by Jim Hughes
Is. 64:5 You welcome those who cheerfully do good, who follow godly ways. But we are not godly. We are constant sinners, so your anger is heavy on us. How can people like us be saved?
We understand how God can be receptive to the godly. It’s not hard to understand how the godly are favored by Him. It is hard for us to grasp how God can save the ungodly, those who constantly live in sin. We easily dismiss the ungodly as being beyond the reach of salvation. We understand how good people are easily loved, but fail to understand how bad people can be loved by a loving God.
Maybe you see yourself as being too much of a sinner to be loved by God. No one is beyond the scope of God’s love. He loves all people equally, regardless if they love Him in return or not. He loves all because He is love. He longs to have a relationship with everyone, including you. He gladly welcomes all who come to Him for the forgiveness of their sins and a life in Him.
We are prone to look down on the ungodly, but what we fail to grasp is that all of us who are saved were amongst the ungodly. Each of us were just as they are now, sinners in need of a Savior. All of us constantly sinned against God before our salvation. None of us knew what it was like to be loved by God. All of us willfully did not let the Lord into our hearts. All of us once were subject to the wrath of God.
Instead of looking down on the ungodly, we should have compassion on them. They have enough people in the world who look down on them and judge them for the way they choose to live. They need people who genuinely love them and care for their souls. They need people to help them find their way out of their sinful lives. They need people to accept them for who they are and prayerfully be a witness of God’s grace before their eyes. They need people who believe in who they can become in Christ if they would only surrender to Him.
How can anyone be saved? It is only through God’s grace and His outpoured love on our lives. No one deserves it, but all can have it. God desires a relationship with everyone. He knows that all won’t accept His offer to save them, but that doesn’t change His love for them. God won’t give up on the lost and neither should we. Someone cared enough about you to love you while you were a sinner and pointed you to the Lord. Someone prayed for your salvation. Will you do the same for someone you know?
About the Author:
Spending his formative years in Ft. Wayne, IN, Jim followed the love of his life to southeast Iowa where they married and have spent the majority of their lives. Jim has pastored several churches throughout his life and has worked many years in local factories to help support his family. The father of two married adult children and one son still at home, Jim is a first-time author.
C Through Marriage came into being through many years of pastoral and life experiences. The book first took on a life of its own over 20 years ago when I sought to address the much publicized moral failures of prominent leaders in the church. In the chapter on Chasity, I include the guideliness that I developed then to protect one's self from such failures.
I am a firm believer in order to make sense out of life you have to use much common sense. We need to get back to the basics of what has worked for many, many generations. If is isn't broke, why try to fix it? I strive to return to the basics of what really works in all my writings.
