Things get cancelled all the time. We cancel orders we didn’t really need. Streaming services cancel shows after one season, right when we got hooked. When something is cancelled, it goes away.

But what about when people get cancelled?

We’ve all watched it unfold. An old post resurfaces, a clip goes viral, and within hours someone’s name is trending for all the wrong reasons. Sometimes it’s a celebrity. Sometimes it’s a stranger who had one bad day on camera. And plenty of us have quietly wondered what would happen if our own worst moments ever saw the light of day.

To be fair, not every callout is petty. But cancel culture often stops at exposure and exile. It has plenty of ways to condemn someone and almost no way to bring them back.

The heart of the gospel tells a completely different story than the one playing out in our feeds. God takes sin more seriously than any comment section ever could, and yet He offers something the internet never will: a way back.

You might say that God’s people, the Church, actually make up the Uncancel Culture.

Pray tell, you wonder?

Let me explain.

When Everyone Is Guilty

It’s rather simple. In the eyes of a holy, righteous, perfect God, our Creator, every human being has done something objectionable, something offensive. That something is sin. And we, the perpetrators, are sinners.

But it’s even worse than that.

We aren’t sinners because we sin. We sin because we are sinners. That truth is wired into our spiritual DNA. Our depravity isn’t only about what we do, it’s about who we are, at the core of our being.

David wrote it plainly in Psalm 51:5:

“Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin my mother conceived me.”

Isaiah 59:2 puts words to the consequence:

“But your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid His face from you, that He will not hear.”

Paul traces it back to the very beginning in Romans 5:12:

“Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned.”

And quoting the Hebrew Scriptures (Psalm 14:1–3 and Psalm 53:1–3), Paul delivers the verdict in Romans 3:10–12:

“As it is written: ‘There is none righteous, no, not one; there is none who understands; there is none who seeks after God. They have all turned aside; they have together become unprofitable; there is none who does good, no, not one.'”

I could go on. Yes, it really is that bad.

By any reasonable estimation, our God – who is holy, righteous, and good, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, has every right to cancel humanity. To leave us lost, alone, and powerless against the sin that separates us from Him. Sin that is worthy of judgment, wrath, condemnation, and hell.

That is bad news, by any measure.

But God…

Our great God, in His mercy and His grace, responded in the most splendid way imaginable: in love.

We, who deserve to be cancelled in the truest, holiest sense, are instead invited to the Banquet Table of Grace found in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Ponder the profundity of His saving work in this powerful passage from Romans:

“For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.” — Romans 5:6–11

Christ died for us, the ungodly, the powerless. While we were His enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son.

Ah, the sweet fragrance of grace. Good news. But not just good news, the best news, and the only news with the power to change the world.

And in a culture drowning in bad news, the countercultural message of the gospel is a breath of fresh air for those who will believe and receive it:

“But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.” — John 1:12–13

“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 3:16

“Most assuredly, I say to you, he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life.” — John 5:24

And we’ve only begun to touch the good news of God’s grace and mercy found in the person and work of Jesus.

Welcome to the Uncancel Culture

Remarkably, human beings who deserve to be cancelled by God are instead offered a place in the uncancelled culture of the Church, a culture of love, grace, and mercy. A culture entered by faith and centered on a personal relationship with Jesus. A culture that promises abundant and eternal life: a life forgiven, a life reconciled to God, a life filled with hope.

In the Un-Cancel Culture, God doesn’t cancel people. He cancels debts.

As we share the gospel, it’s worth pointing out this incredible truth, especially against the backdrop of today’s cancel culture: when a person repents and confesses their sin, trusting in Jesus, the only thing the Lord cancels is our sin debt — and it is paid in full.

“He has not dealt with us according to our sins, nor punished us according to our iniquities. For as the heavens are high above the earth, so great is His mercy toward those who fear Him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us.” — Psalm 103:10–12