Opening A Can Of Paint

And when [the Holy Spirit] comes, he will convict the world of its sin, and of God’s righteousness, and of the coming judgment.   John 16:8

Christ offers us forgiveness of sin, righteousness from above, and deliverance from the judgment to come. But most people don’t feel they need what Christ offers.

People in the business world know that you can’t sell what people don’t want to buy. You may have the most marvelous widget, but if people can’t see a need for it, then you don’t have much hope of success.

The Gospels tell us about a successful businessman who came to Jesus, wanting to know what he had to do to have eternal life. When Jesus spoke about the Ten Commandments, the man said, “I’ve obeyed all these commandments since I was young” (Mark 10:20). He was sincere: “I haven’t trashed my life; you’re talking to a highly successful achiever.”

He wasn’t suggesting he was perfect—no sane person thinks that. But he was not aware of any obvious sin in his life, and he felt he was walking on the right path. As he looked at his own life, his honest opinion was that he measured up to the law of God rather well. He expected to have eternal life; he just wanted to be sure.

Then Christ exposed the man’s need: “There is still one thing you haven’t done. . . . Go and sell all your possessions and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven” (Mark 10:21). In a moment, the man saw himself for the self-centered person that he was.

Think about opening a can of paint. You use the rim of the can as a pivot for the screwdriver. If there were no rim, you wouldn’t be able to pry the lid open. The gospel is like a lever that depends on a sense of sin as its pivot. If a person has no sense of sin, the gospel has no “pull” in that person’s life. If it weren’t for the Holy Spirit, we would never see our need for Jesus.

For further reading, see Mark 10