Micah and 2 Corinthians 5

“He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”
                                                                                                                                    - 2 Corinthians 5:21

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Slouched in the corner of a narrow, subway car of a coffee shop, my fingers think. Sliding across a narrow keyboard and staring down the vestibule I think about my eldest son. He has been a four-year-old lately.

In reality, he’s been a four-year-old for 5 months. But as of late, he’s been a trip. When I reprimand him I cannot lock in on his eyes for longer than 3 seconds — they say that a goldfish can focus for 10 seconds, but my son’s feet drive him into a pirouette at the pinnacle of every sentence I rap in his direction.

And before you think it, I get it: he’s a four-year-old. His world can be cut and segmented into bite-sized feelings and the immediacy of the silly way I enunciated the word “listen” stirs something in him. He giggles. I steam.

He is a four-year-old. He is sassy and sensitive. He is obnoxious and gentle. He is taken by the very same condition that I fight every second of the day. Riddled with a sinful disposition, he is simultaneously one of the kindest people I know. His heart is darkened, but it also possesses something pure.

At the same time that he ignores his mom’s requests, he giggles and encourages his little brother. He willingly plots a path away from obedience, and dreams of cuddling the baby that grows in mom’s tummy.

He is simple but complicated. He is a paradox in velcro shoes (which I cannot get him to put on).

His name carries an irony that stirs me amid my fuming impatience.

Micah. “Who is like the Lord?” What a perfect question. Nobody is like our God.

Brian. He carries the same middle moniker as my father — the impatient, flighty, and intelligent man who stirs out the same feelings that this little boy’s worldview produces in me.

Cantril. The same name that I write to identify myself. He is me. His feelings vacillate at the drop of a pin, and his interests override that of the present circumstance. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.

While I watch him, he begs questions in the deepest recesses of my soul. He bears the image of God, my father, and me. What a debilitatingly confusing trio.

I wonder how God the Father felt when He looked at His own Son. We hear His voice at Jesus’ baptism: “This is My beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased” (Matt. 3:17). He utters the same statement at the transfiguration, ending with the vote of confidence: “Listen to Him” (Matt. 17:5)

Yahweh loves His Son. They have a unity that no person can truly experience or imagine; it is certain, unadulterated love.

Yet, this is the same relationship upon which the silence on the cross hung. “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” (Matt. 27:46).

He ignored His Son. Jesus did not roll His eyes or frustrate His Father’s plans. He didn’t obstinately turn the TV off in the dwindling seconds of a big game to see what would happen. There was no negative response, or discipline that was needed to bridge disobedience and reconciliation.

He ignored His Son.

And He did it for me. And you.

He used love to take a perfect relationship with a perfect Son and place it in my hands. He took the unblemished Lamb of life and walked Him to judgment so that He could take an imperfect and rebellious sinner and give him a home. He sent His Son to the edge and pushed Him off so that He could hold me close to His heart.

No concept of love squares this away for me. I do not know you, but I promise I would not allow my frustrating four-year-old to pay your punishment. If I knew you, I would say it more aggressively; you are not worth my boy’s life.

Why did He see it fitting to trade us?

God the Father gave part of Himself for… you. He gave the best thing He had for the, at best, medium-est, of rewards. He took His greatest love and gave Him death (and it is even weightier than that) in order to give love to those who continuously choose death and disobedience.

He gave everything for nothing.

He made Him who knew nothing of sin, to give me everything of righteousness. He gave you first-class, unimpeded access to love and placed unimaginable separation between Him and His Son.

​Who is like our Lord? I do not know. But I am His.