"He called me brother..." (or, The Beauty of Grace)

Imagine this:

You come home to find a dirty, obviously homeless man asleep in your yard. There's a very good chance he's a paroled convict. What would you do? Ignore him? Call the police? Or would you invite him inside? Perhaps you would cook him a meal and pray over him, calling him an honored guest as he dines with you and your family.

But then what if he slips out in the middle of the night taking as many of your valuable items as he can carry? What if the police catch him and bring him back to your house because he claims you gave him the items? Would you find yourself pressing charges? Or maybe you corroborate his story, calling him brother as you do so, and hand him the most valuable items saying he forgot to take them with him?

This is the scenario that plays out at the beginning of Les Miserables. I'm starting to realize that this show has always been one of my favorites because of its portrayal of grace. We meet Jean Valjean as he finishes his prison sentence: 5 years for stealing a loaf of bread (in an attempt to feeding his starving family) plus another 14 for trying to run. When he's finally released, he remains a prisoner to the past because he is labeled as a convict which means no one will hire him. You can imagine the desperation he might feel when he is rejected and turned away time after time.

And then he finds himself outside a church. The Bishop discovers him, and for the first time, Jean Valjean is shown grace. Just like Christ, the Bishop chooses not to treat Valjean as he deserves; instead, he simply loves him. After the moment I described above, Valjean processes the incredible idea that another human being could call him brother, let alone believe that he had a soul and was capable of being more than a paroled convict. Somehow this act of grace penetrates the hatred he feels toward the world and his desire for vengeance. This frees him to leave the past behind and seek to "live a life worthy of [his] calling" (Ephesians 4:1).

In stark contrast to the Bishop, Javert lives life clinging to the law. He hunts Valjean mercilessly, wanting this man to be brought to justice for his actions. In other instances, we come to understand that Javert sees only wrong choices and not the stories of desperation that may have led to them (or the broken system that created the desperation). He lives by the mantra: "Honest work; just reward- that's the way to please the Lord." The idea that Valjean's crimes could be forgiven eventually leads to Javert's suicide. Javert can't imagine a world  in which grace plays a role. His hope is in the law, in following the rules and earning his reward.

So my question for each of us (including myself) is this: Do you tend to be more like the Bishop or Javert? Do you understand the role grace has played in your own life enough that you can't help but extend it to others? Are you able to see past the exterior to recognize the soul of your brother? Or are you still so busy trying to have it all together that you balk at the idea of others receiving grace?

There's a lyric in the show that goes like this: To love another person is to see the face of God. Lately I've been taking this to mean that we need to recognize the face of God in the other person in order to truly love them. Maybe it's only when you choose to see it that they will be free to see it, too.