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Gospel Greeters

Weekly Devotional for Preachers
Gospel Greeters
Image: Cyndi Monaghan / Getty

My Dear Shepherds,

We should know better but pastors aren’t always sufficiently aware of the toll that temptation and sin has taken on the people who file into church on Sunday morning. They look fine, mostly, but sin has crouched at every door and some have opened it.

There are those who “keep short accounts” with the Lord. When they sin they know to run to Jesus, not to restore their salvation, of course, but to regain their footing and reorient their hearts to him. But others have not come to their senses and they are in jeopardy. The risk is not that they will rush headlong into more sin but that they deceive themselves. “It’ll be alright. I’ll deal with it later and I promise not to let it happen again.” Whether out of shame or indifference they do not answer Christ’s knocking nor see sin crouching in the bushes.

That is where we come in. This is a pastor’s golden opportunity to display the open arms of God’s grace. When failures darken our consciences it’s not easy for any of us to believe that we are warmly welcomed to the throne of grace again and again, seventy times seven, times seventy times seven.

For example, Hebrews teaches us the meaty theology of Christ as our High Priest opening wide the way to our merciful God.

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses. … Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. (Heb. 4:15-16)

“Our time of need” can be anytime but it has a way of coming to a head for people on Sunday morning when it is not so easy for them to ignore Jesus any longer. That’s when we pastors become gospel greeters, welcoming them to find rest for their souls through songs, Communion, prayers of confession, Scriptures of assurance, and our sermons.

Stronger than darkness, new every morn
Our sins they are many, His mercy is more.

Show people God’s extraordinary miracle of repurposing our failures, of plundering our past sin and slavery, to build his tabernacle people. Alexander Maclaren preached, “We may be the stronger for our sins, not because sin strengthens, for it weakens, but because God restores. It is possible that we may build a fairer structure on the ruins of our old selves.” Like Nehemiah, pastors oversee the building of new walls out of the rubble of defeat.

The concern in Hebrews was that people who begin to sin keep sinning, their hearts hardening more each time. God’s remedy is not only to thunder, “Stop it!” but to fling back the once impenetrable curtain, giving us “confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus.”

I’ve never forgotten an old story about Dr. John Duncan, a Hebrew professor at the University of Edinburgh many years ago.  On one occasion he was in church as Communion was being served. He was so overcome with his sinfulness that he felt unworthy to receive the elements and let them pass. As he was sitting there feeling miserable, he noticed a girl in the congregation whom, when the bread and wine came 'round, also allowed them to pass and then broke down into tears. That sight seemed to bring back to the old saint the truth he had forgotten. And in a carrying whisper that could be heard across the church, he urged her, "Take it, lassie, take it. It's meant for sinners." And he himself partook.

Be ye glad!

Lee Eclov recently retired after 40 years of local pastoral ministry and now focuses on ministry among pastors. He writes a weekly devotional for preachers on Preaching Today.

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