20th November 2016 - What is the Ragamuffin gospel

What is the Ragamuffin gospel

1. The ‘ragamuffin’ gospel…?" – 20
th
November 2016
For he says, “In the time of my favor I heard you, and in the day of salvation I helped you.”

I
tell you, now is the time of God’s favor, now is the day of salvation” (2 Corinthians 6:2).
The Cambridge Dictionary defines a ragamuffin as a dirty untidy child or person. The ragamuffin gospel
is a concept made popular by the best-selling and influential book of the same name, originally
published in 1990. Author Brennan Manning, a former Catholic priest, wrote the book “for the
bedraggled, beat-up, and burnt-out” not for the “super spiritual”. The Ragamuffin Gospel proved
popular with several Christian songwriters and musicians, including Michael W. Smith and Rich Mullins,
who formed the Ragamuffin Band in 1993. Manning’s books, including The Ragamuffin Gospel,
emphasize the grace of Jesus in ministering to the “ragamuffins”—the ragged, disreputable people of
His day—the sick, the tax collectors and sinners, the woman caught in adultery. We can learn from the
bible that Jesus often served these “ragamuffins,” while the religious leaders of the day opposed Him
and refused to dirty their hands with society’s problems.

This article is a discussion on how an understanding of God’s grace plays out in the lives of believers.
Manning says, “We can’t earn God’s acceptance, any more than we can earn our salvation. Yet God
gives it to us, willingly—no matter who we are or what we’ve done. We are all ragamuffins. Each of us
come beat-up, burnt-out, ragged and dirty to sit at our Father’s feet. And there he smiles upon us—the
chosen objects of his ‘furious love.’” In other words, Jesus accepts the broken. He accepts those people
who know they will never be perfect. The ragamuffin gospel says that we can come to God in our sin and
ask for forgiveness. We can read in Isaiah 1, God offers the invitation to come to Him, though our sins
are as scarlet, and He will make them white as snow. We can read this from Isaiah 1:18, “ Come now, let
us settle the matter,” says the LORD. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow;
though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool”. As sinners we can know that God desires
sinners to come to Him as they are, so that He can cleanse them.

Jesus comes not for the super-spiritual but for the wobbly and the weak-kneed who know they don’t
have it all together, and who are not too proud to accept the handout of amazing grace” (The
Ragamuffin Gospel, page 27). Jesus came to save sinners. This is stated in 1 Timothy 1:15, “Here is a
trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of
whom I am the worst”. It is important for us as Christians to understand the delicate balance that God
presents—His grace to take us “as we are” and our willing response to not stay “as we are.”

To fully understand grace and the balance God’s Word presents, we need to consider who we were without Christ
and who we become with Christ. We were born in sin and we were guilty of breaking God’s law. We were enemies
of God deserving of death (spiritual death). We had no way to save ourselves: “

Therefore no one will be declared
righteous in God’s sight by the works of the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of our sin”
(Romans 3:20). Spiritually, we were destitute, blind, unclean, and dead. Our souls deserve eternal punishment
which is spiritual death. Therefore to say that we are all ragamuffins is an understatement.
But then came grace. God extended His favor to us. Grace is what saves us as we can learn from
Ephesians 2:8, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves,
it is the gift of God”. Grace is the essence of the gospel and as stated in same Grace gives us victory over
sin as we learn from James 4:6, “But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says: “God opposes
the proud but shows favor to the humble.” It gives us “eternal encouragement and good hope” as we

2. learn from 2 Thessalonians 2:16, “May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us
and by his grace gave us eternal encouragement and good hope…”.

So how do we keep that grace from becoming “cheap grace”—a “grace” that promises all the benefits of
Christianity without repentance or obedience. Cheap grace seeks to hide the cost of discipleship, to
nullify our willing response to God’s gift of grace. While we believe that God’s grace covers all our sins,
we can also accept that faith manifests itself in repentance, obedience, and a transformed heart.
Believers are new creations.

We come to God as ragamuffins and accept His grace, and God calls us to renewal. As we accept God’s
grace in our lives, we do not stay in sin. We seek to be transformed to the image of Christ. He receives
us just as we are and then begins to change us from wherever or however we were as we submit to Him
in obedience. We can learn this from Acts 15:11, “No! We believe it is through the grace of our Lord
Jesus that we are saved, just as they are.”
Therefore we can know that: Yes, the gospel is intended to teach ragamuffins… just as we are. But as
Christians we must also know that God does not leave people as ragamuffins… He begins to change us
to become a new entity that steadfastly seeks to have a close relationship with God always!. Therefore
we can learn from 2 Corinthians 5:15-19, “And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live
for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.
16
So from now on we regard no
one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer.
17
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!