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It’s Sin’s Fault

Posted on by korgrocker

“So the trouble is not with the law, for it is spiritual and good. The trouble is with me, for I am all too human, a slave to sin. I don’t really understand myself, for I want to do what is right, but I don’t do it. Instead, I do what I hate. But if I know that what I am doing is wrong, this shows that I agree that the law is good. So I am not the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it. And I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. I want to do what is right, but I can’t. I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway. But if I do what I don’t want to do, I am not really the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it.”
Romans 7:14-20 NLT

Paul is perplexed. In fact, he is so perplexed that he repeats his dilemma twice in these 7 verses. He says, “I am not really the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it”. But is this really the case? Is it a valid excuse to say before a judge, “I haven’t done anything wrong – it’s the sin living within me that is at fault”? Of course it isn’t but, superficially at least, that seems to be what Paul is saying. 

The picture emerges in Paul’s mind that within him there are effectively two people. One person who loves God’s ways, who wants to spend all his time with Him, and who really, really, wants to do what is right. And to help that “man” inside of him is God’s Law, which “is spiritual and good”. The other person inside him is the “old man”, his sinful nemesis, a part of him determined to continue in the ways of evil. Perhaps an internal battle that never seems to subside. The Godly part of him mourns and grieves over the thoughts and actions of the sinful man, leading to frustration and conflict. At least Paul doesn’t blame the devil, as some have done, for his sinful man. Personable responsibility is never avoided, in Paul’s life.

Does all this sound familiar to us pilgrims? Are we too caught up in this internal battle that never seems to end? Of course we are. And in the days ahead, we will, with Paul, journey into a place where God has provided a remedy. What a wonderful Saviour!

Dear Lord. Thank You for Your salvation, a gift so freely given. Help us to grasp it and grow in the nurturing soils of Your grace. In Jesus’ name.Amen.

Good to Evil

Posted on by korgrocker

“Sin took advantage of those commands and deceived me; it used the commands to kill me. But still, the law itself is holy, and its commands are holy and right and good. But how can that be? Did the law, which is good, cause my death? Of course not! Sin used what was good to bring about my condemnation to death. So we can see how terrible sin really is. It uses God’s good commands for its own evil purposes.”
Romans 7:11-13 NLT

Paul found himself in a situation in which he was perplexed. Once he was exposed to the demands of the Law, he discovered that his thoughts and deeds, some habitually committed since his earliest days, were actually sinful. The Law was a standard against which he found himself falling short. However, he found that if it wasn’t for the Law, he would never have known that what he thought or did was wrong.

As an example from society today. The expression “Oh my god” is ubiquitous, even being abbreviated to OMG in messaging, but do the users of this expression know that they are violating the second commandment from Exodus 20, “You must not misuse the name of the Lord your God. The Lord will not let you go unpunished if you misuse his name” (Exodus 20:7)? Without the benefit of the Law perhaps they would never have known. Of course, people, even Christians, claim that, because of Jesus, the Law no longer has any jurisdiction over them. But that isn’t really the case. Jesus said, as recorded in Matthew 5:17-19, “Don’t misunderstand why I have come. I did not come to abolish the law of Moses or the writings of the prophets. No, I came to accomplish their purpose. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not even the smallest detail of God’s law will disappear until its purpose is achieved. So if you ignore the least commandment and teach others to do the same, you will be called the least in the Kingdom of Heaven. But anyone who obeys God’s laws and teaches them will be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven”. 

So Paul lamented the fact that because of the Law, he found out that he was a sinner. He recognised that the Law was good, even holy, but because of it, it had effectively an evil purpose. 

Of course, we need laws to set boundaries on our lives and prevent society from falling apart. Without the Highway Code, drivers would have no idea of what constitutes a safe journey. Imagine the chaos if no-one knew what side of the road to drive on? But should we veer into the wrong lane, even by accident, we know that we have committed a dangerous act and put ourselves in danger. 

