Encouragement
Today’s lesson is one that we all probably already know … but it serves as a great reminder that going halfway is as good as not going at all.
The Lord has promised to forgive transgression once we admit our action is wrong AND turn away from it. I am speaking from personal experience here when I say that this is probably one of my largest wrestling matches with the Lord … or really myself. In this area, I am the reigning, undefeated champion … or the reigning, totally defeated loser.
While I have given so much of myself to the Lord, while He has pruned and equipped, transformed and re-born me … the process is not complete. There are features and functions of the flesh and my former self that I have not let go of … and perhaps is the reason why I ask for my purpose to be revealed … without answer.
I think that as God sees all and knows our hearts, for the majority of the day we please our Father and bring peace to ourselves and hope to others as we apply the wisdom He graciously shares … but then it happens. The circumstance that is your nemesis … the one thing (or more) that just gets under your skin … that distracts your focus from Him just long enough for the sin to take place.
Sometimes it is right after that moment or perhaps later that we recognize the err to our way, we see that we failed in that circumstance to apply the wisdom of ‘God First’ … so we ask for forgiveness, and then when the circumstance to apply His wisdom is offered again, we again fail by falling to the ways of our flesh. And we ask for forgiveness again, and again … and again.
We have asked for forgiveness, but we have not repented. We have yet to put down this/these sins and truly walk away from them … to truly give them to the Lord. The asking of forgiveness is merely a ‘going through the motion’ coming from the mouth … a spiritual reflex. It is half hearted, if there’s any heart involved at all … but that’s exactly where your forgiveness and repentance is to come from.
We have allowed our focus to again be hindered by the distractions of this world. We have taken our focus off of what we know to be true and good and willing … and it is we who pays the price. It is these very areas that stunt our growth in the Lord’s will. His process of transforming becomes paused … not that He won’t continue to provide opportunity … but we choose to put our path to truly finding ourselves with the Lord in a holding pattern.
I believe that the way we hear the Lord but don’t listen is happening here … now only in reverse. As we put this ‘thing’, this sin between us and the Lord … He surely hears you … but He’s not listening. Why should He? We’re not.
Lately, the signs have been all around me … through the actions of others, the messages from the Lord and the circumstances swirling around in my life. I am seeing parts of myself that I am unhappy with … and the circumstances I choose to surround myself with, or be silent about that bring the sin to the surface.
Fear not believer as there is hope. As He will patiently wait for you to realize the err to your way, He will also still provide the circumstances to better yourself, to rid yourself of this chain … to finally realize that in order to find yourself in the Lord … you need to lose yourself to the world.
Random Scripture
Hebrews 12:1
Heb 12:1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.
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