From As We Are to As He Is
Dearly beloved of God, people have the idea that they have to be a certain way before God will look their way. That’s just not true. God meets you right where you are.
Take Naaman for example; he was the captain of the host of Syria, and he was a great man with his master, and honorable because by him the LORD had given deliverance unto Syria: he was also a mighty man of valour, but he was a leper. The record is in II Kings 5.
Naaman went to Elijah to be healed of his leprosy. Elijah sent a messenger out to Naaman saying, “Go wash in Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall come again to thee, and you shall be clean.”
Naaman finally did what Elijah instructed him to do, and he was healed of his leprosy. After he was healed, Naaman told Elijah that he would offer neither burnt offering nor sacrifice unto other gods, but only unto the LORD. Then he made a request of Elijah.
Naaman’s master worshipped Rimmon, which was the Assyrian storm god Ramman. When his master went in to worship he would lean on Naaman’s hand, and Naaman had to bow himself in the house of Rimmon. He asked Elijah for God to pardon him in this thing.
Elijah said, “Go in peace.” God meets us right where we live.
Religion teaches that you have to live up to certain standards before God will accept you. That’s simply not true. God doesn’t see like men see; He looks on a person’s heart.
There is another example of the woman that the scribes and Pharisees caught in adultery, in the very act. The record is in John 8.
They sat her in their midst, and told Jesus that the law says to stone her, but they asked him, “What do you say?”
Jesus stooped down, and wrote on the ground with his finger. He then said, “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.”
They were convicted by their own conscience, and went out one by one, beginning at the eldest, even unto the last, and Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst.
Jesus then asked, “Woman where are your accusers? Has no man condemned you?”
The woman said, “No man Lord.” And Jesus said unto her, “Neither do I condemn you: go, and sin no more.” He met her right where she was.
All of us were dead in sin, without God, and without hope before He saved us by His great love and grace that is in Christ Jesus. He took us as we were, and saved us by His grace.
We did nothing to earn salvation. We did not contribute anything that made us worthy of His love and grace, but He saved us in spite of our unworthiness. He made us worthy, and by His grace we are who we are in Christ.
Naaman had been an idolater; the woman had been an adulteress. In God’s Word there are many other examples of ruined lives that God delivered, and made whole, from Mary Magdalene to the Apostle Paul. God took them as they were, and He delivered them by His great love and mercy.
When we confess with our mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in our heart that God raised him from the dead, He saves us. These are His only requirements for salvation in the age of grace in which we live.
Religion says, “Yes, but you have to do so and so,” which by the way, varies from one religious group to another.
God says, no ifs, ands, or buts about it: “For by grace are you saved through faith [believing] and that [salvation] not of yourselves; it is the gift of God: not of works lest any man should boast.” Ephesians 2:7-9
God takes you right where you are, and by His grace, and Jesus Christ’s accomplished works He saves you. In that moment you pass from death unto life, and you are given the hope of receiving the glory of God.
That very moment we become the children of God, and heirs; heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ. Furthermore, the spirit we receive in the new birth witnesses to our inner being of these realities.
He takes us as we are, and makes us as he is. Thank God for His wonderful grace. Thank God for His unspeakable gift!