Can God Really Forgive Me?
You all are in for such a treat today because you love this pastor. He's kind of just America's pastor. It's Max Lucado. He has blessed my life so much. In the middle of Covid we kept watching him. I think it was because he exudes such peace. He can speak to when the waters are wild, and it feels like everything's crazy. His faith, his voice, and the way that he communicates just bring peace. Below is our edited conversation-
Jennie- I'm just grateful for your life, and the way that you serve. How many years have you been at the church you are part of?
Max Lucado- 35 years. I came here in 1988. The church was already a healthy church. I didn't start the church. I moved here from South America. I was 33 at the time. The church had about 400 members. It had been in existence already for 30 years at that point. We met in a building about 20 minutes away from where we've been for the last 10 or 15 years. The big move came for us when the Lord gave us a 36-acre parcel of land outside of San Antonio. It allowed us to have plenty of available room.
Jennie- What a gift to be somewhere for that many years, and just to dig roots. As you have dug roots in that local church, your words have gone out to the world. 145 million products in print, 56 languages across 80 countries. I mean, that has to hurt your brain a little if you think about it Max, that your words have gone that far around the world.
Max Lucado- I don't think about it too often.
I've never quite known if I'm a writer who pastors, or a pastor who writes.
I don't think you have to choose between the two, but being in a local church has allowed me to have some guardrails in my life, that I think have helped me stay in one place, or stay focused. I had a huge accountability group every Sunday, and they were expecting a good sermon. For most, nearly all of those years, I was senior pastor. We've all grown together over the last three decades. And now I'm, what we call, a teaching pastor.
Jennie- I love the name of this book. I love what you talk about in it, because I do think we often believe that following Jesus should be easier and cleaner than it is. The book is called God Never Gives Up on You- What Jacob's Story Teaches Us About Grace, Mercy, and God's Relentless Love. It’s really a book about people stumbling. About people trying their best to follow God, but feeling like they do it imperfectly.
Max Lucado- I opened the book saying, "If you got it all together, this book isn't for you." If you're a super saint, and your cheese always stays on your cracker, then the story of Jacob's not for you.” I think he's such an interesting Bible character, because he is so surprising.
Abraham, and Moses, and Daniel and Joseph, even David, even though they stumbled by and large, they just kind of seem like solid leaders. Good men of faith. It's hard to find in the life of Jacob, very many stellar occasions. Most of the time we're shaking our heads saying- "Jacob, what's up." What's your history been with Jacob’s story?
Jennie- That story just hurts my brain. Let's start there. What are some of the moments that captivated you as you begin to really dig in?
Max Lucado- The context is Jacob is the grandson of Abraham, which puts him in pretty good lineage. God had made a promise, and continues to fulfill that wonderful promise that he will bless the world through the seed of Abraham. And two generations removed, here comes Jacob. He's the son of Isaac. And he's the second son of a set of twins. And just by a second, you remember. He saw the older brother was apparently... He strikes us as more of a hunter, outdoorsy type. Jacob is more booksy. So at a certain point, Jacob decides that he wants to have the inheritance. He wants to be the firstborn. He wants to have all the privileges that would've come to his elder brother Esau. The story is full of curious events. The first curious event is a vision, or a dream that mom Rebecca has, that the older will serve the younger.
So it seems that God had told her, that somehow there was going to be a reversal of roles. And that Jacob indeed would lead the clan, but rather than wait on God to do it, they took matters into their own hands.
Here comes the first slippery season in which Jacob convinces Esau to sell his birthright for a bowl of soup, because Esau's famished. He wants what he can see, more than what he might someday inherit. And then as if that wasn't bad enough, Jacob dresses up like his brother. Jacob goes in and fools his nearly blind dad into blessing him, into giving him the blessing that was reserved for Esau. He deceives his brother, he deceives his father. His brother is angry at him. Mom says- "Esau's got that look on his eyes, you better get out of town."
Next thing we know, off goes Jacob, running away from home and he won't come back for 20 years. And really the story of Jacob occupies about 20 years of his life.
He lived much longer than that. But this part of the story is the story of Jacob going up through Mesopotamia, living with his uncle Laban. Who turned out to be more shrewd even than Jacob, where Jacob marries two wives. He really just loved one, and that's a story that is bizarre. Jacob ends up having babies through two handmaidens, ends up with 12 kids. Has to finally come back home, goes through the land of his brother Esau, whom he hasn't seen for 20 years.
That's when he wrestles with God, and then he goes back to Bethel.
Not before there's a terrible bloodbath in a small village called Shechem. So this is the circuitous route of Jacob's life. And like we said earlier, you struggle to find highlights, but you struggle not to relate, because Jacob's story is our story. He's just that guy who wants to do well, but well, he just doesn't know how. Or doesn't accomplish it much.