The Law acts as a constant reminder, a perfect standard, against which we pilgrims can gauge our progress in the Christian life. But thankfully, falling short need not be fatal, if we cover ourselves with Christ’s redeeming power, and listen to the Holy Spirit whispering within us. The old Apostle John wrote, “But if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness” (1 John 1:9). What is He saying to us today? Many activities and thoughts will drown Him out if we are not careful and allow Him space. He is always more willing to speak than we are to listen.

Dear Father God. We thank You for Your grace and mercy. Your care for us knows no limits. Thank You. Amen.

The Law is Holy

Posted on by korgrocker

“ … So I discovered that the law’s commands, which were supposed to bring life, brought spiritual death instead. Sin took advantage of those commands and deceived me; it used the commands to kill me. But still, the law itself is holy, and its commands are holy and right and good.
Romans 7:10-12 NLT

Imagine trying to live our lives only by following a list of rules and regulations. Without any opportunity to vary what we do. So imagine if there is a rule about when to get up in the morning. And another rule about what to eat for breakfast. A rule about the route we must take to get to work and the mode of transport to be used to follow that rule. Before we know it we might as well be a robot, programmed by a higher power who has designed a system within which humans can live, removing from them the right to decide what they should do for themselves. A system with boundaries so tight that there is no opportunity for any individuality. The problem comes when a scenario develops that has not been thought of and no rule applies.

Many years ago we fostered a boy who initially needed rules to establish structure in his life, a life previously blighted by disfunction, a lack of structure, and chaos. I remember a time when he was asked to go to the local shop and purchase some baking potatoes. When he didn’t return my wife went to look for him, to find him standing by the greengrocery section of the shop totally at a loss, because they didn’t have any baking potatoes. We forgot to add another rule – if the shop didn’t have any baking potatoes then to just come home. Thankfully that young lad flourished in our family environment and he is now in his late twenties, with a steady job and a family of his own.

But having said all of that it is a fact that all human beings need boundaries. And that was what God had in mind when he issued the Law. His intention was that by following the Law, His creation would live in a way He desired, a way that was close to Him. The list of rules and regulations started with two important laws, that Jesus spoke about to a Jewish leader. We read his question in Matthew 22:36-40, ““Teacher, which is the most important commandment in the law of Moses?” Jesus replied, “‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’ The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.”” It is from the position of loving God “with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind” that we understand the Law is holy. And that is true when we read the Laws that God gave the Israelites all those years ago. None of them is wrong. We can drill down into each commandment and distill the last drops of what they mean, but nothing will be found that I is unholy. Surely the commands of the Law are righteous and holy.

To be holy means to be set apart. We Christians are in fact living in a sinful, secular, world, but we are not a part of it and its customs. In John 17 Jesus prayed for His disciples. He said, “I’m not asking you to take them out of the world, but to keep them safe from the evil one. They do not belong to this world any more than I do” (John 17:15-16). God’s Law was designed to keep the Israelites “safe from the evil one” in a world populated by nations who were wicked and evil. They were set apart. They were holy (if they adhered to His commandments of course).

Are we pilgrims a holy people? Do we conform to what Peter wrote in 1 Peter 2:9a, “ … you are a chosen people. You are royal priests, a holy nation, God’s very own possession …”? That was the intent of the Law, but we live by the Spirit, set free from the very Law that was supposed to bring life but instead brought spiritual death.

As I write this, the Scottish government is electing a new leader. One of the candidates is a young woman who is very open about her Christian faith. In an interview, which touched on her opinion of marriage, the interviewer wrote in his news article, “As a Christian, she explained, she believed marriage to be between a man and a women but she insisted she would defend the law as “a servant of democracy””. She is operating at the cutting edge of being in the world but not of the world. The issue of holiness in a secular world needs the wisdom of Solomon to get right. I’m thankful I’m not in that position.

