1 Timothy 1:15

"Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners--of whom I am the worst."

This is a verse I had memorized before I opened this Scripture to start memorizing for the day. Here Paul makes his "boastful" statement of Christ's mission and his position as Christ's most unredeemable case.

Again, as I thought through this I had to keep thinking, but why say this to Timothy. Timothy knows Paul's background. If not from multiple personal hearings, then at least from the testimony of his godly Grandmother and Mother. He doesn't need a refersher.

With the preceding verses, I think Paul is shaping a picture here of the great work of God that Timothy has been called into as a young shepherd over this flock. God's passion for his people is great and no one is out of his reach.

We start with a simple statement that Christ came into the world to save sinners. It couldn't be more straightforward. I know Paul wants Timothy to remember this daily. Not just as he is passionately working to win new souls to Christ, but as he is daily dealing with the at times "stinky" flock. The suffereing of Christ was for the purpose of saving sinners. Paul wants to make sure this is understood emphatically. If Timothy's Lord saw this as so high a calling, it is never to be underestimated by Timothy.

Paul then goes to state his place in the as the most unreedemable of sinners. My inner skeptic kind of cringes when people make general statements of being the best or worst, but it is hard to argue that there are many outwardly "worse" sins then actively trying to kill Christians. Even so, I tend to see such a statment as a boast and I think it was ( 2 Cor 11:30). At the same time I think in the statement there is a sense of extreme thankfulness of Christ reaching down so far, to the depths of the worst. This is what I think he wants Timothy to remember. When you think someone is out of reach, reach harder. No one is too low that the hand of Christ still can't grab. You are that hand Timothy. You are called to all men Timothy. Do not be a judge of who constitutes "the redeemable".

That was an incredible personal lesson. There is only one judge who chooses men. He chose them with his own blood. We are called to all men. No one we encounter is to far away or to "great" a sinner that the hand of our Lord can't reach them. We are that hand. That is our calling to work alongside the God of the universe who came to save sinners. Even the worst.

Let us attempt to be at peace with all men so that we might win some.