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Christian Network

Taking communion is a difficult thing for some of us. Many believers feel like they are unworthy to share in the body and blood of Christ. We look at our lives, our sins and it seems that we are not doing well enough in the Christian life to warrant being at our Lord’s Table. This sense of unworthiness also colors many other aspects of our walk with God.

The truth is that this nagging sense of not being good enough reflects reality. We are unworthy…utterly unworthy.

Christians perennially revisit the subject of "works-righteousness"; an oxymoron if they’re ever was one. It has been an issue for every generation of believers since the Church began, and ours is no exception. Human beings naturally try to earn salvation. This is a direct result of the pride that led to the fall of our race. We now live in a world in which nearly everything needs to be worked for. Unfortunately that also often includes human affection. It has always been this way and in our modern capitalist system we are more steeped in a culture of works then perhaps ever before. Everything and everyone apparently has a price.

The faith began in Jesus Christ turns all that on its ear. The Bible tells us that work justifies no one. It is only by grace, through faith, that any of us are saved. The Church is made up of people, who have rejected, or are in the process of rejecting, the World’s idea of achievement. For us to be made sons and daughters of God we must only accept the work done by the One on behalf of us all. The work of the cross takes care of our work. Our effort is never going to be enough to attain to Heaven. Our work is indeed unworthy as we, ourselves, are. Thank God that He has made salvation a truly free gift.

So why do so many of us bang our heads against a spiritual wall, still trying to gain acceptance from our Lord? Besides the ingrained human tendency to work for all things what else is it that keeps us from, as Brennan Manning once wrote, "accepting our acceptance"? Maybe it is the trouble we have in believing that the love the Father has for us is greater then our unworthiness. This is especially true of Christians with tendencies towards introspection. When we look at our flesh we see nothing but sin, darkness and rebellion and we look at our flesh too often. It is better to train our eyes outward and upwards, towards God. If we did that more regularly we might begin to see that where sin abounds His grace abounds all the more. The love of Jesus Christ is bigger than our unworthiness. It always has been and it always shall be.

We are finite beings in relationship with an infinite God. His love is as infinite as He is. It is difficult to believe that for most of us. We are so steeped in the conditional and limited love of fallen humans that to believe, really believe, that the love of our Lord towards us is enough to overcome our unworthiness is not an easy thing.

But we can come into the freedom promised to the children of God. Again, this begins with seeing Him as He is and it involves making a conscious decision to turn from our sometimes-morbid introspection towards His face. This change of perspective will probably not come overnight and it will require the help of God Himself. We can pray for Him to reveal Himself to us as we make the choice to seek Him in spirit and in truth. The Bible tells us that God draws near to us as we draw near to Him. It also tells us that we can love Him only because He first loved us. The effort we make to move into the fullness of His gift of salvation is powered by the love of the Lord towards us. It is not the work of our flesh but the fruit of that love already working in us. It is ultimately a work of grace. We must only turn our eyes upon Jesus.

It is then, and only then, that our terrible sense of unworthiness can gradually give way to a heart knowledge of our acceptance in the Beloved.