All tagged forgiveness
Are we worthy? Are we worthy of the Christ Child’s birth that we celebrated yesterday? Are we worthy of the sacrifice that God made by giving His only begotten Son to die for your sins? Are we worthy of an audience with the creator of the universe? Are we worthy of His forgiveness? There are so many questions like this that most of us would answer with a resounding “NO!”, but is that really true? Do we even know what it means to be worthy?
Have the things of the world died to you? Are you a different person today than you were the day before you first believed? Have you asked the Lord to forgive you for your sins today and then taken a deep and refreshing breath of relief once they were lifted from you? Or do you ask for and receive His forgiveness only to neglect the fruit of that redemption, which is the peace, joy, and rest He means for you to be blessed with? Let’s look at this dastardly ploy of Satan who attempts to steal the heavenly peace and joy of God away from us by keeping us spiritually bound to sin and our continued focus on another one of his lies… which is the need for our ongoing spiritual regret and conviction for previously forgiven sins long after the Lord our God and Savior Jesus Christ have cleansed us of them
As we move towards a godly state of righteousness we shed one sin after another until at last we are down to our pet sins... those that give us personal pleasure or reduce the pain of living in some way. When we reach this point, and we refuse to let these sins go, then our relationship with God stalls, and we feel a growing separation from Jesus. This can happen early on in our walk of faith, but usually it occurs once all the low hanging sinful fruit has been plucked from us. These deeply rooted personal sins require a specialized spiritual surgery to extract them.
We can’t enter into heaven and live an eternal life because we deserve it. That kind of thinking is based upon our own vanity and arrogance. Our salvation and everlasting life is sealed by covenant alone, and that covenant of grace comes only by our belief in God’s acceptance of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ as our blood sacrifice and atonement for sin. Only through Jesus can we be redeemed, forgiven, perfected, and sanctified. Only through Him can we truly claim the covenant of God’s grace.
Are you in a covenant relationship with God? Have you accepted the blood of Jesus Christ as affirmation of that covenant? Has God’s grace and forgiveness of sin through the sacrifice of Jesus become your blood offering that has signed and sealed this covenant? We see the cross and say “this is the covenant”, but it is only a sign. We see the rending of the temple curtain and say “this is the covenant”, but it is only a sign. We see the empty tomb and say “this is the covenant”, but it too is only a sign. The covenant is forgiveness, and the blood of Jesus is the offering that inaugurates it. Is the blood of Jesus upon you as God’s seal?
Do you have your body under control? Have you let yourself separate your spirituality of nature from the physical manifestation of that faith within your body itself? By this I am not asking if you treat yourself as a narcissist, but if you do those things that are godly and good with yourself, and treat your body as a temple of the Holy Spirit? Our spiritual and physical selves walk hand in hand with our faith, and it is by God’s will that we find the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit within our physical bodies.
What sins do we have in our lives that have enslaved us? Do we have an overriding desire for something that drives us to commit sin, or a need in our life that makes us complicit or vulnerable to sinful things? Either way, we have been enslaved, and our sin will rule us until we can find emancipation from it. Sexual predators are in the news again right now... let’s take a look.
We have been purchased with the blood of Jesus Christ and are privileged to know Him personally. We have been baptized in water, and then again in the Holy Spirit as they were poured over and into us, having been born on the wings of grace and carried within the sweet breath of Christ Himself. Yet despite this, we find that the allure and temptation of sin can be too great for us to resist. How can this possibly be? How can we at one moment be declared the temple of the Holy Spirit and in the next find ourselves in a pit of raging lions… which are our sins.
The gift of salvation through God's grace is totally of God, and has nothing to do with our earning it... but does that relieve us of all responsibility? I was reading a devotional message yesterday in which the author agreed that our salvation was 100% the work of God's grace, but as he went on, he concluded that because of this we have "no responsibility whatsoever"! I agree that we have no responsibility in receiving the gift, but once received we most certainly have a responsibility... in fact, we have responsibilities as a result of it.
I am more than just a sinner in the general sense; I am a person who commits very specific sins. It is easy to make the open-ended statement "I am a sinner", but God wants to deal with each of us regarding our specific sins. We are led to understand what our sins are when we stand in the presence of God.
Carrying anger or hatred in us for long periods of time, that is my concentration this morning. Do we resolve issues quickly and move to forgiveness in a timely manner or are we suffering as we carry that unforgiven baggage day after day. What does God's Word tell us about this?
Am I a sinner? Can I lead a life of innocence? Am I seeking to be pure? Will God forgive me when I sin against Him? These are the questions man has always asked himself and which we are asking ourselves today as we contemplate sin in our lives, and the world around us. Let’s join together as one today as we listen to the words of the Apostle Paul and seek out our own salvation which God has planned and now works in us.
As Christians we fail in a certain way almost every day. It is so hard for us not to judge the actions of those around us, and in this, if it were not for the Atonement of Christ, we would be lost. Seeing and turning our noses up at sinners is just too natural for us.
June is the Month that has the most weddings, and since Ann and I just celebrated our 49th wedding anniversary, I thought this would be a good time to talk about marriage and what is takes to stay married till death do us part. Today we will address some of the common questions newlyweds or struggling couples ask… What is the secret to a successful marriage? Will our marriage last? Will the world drive us apart? How should we approach conflicts between us as husband and wife? What happens when the world collapses on us and crushes the love from our relationship?
Are we too ashamed to speak to God, much less ask Him for something? Are we too embarrassed by our condition or too ashamed of our sin to reach out to Him for help? When should we bring our needs or our contrition before Him in prayer? When should we ask for forgiveness?