John D. Rockefeller was the American industrialist who built the great Standard Oil Empire. Not surprisingly, Rockefeller was a man who demanded high performance from his executives.

One day, one of those executives made a two million dollar mistake. Word of the man’s enormous error quickly spread throughout the executive offices, and the other men began to make themselves scarce, not wanting to cross Rockefeller’s path.

One executive didn’t have any choice, however, since he had an appointment with the boss. So he straightened his shoulders and walked into Rockefeller’s office.

As he approached Rockefeller’s desk, he looked up from the piece of paper on which he was writing. “I guess you’ve heard about the two million dollar mistake our friend made,” he said abruptly.

“Yes,” the executive said, expecting Rockefeller to explode.

“Well, I’ve been sitting here listing all of our friend’s good qualities. I’ve discovered that in the past he has made us many more times the amount he lost for us today by his one mistake. His good points far outweigh this one human error. So, I think we ought to forgive him, don’t you?”

Rockefeller was willing to forgive a man based on the man’s good prior performance. As unexpected as that might have been, God offers us something that is far more unlikely in terms of human logic. God forgives us even when we do not have the benefit of prior good performance. He is willing to forgive those with the very worst performance.

Romans 5:8 puts it this way:

8But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

We didn’t just make an error – we were His enemies! Yet Jesus died for us, showing the incredible forgiveness extended to us by God.

I thank God for His gracious forgiveness of a sinner like me – one who cannot point to any prior performance to warrant our Lord’s grace.

With Love,

Mike