Half-Grace

All of us have regrets.

I’m certain something has probably popped into your mind: a poor choice of words or a white lie, maybe even something much larger and significant like a lifestyle of sin you used to live or a life-changing mistake you’ve made. What I’m getting at is the importance of the fact that none of us are without blemish or stain. Likely, some of us have a past we aren’t too terribly proud of. But, what if we abandoned the truth that not one of us is righteous on our own? What if we began to weigh our sins against one another and put human guidelines and exceptions on sin? What if we measured each other’s sins, compared, and condemned them? Sadly, we have done most, if not all, of these things.

Doing so is a dangerous game. Christians then begin to determine which sin is nastier than another, and then we take and twist what is truth and become the Pharisees who condemned wrong-doers. Think about it. At first instinct and impulse, which is worse to you: a person who cheats on an exam or a raging alcoholic? What about a liar compared to a drug addict? If you’re being completely honest with yourself, you’d probably put the alcoholic and drug addict on the same level high above the level of a cheater and a liar. It’s what we do. We weigh sins. We do it in the courtroom; we do it in society. Somehow, we’ve placed measurements on the severity of sins when we know Jesus treated all sins equally. He treated every sin with the same consequence. He knew that all of us would struggle with sin, no matter how small or large we would consider that sin to be. And, He died for every one of those.

When we begin to weigh sins, we start to believe a very malignant, self-righteous lie. We take certain sins and say, “that could never be me. I would never fall into a sin like that.” Brothers and sisters, I cannot caution you enough on this thinking. This is the thinking that drives people away from Christianity. This is the thinking and the lack of understanding that causes us to condemn, whether purposefully or not. This thinking is a casting of judgment. Hear me now: no one is immune to certain sins. We are all capable of falling into any of Satan’s snares. See, we weigh sins and say that alcoholism, substance addiction, murder, pornography, homosexuality, sexual immorality, etc. are worse than others, and then we insist we couldn’t fall for any of those ever. It’s like we veil ourselves in a perfect little Christian bubble and say “not me. I don’t struggle with anything like that.” There is none righteous, no, not one. And let me assure you, when nonbelievers hear you condemn other people for their past sins, they run. You make a mockery of what Christ did on the cross for everyone, every sin, and every past. Merging legalism with grace distorts grace and insults the significance of the cross. “I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing!” (Galatians 2:21) There is a difference between saying those sins are wrong and saying those sins are special, different, and therefore condemnable. It is not and will never be our place.

One reason we have a tendency to believe ourselves immune to certain sins is we have a lack of understanding of the specific sin. This lack of understanding has to do with our inability to relate to that sin. For example, I don’t drink alcohol. It would be easy for me to say I could never fall into a sin like that because alcohol tastes bad to me, and I don’t need a substance to have a good time. But that’s wrong. Do you understand how callous that is to present to an alcoholic or a recovering alcoholic? It’s like saying, “What was wrong with you? I have no idea how you could’ve fallen into that sin.” It brings on a spirit of condemnation. It puts that person in a cage where people who don’t relate to them poke, prod, and point fingers at them in disgust. There is no grace in that mindset. We must be careful not to condemn or judge our brothers and sisters lest we be whitewashed tombs and hypocrites (Matthew 23:27-28). The same goes for any of those “bigger” sins, if you will.

Here’s one everyone cringes at and Christian society can hardly stand to talk about: homosexuality. If they’re talking about it, they’re condemning gay people. It’s like homosexuality has a separate category of sin. It is this unchartered water that’s being more openly explored in the world today. It is becoming more and more common and it is one of the least understood sins.

