Help for the Helpless

Romans 5:6 "for while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly."

There is something scandalous in these words. A man without guilt was placed under the penalty of men with much guilt, and he received their death sentence. It is as if justice was turned on its head, and not a single objection was made. No protests were heard, no pleas for mercy, only the emphatic cries of an angry mob, demanding the death of a man who had never wronged anyone.

The man of perpetual controversy, Jesus, was accused of "making himself equal with God" (John 5:18). And so the mobs, incited by religious rabble rousers, demanded a punishment fit for murderers and mutineers; death on a Roman cross. To many onlookers, his death was a bloody spectacle with no divine purpose or meaning. However the crucified Jesus did not leave us without explanation to the question of his death, but told his friends that he "did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many" (Mark 10:45). And so he died..."for the ungodly."

It is not with readiness that men identify themselves with this title. No one is eager to sit in the seat of criminals and convicts and share in their shame. "Ungodly" has such an unflattering ring, it belongs to the worst of the worst and the lowest of low lives, yet these are the very ones Christ died for.

It wasn't until I realized that I was one of them that the death of Jesus became wonderful news to me. I have heard the Biblical indictment of humanity, that we "all like sheep have gone astray" (Isaiah 53:6). I have seen this confirmed daily in my own heart; a cowardly rebellion against the God of love, and I tremble knowing that He is also a God of justice who "will by no means leave the guilty unpunished" (Exodus 34:7). But He is so GOOD! My resistance is shattered when I hear the invitation He makes: "'Come now, and let us reason together' says the Lord, 'though your sins are as scarlet, they will be as white as snow'" (Isaiah 1:18).

What can I do but come to Jesus and be forgiven!? Though I am ungodly and indisputably guilty, though I am helpless and incapable of making all my wrongs right, it is for someone like ME that Jesus died, so I count myself among the richest men alive.