–This is a Fictitious Story–
He had my attention now, and I knew the task I was up against wasn’t going to be easy. I wasn’t sure where he was coming from, so I decided to start at ground zero and establish what his context was for understanding the Gospel. I knew no better way than to simply illustrate it. As irreverent as it may have been, I selected a barf bag as the media of choice for the presentation of the Gospel. I drew a straight line and put God on one end and asked Dave to put the most evil person he could think of on the other end of the line.
Now with George Bush on the left extreme and God on the right hand side we established a righteousness meter. He decided that God should be 100% righteous and George Bush 0% righteous. I then drew the half-way mark on the scale and asked where he fit into the picture. He debated for a little while, no doubt trying to decide how close to God he could be without looking arrogant, and how close to Bush he could be without looking like a republican. His conflict ended as he marked the sick-sack just past the halfway point. He had a safe place to rest, at least for now.
Dave felt good about his standing, and felt confident that it illustrated that he was mostly good. That was about to change. It was time for me to re-shape his context into a biblical one. I opened my digital Bible and went to Romans 3:23, and explained that all have fallen short of God’s glory. He agreed as he saw himself at a mere 58% of God’s holiness. I then shared with him that Romans 1:21-23 says falling short of God’s glory is to exchange living for God’s glory for something of lesser value. Again he had no problem with understanding that, because he was still thinking in terms of the sin as things you do to pollute yourself in God’s sight.
Then I asked, “Since God is holy and just, what basis does he have for overlooking your sin and letting you live with Him: as if you hadn’t sinned?” Dave said, “I have done a lot of good stuff, and I am sorry for the bad. Surely God understands ‘sorry’.” I then decided it was time to break the news to him. I read Romans 3:10-12 and James 2:10-11 I asked Dave, “So what does God think about your good deeds? What about your bad deeds?”
I continued to progress with the rewriting of Dave’s context by reading Ephesians 2:1-3. I asked, “Whose kingdom does the Bible say you are in, God’s or Satan’s?” Dave thought about it for a long time, not wanting to say what he now realized to be true. “Well, I’m not in God’s, but I don’t think I am in Satan’s either.” I said, “according to God’s word, would you like to adjust your position on the righteousness scale? Remember this is going by what God considers righteousness.” “Well if you are going by that, then I would be at 0%…but I’m not a satanist!”
I decided it was time for a recap. “So, we have established that God is Holy, and demands perfection. We have established that God is just and demands a penalty for sin. We also see that we stand before God guilty, with 0% righteousness. Not only that, but we deserve every bit of condemnation God owes to us, and we are helpless to do anything about it. Even if we tried to, it would be like offering garbage to God in exchange for our debt and that isn’t legal! As a just judge, God cannot accept it as payment. We are legally screwed!”
Dave was deep in thought, and I could tell he had never seen himself in this way before. The plane began its final decent and I wasn’t sure that Dave was ready for the good news yet. So I asked, “What are you going to do about this?” He said, “What can I do? If I try to be good, I’m still guilty. If I stop trying, I’m giving up, and still guilty. I don’t know, I guess I just have to hope God is loving enough to accept me when that time comes.”
“That is exactly it,” I said, “well not exactly, but you’re on the right track. God is also loving, just as you said. Because He is loving, he demands a pardon for your guilty status. However, He can’t just acquit you, or He isn’t just, and He can’t just overlook it or He isn’t holy. So what can He do? The penalty has to be paid somehow, and you can’t do it yourself. But God loved you so much that He sent His one and only son, Jesus, to take your place. Jesus had never sinned, and therefore stood at the 100% mark. He took on human form, so that the payment would be adequate: one life for another life.”
“So, Jesus was put to death on a cross, in your place. The Bible says, ‘but God demonstrates his own love for us in this, while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.’ So it is possible for God to be Holy, not overlooking sin; just, demanding blood to be shed as payment, and loving, not counting men’s sins against them because Jesus served your death sentence for you.” Dave sat there deep in thought. We were just about to land and I didn’t want to leave Dave without answering his question. “Dave, after seeing what Jesus has done on your behalf, where do you think you are on the righteousness scale?” “100%.” He said after a long pause.