Let’s say you have a man who has recently been redeemed from a lifestyle of homosexuality. Everyone celebrates and rejoices for a time. But, you will see that there are some people in the Church who will always condemn the sin and cast judgment on the person. Listen, brothers and sisters: just because you have never been attracted to someone of the same sex as you does not mean the person who has is crazy, weird, or nasty. Just because you have never been addicted to a substance or sex doesn’t mean people who have are bad or condemnable. They are just as human and as imperfect as you. Do not let your inability or unwillingness to relate to a certain sin get in the way of the power of the cross. Jesus’ forgiveness is not contingent on the severity of our actions. Freedom is not offered solely as the reward of our standards of what a “great” testimony is. We all fall short. We are no better than any other humble beggar that comes to fall before Jesus’ feet. Jesus died once for all sins; there were no categories or levels. He died for the cheater, the prostitute, and the liar. He died for you.

So, how do we fix that? Well, we make sin a single category and consider what sin is. Sin is morally evil. It is against God and who He is. It is the breaking of God’s law and it is a part of our nature. So, what motivates you to sin or what has motivated you to in the past? Flesh motivates us. We want to do something satisfying to our flesh. Sin generally feels good, at least in the moment. We are also motivated to sin by temptation. Sometimes we are inclined to fall into temptation because we just don’t care.

The crazy thing about this list and understanding what sin is and the stirring behind it is the fact this covers all sins from a harsh word to murder. If that’s the case, then we all relate. We can understand any sin because we understand the depth of the temptation and we understand the enemy and his schemes. Some people are tempted to cheat, some to steal, some to have sex outside of marriage, some to be drunk, some to do drugs, and so on. Now, one of those may not specifically relate to you, but they all begin with a temptation. Every sin is reconcilable. And, praise The Father that is true. We should rejoice in the fact Jesus did not weigh sins like we try to. The dirt our knees fall into at the foot of the cross is level ground.

And what’s more, together, no matter what the sin or circumstance of our past, we can rejoice in how He has made us new- new and beautiful creations. Our lives were turned to ash He restored. Our hearts were broken, our wrists were shackled, our heads were bent with shame, but He overcame. All that we had done wrong instantly became undone in the eyes of a loving Father wanting to draw us back to Him and His loving arms. “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland” (Isaiah 43:18-19). He is so good.

Remember we, as Christians, are all on the same team, regardless of pasts. Your co-worker may have quite the backstory, but don’t make him feel shame because it’s not your own. You aren’t going to understand every sin and why some people fall into it. The measurement you put on sins will be used to measure you (Matthew 7:1-2). We are all enticed by different things. But, do not think you’re above certain sins. Understand the temptation of sin is a very real thing, and we are all fighting it together as one body: the Church in fellowship, as Christ designed it. We are all weak without Jesus, and that’s okay. He fills in the gaps that we can’t. We have cracks in our foundation that Jesus fills up with His strength. He is the cornerstone we can depend on. Where we are weak, He is strong.

“Therefore let us stop passing judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in the way of a brother or sister” (Romans 14:13). We want to build each other up. We need one another. And if we truly want to make gains in the Kingdom of God- if we truly want to witness to people and share the gospel, we will stop giving out “half-grace”. What if Jesus had only offered us half-grace? What if He only partially forgave our sins or only forgave some sins and not all? Can you imagine what that would be like? I don’t want to. I am so overwhelming thankful for how He loved me even when I was the filthiest and most wretched. Jesus didn’t offer us half-grace, nor should we offer it to our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ or nonbelievers. It most certainly is a matter of life or death.

To any of you who have been offered half-grace in the past from the Church or believers, hear me now: we are broken people in a broken world trying to be like Jesus, and sometimes we don’t always succeed. But take heart, for you are a new creation. Your sin is not specially horrific, categorized, or compared to others- not in Jesus’ eyes. “’No weapon forged against you will prevail, and you will refute every tongue that accuses you. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord, and this is their vindication from me,’ declares the Lord” (Isaiah 54:17). Jesus offers us vindication and victory- no matter what anyone says! What a promise.

I’ll leave you with these words Paul wrote:

“So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sin against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” (2 Corinthians 5:16-21)

Forget what is behind, and strain toward what is ahead! Press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called us heavenward in Christ Jesus (Philippians 3:13-14). Don’t push your brothers and sisters down. Be better. We are on the same team, striving towards the same goal, and may we ever cry together, “Even so come, Lord Jesus, come!”