Saved A Wretch Like Me Series

Earlier in the sermon I told you there are two meaning for the word Wretch. The one we looked at earlier is “someone who is contemptible or despicable.” But the other meaning of the word “wretch” is this: “Wretch - an unfortunate or unhappy person.” You see… for people who doubt they’ve been good enough they literally feel wretched. They are unhappy because they have no assurance of salvation. They KNOW they’ve not lived a good life. They’re pretty sure they’re not going to make it!

One retired priest noted: “I have seen so many people at the end of their lives (they’re) so remorseful (and they ask themselves) ‘What am I going to do NOW about my past.’” (Jonathan Morris - former priest who played a priest in a Martin Scorsese movie “The Irishman”)

And God says: “It’s OK - I got you covered. You’re worried about your past, your past doesn’t matter. All that matters is that you realize I LOVE YOU and I want to save you. I want to change your life. Just let me do it! Don’t try depending upon your righteous deeds because your righteous deeds won’t get it done! Good deeds won’t get anyone into heaven.”

But you know - too often, too many Christians fall into that trap. They think they’ve been good enough to be good enough. But they can’t!

ILLUS: There’s an old story about a man who came before the Golden Gates. He’d been a member in good standing in church and (because he’d been such a GOOD man) he expected to just walk right on into heaven. To his amazement, he was told by Peter that there’s a point system he’s required to meet in order to qualify for heaven. "How many points do I need to get into heaven?" he asked. "30,000" replied Peter. “30,000?! Well, I was a member of the Church of Christ at Logansport. How much was that worth?" "About five points," came the answer. "Five points!" the man stammered, "Okay, then what about all the good things I've done for neighbors & family. Surely that is worth quite a bit." "According to our records," Peter, replied "that comes to about eight more points." Worried now, the man cried out, "But that makes only 13 of the 30,000. Why, if it weren't for the grace of God, no one could make it into heaven!"

Peter smiles and says: "That's the rest of the thirty thousand."

CLOSE: I want to close with this thought. I don’t know if you know that I have one of the cutest, cleverest, smartest grandsons around… but I do and he is. Recently I’ve been giving thought to working on my will and I’m trying to figure out how to include Benjamin in it.

As I was preparing this sermon, it occurred to me that there’s lots of kids in town who are cute, and clever and smart. They may even be your kids or grandkids… but I’m not going to leave them anything in my will. Do you know why? That’s right, they don’t belong to me. They aren’t my grandchildren, so I won’t be giving them anything. Benjamin will receive an inheritance from me but ONLY because he’s mine.