“God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8)
Jesus did not come to call to the righteous, to call those who are spiritually-wise in their own eyes . . . because they think they earn their way to heaven with their good deeds and proper living and spiritual wisdom and polished outside.
No! Jesus came to call the sinners, those who are broken and hurting and who know that they need Him and that they could never earn their way to heaven. And God loves us sinners enough to send Jesus to die for us.
And no one needs to polish themselves up to be worthy of that love. It is there. It is free. It is yours for the taking. As long as you know that you need it but can never earn it.
It’s not about being “good enough.” It’s just about accepting the free gifts of love and forgiveness and grace that God offers to us while we are still sinners, before we clean ourselves up.
Consider how Jesus treated the broken people He met. How about the woman at the well (John 4)? He didn’t focus on her sins and what she did wrong. He didn’t scold her for her lifestyle or pull back from her or treat her differently than anyone else.
Actually, He did treat her differently. He reached out to her, whereas others probably shamed her (which would explain why she was at the well alone in the middle of the day, instead of going when all the other women went).
Knowing that she was a broken person in need of healing, He approached her. In fact, He made sure to be at the well when she was there, not when all the other girls were there. But He did not scold or condemn her. He simply stated the truth that she had five husbands and was now living with a man she was not married to. He stated the facts about her life and told her that He was the Messiah and offered her everything He had to give – love, salvation, forgiveness. And then He left it up to her to come to the conclusion that she was living in sin and needed to change.
He didn’t make it about a change of behavior, but about a change of the heart first. Clean the inside of the cup before tackling the outside. He tried to draw her with simple truth and kindness, instead of turning His back on her or trying to shame her or trying to push her out of her sinful lifestyle.
And the woman caught in adultery in John 8? The religious leaders wanted to punish her, to give her what her actions deserved. But Jesus stood up for her. He gave her back her life instead of applying the required, appropriate penalty. He stopped the throwing of stones, even though He alone had every right to throw them.
It didn’t mean that He condoned her choices (He instructed her to leave her life of sin), although I am sure it might look like that to the religious leaders. But I think He cared more about where she was going than where she had been. He cared more about the potential for her to get her life right than He did about what she had done wrong. He cared more about making the judgmental, self-righteous people mind their own business than He did about making a show of “dishing out justice” to a sinner. And He cared more about reaching past her broken, sinful condition and touching her heart and offering her grace, mercy, forgiveness, and healing than He did about the fact that His actions might be interpreted by the religious leaders as supporting or excusing her immorality.
I fear that we Christians, in an effort to stand firmly on God’s Truth, can fail sometimes at seeing and loving the person behind the sin. We fail to consider on our own standing before the Lord while we point out everything that everyone else does wrong. We fail to extend grace, mercy, kindness, and respect to “those sinners” because we don’t want to look like we have compromised God’s Word or gone soft on sin. We slam the door on sinners of various kinds and turn away from them so that it doesn’t look like we agree with their choices. We polish ourselves up so that we don’t look too real, too human, or too broken, like the rest of the people out there. We throw stones at others, when we should be shielding them from stones, even if they “deserve” it. We condemn them for their humanness instead of coming alongside them to help. We point fingers and shame others, when we should be standing next to them because we are all on the same level at the foot of God’s throne.
Don’t get me wrong… I’m not saying that we shouldn’t call sin what it is. After all, remember that Jesus didn’t excuse the woman’s life of sin or soothe her by telling her that it doesn’t matter how she lives. He told her to leave her life of sin.
But what I am saying is that it’s not our job to dish out punishment for sins or to condemn, criticize, and shun those who sin. For we are all sinners. We are all on the same level before the Lord. We are all broken. We all need grace and mercy and love and forgiveness. And we need to extend it to others also, to draw them to Christ. We need to love the person while still upholding God’s truth.
When you interact with others, remember that it’s love (along with a gentle, firm stand on truth) that will draw people to Him. If God loves them as they are, we can too. And when they turn to God, the Holy Spirit will encourage them to clean up their lives. We don’t have to worry about that yet.
First comes loving them (in gentle but firm truth) and extending grace to them, then comes their desire to change. First comes their heart change, then comes their behavior change. First comes cleaning the inside of the cup, then comes the outside.
And let’s also remember that we need to take care of the plank in our eyes first before focusing on other people’s sins. We need to be more concerned with how we are living before the Lord than with how someone else is living before the Lord. And God looks past our nice, shiny, false masks and sees the condition of our hearts. And so we need to be more concerned with our heart’s condition than we are with our “good Christian” performance. For God judges the motives of the heart.
“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.” (Matt 23:25-26)
“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.” (Matt 7:3-5)
“The Lord looks down from heaven on the sons of men to see if there are any who understand, any who seek God.” (Psalm 14:2)
“For the eyes of the Lord range throughout the earth to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to him.” (2 Chronicles 16:9)
