Tag Archives: forgiveness

I Remember

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I remember. I remember times I lied to my parents when I was a kid. I remember things I did in college I’m ashamed of. I remember the awful things I’ve done as an adult, things I’d rather not talk about. I am a sinner. And I remember.

But God doesn’t. When I confessed my sins He forgave and forgot them. He buried their memory in the deepest sea and promises never to remember them ever again. Ezekiel 20:42-44 says when we remember our ways, our doings which have defiled us, we will loathe ourselves because of the evil we’ve committed.

Then, he says, we’ll know God is the Lord when he deals with us, “not according to (our) wicked ways nor according to (our) corrupt doings.”

That’s Jesus for you. He paid for every one of the sins I’ve committed so I don’t have to. Hebrews 10 says He offered Himself as a sacrifice once and for all of us:

For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.

He goes on to say, “Their sins and lawless deeds I will remember no more.”

I don’t deserve this. But I am overwhelmed with gratitude and love for the One who has lavished me with grace. I want only to bring joy to my Savior.

Because I remember.

A Better Hope

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Colton, my nephew’s four-year-old son is learning to zip his own coat, and the other day he wanted to show me he could do it. Colton found the two ends, lined them up, and tried to connect them, but failed. So he tried again, doing exactly the steps Mommy had taught him. But he failed again. And again.

Then I watched him look at his mother with a soulful look that said, “I need you,” and he took a step toward her. She didn’t roll her eyes or scold him. She didn’t make fun of him because he’d failed. She squatted down so her face was level with his, kissed his forehead, and zipped his coat.

The writer of Hebrews talks about the Law, and Jesus’ role as Priest. In chapter seven he points out that the Law was weak and unprofitable. It, he says, made nothing perfect.

“On the other hand, there is the bringing in of a better hope, through which we draw near to God.” (verse 19)

That better hope is Jesus. You can try to live this life on your own. You can go to church, volunteer at the homeless shelter, write a check to a charity. But none of that will save you. You can try all you want to meet God’s standard of perfection. And you’ll fail.

But when you look to our High Priest, Jesus who bought your salvation with His blood, He will meet you face to face. He will save you. He won’t roll his eyes or scold you. He’ll kiss you on the forehead and zip your coat. He loves you so much. You can trust His love.

Thank you, Jesus, for loving us. As our High Priest you have the power to forgive sins. As the perfect Lamb of God, you’ve shed the blood necessary for our salvation. I pray that everyone reading this post will know that better hope the writer of Hebrews talks about. May we come to you, admit our need of you, and allow you to demonstrate your love for us. Thank you, God, for forgiving me, and giving me hope.

Renewed Days

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I read Lamentations this morning. God was unresponsive to the cries of the disobedient nation of Israel. There was a famine in the land and the Jews were not spared. In fact, the actions of some to survive are unimaginable. How desperate they were! Why did God reject his people?

Woe to us, for we have sinned. (5:16)

The last two verses of this sad book caused me to pause. Here’s what they say:

Renew our days of old, unless You have utterly rejected us, and are very angry with us.

The truth of the matter is God was angry, and they were rejected because of their disobedience.

Psalm 119 reminds me how important is God’s Word, how necessary it is that we obey it. God’s not playing around. He’s serious about sin. And so should we be. He has spelled out His demands, His Law, and has demonstrated the severe consequences for disobedience. This psalm challenges me to love Scripture and obey it. There is evidence of God’s holiness, power, and love on every page.

Then I read the beautiful letter Paul wrote to Philemon, and I am reminded what Jesus did for me. I sinned against God, like Onesimus sinned against Philemon. Philemon had owned Onesimus, but Onesimus walked away from him, may have stolen from him. God created me to be His, but I, too, walked away when I sinned. Onesimus owed a debt he could not pay. There’s no way I could pay my sin debt, either.

But Onesimus repented. He became a follower of Jesus, a helper to Paul. So Paul asked Philemon to forgive Onesimus, to accept him as a brother, to place any debt of Onesimus’ on Paul’s account. And Jesus did the same for me. He paid my enormous debt, asked the Father to forgive me, and accepted me as His child when I repented, too .

My days are renewed and I am not rejected, thanks to Jesus. I pray you can say the same.

