“HE FORGIVES, HE SAVES”

13 He went out again beside the sea, and all the crowd was coming to him, and he was teaching them. 14 And as he passed by, he saw Levi the son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax booth, and he said to him, “Follow me.” And he rose and followed him.

Mark 2:13-14

God is good. He truly is. But some people miss out on the truthfulness of this statement simply because they see Him as an angry cosmic deity who takes pleasure in punishing people. That description is nowhere near the truth about the God of the Bible.

Our previous blog taught us that Jesus stepped in and gave us a new life. Here’s another biblical principle you and I should keep in mind:

Jesus Christ never stops creating opportunities to save sinners.

Jesus was a busy man, who was always out telling people about God. He was never off-duty. Even on the Sabbath, He healed people and changed their lives. So wherever He went, multitudes naturally followed Him. But He looked at people as individuals, not as crowds. He didn’t stop creating opportunities to impact people’s lives. To Him, each person, regardless of their past (or present), was valuable.

We can see Jesus simply walking, but He was actually on a mission here: to save Levi (“joined”) and turn him into a Matthew (“gift of the Lord”). And what a gift Matthew has been! Because he followed the Lord, we have 28 chapters of records that tell us about the Lord Jesus.

The God who stopped by and called Levi is still calling people to follow Him and experience life in its fullest sense. You may think that you’re just a number in a multitude. You may think you’re too sinful and your past is too dark that you’re beyond saving—that you’re a lost cause. You may think that you have committed sins too terrible for God to forgive.

Let me share something about the God of the Bible:

15 “The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost.”

1 Timothy 1:15

This is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He came to seek and save sinners. The Apostle Paul considered himself the chief of sinners because he persecuted Christians tirelessly. He arrested believers and put them in jail, and for some of them, he agreed to be killed. In his heart, he was convinced that he was blameless because he perfectly observed the law, but little did he know that his efforts were pointless. He was still going to go to hell if not for God’s intervention. Jesus sought him, saved him, and gave him a new life.

Our God is a merciful God who forgives sins. He still saves people to this day. That’s who He is—the God who saves. Even now, He is not resting, creating opportunities to save sinners like you and me.

Pursue the Savior today!

Photo by Jakob Owens on Unsplash