I saw this recently. “Jacob lied. Moses murdered. Saul hunted down Christians. David had an affair. Peter disowned Jesus. God used every single one of these people to build the Kingdom. You are never too far gone for God to use. Don’t let the Devil steal your story, let Christ rewrite it.”
I am amazed at some of the heroes in the Scriptures. King David especially. His adultery and lies led to murder, and yet God identified him as a man after God’s heart. God uses broken people to bring hope to a broken world. We have all fallen and are broken, but still usable because of His mercy and grace that puts us back together again. God does not discard … he repurposes.
For the longest time, I have been questioning some of my own theological bias. For example, I have wrestled with this question, “How many times does a person sin to be disqualified by that sin to be used by God in the Church?” Some sin, like a habitual sin, something that repeats itself … does that become the disqualifier from actively pursuing a ministry position in a Church? Another example of this would be a person who has been divorced several times. Would they be disqualified to a ministry position? I would have said, yes, there are certain sins that would disqualify you and this would be one of them. Yet, when forgiveness was talked about by Jesus, it would appear He was teaching us that forgiveness is having mercy on the sinful.
In Matthew 18:21-22 Jesus says that we are to forgive someone “seventy-seven times” (or, in many translations, “seventy times seven,” which is 490 times). In Luke 17:4, Jesus says that you should forgive someone seven times in one day; that would work out to more than 2,500 acts of forgiveness each year.
Now does forgiveness restore someone to a previous state of relationship with God and with others? I love what James 2:13 in the Amplified Bible (AMP) says, “For judgment will be merciless to one who has shown no mercy; but [to the one who has shown mercy] mercy triumphs [victoriously] over judgment.”
Now some would say, “Forgiveness does not qualify a person for a position in the Church, forgiveness may restore the person, but it may not restore a person to a previous or a future position as a leader in a Church. This is where my bias in the past made me a judge of a forgiven person. I can tell you that in fifty years of ministry in the Church, if I were to use the standard that many use to disqualify a person for ministry, I would not have lasted long in leadership … nor would anyone else for that matter. Again, I am not suggesting that we loosen our standards for leadership in the Church, the Scriptures set that up for us in 1 Timothy 3. Yet, if a person is restored by repentance and forgiveness, has a proven track record of Godly living, and is living a life that honors God, I must err on the side of restoration, rather than on condemnation. All sin and fall short of the glory of God, so who among us can say, “I go and I sin no more.” One preacher said, “God forgives, but people don’t!” How true is that?
In my opening paragraph, it lists people that sinned horrendously, and yet God used them to work out His will through their lives. Here is my point. Not one of them would qualify for a leadership position today in the Church. In fact, most of the heroes in Scripture were broken people with broken lives. In my experience with places like Teen Challenge, most of the counselors and coaches have had an addiction problem in their lives. God knows how to use the brokenness of the past to help the brokenness of the present in people’s lives. I have concluded that God does not discard people who sin … He repurposes people in restoration for His glory.
Wrestling with being righteous enough ends with knowing Jesus is our righteousness, and He continues to work His righteousness in our lives. Let’s stop making people feel that sin defines them, when God says He defines through forgiveness and stamps them restored in Him. Amen.
Challenging the Culture with Truth … Larry Kutzler
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