You're Not Disqualified!

Manure has been used for centuries as a fertilizer for plant life. It improves soil structure so that it holds more nutrients and water, which makes the ground more fertile. Manure also encourages microscopic life in soil which improves plant nutrition, growth and…. Okay, you get the point.  

Despite what it is made of, manure is good.

God likes manure too. Actually He loves it!   He especially loves using people that the world thinks are just waste or manure. 

Useless. Unworthy. Unqualified.

Seriously He does!

Read the Bible.  When God wants to start a movement, He doesn’t use the best people. He doesn’t look for the most qualified, the man or woman with the best linage, the smartest, strongest, or holiest.

He uses people covered in manure and turns their stinky, unwanted mess into His glory!

Look at many of the heroes we’ve been told or read about since we were children in Sunday school class.

 

Noah…  He was a drunk (Genesis 9:21)

Abraham… He worshipped false idols (Joshua 24:2)

Moses… He was a murderer (Exodus 2:12)

Rahab… She was a prostitute (Joshua 6)

David… He stole his buddy Uriah’s wife, Bathsheba, impregnated her, and murdered him (2 Samuel 11)

Gomer… She was an adulterous prostitute who cheated on Hosea (Hosea 2)

Mary… She was a poor unmarried woman who would become miraculously pregnant and subject to ridicule and persecution (Matthew 1:18-25).

Matthew… He was a dirty, rotten, filthy, stinking, tax collector (Matthew 9)

Saul (Paul)… He persecuted Christians and was the cheerleader when the Pharisees stoned Stephen (Acts 7)

I can keep on going, but I think you get the point.

In Genesis 37, we read about the trials of the much loved Son of Jacob, Joseph. Rather than being killed by his 11 brothers, one of them, Judah, suggests Joseph is sold into slavery, all because they were jealous of their father’s vast love for Joseph.

“Judah said to his brothers, “What will we gain if we kill our brother and cover up his blood? Come, let’s sell him to the Ishmaelites and not lay our hands on him; after all, he is our brother, our own flesh and blood.” His brothers agreed.” Genesis 37:26-27

Fast forward through Genesis 47, and we read about how the amazing Joseph saved the lives of his father Jacob and his brothers, by providing for them during the great famine though his being enslaved to Pharaoh.  Joseph was the man!

 

In Genesis 38 we read about Judah (Joseph’s aforementioned brother) and Tamar. After selling Joseph into slavery, Judah goes about his own life. One day he solicits a prostitute in exchange for a young goat that he would later send. He gives her the cord and staff he carries around as collateral, and then does “the deed.”

Judah returns home and sends his payment, the young goat, but his servant is unable to find the prostitute to make the exchange.

“Then Judah said, “Let her keep what she has, or we will become a laughingstock. After all, I did send her this young goat, but you didn’t find her.” Genesis 38:23

He later learns his daughter in–law, Tamar, had become a prostitute and was pregnant.  Judah wants her burned to death according to Jewish law.    When she was brought out for her punishment, she exclaims:

“As she was being brought out, she sent a message to her father-in-law. “I am pregnant by the man who owns these,” she said. And she added, “See if you recognize whose seal and cord and staff these are.” Genesis 38:25

Any guesses whose staff and cords she was holding up? Turns out that Judah had incestuous sweet love with his own daughter in-law, Tamar.

Okay, so you’re probably wondering what this has to do with manure and heroes of the Bible… I get it.

Here we have two brothers, Joseph and Judah. Do you want to take a guess which one of these brother’s bloodlines Jesus Christ came from?

Yes, the brother selling, daughter in-law sleeping scumbag, is the one whom God decided to use as the great-great-great (X 50+) grand-pappy of Jesus Christ. God could’ve used whomever he wanted, but he chose Judah. He turned manure into Glory.

Here's an abbreviated genealogical chart....

Lets be honest, most churches today would kick out a member like Judah and certainly wouldn’t welcome a visitor like him. They’d say he was a danger to others, that he’d corrupt those who are trying to walk with God.  

But God doesn’t see us that way. He sees our mess as a canvas for His glory. He actually delights in it.  That is what is so amazing about His grace!

God knew that there was no way you or I could ever pay for the sins in our lives. We simply don’t have the ability to do so. So he offered the one and only perfect sacrifice to do it for us, His Son Jesus Christ.

“for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.” Romans 3:23-24

You can’t disqualify yourself from God. You simply can’t. I’ve met a lot of people, some who have done some pretty rotten things, but none who come close to the sins of Paul, David, or Judah.  It’s not about whose sin is worse. They’re all bad, but they’re also paid for if you receive Him as your Lord and Savior!

When God looks at you and me, He doesn’t see our sin, He sees righteousness. The blood of Jesus Christ has covered and washed away all of those sins. Not just the small ones either... ALL OF THEM!

Bad people, by the world’s standards, make good soil by God standards. They have a lot of manure in their life. The perfect farm for growth!