It is so clear that God, at various times, uses things such as circumstances, preaching, and relationships to force one to squarely focus on His truth. And then He uses perfect timing to illuminate His Word, evoking that awe-inspiring, Spirit-filled joy that belongs to believers.
Let me back up a moment. I share this blog with some people via e-mail, a few others follow along in different ways, and from its beginning the intention was to simply share devotional thoughts as I read Scripture. At times I guess it gets “preachy”, but let me make this clear, I preach to me more than I ever mean to preach to anyone else. The danger for me is to put on like I have it “all together”, and what I really hope to convey is that we are all in this Christian life together, each of us with our struggles, and I am simply trying to encourage us all to be in His Word and honestly evaluate our walk.
When confronted with sin, there are two options. Ignore it, or correct it. When the Bible is used to point out sin, God’s goal is not to put down or destroy someone, but rather to challenge toward correction. When that correction is begun, we can then see the Bible’s take on forgiveness. Very few people, even Christians, truly understand forgiveness. When God forgives sin, He does not “forget it” but rather He “remembers it no longer”, literally speaking, He does not bring it up again. And so when we forgive, we are to follow likewise, we do not bring it up again to the other person, to ourselves, or to God. It is done with. Think about our salvation. God has forgiven us the penalty of our sin. When we leave this world, He will look on us, and then look on Christ, and “remember our sin no more! That is an unspeakable gift, to be sure. And speaking personally now, when I see and know that someone here on earth has forgiven me when I do not deserve it, it really drives home God’s forgiveness; that is, when we get a glimpse of true Christian behavior here, God’s glory is on display so clearly!
I came to Hebrews 10 today, and read this.
“Now where there is forgiveness of these things, there is no longer any offering for sin…and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful;”
To say that God is faithful is a major understatement. He is faithful to us, even when we are not reciprocating of that to Him. The phrase that gave me pause, though, was “hold fast…without wavering.” The ‘hold fast’ is good lip service on its own, but the ‘without wavering’ is what shows how tightly we indeed cling to His Word. I have found myself wavering at times (the NIV says ‘swerving’), and God has used events and others in my life to help me. He has used His mighty Word to keep the path well-lit, and He has left it up to me to draw on His power to make decisions that honor Him and reflect His glory.
I hope you can say the same, and yet that is between you and the Lord.
Holding Fast to the Name of Our Creator
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