Article February 12, 2018 Issue

You are worthy of God’s redeeming love

Elizabeth Crecelius Schwartz

Who of us, at one time or another, hasn’t said or done something that we are not proud of, or perhaps even made what seems to be a paralyzing mistake—something we feel keeps us from moving forward on a better path? In that sense, we’re probably no different than many of the Bible luminaries who had less than perfect lives: Moses (killed a man), Jacob (stole his brother’s birthright), David (lied and committed adultery), Saul (persecuted Christians), to name just a few! Yet, even they found redemption and new purpose in God’s saving grace.

The book of Matthew illustrates that each of us is just as deserving of the redeeming love of God. It tells of a man with palsy who was brought to Christ Jesus on his bed by the people of the city of Capernaum, where Jesus was living at the time. Seeing their faith, Jesus said to the man: “Son, be of good cheer, thy sins be forgiven thee.” He goes straight to the crux of the matter: Your sins are forgiven. His immediate forgiveness demonstrated not only compassion, but his ability to see beyond what appeared to be a sinful, mortal man—with his flaws and misdeeds—to the man that God created and to recognize his spiritual, sinless individuality. This spiritual discernment gave Jesus the authority to say to the man, “Arise, take up thy bed and go unto thine house” (9:2, 6), and it enabled the man to get up and walk into his house, healed.

But what if we can’t find it in us to feel that someone is worthy of redemption or forgiveness, or to be healed of a physical condition we attribute to some sin? Perhaps we even feel unforgiving of ourselves and are despondent about our failings and unable to see beyond our misdeeds or perceived faults. If so, the Christly love that Jesus expressed, which freed the man of his sins, whatever they might have been, is here right now assuring us that we, too, are worthy of healing. This regenerating love, which can only come from divine Love, shows us there is a way out. It is possible to come out from under the cloud of negativity about ourselves or our actions by yielding to divine Truth’s call to “arise”—to resist the persistent belief that man is mortal and therefore capable of sin.

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