SAINTS OUT OF SINNERS

God creates out of nothing. Wonderful you say. Yes, to be sure, but he does what is still more wonderful: he makes saints out of sinners. ~Soren Kierkegaard, The Journals of Kierkegaard

Over the years, I have heard many folks confess their guilt about why they don’t go to church. Some have shared that they feel too sinful to go to church even saying things like, “If I step in there, the place might catch on fire.” Some step away from church for fear of judgment by others in the congregation that they won’t be worthy amongst people regarded as “good people.” I think sometimes if we miss a few Sundays we fear the judgmental looks that might come for missing a few weeks. For those of us that go to church and truly get our Reformed faith, we know that none of us is without sin. No matter how hard we try, our humanity gets the best of us in all forms: thought, word, and deed. This is the reason that we start each service with confession. We are all guilty of not always making the best choices. Church is not a place without sin but a community of folks who know we are sinners.

What Kierkegaard conveys in his journal is the amazing love of God to not give up on any of us. Rather than abandon us and turn away in our sinfulness, God comes back again and again to forgive us and love us. This is the amazing nature of God to continue loving us truly transforming us from the sinners that we are to the capacity to act and serve in love. We should go and do likewise. When you come to church after a gap in days, weeks, months, or years, we should be like the father in the Prodigal Son story with open arms greeting one another.

Prayer

God of unconditional love, time and again you show your never ending love to us. No matter how long it has been since a conversation with you, you are always listening and ready for our return. Thank you for your transformative love that finds us again and again no matter how far we stray. Amen.