Listen! There probably are thousands in hell who thought themselves too good to be “lost.” Then they tasted the bitter reality of being dead and lost beyond the reach of grace. But it’s certain that out of the huge number of redeemed people in glory not one could be found to say, “I’m here enjoying heaven because on earth I was good enough to be saved.” The Apostle Peter is there, and he called himself “a sinful man,” unfit for his Master’s presence. Paul confessed to being the “chief of sinners,” and so for all the rest. “By grace,” and by grace alone, every one of them has been saved.
The fact is, the thought of deserving salvation is as natural to man’s heart as the ugly weeds are to his garden. Satan knows how to take advantage of this, and to hide from man’s eye the lovely character of the “manifold grace of God,” whereby alone he can be saved. Satan hates the story of God’s grace; for it cannot be told without recording the redemption glories of Christ. It is “grace” that reigns through righteousness — a righteousness declared at the cross, where the judgment due to the sinner fell upon the voluntary Substitute. It is only because of that precious shed blood that free, undeserved pardon could be preached to guilty sinners.
Thus the merit is all on His side, the guilt on ours. We are bad enough to deserve the judgment; He is good enough to come and take our death — good enough to take the judgment for us. He suffered all of it and said, “It is finished.” God has only two ways of dealing with guilty men. He will either give them (standing on their own merits) all they deserve, to the very last drop; or, coming to Christ as guilty and lost, He will give them, completely, what Christ deserves.
If you only got a glimpse of what grace is, you would never again talk of being too bad to be saved.
Suppose a man were to put over his door (let’s call it No. 2) these words:
A free breakfast provided every morning in this house. Tickets given away next door (No. 1) to seniors only. None admitted after nine o’clock.
What senior would be so foolish as to stand shivering outside that door until after nine o’clock, fearing that he was “too old” to be entitled to a ticket for the breakfast? No, the older the person the more undeniable his title to the free ticket.
But suppose, further, that a certain senior, having refused to go to door No. 1 for the ticket, goes up to door No. 2 and applies for the breakfast without it. Should he be surprised if he finds the door closed to him? What good would it do if he argues, “You have just admitted an older man than myself.” “True,” would be the answer, “but it is not because of his advanced age that he was admitted. His age gave him the best possible recommendation for a free ticket — had he been younger his right to be called a senior might have been questioned — but it is the ticket that gives the older man a right for the breakfast, and this you have refused. Leave.”
There are many who seem to think that because all are sinners, and because they hear that God is going to take some of them to heaven, it must therefore be the best of them. From this they reason, if so and so gets there, I will certainly stand a good chance of getting in. But pay close attention, your being a sinner gives you no right to heaven, even if you could claim to be the best person alive today. Your being a sinner gives you the best possible recommendation to the Saviour, but it is the Saviour that gives you a right to enter glory.
“This Man receiveth sinners” (Luke 15:22And the Pharisees and scribes murmured, saying, This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them. (Luke 15:2)) is the inscription over the Saviour’s doorway, and none can be too bad. Read again, “no man cometh to the Father, but by Me.” “Him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out” (John 14:66Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. (John 14:6); John 6:3737All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. (John 6:37)). And again, “Come unto Me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:2828Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. (Matthew 11:28)). “By Me if any man enter in, he shall be saved” (John 10:99I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture. (John 10:9)).
Beware that, like the senior, you don’t practically ignore house No. 1, and presume that you can, through what you are, claim the benefit at house No. 2. It’s only because of what Christ is, and what He has done, that we can be saved. If you had as many good deeds to boast of as there are grains of sand on the ocean shore, and your sins were as few and far between as the largest ships that sail on her surface, or as hidden as the deadly mines that lie covered in her floor, without Christ you have no right, except to the lake of fire. One sin would be your ruin — an idle word, a wicked thought, a single act of self-will would as surely be enough to shut you out of heaven, as one act of disobedience shut Adam out of paradise.
Don’t waste your precious time in “trying to do better” before you come to Christ. The very fact that you need such reformation proves the past is bad; and if you presume to stand upon your own merit, remember that it is written, “God requireth that which is past” (Ecclesiastes 3:1515That which hath been is now; and that which is to be hath already been; and God requireth that which is past. (Ecclesiastes 3:15)).
To say that you are “too bad” is to diminish the glory of the all-abounding grace of God, to limit the power of the all-cleansing blood of Jesus. It’s as easy for the ocean to float the 5,000-ton ship on her surface as the down from a sea-gull’s wing. And since it is our hearts He seeks for, and since those to whom much is forgiven love much, be assured He is as willing to welcome the worst as He is able to save the most sinful.
A few years ago I visited the house of a well-to-do business man to see his only daughter on her death bed. She was sinking without hope, and she knew it. The poor mother had failed to sooth her daughter’s fears by telling her that there was no real cause for alarm about the future. Even though she had spent her last summer on earth with all the excitement of parties in London, yet that she had been “such a pure minded girl in it all.”
After considerable reluctance on the part of the parents, I was at last permitted to go upstairs to the sick-room.
I knelt down at the bedside and cried from my soul’s depths for the eternal blessing of this dying lady. Rising from my knees, I read a few verses from Romans 5, focusing on verse 8, “God commendeth His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”
At this point she exclaimed, “you do not know what I’ve been, or you would not talk to me about God’s love. There can be no mercy for me!”
I replied, “I believe that if you saw yourself as God sees you, you would see yourself as ten thousand times worse than you do. But you have, I think, made a great mistake today.”
The aged father looked inquiringly through his tears from the other side of the bed, as much as to say, “What mistake has she made?”
“Well,” I continued, “I have not come all this way to ask whether you think you are sufficiently worthy for God to trust you, but to bring you the good news that God thinks His Son is sufficiently worthy for you to trust Him. And on this depends your blessing for eternity.”
In a moment her face changed as though a ray of heavenly light had just entered.
Nor can there be a doubt about it. Her father soon wrote to tell me about his daughter’s blessing, and said that she soon would be with Christ.
May the Lord let the rays of the glory of His grace enter your troubled heart and help you to see that God is not looking for worthiness in you as to the past, nor for any resolve that you will be worthy for the future; but He has a lot to say to you about the worthiness of Jesus, His beloved Son.
He is the “Nail” fastened in “a sure place,” and on Him you may safely hang in calmest confidence. If the “Nail” comes down all must fall that was hung on it, whether vessels of burnished gold or the roughest earthenware. Their safety in hanging on it depends not upon the quality of the cups, but the stability of the “Nail.” (See Isaiah 22:23-2423And I will fasten him as a nail in a sure place; and he shall be for a glorious throne to his father's house. 24And they shall hang upon him all the glory of his father's house, the offspring and the issue, all vessels of small quantity, from the vessels of cups, even to all the vessels of flagons. (Isaiah 22:23‑24).)
Believe on Him, because He is worthy, and take the pledge of His own word, that the blessing is yours. “God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:1616For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16)).