Dear Father God. We need Your help to live as a holy people in this evil world. We echo Jesus’ prayer for safety from the evil one. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Coveting is Wrong

Posted on by korgrocker

“Well then, am I suggesting that the law of God is sinful? Of course not! In fact, it was the law that showed me my sin. I would never have known that coveting is wrong if the law had not said, “You must not covet.” But sin used this command to arouse all kinds of covetous desires within me! If there were no law, sin would not have that power. At one time I lived without understanding the law. But when I learned the command not to covet, for instance, the power of sin came to life, and I died”
Romans 7:7-9 NLT

What is “coveting” all about? A dictionary definition is “to wish for earnestly”. Other words crop up like yearning and desiring. So I see a shiny new car in my neighbour’s driveway and “covet” it. I imagine how great it would be to own a model like that, and my imagination starts to kick in with all sorts of feelings, leading me down a sinful path at variance with the tenth commandment. Another example of coveting is with all those people who wish they could win the lottery. They start to imagine what they could do with all that money. Coveting.

Paul wrote that the Law exposed how sinful he was. He made the assumption that he “would never have known that coveting is wrong if the law had not said, “You must not covet.”  But is he right in this? Surely there is something inbuilt within us that would understand that coveting is a pointless exercise that could degrade into sin, should it be pursued to its limit? Perhaps. To take a modern example from the UK Highway Code, if we did not have such a reference book detailing the laws of driving would we still find ourselves driving safely, or would chaos reign? I suspect the latter position! Seeing something like a law written down in black and white draws our attention to a non-negotiable position, designed for our protection and safety. God gave the Ten Commandments to Moses for a very good reason. It brought social cohesion and God’s expectations to a bunch of rebellious ex-slaves, and is expanded upon in books such as Leviticus.

But the specific Law, “You must not covet”, was included in God’s list for a reason. The commandment in Exodus 20:17 reads, “You must not covet your neighbour’s house. You must not covet your neighbour’s wife, male or female servant, ox or donkey, or anything else that belongs to your neighbour.” It is interesting that this commandment is focused on what our neighbours have. Nothing about more general coveting, which is so often driven by national advertising, incessantly pushed on our televisions and media sources. But the principle is still there. 

How much debt and misery has been caused by people who have responded to an advert and got into debt as a result. A child nags their parents for a particular game, or item of clothing, or the latest type of mobile phone. Often unaffordable, the parent capitulates and runs up a debt that takes months to pay off. How many families get caught up in the commercial materialism of Christmas and end up trapped to a payment plan? It’s all starts with coveting and ends up in misery. 

When God issued the commandment “You must not covet” he knew what the propensity of human beings was like. We pilgrims will get caught up in this as well, the still small voice of the Holy Spirit drowned out by the coveting nature of our unredeemed sinful selves. When times are hard financially perhaps we should ask  ourselves whether what we desire is a need or a want. Hmmm… 

Dear God. You promised to provide for all our needs, so we trust in You and Your provision. Please forgive us for when we get caught up in the sin of covetousness. For Jesus’ sake. Amen.

Death to the Law

Posted on by korgrocker

“So, my dear brothers and sisters, this is the point: You died to the power of the law when you died with Christ. And now you are united with the one who was raised from the dead. As a result, we can produce a harvest of good deeds for God. When we were controlled by our old nature, sinful desires were at work within us, and the law aroused these evil desires that produced a harvest of sinful deeds, resulting in death. But now we have been released from the law, for we died to it and are no longer captive to its power. Now we can serve God, not in the old way of obeying the letter of the law, but in the new way of living in the Spirit.”
Romans 7:4-6 NLT

Perhaps we can see how the Roman Christians became a bit confused, prompting Paul’s detailed and enlightening letter. They must have thought that if the Law was replaced by something far better – their faith in the redeeming power of Jesus – then they were free to do what they wanted. Paul associated the Law and its many rules and regulations about what to do and what not to do with arousing within them the desire to do what they shouldn’t. Imagine the scene. There is a door to a cupboard in the house and a small boy living there is warned to never open it and look inside. What is the first thing he would do when the opportunity arises? He will open it and have a look. Perhaps if he had not been given that instruction, he might never have given it a thought. Paul wrote, “the law aroused these evil desires that produced a harvest of sinful deeds”. 

