The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost.
~ 1 Timothy 1:15
Perhaps even yet we hardly know, as we should know, our need of a Saviour. Perhaps we may acknowledge ourselves to be sinners only in a languid acquiescence in a current formula. Such a state of self-ignorance cannot, however, last for ever. And some day – probably it has already come to most of us – some day the scales will fall from our eyes, and we shall see ourselves as we really are. Ah, then, we shall have no difficulty in placing ourselves by the Apostle’s side, and pronouncing ourselves, in the accents of the deepest conviction, the chief of sinners. And, then, our only comfort for life and death, too, will be in the discovery that Christ Jesus came into the world just to save sinners. We may have long admired Him as a teacher sent from God, and have long sought to serve Him as a King re-ordering the world; but we shall find in that great day of self-discovery that we have never known Him at all till He has risen upon our soul’s vision as our Priest, making His own body a sacrifice for our sin. For such as we shall then know ourselves to be, it is only as a Saviour from sin that Christ will suffice; and we will passionately make our own such words as these that a Christian singer has got into our mouths:
I sought thee, weeping, high and low,
I found Thee not; I did not know
I was a sinner – even so,
I missed Thee for my Saviour.
I saw Thee sweetly condescend
Of humble men to be the friend,
I chose Thee for my way, my end,
But found Thee not my Saviour,
Until upon the cross I saw
My God, who died to meet the law
That man had broken; then I saw
My sin, and then my Saviour.
Be thou to me my Lord, my Guide,
My Friend, yea, everything beside;
But first, last, best, whate’er betide
Be Thou to me my Saviour!
The Power of God unto Salvation: The Saving Christ, Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield
