Amazing Love

I have a concern that there may be someone at my funeral who will think, “Well, if anyone can make it to heaven, it’s Mark... thirty-five years as a missionary, winning people to Christ, always talking about God, etc.”  Oh, how wrong they would be.

I suppose outwardly my moral resume looks pretty good.  I’ve never been drunk, never smoked anything, never committed adultery or fornication, never stolen anything of significance, never murdered.  But my resume will be worthless in the council of Heaven.  God doesn’t grade by outward appearance.  He looks into the depths of our heart.  And there lies my problem.

There have been plenty of times in my life when God withheld His empowering grace from me in order for the miry filth of my heart, like sludge from a sewer, to bubble out.  I will bury my head in the sands of shame if anyone could see some of the wicked thoughts that have passed between my ears, thoughts of revenge, greed, lust, anger, pride, and all manner of selfishness.  The condition of my heart is no better than those who manage to carry out some of the thoughts contained within.

In Romans 9, Paul says it is God’s providential prerogative to take from one lump of clay and make some vessels for honorable use and some for dishonor.  The point here is that we all come from the same lump of clay.  My heart is no better than that of the most despicable person on earth.  The only difference is what God has made me to be.

God tells me that, apart from His empowering grace, nothing I do is good (Romans 3), even things I do that I might think are good, to Him are like “filthy rags” (Isaiah 64).  He says I’m dead in my sins and I’m nothing more than a vile vessel for Him to pour out His wrath (Ephesians 2).  Apart from Him, my evil heart, with me attached, is deserving only of the eternal fires of hell.

But here comes the good news!  “All of us like sheep have gone astray, each has turned to his own way, but the Lord laid on Him, the iniquity of us all.” (Isaiah 53).  On the cross, Jesus took the death penalty my wretched heart deserves.  Upon treasuring Him as my Lord and my only hope, He gives me His Holy Spirit to cover my depraved heart.  Thus, when anything good comes out of me (an act of love, compassion, forgiveness, or a show of humility, wisdom, or joy), it is coming from God’s Spirit in me, not from my wicked heart.  He gets all the credit and all the glory.

I will not carry my moral resume with me on my deathbed.  It will do me no good.  All I can do is cry out, “Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner.”  Then, I trust in His promises that He will rescue the brokenhearted, transform a heart of stone, lift my guilty head, cleanse me with Calvary’s blood, carry me to His heavenly place, and share with me His bountiful glory.  He does it all!  “Amazing love, how can it be, that Thou my King, would die for me!”