Paul wrote that because of Jesus and all that He did at Calvary, and through their faith in Him, they were released from the power of the Law. So for the small boy in our example, instead of listening to his “evil desires”, he has the opportunity to listen to the “still small voice” of the Holy Spirit within him, leading him to make the right decision. Perhaps not a good example but it hopefully illustrates the point.

God’s Spirit has unfettered access to the hearts and minds of redeemed Christians. And we pilgrims welcome Him in with open arms. Without the Holy Spirit we are very spiritually impoverished and thrown back to a time when all we had was the letter of the Law. But thanks to God and His wonderful plan we have a new way – life in the Spirit.

There was a principle taught to youth groups a few years ago, and it spawned a number of wrist bands with the letters WWJD engraved on them. The letters stand for ”What Would Jesus Do”. Perhaps this could be a mid point between the legalism of “obeying the letter of the Law” and true life in the Spirit. For most people it is perhaps too big a leap going from a Law-inspired life of sinful thoughts and actions to one of pure obedience to the Holy Spirit within us. So on occasion there might be a fog of doubt and confusion as to whether the voice within was really the Holy Spirit. To put skin on the Spirit’s voice is often helpful in times of uncertainty. But as we listen more and more to the Holy Spirit within us we increasingly recognise His voice and learn, almost intuitively, how to learn the ”new way of living in the Spirit”.

Dear Father God. What would we do without Your Spirit’s dwelling within us? Going back to slavery in the Egypt of laws is not an option we can consider. We are so grateful. Amen.

Laws of Marriage

Posted on by korgrocker

“Now, dear brothers and sisters—you who are familiar with the law—don’t you know that the law applies only while a person is living? For example, when a woman marries, the law binds her to her husband as long as he is alive. But if he dies, the laws of marriage no longer apply to her. So while her husband is alive, she would be committing adultery if she married another man. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law and does not commit adultery when she remarries.”
Romans 7:1-3 NLT

I don’t know why Paul used the illustration of marriage to make a point that “the law applies only while a person is living”. And in such a misogynistic way as well. Of course, we could write these verses from a man’s perspective as well, and they would be just as applicable. But we mustn’t be too hard on Paul – that was the culture of his day. His message, though, is a very unpopular one in today’s societies. It’s not just about the failure of a man or a woman to keep and honour their marriage vows. There is also the current societal preoccupation with single sex marriages. Paul used a straightforward example in his letter but I’m sure he never envisaged that it would open a “can of worms” on 21st Century Planet Earth.

To take the problem of marriages demanded between single sex couples, we first have to ask the question – do we believe that the Bible is the inspired and infallible Word of God, or is it a book of writings that can be interpreted and ignored in the light of the society in which we live? My writings in this blog always assume the former position, the infallibility of Scripture, because that is what I passionately believe. If you, my reader, lean towards the latter then what I am about to write might not sit easily with you. Genesis 2:24, “This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one“. Right in the beginning of Genesis, God states two positions – marriage is a union between a man and a woman, and He also implies that there are only two genders (but that’s for another day in another blog). Jesus referred to this Scripture when He was asked about divorce. We read what He said in Mark 10:6-9, “But ‘God made them male and female’ from the beginning of creation. ‘This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one.’ Since they are no longer two but one, let no one split apart what God has joined together“. 

