Don't Throw in the Towel

A Non-Exhaustive List of Reasons to Hope in God and Keep Getting Up in His Grace (Even After Nuking Your Life Again)

When our Lord and Master Jesus Christ said, “Repent” (Matt. 4:17), he willed the entire life of believers to be one of repentance.
- Martin Luther

To you I say, do you know what Jesus does with those who squander his mercy? He pours out more mercy. God is rich in mercy. That’s the whole point.
- Dane Ortlund, Gentle and Lowly, 179.

Been Here Before and Now, Again

Failure

Idiot

Hypocrite

Filthy

Compulsive

Lazy

Defeated

Disgusting

Worthless

These are just a handful of labels that I’ve thrown at myself after I felt I’ve blown it in my walk with Jesus (can I even call it a walk with Jesus?). You’ve been there too. It’s that same besetting sin that you thought you’d get over after all these years. Maybe you know you should be growing in a specific area of your life but you don’t see any change. Or maybe it was another interaction with someone and you left that conversation worse than when it started. Sometimes those moments make you look in the mirror and ask yourself, “What’s the point? Why try to keep moving forward?”

“What’s the point of personal holiness when I’m just going to fail again?”

I don’t know if this happens often for you, and maybe you haven’t had any experiences like this . . . yet. But when you do, there is still hope for you, even when you feel like there isn’t.

How can that be? Why should you keep going? Why should you get back up after you gut-punched yourself again and again with your sin? Why should you leave the pit of despair and shame even when it just seems like that is where you should be forever?

A Multitude of Gospel-Saturated, Jesus-Infatuating, God-Powered Reasons to Keep Coming to Jesus

1. Jesus died for your sins, every single one of them, and you bear them no more.

2. You are united with Christ which means God will never stop loving you.

3. God knows everything so no sin or failure is a surprise to him, and Jesus’ blood is still stronger than any of them.

4. There is only mercy and grace for those who come to Jesus for help.

5. Sulking in your sin and failure is pride. God loves it when we just own the fact we sinned and come to him for healing because that’s what he wants to do for his kids.

6. Nothing is wasted in a Christian’s life, and the Gospel will restore and redeem every moment. So what are you waiting for?

7. You’re not the first Christian to blow it. I mean look at Peter who denied Christ and at one point divided the church with error. How humiliating, yet God still restored him. Which shows . . .

8. God loves you, not a future version of you, and will discipline you in love to grow in living out who you are in Christ.

9. If God is infinite in all his perfections, you are in Christ, and you have received grace upon grace, then you will never exhaust God’s grace.

10. Jesus died not only to forgive you of all your sins but also to empower you by the indwelling Holy Spirit to now be able to kill sin.

11. Therefore, remember that the power to grow in faithful, personal holiness (NOT PERFECTION) is not by wallowing in your shame, but by acknowledging your need for God’s power and work in your life. You need his power, not yours, and you have it because . . .

12. The Holy Spirit loves to help Christians want more of Jesus than before. He will empower you.

13. You will not make God unclean by coming to him. Just like the leper coming to Jesus, Jesus doesn’t become unclean. He makes the unclean clean.

14. Jesus came to seek and save the lost, to serve, not to be served. So if you are in him and you are hurting, let him love you. Let him heal you.

15. You are not what you or others say you are. Ultimately, your identity is defined by God either as an image-bearer who is headed for damnation or who is in Christ and will never stop receiving divine love.

16. The only reason why you are still rolling in the mud of your sin’s fallout is because of your pride. You think you are irredeemable and thus have given yourself permission to either self-shame or keep sinning. But that ain’t what God’s doing to you.

17. Because your worth and value are in Christ, you can say no to sin. Tell that sin/failure and the lies that you were believing to shove it because God chose you before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless.

18. God is not waiting at a distance for you with a belt in hand to abuse you. God is with you in your mess working in your life to lift your eyes back to the beauty of the Gospel.

19. Think about mature Christian friends you know. Most likely, they too have endured similar hardships. Sure, maybe it’s not the same exact thing, but all sin, failure, and temptation is common under the sun, and yet Jesus still loves them and they continue to persevere. What makes you think you’re so special?

20. And that’s the beauty of God’s grace. Your sin or failure really isn’t that special or unique because you still need God’s grace! That’s what makes Christianity true: Christ died for our sins! Period. “But my sin is . . .” NOPE! Christ died for that too!

21. Jesus doesn’t waste his purchases. If he bought you with his blood, he ain’t done with you yet.

22. You are not omniscient. Thus, you don’t know the future of your story. But what you do know is the Gospel and that God loves to work in his children. So follow his script, not yours.

23. God is your only refuge! Meaning, you will not find a safe space anywhere else except for him. So run to your refuge. Get up! Stop sulking in yourself.

24. Don’t you dare think about trying to clean yourself up in order to come to Jesus. That’s not how grace works to produce holiness. “If you tarry till you’re better, you will never come at all.” In fact, “all the fitness he requires is to feel your need for him.”

25. The way you grow in holiness is by looking to Jesus and seeing the riches of his grace which will only empower you to want him more and thus live for him more than before.

26. This world of sinful brokenness is not your true home. Remember that you are now a citizen of the kingdom of God which will come to fruition when Jesus comes and makes all things new.

27. Speaking of all things new, what makes you think you can live up to an unrealistic, legalistic standard of perfectionism when God has called you to faithful obedience by growing in dependence on him?

28. If you are in Christ, then you are invincible because Christ is not in the grave. Therefore, you can get up in His infinite grace to live out his resurrection power.

29. Jesus is the only anchor for your weary soul because he endured the worst experience (dying for our sins) and achieved the greatest victory (conquering sin and death).

30. Jesus loves you, and you know this because the Bible tells you so. Yes, Jesus loves you. He loves you. He will never stop loving you. So . . .

Get Up Under the War Banner of Jesus Who Already Won

The apostle John wrote that Jesus did so many other things but to put all of them on paper would overwhelm all the earth’s real estate. I suppose that even the same can be said for all the reasons why Christians who will stumble and fall and even willfully sin can still get up in the grace of God. This means that when we get up and let the Holy Spirit brush the dust off of us, we don’t press forward toward an unknown outcome. No, Christ has won! The Triune God has saved us. He has saved you. My goodness, I’m still amazed he even saved me. Jesus is still high and lifted up as our mediator, redeemer, shepherd, king, and friend, and he hates it when his friends are hurting. In fact, Jesus says that we’re not just friends—we’re family. And his victory is our victory.

So whether it’s that same sinful addiction, the lack of growth in spiritual disciplines, another colossal interaction with that same person, or that third sleepless night, it doesn’t matter. You are in Christ, and the flag that is waving above you as you get up is not a white towel of surrender but the war banner of the love of Christ who will never stop loving you because he lives for that.

Time to get up in the indelible, sheer grace of God.

Let’s roll!

Appendix: What about your reasons?

These reasons above are just what came to mind at the top of my head right after one of these moments. What about you? Maybe it would be good to just take a few minutes with a journal and write down all of the Bible-based, Gospel-informed reasons why you can get up again in repentance and keep walking with Jesus. I know that there are no Bible verses above but I’m sure that there a many verses that came to mind when you were reading these reasons. So have your Bible in hand, and think through the reasons God has given to us to keep trusting in him and getting up by his power to live for him, no matter the hardships, obstacles, failures, and sins.