Unworthy

© Copyright 2013 PJ Stassen

All Rights Reserved

His face was filled with broken commandments.

-          John Masefield, 1878-1967.

   We live in a moral Universe, and the Scales of Moral Justice will, in the final analysis, sternly demand non-negotiable retribution from every person that was ever born and who had ever lived.  There is, as they say, no such a thing as a free lunch, and for every moral indiscretion a Heavenly Invoice will inevitably be issued, demanding full payment indeed, or face moral foreclosure forever. That Invoice may, sometimes and for some people (and for various reasons) appear to be late, or slow to arrive, but it’s on its way nevertheless … the mills of God grind slowly, but surely. 

   So, how the atheist, so full of bravado and brilliant encyclopaedic knowledge, so puffed up with self-importance (and often bitter sarcasm, filthy profanity and shocking blasphemy) propose to escape the final countdown to Judgment one day, I honestly do not know. Even as believers we shudder at the thought of the judgments of God … yes, terrible is it to fall into the hands of a living, holy Creator.

   Now there is one thing I (on the one hand) know, whether I am a believer or an unbeliever, saint or sinner, Church-member or savage heathen, spiritual giant or uncultured pagan … I cannot save myself, engineer my own Salvation, or orchestrate my own Justification in the eyes of God and His Heavenly Court.  I cannot undo my own despicable and notorious past, or delete and nullify the many vile and embarrassing indiscretions of my irresponsible youth. I cannot grant 'absolution' at random or at will, either to myself or anyone else for that matter.  I am, humanly speaking, mercilessly incarcerated in the prison of the soundtrack and cinematographic record of my pathetic and pitiful existence on Earth.  
   I also have no one to blame other than myself: I probably was, most of the time, the very self-assured, passionate and cocky producer, director and scriptwriter of my own repugnant screenplay and story … nothing succeeds like sinful excess.

   On the other hand, and on the positive side, there is the magnificent promise from that humble Carpenter from Nazareth.  Jesus says:

John 3:14  But even as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up,

John 3:15  so that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

John 3:16  For God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.

John 3:17  For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but so that the world might be saved through Him.

John 3:18  He who believes on Him is not condemned, but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only-begotten Son of God.

John 3:19  And this is the condemnation, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the Light, because their deeds were evil.

John 3:20  For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light, lest his deeds should be exposed.

John 3:21  But he who practices truth comes to the Light so that his works may be revealed, that they exist, having been worked in God. (MKJV, eSword).

   Though we are unworthy of Heaven and our ‘good works’ as filthy rags in the sight of a holy God, we have, metaphorically speaking, this trillion-dollar promise from Jesus, the Pearl of Great Price, Himself … there is a way out; there is a solution: The Gospel, or Good News!  Accept it and LIVE!  The word JUSTIFIED explains the legal position of the believer perfectly:  

After Justification in the Name and Authority of Jesus of Nazareth, the soul has been ‘justified’:  Just-if-I-had never-sinned.  

The sensible man (or woman) will thus rather go to God without his/her usual excuses and (so-called) alibis and, lay his/her sins at the feet of the Cross of Calvary and, as a penitent sinner, plead the forgiveness, mercy and grace of God, than face the Courtroom of the White Throne Judgment on the treacherous merit of an ‘exemplary life’ and the good works of a ‘highly esteemed character’. 

   At Calvary, the Holy Tribunal of Father, Son and Holy Spirit has extended a Universal amnesty to all of mankind, provided we accept it and appropriate the offer as demanded.  A proud, unrepentant prisoner not interested in such kind of amnesty but, who, due to his inflated ego, demands his rightful day in court, will not only lose his single most precious chance for blanket amnesty, but probably will lose his case in court as well … the wages of sin is death.  

   There is no Salvation without accepting the sanctifying sacrifice and blood and saving power of Jesus Christ, the only mediator between God and man in the entire Universe.  Therefore, let us not allow ourselves to be tripped up by our swollen ‘Mickey Mouse’ egos or duped by the inflated opinion of our own (laughable) philosophical prowess … let’s confess Jesus Christ and be saved.  There is no way we will ever be able to successfully debate or argue our case on the principle of personal merit with a God sporting an I.Q. of Infinity^Infinity! (Mathematically-speaking: Infinity to the power of Infinity … the highest number in transfinite mathematics).

   At the White Throne Judgment the judicial value, weight and merit of our usually highly articulate rhetoric and arguments in our defence will probably be reduced by the Prosecution to zilch … not as much by God as by the obstinate and unrelenting prosecution of our own self condemning conscience.  Jesus has warned:

John 5:45  Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father; there is one who accuses you, Moses, in whom you trust.

