Contaminated Surgical Clamp
Object LessonAnalogy★★★★★We have here a number of medical people, okay? And I have here a clamp, a surgical clamp. All right, if I’m about to do surgery, all right, I have this all bundled up. If I’m about to do surgery, I unfold this, and what is this called?
A sterile field. Because we know that in surgery, 1 of the most dangerous things to a patient is germs, contamination by germs. And so this instrument has been through a process of sterilization. And so this is called a sterile field.
Is it sterile now? No. Can it be used for surgery now? No.
But listen, put your thinkers on. Can’t it still perform? It has the functions, it can still perform. What’s the problem?
It’s contaminated. Everything it touches is contaminated. It’s going to cause problems. So for this instrument then To be able to be used in surgery again, what’s going to happen?
It has to be sterilized. Can the clamp sterilize itself? It needs a source outside of itself to sterilize it so that its works can be accepted. You see, you and I have a fall in nature.
By default, what we do is motivated by selfishness, naturally now. So the only way that that can change is if a source outside of us cleanses us and changes us heart so that our motives are different. Does this make sense? That’s why you can never be saved by works.
You and I cannot change ourselves. It has to be through God’s work in us if we will allow it. That’s the only way by accepting the gift of God, His grace, and allow Him to do His work in our lives.
Baute, Jorge, “09 The Most Holy Place” (AudioVerse teaching 25309).
The point
A surgical clamp, once sterile, becomes contaminated and cannot be used for surgery, even though it can still perform its mechanical function. It requires an external source to re-sterilize it. This illustrates that human works, tainted by a fallen, selfish nature, cannot earn salvation; we need an external source—God's grace—to cleanse and transform our hearts so that our motives and works become acceptable.