Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - Has My Sexual Sin Made Me Unsavable? | Questions You're Asking | Matthew 21.31

Episode Date: August 5, 2020

There's something about sexual sin that oftentimes makes it seem like the worst kind of sin. Is it really? Is it unforgiveable? Discover how Jesus treated sexual sin from https://www.thecrossingchurch.com/staff/keith-simon/ (Pastor Keith Simon) as he continues our series on answering https://www.thecrossingchurch.com/podcast-series/questions-youre-asking/ (Questions You're Asking). Interested in more content like this? Listen to https://www.thecrossingchurch.com/podcasts/why-is-god-saving-the-wrong-people-learning-to-follow-jesus-luke-4-14-30/ (Why Is God Saving the Wrong People?) from our last series on https://www.thecrossingchurch.com/podcast-series/how-to-follow-jesus/ (Learning to Follow Jesus). Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it with others, so others can find it too. To learn more, visit our https://www.thecrossingchurch.com/ (website) and follow us on https://www.facebook.com/TenMinuteBibleTalks (Facebook) @TenMinuteBibleTalks  Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now.

Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life and the time it takes to get to work. I'm Patrick Miller. And I'm Keith Simon. Right now, we're answering questions that you're asking. A lot of these are coming from our Facebook page. So if you follow 10-minute Bible Talks on Facebook, you can ask questions that you want us to answer or vote on questions that other people are asking. Today's question came in through our Facebook page, and I think it's one a lot of people have.

have. It's one that kind of breaks my heart because you can hear the pain and the doubt behind it. It's this, has my sexual sin made me unsavable? There's something about sexual sin that makes us feel dirty or ashamed or guilty that we might be beyond the reach of God's saving grace. And unfortunately, the church has given people. reason to believe that. Even though it's not true, the way the church has talked about sexual sin has caused people to question whether they are outside of God's forgiveness. Matt Chandlera, pastor in Texas, tells a story about sitting in a church congregation one time when he was younger and hearing a pastor talk about sexual sin. As the sermon started, the pastor

handed a rose out in the congregation and told people to pass it around and look at it. While they were doing that, he was preaching a sermon about the dangers of sexual sin, about the horrible things that sexual sin does to human beings, about how wrong sexual sin is, about how God judges sexual sin. And according to Chandler, this was a sermon that was filled with a lot of guilt and a lot of shame and a lot of scolding, not a lot of love or grace. Well, by the time the pastor had ended the sermon, the rose had ended up going around the congregation and was back in his hand. And he held up that rose and he said, just as this rose looks like it has been passed

around among a lot of people. It is wilted now. The stem is broken. It's low. It's low. It's limp, its petals are torn. Well, who would want this rose? And just like that, sexual sin makes us unwontable, undesirable, unlovable, because as a person's body has been passed around, it bears the marks of sexual sin, and who would want the rose? Who would want a sexual sinner? And Chandler said he wanted to stand up in the congregation and yell, Jesus wants the rose. Jesus wants that rose. Jesus died for that sinner.

I think that's a powerful story that reminds us that no sin, including sexual sin, puts us outside of God's loving grace. Why do people ask this question about sexual sin more than others? I mean, no one asks this about lying or pride or selfishness, right? Like, does my selfishness make me unsavable? Does my pride make me unsavable? Well, why not? Why do people ask this particularly about sexual sin? Well, we know that sin is equal in some ways and unequal in other ways, right? Sin is equal in that it keeps us from having a relationship with God. Sin ruptures that relationship with God, whether in our eyes it is a small sin or a big sin, it has an equal impact. But it's unequal in other ways

in that some sins carry more damage. Some sins have more consequences here and now in our life. I mean, for example, if you were to get angry with someone versus murdering them, well, anger and murder are both sins, and yet they don't have the same consequences attached to them. Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 6 to flee from sexual immorality that all other sins a person commits are outside the body, but whoever sins sexually sins against their own body. So it seems that sexual sin has some consequences that don't necessarily come with other sins, or at least not in the same way. whether it is because of our own conscience or because of cultural expectations, there is a guilt and shame attached to sexual sin. And we are afraid that if people knew about our sexual sins, that they would reject us and we're afraid that God would reject us. Think about Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.

They were naked and unashamed. But then when they ate the forbidden fruit and rebelled the against God, they became ashamed of their nakedness. They became ashamed of their sin. So how do we process this? Is sexual sin something that puts us beyond God's forgiveness? Well, one of the places that we can see God most clearly is in Jesus. If we want to know what God is like, a great place to start is say, well, what was Jesus like? And you can't miss that Jesus reaches out to the sexually impure. He reaches out to the sexually broken. He reaches out to the sinners. He reaches out to the prostitutes. He reaches out to those that the culture has said are beyond God's forgiveness. And he offers them a relationship with God. In fact, Jesus says,

that it is the sexual sinners who tend to get the gospel more than those who are righteous in their own eyes. Matthew 21, Jesus said to them, and he's talking to the Pharisees now, he says, truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you. So clearly the prostitutes, the sexual sinners, were invited into the kingdom of God. in fact, they were entering into the kingdom of God ahead of the religious and morally pure. That verse led C.S. Lewis to write this. Prostitutes are in no danger of finding their present life so satisfactory that they cannot turn to God. The proud, the avaricious, which just means greedy, the self-righteous are in that danger.

So Jesus says that the sexually are broken are entering the kingdom of God ahead, of those who think themselves moral. And Lewis thinks about this and says, well, why is this the case? And he says, well, the reason is because prostitutes, the sexually broken, know their need. They know their need. And oftentimes the proud, the greedy, the self-righteous, they don't see their need. And so they don't come running to Jesus as Savior. And they miss out on the kingdom of God.

Jesus is seeking out sinners, including those who are sexually broken. He's offering them life in himself. Jesus knows what kind of person he chose to save. If you come from a past of sexual brokenness, Jesus knows, and he loves you. And he invites you to follow him. He invites you to bring that sin and all your other sin. sins to him to be forgiven. There is no sin so small that it does not receive God's judgment,

but there is no sin so great that it cannot be forgiven through Jesus's death and resurrection. Jesus says, behold, I make all things new. Jesus wants to restore you and heal you and forgive you. He wants to make you new. Jesus's death and resurrection, the grace that he offers there, is greater than all our sin. Even the sins you're most ashamed of. Even your sexual sins. That's why Jesus went out to the sexually broken. That's why he went out to the prostitutes.

And he said, come find life in me. find forgiveness in me, regardless of your sin, regardless of your past. There is hope in Jesus. He forgives, he heals, he restores, he loves, turn to him. Thanks for listening. If you've enjoyed this content, please subscribe and give us a rating. That helps others find this podcast more easily. Also ask yourself who you could share this podcast with.

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