Which Will Love Him More?

Do you ever spend time thinking about your sin?  Do you ever dwell on the depths of your own depravity?  I would encourage you to do this sometime.

Some of you will say that this will create self-loathing.  Some of you will argue that thinking about the depths of our own depravity is not very uplifting; I mean, imagine the blow to our self-esteem.

Now, I don't think we spend all of our time or even a lot of our time remembering or recognizing our many sins, but I do think it is an important thing to do.

Consider this story from the life of Jesus:

A Pharisee named Simon had invited Jesus to have dinner at his house.  While Jesus was at the dinner a woman who Luke tells us had lived a sinful life came into the house with a jar of perfume.  The woman poured perfume on Jesus feet, kissed His feet, wet His feet with her tears and wiped His feet off with her own hair.  The Pharisee saw this and wondered why Jesus was allowing such a thing.

Jesus responded to the Pharisee's thoughts like this:

"'Two men owed money to a certain moneylender.  One owed him five hundred denarii, and the other fifty.  Neither of them had the money to pay him back, so he canceled the debts of both.  Now which of them will love him more?'

Simon replied, 'I suppose the one who had the bigger debt canceled.'

'You have judged correctly,' Jesus answered." Luke 7:41-43

Jesus then went on to explain how the sinful woman had showed an extravagant love for Jesus and the Pharisee had not shown much at all.

See, we are like the Pharisee more often than we are like the sinful woman.  Most of us think that we are pretty good people.  We know that Jesus died for our sins, but to be honest most of us think that we didn't add many sins to the pile.  We feel, most of the time, that we were worth dying for.

That's why we need to think about the depth of our depravity more.  We must take inventory of every evil thought and deep because it will fuel our love.  Those who are forgiven much love much.

Do you think of yourself as a pretty good person or do you ponder the depths of your sin?

"Now which of them will love Him more?"

Consider your sinfulness in the light of God's forgiveness today.