“He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed.”
— 1 Peter 2:24, ESV
Holy Spirit, please guide my words in all truth.
I was watching a podcast featuring Lee Strobel and Shawn Ryan, and Lee (a former atheist) brought up a very simple thought experiment that I’d like you and me to explore together today.
Imagine that you have committed a serious crime: murder. You’ve been indicted and found guilty. Now, standing before the judge, you hear your life-shattering fate: life in prison or a $100 million fine.
For ordinary people like you and me, the fine might as well be $100 billion. There’s no chance we could pay it, so the grim reality of spending the rest of our lives behind bars starts setting in. You look toward the gallery and see your mother weeping, your spouse distraught, and judgmental stares from the jury and everyone else who decided to attend your funeral.
However, just as you’re being taken away, the judge speaks again:
This fine is too much for you to bear. I will pay it under one condition:
Admit to yourself, in your heart, that this burden is too great and that you need me to intervene. Believe that, as your judge, I am able to do this and have already done it for you out of compassion and mercy.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is the perfectly wise and absolutely necessary logic of Jesus Christ. We have all sinned at least once in our lives, and because God is perfectly just, a fine has been imposed on us. Community service won’t save you from this, and money is useless here. This penalty requires payment in a currency no one but God Himself can afford.
Knowing this, there is only one way out: God Himself must intervene.
“For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.”
— Ephesians 2:8–9, KJV
Do you not see? How can you—a mortal, diseased and corrupt, evil down to your very core, regardless of how much “good” you claim to do—even begin to think, for a second, that your filthy rags could ever absolve you of this penalty?
Isn’t Jesus’s beautiful sacrifice absolutely necessary for you?
God’s intervention: a perfect man, His Son, sent on your behalf to pay the debt for your sins—past, present, and future. A free gift, the perfect culmination of love, mercy, and compassion for the sin you were born into as a result of Adam’s fall in the garden.
No more guilt. No more atonement. No more feeling bad about last week’s sin and allowing it to keep you up at night. No more living in death’s shadow, trying your very best not to sin, then sinning and falling into depression because you tried your best but failed, as usual.
Brothers and sisters, please listen.
I get no reward for passing this on, nor am I fulfilling a quota given to me from above. I am preaching this to you because I was you. I was a “good person.” I tried my best, gave to the poor, and turned my back on sin as often as I could. But none of that matters, don’t you see?
Our human efforts are nothing to the LORD—not because He has no compassion, but because He is God. He doesn’t deal in worldly atonement, but in perfect sacrifice and perfect justice. You cannot pay this debt. Let Him pay it for you! It’s free, beautiful, perfect, and, again, absolutely necessary.
Every other religion teaches works.
In Islam, you must pray five times a day, give obligatory charity to those who qualify, fast during Ramadan, and make the pilgrimage to Mecca…
Filthy rags.
In Judaism, you must keep all 613 commandments from the Old Testament, yet the Law was given to make sin known to the world, not to save us.
Filthy rags.
The thousands of other religions—Buddhism, Sikhism, Hinduism—all teach that you must do this and that and reach a level of enlightenment…
All. Filthy. Rags.
The penalty for sin must be paid by God. He must intervene.
God so loved the world that He came into it, died at the hands of His own creation (imagine the humility needed), and freed you and me once and for all from our fate by paying the impossible debt for us.
“For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.”
— 2 Corinthians 5:21, KJV
It’s a free gift. All you must do is believe, and you will receive it.
Until next time, and as always, stand firm in Christ.
Leave a Reply