Transcript:
Stephen: One of the things that we see in the life of Christ is that crowds of people flocked to him. And often the crowds were filled with some of the worst of people, tax collectors, sinners. One of the times that we see this though, there is this complaint that comes from the scribes and the Pharisees. It's in Luke 15. And they say this: "This man receives sinners and eats with them." And it's not meant to be a compliment. Why was that a shocking idea for them?
Joel: They saw that as this man who comes claiming to be the representative of God on earth, who is God manifest in the flesh. How then can he allow people who are so clearly wicked to be in his presence? And when you think of the context that was spoken in, the people who were coming, they were prostitutes. They were tax collectors who not only took people's money to line their own pockets, but they collaborated with the hated Romans. So, there's a whole lot of things going on here. And for these religious people to look on a group of people who were so clearly guilty, whose actions were so clearly worthy of condemnation, they just could not understand how could these people ever have access to the presence of God. And the answer is simple. It's grace. This speaks right to the heart of the Christian faith.
Many years ago, there was a debate about comparative religions with this sort of panel of experts. And one of the people who was there was CS Lewis. And the question that was put to him is what is the distinctive feature of the Christian faith? And he answered with just a very short little sentence. He said, "Oh, that's easy. It's grace." And after discussing it among the experts, they had to conclude that he was right. This notion that God's love can come to us unconditionally, no strings attached, that is absolutely unique to Christianity and it seems to go against our most deeply felt sensibilities in terms of how we would relate to God. I think most people are willing to admit, I've messed up. I've done things that are wrong. My wrongdoing needs to be addressed. It needs to be atoned for. But people think, I've got to do that myself. I've got to make amends. I've got to make it right. I've got to bring a payment to God so that I will be acceptable in his sight. What Christ is doing is showing you'll never come to God on that basis. Salvation is not something that is achieved. It's just something that is received.
Stephen: Whenever we then look at the worst of people receiving God's grace, getting saved, being forgiven, that seems so unfair that these people would live a life of wickedness and in the very last moment at kind of one minute to midnight, they turn to Christ and get saved. Think of a murderer on death row. How is that fair?
Joel: And the answer really is in a sense it's not. They're not getting what they deserve. Christ got what they deserve on the cross. But actually that applies to everyone. If we get what is fair, if we get what we deserve, we are under the wrath of God, separated from his goodness and his presence forever. That's what's fair. The wages of sin is death. Paul says in Romans chapter 6 verse 23. But then he goes on, he says, "But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." So again you see this truth coming out that salvation is only something that you get on the basis of grace if you receive it as a gift. Now for those people to be in heaven we do look at that, how could someone who has been a murderer, an abuser, someone who has been a liar all their lives, how could that person be in heaven? And the answer to that is really well that's not the person who is in heaven, that person is changed, they are made new. They're a new creation in Christ Jesus. And this actually happens. This begins when a person trusts in Jesus Christ. They become a new creation, a new creature in him. The moment you and I trusted him for salvation, the old Stephen, the old Joel, he was gone forever. Now practically in our day-to-day lives, we still sin. We still fail. We hate our sin. And we long to be rid of it. We long for that day when we're going to love Jesus with an unsinning heart. When a person is in heaven, they have arrived at that. They are no longer defined by the sins and the evil that marked their whole life down here on earth. They're someone who loves God with a whole heart and who does his will, does what is good immediately and unthinkingly.
Stephen: Another pushback against grace or maybe a temptation that might arise would be, okay, great. God works through grace. We receive salvation through grace. Even the worst sinners can be saved through grace. Does that therefore mean that we can take advantage of grace? That we can abuse grace? So there's a verse in Romans 6 where Paul anticipates this very thing and he says, "Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?" Does his grace not get shown every time I sin and he forgives me? So can I not just keep doing what I want on earth?
Joel: And I think again that is a, the fact that Paul deals with that in Romans chapter 6 shows that he anticipates the objection that you have raised. But what he goes on to show is that is absolutely not the case. A person who has received the grace of God is changed by that same grace. And I heard an illustration on this point a number of years ago I thought was quite powerful. The illustration was that there's a father and son who go on a camping trip together. They set up near a lake. And the father says to the son, "Look, I'm going to have a sleep, a doze. But you see just down at that lake, don't go near it because there's actually crocodiles in that lake." Not something that we are terribly worried about here in Northern Ireland or in Scotland, but just stick with it for the sake of the illustration. So the dad goes off to sleep. The son, he's kind of kicking about. He's a bit bored. He looks down at the lake and he sees there's a kayak and he thinks to himself, "Do you know what? I could go down there, get into that kayak, have a paddle about, and it probably wouldn't do any harm." So off he goes. And he's sailing about. He's having a great time. And the next thing he feels a bump on the side of the kayak and another and another and the next thing he's into the water and he blacks out. Some point later he wakes up and he's lying on the bank at the side of the lake and beside him is his father who has clearly been mauled and wounded in an encounter with a crocodile. What kind of son would then turn to his father and say, "Look, Dad, thanks so much for rescuing me. But if it's all the same to you, I'm actually just going to head back out into the lake again." What kind of ingratitude would that show? That's what it would be like in some small way for someone who has been saved by the grace of Christ, the death of Christ to turn to him and say, "Thank you, Lord. You've given me this golden ticket to heaven. That's where I'm going. All depends on you. So now I'm just going to go back to the old way of life. I'm going to do the things that you had to die for to set me free." That would show that that person has no gratitude towards the Lord Jesus. No appreciation of him. What it would actually show is that they're not thankful to him because they've not been saved by him. They might say that they've received grace, but their actions show that they haven't.
Stephen: And that reminds me of another story in the book of Luke where there is this woman who is known as the sinner. Basically, she is like probably the worst woman in the city. She's a sinful woman and she receives forgiveness from Christ. But one of the things she immediately does then is she comes to Christ and there's this extravagant outpouring of her love to him. And the Lord says this on that occasion, she that was forgiven much loves much. And so I think what we're learning here is that grace changes us. And we're not the same. And the result is maybe in this sense the worst of sinners when saved have this greater love for Christ that should be produced as they realise just how greatly they have been loved by God.
