Lessons From Paul: Greater Sin, Greater Grace

While teaching a class at my home church, one of the early-arriving participants took me aside and told me about some coworkers who were driving him crazy. This gentleman told me two coworkers had a habit of cursing. He wanted to confront them and tell them to cut it out. He wanted my counsel as to how to proceed.

I asked, “Do they know the Lord?” He responded in the negative, “No, they don’t.” 

In so many words I told him not to expect them to change apart from Christ, for they are slaves to sin. I then added that if they knew Christ, they would have the resource, the Holy Spirit, who could enable them to tame their tongues. As it was, they were simply acting ignorantly in unbelief.

I encouraged him to love them, pray for their salvation, shine the light of Christ, and look for opportunities to share truth with them. He agreed, was encouraged himself, and we began class with the others.

The Apostle Paul knew all too well of his own bondage to sin. Following his conversion, he acknowledged that he acted ignorantly in unbelief. At the same time, he also acknowledged God’s grace in delivering him from that bondage!

For Paul is a sterling example of no matter how great the sin, greater is the reach of God’s amazing grace to deliver the sinner. Paul claimed to be the worst!

As the Apostle Paul began his first letter to Timothy, he shared a brief section chronicling his great sin, God’s greater grace, and the impact this reality had upon his witness to others.

There are two powerful lessons here for us.

In 1 Timothy 1:12-15, Paul contrasted the extent of his sin with the reach of God’s grace extended to him:

“And I thank Christ Jesus our Lord who has enabled me, because He counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry, although I was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and an insolent man; but I obtained mercy because I did it ignorantly in unbelief. And the grace of our Lord was exceedingly abundant, with faith and love which are in Christ Jesus. This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief.”

How is it that the “chief of sinners,” a blasphemer and persecutor of God’s people, is placed into ministry? God’s exceedingly abundant grace found in Jesus Christ!

Lesson #1 – Nobody is beyond the reach of God’s great grace.

I have been tempted to give up on people, assuming there is no hope of them repenting and receiving Jesus. How about you?

I wonder about those first-century believers who experienced or knew about the wrath of Paul’s persecution of God’s people. There may have been a group of believers who viewed Saul as a “madman”, as “bad news”, and someone to avoid at all times in all situations. Some may have even labeled Saul a “lost cause,” giving up on the man. Here was this learned religious Jewish man who certainly would have, to some degree, been exposed to Jesus’ teaching and would have known of His miracles and renown during His earthly ministry, yet he categorically rejected everyone and everything associated with Jesus. 

On the other hand, there must have been those disciples who remembered Jesus’ words regarding human enemies:

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you that you may be sons of your Father in heaven” (Matthew 5:43-45).

Wow! This response is not natural; it’s supernatural. It’s the response to Saul’s persecution I believe would have been undertaken by some of Jesus’ faithful followers, those who had the faith to put His teachings into practice, even those teachings most challenging to our human sensibilities! 

It shouldn’t take long for you and me to think about those in our sphere of influence who appear most hardened to the gospel. Their sin is not beyond the reach of God’s grace.

Remember, their past or even present rejection of Jesus doesn’t necessarily reflect or project into the future! Certainly contemporaries of Paul were tempted to throw in the proverbial towel regarding his rejection of the Lord, and you and I may be tempted to do the same with some people we know. I think of an atheist friend I recently conversed with, a person entrenched in his atheistic dogma. I attempted to witness to him, yet humanly speaking, it seemed that I was addressing a brick wall of unbelief! Have you been there? 

Don’t ‘give up the ship.’ Rather, keep praying, keep shining the light of Christ, and imploring God to do only that which He can, save those who are lost!

Lesson #2 – Patience is a virtue in the evangelistic process.

Paul ended this section by explaining the reason for God’s mercy extended to him:

“Yet for this reason I found mercy, so that in me as the foremost, Jesus Christ might demonstrate His perfect patience as an example for those who would believe in Him for eternal life” (1 Timothy 1:16).

In saving Paul, the Lord displayed His gracious and merciful patience with even the most vile of sinners. For God is “longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance” (1 Peter 3:9).

As long as people have breath, there is still the opportunity for God to work and for them to receive Jesus.

As we ponder the longsuffering of God toward lost sinners, may we in kind, through the power of the Spirit, also demonstrate patience toward those we desperately want to know the Lord.

For each of us who know Christ, may our hearts praise the God of salvation, as did Paul, in response to the reality that while our own sin was great, His grace was greater.

“Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen” (1 Timothy 1:17).