David committed adultery and conspiracy to commit murder. And yet God said David was a man after His own heart.

Abraham passed his wife off as his sister and gave her to another man. Why? Because he was afraid he might be killed if it was known she was really his wife. He did it not once, but  twice. And yet he was the father of the nation of Israel and known as a man of faith.

Noah trusted God so completely that he built the ark on dry land because God told him to. And yet after the flood, he got so drunk he didn’t even realize his own daughter entered his tent to sleep with him.

Peter denied he even knew Jesus. Three times. And yet he later preached to a large crowd and 3,000 people were added to the church that day.

Paul hunted down believers in Christ to imprison or kill them. And yet God used him to take the gospel to the gentiles and write much of the New Testament.

Jonah was instructed to go to Ninevah, but ran away instead. When he finally did do what God commanded, he did it with a bad attitude. And yet God used him to turn the hearts of hundreds of thousands of people back to Him.

What about you? How have you screwed up?

Have you blown it so many times you feel like God can no longer bless you or use you?

Maybe you’ve committed some “big” sin like adultery. Or maybe you’ve been guilty of the same sin, day after day after day after day. You feel like God’s patience is wearing thin and you’re about to exhaust His mercy and grace.

Isaiah 55:6-9 says:

Seek the LORD while he may be found; call on him while he is near. Let the wicked forsake their ways and the unrighteous their thoughts. Let them turn to the LORD, and he will have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will freely pardon.

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the LORD. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”

The good news is this–God’s thoughts and ways are not like ours. We feel guilty and ashamed, but God invites us to turn back to Him and be freely pardoned. We think God must certainly be angry or disappointed this time, but still He calls us to turn back to Him and receive mercy. We think there needs to be a period of time that must pass before we can turn back to God. Kind of like being put in “time-out.”

Surely, He can’t bless us or use us or love us right after we’ve sinned. We need to wait awhile. Right?

Wrong. His thoughts and ways aren’t like ours. There’s no waiting required. His invitation to turn back to Him is always open.

Don’t let your guilt and shame keep you from Him. Your enemy, the devil, would love for you to believe you’ve finally pushed God too far. But you haven’t.

Turn your back on your sin, your guilt and your shame. Turn back to the One who delights in showing you mercy, the One who freely pardons you.

The real tragedy is not that we sin, but that we fail to seek God because we believe we’ve exhausted His inexhaustible grace.