Is Anyone Irredeemable?

For someone who enjoys keeping up with the what’s going on in the world, I am purposely watching less and less news and commentary programs. It seems to be the same old tune. Hillary’s health. Hillary’s emails. Trump’s new poll numbers. Or some gaffe made by Trump.

But this comment by Hillary Clinton that half of Donald Trump’s supporters are a “basket of deplorables” did get my attention. She said they are “irredeemable.”

Really?

Now, before I set off a political frenzy between the Trump supporters and the anti-Trump protesters, this post is really not about politics. Nor is it an endorsement of either Presidential candidate.  But don’t quit reading. It will be more beneficial than another edition of “Hannity.”

Aside from the judgment of labeling millions of people who support a candidate as “deplorable,” to say they are simply “irredeemable” is a pretty incredible charge. I suppose as a preacher and a Christian the word “irredeemable” jumped out at me. I thought “who can’t be redeemed?”

Who can’t be redeemed from bad choices? Redeemed from hurtful vices? Redeemed from hateful actions? Redeemed from racist behavior? Redeemed from sexist attitudes? Redeemed from the proclivity of prejudice? Who can’t be redeemed from whatever enslaves them?

The word “redemption” mean to purchase. To buy back. To set free. To rescue. Or to recover. Thayer’s Greek Lexicon says it means, “to let one go free on receiving the price: a releasing effected by payment of ransom; redemption, deliverance, liberation procured by the payment of a ransom.” It was a word used for the price paid to set free a slave whose freedom had been bought by beneficent benefactor.

Like the slave, we have been captives of sin, serving Satan, and enslaved to basest instincts. Paul put it this way in Ephesians 2. We were “dead in trespasses in sins.” We were “the sons of disobedience.” We “conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others.” Furthermore, we had “no hope” and were “without God in the world.”

Satan, the thief, stole us away from God. By seducing us with sinful pleasures he seized us away from our Creator. He held us captive. He kept us away from our rightful Owner. He separated us from God’s “most favorite thing.” But we are not irredeemable.

God’s grace, mercy and love purchased our freedom through Jesus Christ. And returned us to our rightful Owner! The Bible says, “In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace” (Eph. 1:7).

The writer of Romans was right. “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God. (But we have been) justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.” (Rom. 3:23-24)

No matter how long you’ve been separated from God. Regardless of how many phobias you’ve developed. Or sinful practices that have enslaved you. Or how deplorable your life has become. There is always the possibility of redemption.

God loves you. He has a passion for you. And Jesus has paid the price for your redemption. Spiritually, no one is irredeemable.

Redeemed–how I love to proclaim it!

Redeemed by the blood of the Lamb;

Redeemed through His infinite mercy,

His child, and forever, I am.

–Ken Weliever, The Preacherman