Imbedded Truth

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My Bible reading plan for 2015 had me in the first two chapters of Lamentations this morning. I realize that this book, like all the Old Testament, tells us what happened or was going to happen to the flesh and blood people of that day. I know the buildings were brick and mortar, the wars resulted in bloodshed, the famines were severe. Real people suffering real hardships in real time.

Then I turned to the third chapter of Titus where Paul says something I hadn’t seen before. He said to avoid genealogies because they are “unprofitable and useless.” (Titus 3:9 NKJV) I had to stop and think about that. I myself have researched our family tree. And I know, for a Jew at that time, tracing their ancestry was everything to them. Why would Paul say genealogy is useless?

First of all, I thank God for that truth! Many people still today want to give importance to the genealogy of the Jewish nation, and can point to verses to back them up. Others can point to verses that proclaim there is no difference between Jews, Greeks, men, women. I’m not here to dispute or agree with either belief. Because I think God would have us see a bigger truth.

Psalm 119:137 says:

Righteous are You, O Lord, and upright are your judgments.

I believe God would have us see Him and our world from His vantage point when we read His written Word. “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world. But that the world, through Him, might be saved.” (John 3:16-17)

Yes, the Bible is made up of the accounts of individual people, nations, and events. But the purpose of recording all of that is to show us Who God is, what He demands, the result of disobedience, and the love of God for each of us, a love that sent Him to Calvary. As we read the Old Testament we see over and over a God who is Holy, Almighty, Just, a God who demands obedience and punishes disobedience. In the New Testament we see the same God, and One who loves each of us so completely He paid what we could not pay, the debt of our sin. We need to see that today. And that’s why God inspired men to record the events we read here.

If we read the Bible as an historical account, or a mystery novel trying to figure out the end from the clues, we miss the big, most important picture. I think that’s why Paul said genealogy is unprofitable. It’s just not important in the light of eternity.

Dear God, thank you for your written Word. Thank you for the men and women whose lives we read about, people who followed you, people who didn’t, people who were blessed, and people who suffered the consequences of sin. Because through those lives you have painted a picture of my own life and relationship with You. Thank you for the accounts of the life of Jesus, for revealing the fact that He is the one and only Savior of all of mankind, and that His forgiveness is available to anyone who believes. I pray that none of us will miss the relevant Truth imbedded in each book of the Bible. And may we apply that Truth to our lives today.

What’s The Loving Thing To Do?

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Paul begins the fifth chapter of Ephesians with a challenge for us to imitate God as dear children. Walk in love, he says. And some would like it better if he had just stopped with that thought.

But he didn’t. In verse three he starts talking about sin: fornication, foolish talk, coarse joking, jealousy, idolatry. He warns us against participating in any of it.

Walk as children of light, he says. Have no fellowship with the unfruitful work of darkness, he says. Then  he adds: but rather expose them. (Eph 5:11)

Is it possible to walk in love AND expose sin as sin? Friend, that’s the only loving thing to do. Tolerance is not love. It’s not love to turn a blind eye to or accept a sin that will usher someone into hell.

Paul compares light to darkness. You do know, don’t you, that darkness can never win over light? When you turn on the light switch there is never a struggle as to whether the darkness will disappear. When light is present, darkness can’t be.

So if we walk in the Light which is God in us, sin will be exposed. The only way we don’t expose sin is by hiding the Light, keeping it to ourselves. Satan loves it when we do that.

So here’s how much I love you: Homosexuality is sin. Abortion is sin. Lying is sin. Looking at porn or watching ungodly TV shows are sin. Having sex outside of marriage is sin. Laughing at dirty jokes is sin. Hatred, unforgiveness, jealousy, greed, drunkenness, gluttony, are all sin.

And if you are guilty of sin you need the Savior. You need to ask God to forgive you and change you so that you don’t repeat the sin. You need to surrender to God, plain and simple.

My prayer is that we will all imitate God in our walk today. May we love our family members, our neighbors, our friends with the same kind of love God loves. May we lovingly identify sin and introduce them to the One who loves them and gave Himself for them so that they can walk in the Light here and in eternity.

That’s the loving thing to do.

Be Ye Kind

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My dad loved to tell the story about a time I, as a young child, disobeyed him. (I know, hard to believe) The story goes that as he was taking off his belt to swat my behind, I began to sing a little chorus I had learned in Sunday School. It goes like this:

Be ye kind, be ye kind, be ye kind to one another.

Dad said he couldn’t help but laugh, and put his belt back on.