John 5:46  For if you had believed Moses, you would have believed Me, for he wrote of Me.

John 5:47  But if you do not believe his writings, how shall you believe My Words? (MKJV, eSword).

   

   Rest assured, could we have been saved on personal merit, we would not have needed Jesus Christ, the Gospel and Salvation anyway … so there really is no other way out: Accept Jesus Christ … today (tomorrow may be too late).  It was Mark Twain who reportedly has said that, if God were to consider His creatures’ spiritual status and fitness for Heaven on merit, our dogs would probably have qualified for Heaven with ‘flying colours’, and we would have languished behind.  Furthermore, nobody can ever deserve Salvation … if that were indeed possible, the paradox here is that we probably then would not have needed it anyway.  Jesus has said:

Mark 8:34  And calling near the crowd with His disciples, He said to them, Whoever will come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me.

Mark 8:35  For whoever will save his life shall lose it; but whoever shall lose his life for My sake and the gospel's, he shall save it.

Mark 8:36  For what shall it profit a man if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul?

Mark 8:37  Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?

Mark 8:38  Therefore whoever shall be ashamed of Me and of My Words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man shall also be ashamed of him when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels. (MKJV, eSword).

    God's Plan of Salvation (the Gospel), referred to as 'foolishness' by the Apostle Paul, is a strange paradox:   Had we really been worth dying for, Jesus Christ's dying for us would not have been necessary.  We were, apparently, not a race or 'species' worth dying for (in other words, we were hopelessly depraved and lost) ... so Jesus went to Calvary to lay down His life for us, to make us worth dying for. 
   This song, Unworthy, is about the fact that we could never in all eternity have saved ourselves, and must forever trust in Jesus as our Saviour to engineer that difficult, humanly-impossible, super-metaphysical feat of imparting unmerited Salvation to a lost and undeserving world:

YouTube

Unworthy

(Ira F. Stanphill, 1914-1993)

Unworthy, am I of the grace that He gave,

Unworthy to hold to His hands;

Amazed that a King would reach down to a slave …

This love I cannot understand!

My sorrow and sickness laid stripes on His back,

My sins caused the blood that was shed;

My faults and my failures have woven a crown …

Of thorns that He wore on His head.

Unworthy am I of the glory to come,

Unworthy with angels to sing;

I thrill just to know that He loved me so much …

A pauper, I walk with a King.

CHORUS: Unworthy, Unworthy!

A beggar … in bondage and alone;

But He made me worthy, and now, by His grace,

His mercy has made me His own!

eLiterature/eLiteratuur:

1. Scribd Publishing Site:  www.scribd.com/PietStassen (ENGLISH & AFRIKAANS)
2. eBook: 'Evolution: The Science That Evolved Into A Fairy Tale' (ENGLISH)  
3. eBook:  'Bertrand Russell Revisited: Rebuttal Of Bertrand Russell's 'Why I Am Not A Christian''(ENGLISH)
4. eBook: 'Meditations & Contemplations: A Reader For Both Atheists And Creationists' (ENGLISH)
5. eBook: 'Conservation, Rhino Poaching And Hypocrisy' (ENGLISH)
6. eBook: 'Why Darwinism ('Evolution') Does Not Make Sense' (ENGLISH)
7. eBook: 'Names And Titles Of Jesus Of Nazareth (ENGLISH)'
8. eBoek:  'Darwin Of Christus: Suid-Afrikaners By 'n Kruispad!' [AFRIKAANS].
9. eBoek:  'Bevryding Van Die Anti-Evangelie Van Ateisme-Evolusionisme' [AFRIKAANS].
10. eBoek:  'Name & Titels Van Jesus Christus' [AFRIKAANS].
11. eTracts, Christian (Free, Downloadable):  Free, downloadable Christian eTracts for free distribution (ENGLISH)
12. eTraktate, Christelik (Gratis, Aflaaibaar): Gratis, aflaaibabre Christelike Traktate vir gratis verspreiding (AFRIKAANS)

Bibliography

1.  Andrews, Allen (1969) Quotations For Speakers And Writers. Newnes Books. London.

2.  OriginOfSongs. 'Ira F Stanphill'. Accessed At http://originofsongs.blogspot.com/2012/07/mansion-over-hilltop.html  [online] 2013.  
 3.  Peterson, John V. (1971). Favourites Number Seven. ‘Unworthy’. Singspiration^®. Zondervan Publishing House. Grand Rapids, Michigan.