Paying Jesus back

Does the master thank the servant for doing what he was told to do? Of course not. In the same way, when you obey me you should say, ‘We are unworthy servants who have simply done our duty’ (Luke 17:9-10).

When someone does you a favor, you feel indebted to them, that you owe something in return. Most of us don’t like to carry an unpaid debt—it makes us feel uncomfortable. So we look for ways to return the favor.

When Jesus died to forgive our sins, He gave us a gift of enormous value. Because He suffered in our place, we can be forgiven anything we’ve done wrong. Because He died for us, we can walk through the grave to eternity in paradise. These are incredible gifts, and Jesus suffered horribly to make them available to us. So it is natural that we feel deeply indebted to the Son of God. We wonder how we might repay Christ for all that He’s gone through on our behalf.

But repaying Jesus is impossible. Here’s why: God expects us to be perfect. He says Be holy, because I the LORD your God, am holy (Leviticus 19:2). Every minute of every day, we are to be living out God’s command: `Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind'; and `Love your neighbor as yourself' (Luke 10:27).

But sin makes such a command impossible for us to keep. Paul wrote, I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. I want to do what is right, but I can’t…I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway (Romans 7:18-19). No matter how hard we try to avoid it, we sin. We sin a lot, every single day.

Thankfully, Jesus forgives us when we ask Him to. But there is no way for us to replace the time wasted on sin. There is nothing we can give the Lord to repay Him, because all that we have already belongs to Him. Jesus summed up our situation when He said: Does the master thank the servant for doing what he was told to do? Of course not. In the same way, when you obey me you should say, ‘We are unworthy servants who have simply done our duty.’ There is no way for us to repay Jesus for all that He’s done as our Savior. We owe Him big time, and we always will.