Carty’s Contemporary Classics 30: You Stink!

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It was on a Friday night that 14-year-old, 6’3” 130 pound Jay Carty accepted an invitation to church. As a bar-kid with a bookie dad, church usually wasn’t on the Friday night to do list, but Jay was afraid to refuse. It was there in that service that Jay heard his first fire and brimstone, turn or burn sermon.

The preacher proclaimed, “We’ve all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God!!”

Jay believed at the time that God grades on a curve. However, that night, he learned that everyone on the bell shaped curve of sin is in trouble.

You see, sin in it’s purest form is not what you do. What you do is: lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes and boastful pride of life.

But sin is rebellion. It’s saying no to God and wanting to be your own god.

And since we’re all sinners, we can’t face God on our own.

We need a representative.

Sin makes you stink. And we all stink. You’re like an onion. You stink.

Some of us are Bermuda onions – nothing worse. Some are Walla Walla sweet onions. Some are Mauis, reds, greens, leeks, chives… no matter the name, an onion by any other name is still an onion. And we’re all onions. We all stink.

And since there’s no stink in God’s heavenly refrigerator, our stinking selves aren’t allowed in heaven.

So what do you do to prepare an onion for heaven?

You need to start by putting a new seed (Jesus) into the core fo the onion and transform it from the inside out.

You see, as soon as you compare yourself to the absolutely holy standard of God, you realize you don’t measure up; and that you need a representative. Jesus Christ offers to be just that for you.