Paul tells us to be kind, tenderhearted, and forgiving, “even as God in Christ forgave you.” (Ephesians 4:32)

Kindness isn’t something we do to get out of trouble. Tenderheartedness isn’t something we do to get attention. And forgiving someone isn’t always easy.

Kindness, tenderheartedness, and forgiveness aren’t only things we do, but rather things we are in Christ. I didn’t say tolerant. I didn’t say to ignore sin or allow yourself to be abused. But kindness should be evident in our dealings with others regardless of the situation. Our tender hearts should recognize pain, or grief, or anxiousness in others and encourage us to reach out to them. And certainly our lives should be lived in an attitude of forgiveness, knowing how much God has forgiven us.

Our world lacks kindness, as we witness in the news every day. Many people are too self centered to have tender hearts toward another. And too many times people allow unforgiveness to fester and grow into rage.

Let’s us, as God’s children, be the change we need in our world by allowing God’s kindness, God’s tenderheartedness, and His forgiveness to be evident in us, in Jesus’ name.

And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you, with all malice. And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you. (Eph 4:30-32)

The Sin of Prayer

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I was reading Psalm 109 this morning and was struck by something in verse 7:

When he is judged, let him be found guilty, and let his prayer become sin. (NKJV)

The NIV translates it like this: …and may his prayer condemn him.

Can a prayer be a sin? Can whispering a prayer condemn us? It must be so or it wouldn’t be written here in this psalm.

David is talking about being treated unfairly. Remember, Saul wanted to kill David. And Saul’s followers pursued David relentlessly. David asks God to be their judge. Then he said what he did about prayer.

That got me to thinking. How can a prayer be sin? Certainly in these days after the cross, when Jesus told us to love one another, including our enemies, praying that harm might come to someone is probably a sin. I can see how praying for a selfish gain would be considered a sin. Praying that God would honor or ignore or, worse, bless a sin in my life is most assuredly a sin.

Maybe God is saying through David that praying in order to tell God what His will is is a sin. Saul’s men probably thought they were obeying God by trying to protect King Saul from David’s overthrow of the kingdom. Maybe they even prayed to God to help them kill David. Praying to Allah, or a higher power, or some dear departed loved one, isn’t a prayer that honors God. And what doesn’t honor God is sin.

Then the thought came to mind that a person who rejects God’s grace and lives in opposition to God’s demands, yet prays a quick prayer when their car slips on ice, or a family member receives a frightening diagnosis sins. A person who leaves God out of their life, yet prays to win the lottery, or get a promotion at work also sins.

Prayer is a privilege. But it’s serious business to go barging into the throne room. In the Old Testament we read where a king could only be approached by invitation. Going otherwise to talk to the king resulted in death. Unless the king granted audience, you died.

We who have accepted Jesus as our Savior are invited to come boldly before the throne of grace. (Heb 4:16) We have that ongoing invitation to talk to the King any time of the day or night. But it seems to me from what I read in the Bible, if you haven’t come to God through His Son, you have no business in the throne room.

And, if I go barging into the throne room with unconfessed sin in my heart, my prayer just might condemn me. This morning I am impressed with the importance of prayer. And the seriousness of having audience with a God who is Holy, Holy, Holy. I don’t want to take this privilege for granted. And I don’t want to sin in my prayer.

Holy God, Please forgive me for sin in my life. Help me to recognize those sins and be quick to confess them. Thank you for inviting me into your throne room where I can talk to you about the things on my heart. May I never take this privilege for granted. May the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, my Lord and my Savior.

The Bottom Line

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Solomon, in chapter 12 of Ecclesiastes, gives us the conclusion of his active study of life, of wisdom, wealth, and happiness. He looked at nature in his quest for truth. He studied humanity. He looked at eternity. He spared no expense. And this is what he found to be true:

“Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is man’s all. For God will bring every work into judgement, including every secret thing whether good or evil.” (12:13-14)

The bottom line is this: God.

Period.

The most important thing in this life is one’s relationship with God. Fear of God. Absolute surrender to God.

Because in the end, every human who ever lived will stand before God in judgement. Every thought, every action, the good and the bad, the public and the private will require accountability.

When it’s my turn, I want God to look at me and see Jesus’ righteousness. I want him to attribute Jesus’ work to me. I certainly don’t want to stand before him on my own authority, on my own terms, based on my life. Just the thought of that scares me to death.

