For the Love of God...

What would you do to know that God loves you? Would you climb mountains for God, or sacrifice your lifestyle for God, or even dress in a way that makes you uncomfortable for God? What would YOU do to know that God is pleased with you?



It has come up a couple of times in conversation with people this week about what we CAN DO for God with our lives. One lady pointed out that this type of thinking is quite self-centered. We are thinking about what WE can do all the time, and not what God can do through our lives. We take the focus off God and put it back on ourselves. We make ourselves feel good about doing things for God, and making ourselves obedient to His Word. I believe we should obey God's Word as much as possible, and we should strive to grow in our relationship with our Lord. However, when we constantly focus on what WE can do for God, and we get trapped into self-centeredness, we also begin to become self-righteous. We begin to take credit for God's accomplishments, victories and successes in our lives. We conquer an addiction and we say it is because WE stopped drinking, doing drugs, having pre-marital sex, etc. Do we really give God the glory He deserves for everything He does in and through our lives, or are we trying to find works to do that make us glorified in the eyes of others? Are we stealing God's glory each and every day?



I am speaking to myself, as well as to the readers out there. God has laid upon my heart the great sickness in His church of legalism, and He has expounded upon the self-righteousness of His people. When a person becomes self-righteous, he/she becomes prideful, and ultimately becomes judgmental and critical of others who are less spiritual/holy than they are. I think some Christians tend to forget where they came from....and I admit that I have been guilty of this sinful heart attitude as well. Everything started going so well in my Christian walk that I began to feel like I was better than those other "sinners" around me. That is when God revealed my own heart to me in comparison with His holiness. I realized that I had not changed in nature as much as I thought....I still struggle with complacency, apathy, laziness and pride almost daily. I know that God has given me power by the Holy Spirit to overcome sin in my life, but I have also learned that God delivers me from sin in His timing, not mine. I can boldly ask my Father in heaven for grace to overcome sin, but He takes time in working the sin out of my heart and life. It is often not overnight, although I have experienced immediate deliverance from certain long-term sins in my life such as a drinking and sexual promiscuity. I believe the Lord knew that I just couldn't have those sins in my life anymore.



The Lord says He will never give me more than I can bear, and there will be never be temptation that is not common to man....and He always makes a way of escape for me. But how often do I really meditate on the grace of God in my life? Lately, I have been hearing a lot about grace and the Lord has been teaching me that everything I do, and everything I am in Him is because of His grace alone in my life. This is quite humbling to know that I cannot overcome sin without His grace, I cannot wake up in the morning and pray to Him without His grace, and I cannot live a godly life day to day without His GRACE. I thank God that He is delivering me from the sickness of pride in my life...but as He sheds the pride away from me, I am seeing how many of my brothers/sisters in Christ do not realize their own sickness as well. We are not going to reach people with the salvation of Jesus Christ by looking down our noses at others, and judging them for their sins. We have to let God be the true judge in our lives and the lives of others. When someone comes to me with a problem of sin in their life, I usually just start spouting scriptures to make sure they know the sin is wrong and needs to be repented of! But God is showing me that I need to love that person, right where they are. I need to stop judging them for what they are currently NOT, and just hope and pray for them that God will give them grace to overcome sin in their life!!! Probably the greatest destructive force of pride in the church is that it makes us focus on ourselves more than others, and ultimately, the love we have for God and one another starts to fade away. We start comparing everyone to ourselves, and not to the standard of God's Word. Jesus was loving, compassionate and forgiving of even the worst of sinners that He encountered. But lately, many people in the church (including myself) are resembling the Pharisees that Jesus so harshly rebuked rather than reflecting our Lord Jesus Christ. The Pharisees knew all the scripture, the laws, the prophets, and were awaiting a Messiah....but they rejected the true Messiah and Savior, Jesus. They basically thought they knew it all, and they ended up committing blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, the unpardonable sin. They crucified our Lord Jesus, and I believe when we act like Pharisees in the church today, we might as well be doing the same thing.



Join together with me today and make a heart decision (by prayer and God's grace) that you are going to stop being judgmental of brothers/sisters in Christ, and nonbelievers alike. Does that mean we turn a blind eye to sin in a person's life? Absolutely not. But if approach them regarding their sin, let it be done in love and in the spirit of truth. Make loving God and others as yourself the first priorities in your Christian life.



So, what would I do to receive the love of God? Well, instead of trying so hard to earn God's love (which is already there)...I am going to focus on how God has already shown His love for me, through the death and resurrection of His Son Jesus on the cross, when He died for my sins and reconciled me back to Himself. I am going to make a relationship with Jesus my first priority, and stop trying to earn my way into heaven. God loves me just the way I am, and He has justified me through Christ's blood, and faith in Him. All I need to do is accept God's love letter to me as truth (His Holy Word) and believe that Jesus' sacrifice was all the payment necessary to pay the penalty for MY sins. Does this mean I am free to sin? Yes and no. Yes, because I no longer pay the penalty of death for my sins, but NO because sin in my life will still bring on chastening of the Lord and lead to my physical destruction.



Romans 6:1-7 (NASB):



"What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace my increase? May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it? Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death? Therefore, we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in the newness of life. For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin; for he who has died is freed from sin."

The more I choose to obey God's commandment, and God's Word, and seek a deeper relationship with God Himself....the more of an abundant life I will have here on earth. If my eyes remained fixed on Jesus, then He will keep me in perfect peace. Who wouldn't want to live a peaceful life admist all the craziness, fear and tragedy lurking around every corner? In the end, I believe as long as I confess with my mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in my heart that God raised him from the dead, I will be saved (Romans 10:9-10).

I have been studying the relationship of grace/works in the gospel of Jesus Christ since the day I got saved. I have heard from others that we are not saved, or will not be saved until we reach the final day of redemption when Christ returns for us. I know that some believe that must continue to do works until that time, and it seems this is to "secure" our salvation by works. Isn't that like earning salvation in our own strength? I do believe that God sanctifies us through and by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, but as the Lord said to me in prayer one day, "Salvation is MY (God's) ministry." It is not my ministry to save anyone from the depth of their sinfulness, only God can do that through the blood of Jesus. It is also not my ministry to SAVE MYSELF from sin. That, too, is God's ministry in my life. He has saved me by His grace, not by any works, lest I should boast (as God said through Paul). When we focus on ourselves and OUR works, we begin to think we have something to boast about in somehow attaining our own salvation, thus giving way to pride in our lives. I think it is about time we give credit where credit is due - to the One who saves our souls from the depths of hell - God.

I pray tonight that this revelation has blessed your heart as much as it has mine. What a weight God lifted from me when I realized that it was His grace that was my salvation and not anything that I could do. I finally feel free in Christ to receive the abundant life God for me, and live out my salvation here and into eternity with joy and peace in the Holy Spirit. I pray in Jesus' name that God would unveil any pride in your life, and reveal to your heart if you are doing works in Jesus' name to glorify God or to somehow procure your own glory or salvation. May God give you His Spirit that will lead you into all truth. I pray that God would deliver me and you from ourselves and our sins. May God bless you in Jesus' name. Amen.

Thankful for God's grace,

Sarah