rest of the players advance.  It’s actually a lot like life.

The case could be made that everyone has a bad roll once in a while.  Most of us are adept at minimizing our contributions to the misfortunes that come our way, and in truth, there are times when we trip into trouble quite accidently.  But there are other times we dare trouble to find us, or worse, flaunt willful and rebellious speech and behaviors, more determined to have our way than to comply with whatever we don’t like.

Such was the case for a large number of the Israelites that Moses led out of Egypt into the desert to the foot of Mt. Sinai.  While Moses was on the mountain for 40 days and 40 nights receiving the Ten Commandments from God, the people got tired of waiting and complained to Aaron, Moses’ brother.  Aaron took their gold jewelry, melted it down and forged it into a calf idol he presented to the people as their god.  As Moses was descending from the mountain, the Israelites had already broken into wild, idolatrous celebration. “I have seen these people,” the Lord said to Moses, “and they are a stiff-necked people. ¹⁰ Now leave Me alone so that My anger may burn against them and that I may destroy them. Then I will make you into a great nation.” (Exodus 32:9-10) Instead, Moses sought God’s favor to change His mind about destroying them.  God relented, even though Moses agreed they were a stiff-necked people.

The Hebrew word for “stiff-necked” means stubborn, obstinate, and in this case, resistant to God’s commands.  Stiff-necked people put their opinions, ideas, and understanding ahead of God.  The term applies anytime we diminish, rationalize, or ignore Biblical truth, choosing our own (or the popular) version of truth and wisdom.  The most grievous thing is that we think so little of doing this that most of us are guilty, having forgotten that this particular sin was offensive enough to God to be punishable by death.

So why are more of us not struck by lightning or some other “natural” disaster?  Just as Moses stood in the gap for the Israelites, Jesus now stands in the gap for us believers.  That doesn’t mean the offense is less serious; God assured Moses that the people would be punished at the appropriate time.  We face punishment as well, but we have a Savior Who took it and died for our sins of insolence and contempt against the Father.  We must avoid using Jesus’ sacrificial death as our entitled Get-Out-of-Jail Free card and come face-to-face with the fact that “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure.” (Jeremiah 17:9) It is only through sorrow and true repentance that we receive the benefit of Jesus’s forgiveness. True repentance means we are appalled and disgusted by our self-righteous behavior that permits us to treat our precious Savior callously.  It necessitates that we must draw on God’s power to never again participate in being stiff-necked.

For some of us, that is easier said than done, as old habits die hard.  Despite our best intentions, when we end up doing those things we honestly don’t want to do and are met with the blessing of Jesus’ love and grace in the midst of our filthiness, it is extraordinarily humbling and overwhelmingly breathtaking.  That is when our Get-Out-of-Jail Free card becomes priceless, dearly cherished, and never taken for granted.  That card was anything but free.