I am grateful to think that I can stand before God with confidence, because I have recognized that I am a sinner. I have asked God to forgive me, and I have accepted God’s grace: the forgiveness of my sin paid for by my Savior, God’s Son, Jesus Christ.

I want God to see me through Jesus’ blood. Then and only then, will I hear those precious words, “Well done, good and faithful servant. Welcome home.”

Job’s Hell On Earth

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I am reading the book of Job this week as part of my year long plan. I’ve read Job several times, so as I read his words of anguish, I know his turmoil is temporary. Job’s hell on earth will not last forever.

Job is tormented by his thoughts, his memories, his questions, the “what-ifs”. He can find no comfort; not physically and not in his soul. His groans come from deep inside of him.

If you’ve been with me on this blogging journey for very long, you know that in 2012 we lost my 22 year old nephew in an auto accident. I have experienced death repeated times as we’ve buried grandparents, aunts and uncles, parents. But I had never experienced the level of grief that paralyzed me when I got the horrible news of Geoffrey’s death.

I remember sitting in silence in my parent’s family room. My sisters, their families, my dad. Tears flowed freely, but there were no words that could express what we were going through. There were, however, occasional groans.

I can still hear the sound of Geoff’s parents as that mournful sound escaped from their hearts. Our sister, Kathy, Geoff’s aunt, would groan in such a way you never thought could come from a human. I remember hearing a sorrowful groan, then realizing the sound had come from me. I finally understood the definition of “lament”.

That kind of grief cannot be described. It’s too painful, too personal. The sound of that kind of pain comes involuntarily. It’s like the whistle of a teapot. It just comes on its own as a result of the boiling turmoil deep inside. It’s the sound of true anguish.

Dear One, that’s a portrait of hell. Hell is not a giant bonfire. It is the absence of God, the absence of light, of love, of comfort, of peace, of joy. It’s living inside that teapot where thoughts and memories, the “what-ifs” torment. Forever. Where the only sound heard is that of painful, personal groaning.

Job’s anguish was temporary. Even though I still grieve the loss of my dear nephew, the intensity isn’t the same today as it was on June 24, 2012. But here is what God would say to us today: without  accepting the grace God offers to us sinners through the blood of his Son Jesus, eternity will be living with that grief, that agony, that helplessness FOREVER. No relief, no lessening of the pain, no hope that things will ever get better. And if I think my grief was hard to bear, if Job’s grief was devastating, the grief of those in hell, separated from God will be so much more intense.

I can’t imagine living an eternity of June 24, 2012. And hell will be so much more painful than even that day was.

Hell is nothing to joke about, nothing to take lightly. It’s personal, and painful, and devastating, and ugly, and separated from everything good with no chance of reprieve. The good news is, you can avoid that end.

Jesus died so you and I don’t have to ever experience hell. But you need to meet him on his terms. You need to confess your sins and accept his forgiveness. I promise you, he will be faithful to forgive you, to cleanse you, to live inside of you, and one day, to welcome you into his heavenly home where you will joyfully live…

Forever.

Dear God, Hell is scary. And not the sci-fi kind of scary. It’s real. It’s personal. It’s devastating. Thank you for Jesus, for his willingness to die so that I don’t have to spend one second in that awful place. Life on earth is hard enough, is sad enough. I’d much rather spend eternity in Your presence. I pray for each one who reads these words today. I pray that hearts will be drawn to you, that sins will be confessed, that Your grace will be accepted by anyone who doesn’t already know You. May each of us come to You on Your terms, then look forward to seeing You the day you call us home.

That Makes Me Happy

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Some people get caught up in what Paul says in Romans 7 about divorce, and miss the point of what God wants us to know. This is not a mandate about marriage. It is, however, an example of marriage to show what happens when we accept Jesus as Savior. We bind ourselves to God, keeping ourselves only to God, as long as we live.

If I begin to worship anyone or anything else (in other words, if I put anything before God on my priority list) I am like an adulteress.

Paul is saying we were once married to the law. The Old Testament Jews were bound to the law, and found forgiveness through the Law of Moses and blood sacrifices. But when Jesus died, the Law died, too. We are now free to bind ourselves to another husband, to God through faith in Jesus.

“… we should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter.”

I love this analogy of marriage here in Romans. I don’t follow a religion. I have a relationship, as loving and intimate as a marriage, to God Himself! I choose to love Jesus. I choose to worship him only.

I am bound by love. And that makes me happy.