But the hero of the story is God.
Because every time I think God's going to give up on the guy, there's God going up with blessings, with covenants, with forgiveness, with grace. So there's the hero. That's why the title, God Never Gives Up On You.
Jennie- I'm actually reading a book, an old book by Chuck Swindoll right now, called Grace Awakening. He talks about grace is so dangerous because the idea that He would forgive all of our sins means that there's nothing you can do to separate yourself from God. But in reality, it's just not how we work. And it feels scary. It almost feels dangerous, that you could mess up that badly, be that sneaky and horrible to your family. And yet God would still move in your life, and bless you. I think it bothers people.
Max Lucado- I think people respond when they see this Niagara of grace that God gives. This pure unadulterated grace. The response is- We've never seen anything like that. Even though our parents love us, they don't love us with that level of grace.
They love us unconditionally, yes. But the sense that we are purchased, that we've been redeemed, that we were owned by God, and He's never going to let us go.
In my own life, I really struggled with that kind of grace because I just didn't think God could forgive a jerk like me. I don't know why we see ourselves as the exception to this rule.
For many of us, the great step of faith is not to believe that Christ rose from the dead, but to believe that He can forgive us, and secure us forever.
Jennie - So many people that are believers, still live in shame. And it truly can paralyze people, and steal their joy. Talk to them for a minute. Just because you relate to that, the person that just feels that this grace doesn't apply to them.
Max Lucado- The Bible teaches us that God sees the end from the beginning. I believe historically, He sees the final day of this earthly age, as well as He sees the first day in the Garden of Eden.
He sees history from the end, the timeline, all at one time. Same with my life. He sees my last day, as well as He does my first day. He can make an accurate assessment of everything and He has.
And he’s said, "I know everything she's going to do, or think. I know everything he's going to do, or think. That's okay. My sacrifice is adequate for them. And I want them in My kingdom." The reason God redeems us, is because He has plans for us for eternity.
We're going to reign with Him in a perfect kingdom. He loves us, yes, but He's preparing us. He's preparing us to enter. We're just barely on a threshold.
We're not even starting our life, and we've barely taken one step in terms of our eternal life. One of the wonderful things we'll do throughout eternity, is just be amazed at the grace that God has given to us. And celebrate Him. And that's why we won't boast. That's why we will gladly place our crowns at the feet of Christ, because no one deserves a crown in heaven. Only Jesus does. Understanding the eternal perspective that God sees is helpful in understanding His grace.
Jennie- We live in a world that is harsh. It really is a discipline to remember that God is all together different, that there's not some star chart that he's keeping for you. He really can forgive in a way, because of Jesus's blood, a way that nobody else can forgive. And it is possible. When you wrote this book, when you thought about Jacob's life, why was it that you thought of the people who were messing up so badly? What was the connection for you in Jacob's life, and the people that feel discounted, discouraged, and that they can't be forgiven?
Max Lucado- I run with a bunch of guys, and we play golf. These guys always are amazed that they're letting a pastor play with them. Because they're not your pastor sorts, they're certainly not on a staff. They're barely in a church pew. And I love them. It's a group of about eight or 10 guys. Whoever's available on a given Friday, we go play. I listen to their language, jokes, and they make snide remarks. I love the guys and I love their honesty about life. I think that their view of God is exactly like mine was in early in my life. That is, they've outspent His grace.
They're responsible guys, to one degree or another, they have happy homes. But they would never think that God chose them.
That's a foreign language to them. And so when I started reading Jacob, I thought, I know these guys. I golf with them all the time. They too, they've gotten in trouble through the years, and made some bad decisions. Stuff that they regret. As they're getting up there in years, we're all about the same age, they're hungry to know though if this God I tell them about, can they dare believe that? Dare believe it. That's really the great message that we have to give.
That’s the big story of the Christian faith, is that we're casting our life. We're throwing our hat in the ring with this Savior, who saves us not by what we do, but by what He does. This grace changes us. It really does. It turns us into better people.
There's always the thought people would say, "Yeah, but Max, if somebody really gets grace, they're going to sin in order to take advantage of grace." My response is- "Yeah, of course they will, at first. But as they grow, as that grace begins to move in, as that grace begins to clean their heart, what it does is it creates an awe, a desire to love this God who loves me so much."
I read once that "grace rightly received results in a holiness deeply desired". This grace that has forgiven me for all of my immoralities, and continues to forgive me is a grace that activates within me a desire to be holy.
To love my wife, to love my Lord, to love my church. It creates a happier person, a healthier person. When I was reading about Jacob, I had several case studies walking down the fairway with me every week.
Jennie - Everybody listening right now, I promise you they're probably either smiling or they're just relaxed. Because I think we rest in this idea- That God really just delights over us, and we are safe with Him.
