“Credit where none is due”, a sermon by Owen Rogers based on Galatians 1 with acknowledgements to Max Lucado and William Barclay.
Credit cards are useful things. It is the best thing to scrape ice off the car windscreen on a frosty morning. It is also useful for buying something without paying for it. The original Clayton’s purchasing card – the payment you make when you’re not making a payment. But of course we all know we’re only delaying the payment, not avoiding it. In fact, worse than that, instead of paying for things as you go, little by little, you add them all up and pay for the lot all at once. But it happens so painlessly. No nose, no drama, no pain, no handing over of piles of notes and coins, just a zap of the card, punch in four numbers and it’s done.
You buy petrol. Zap! You charge some clothes, zap! You pay for dinner, zap! You buy the groceries, zap! When the statement comes, it can be sobering to realise how much one has spent in a month. In fact that short time is enough to rack up some major debt.
And a lifetime is enough to rack up some major debt in heaven.You yell at your kids, zap! You covet a friend’s car, zap! You envy your neighbour’s success, zap! You break a promise, zap! You lie, zap! You lose control, zap! Further and further into debt. There are several pages to the statement at the end of the month.
Initially we may attempt to repay what we owe. If we can do one good act for every bad act then won’t our account balance out in the end? If I can counter my swearing with sweetness, my lusts with loyalties, my complaints with contributions, my vices with victiories – then won’t my account be justified? Many people believe this is how it works.
There are two main problems.
First, I don’t know the cost of each sin. The price of petrol is easy to find. Would that it were as clear for sin. It’s not. What for example is the charge for road rage? Drive at 90 in 100K zone? Smile and wave at 10 consecutive cars? Or what if I wake up in a bad mood? Will one church service next Sunday offset one grumpy morning today? Is the charge for grumpiness less on cloudy days than on fine? Or am I permitted a certain number of grouchy days a year?
This gets really confusing.
The other problem is I don’t always know the occasion of my sin. There are times when I sin and I don’t even know it. How do I pay for those sins? Do I get an exemption based on ignorance? And what of you? Any sins of omission on this month’s statement? Did you miss any chance to do good? Overlook an opportunity to forgive? Did you seize every chance to encourage your friends? Zap!zap! Zap!
And there are other concerns. The grace period, for example. My credit card allows a minimal payment and then rolls the debt into the next month and starts charging interest on it. Does God? Will he let me pay off today’s greed next year? What about interest? If I leave a sin on my statement for several months, does it require more good deeds? And speaking of the statement, where is it? Can I see it? Who has it? How do I pay the blasted thing off?
There it is. That ‘s the question. How do we deal with the debt we owe God?
Deny it? My conscience won’t let me.
Find worse sins in others? God won’t fall for that.
Claim lineage immunity? Family pride won’t help. Anyway I’m not a Jew.
Try to pay it off? Can’t even start. As we’ve seen, we don’t know how much we owe.
The answer is right here in Galatians 1:4 In order to set us free from this present evil age, Christ gave himself for our sins, in obedience to the will of our God and Father. Simply put: the cost of our sins is more than we can pay. The gift of our God is more than we can imagine. A person is put right with God through faith, not through obeying the law. (Rom.3:28).
Grace and Peace
Right at the beginning of his letter, Paul sums up his wishes and prayers for his friends in two tremendous words.
(i) He wishes them grace. There are two main ideas in the word grace. The first is the idea of sheer beauty. The Greek word charis means grace in the theological sense; but it always means beauty and charm; and even when it is used theologically the idea of charm is never far away from it. If the Christian life has grace in it it must be a lovely thing. Far too often goodness exists without charm, and charm without goodness. It is when goodness and charm unite that the work of grace is seen. The second idea is the idea of sheer undeserved generosity. The idea is that of a gift which you never deserved and could never earn, and which is given to you in the generous goodness and love of the heart of God. It is a word which has in it all the love of God. When Paul prays for grace on his friends, it is as if he said, ‘May the beauty of the wonder of the undeserved love of God be on you, so that it will make your life lovely too.”
(ii) He wishes them Peace. Paul was a Jew, and the Jewish word shalom must have been in his mind, even as he wrote the Greek eirene. Now shalom means far more than the mere absence of trouble. It means everything which is to a person’s highest good. It means everything which will make your mind pure, your will resolute and your heart glad. It is that sense of the love and care of God, which, even if your body were tortured, would keep your heart in peace and joy.
Paul, when he speaks of Jesus, sums up in one sentence of literally infinite meaning the heart and the work of Jesus Christ. “He gave Himself. . . to rescue us.” (i) The love of Christ is a love which gave and suffered. (ii) The love of Christ is a love which conquered and achieved. In this life the tragedy of love is that it is so often frustrated; that it must bear the pain of loving and yet being unable to rescue the one it loves. But the love of Christ is the perfect love because it is backed by that infinite power which nothing can frustrate and which can rescue its loved one from the bondage of sin.
Wouldn’t it be nice if each month we zapped the card making purchases and then when the statement came it showed a zero balance because someone – some wonderful benefactor – was paying it off for us? Don’t hold your breath, it’s not likely ever to happen. But in terms of our debt to God, Jesus does exactly that. In fact he has prepaid our account for our whole life. Justified by faith means being debt free forever.
But will God cover everything? Many people wonder whether they’ve overextended their credit line with God. They say things like, “God may give grace to you, but not to me. What I’ve done is way too bad. I’ve pushed the envelope too many times. I’m not your typical sinner, I’m guilty of … .” and they fill in the blank.
How would you fill in the blank? Is there a chapter in your biography that condemns you? A valley of your heart too deep for Jesus to reach? If you think there is no hope for you, then review the Bible record: Adam and Eve, Cain, Noah, Moses, Abraham, David, Solomon, Jonah, Peter, Paul, Thomas, – in fact, everyone there. Do we have much more than they? There’s not one of us who hasn’t zip-zapped more bills that we could ever pay. But there’s not one of us who must remain in debt. God has been picking up the tab since he created people. And he will continue to do so until Christ returns. Christ has paid your debt – trust him.