In Deuteronomy 24:1-2 we read that divorce was allowed in the Israelite culture of the time – “Suppose a man marries a woman but she does not please him. Having discovered something wrong with her, he writes a document of divorce, hands it to her, and sends her away from his house. When she leaves his house, she is free to marry another man“. Some Pharisees tried to trap Jesus with a question over divorce (perhaps it was just as hot a topic then as it is today), and we read in Matthew 19:7-9, ““Then why did Moses say in the law that a man could give his wife a written notice of divorce and send her away?” they asked. Jesus replied, “Moses permitted divorce only as a concession to your hard hearts, but it was not what God had originally intended. And I tell you this, whoever divorces his wife and marries someone else commits adultery—unless his wife has been unfaithful””. Jesus’ disciples were appalled by what He said, it seems, responding with, “ … If this is the case, it is better not to marry!”” (Matthew 19:10b). They took what He said very seriously.

So Paul, in his example about the law, stated that a marriage contract between a man and a woman could only be broken by the death of either partner. Then the remaining partner was free to remarry. There is another “can of worms” for our societies today over the marrying of a divorcee, but that too is for another day. Marriage is a legally binding contract in God’s eyes which ideally should not be broken. But we also have to balance this apparently dogmatic position with other Scriptures, such as God’s love and grace. We who are married pray for both our own marriages and for those of our friends and families. The devil is in the business of destroying marriages, as he is for anything that is God-ordained. Forewarned, we keep close to God and in difficult times we pray for more love and grace.

Dear God. You established an order on earth with two genders, who were to be joined together in a holy union. I pray for protection both for my own marriage, but also for the marriages of my friends and family. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

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Laws Are For The Living

Posted on by korgrocker

“Now, dear brothers and sisters—you who are familiar with the law—don’t you know that the law applies only while a person is living? For example, when a woman marries, the law binds her to her husband as long as he is alive. But if he dies, the laws of marriage no longer apply to her. So while her husband is alive, she would be committing adultery if she married another man. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law and does not commit adultery when she remarries.”
Romans 7:1-3 NLT

It is as though Paul is now starting a new paragraph in his lengthy letter to the Roman Christians. He refers again to the “law” and he makes an obvious point – the “law” only applies during a person’s life. Once they have died it no longer has any hold over them. Though it may be very frustrating to a person seeking justice for a crime committed against them, if the miscreant is dead, they will have no redress in law. As an example, and to take a very high profile case in the UK in recent years, Jimmy Saville, a famous DJ and a man even knighted for his charitable work, left a trail of hundreds of allegations of sexual abuse that were only investigated after his death. The police concluded that he was a prolific and predatory sex offender but there was no legal redress for his victims because the law no longer applied to him. He was dead. 

There is a temptation for the victims of crime to feel cheated if the one who offended against them has died and can’t be brought to justice. But they forget one thing. Justice doesn’t end with our natural deaths. One day everyone will have to stand before God to give an account for their lives. Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 5:10, “For we must all stand before Christ to be judged. We will each receive whatever we deserve for the good or evil we have done in this earthly body”. And about evil people, Jesus said to His disciples, “And they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous will go into eternal life” (Matthew 25:46). The old Apostle John recorded a revelation given to him by Jesus, and at the end of Revelation 20 we read, “I saw the dead, both great and small, standing before God’s throne. And the books were opened, including the Book of Life. And the dead were judged according to what they had done, as recorded in the books. And anyone whose name was not found recorded in the Book of Life was thrown into the lake of fire” (Revelation 20:12,15).

So we never need fear that anyone who dies before they have been called to account in a court of law has escaped the punishment they deserve. But of course we must also remember that God’s grace extends even to criminals. A confession of sin and a turning to God even with our dying breaths will ensure that our names are written in the “Book of Life”. One of the criminals being crucified with Jesus turned to Him in repentance, convicted of his sins, and he said, ““… Don’t you fear God even when you have been sentenced to die? We deserve to die for our crimes, but this man hasn’t done anything wrong.” Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your Kingdom.” And Jesus replied, “I assure you, today you will be with me in paradise”” (Luke 23:40-43). Such love! Such grace! It may be difficult to think that someone who has lived a life of evil crime and makes a last minute confession can find a Heavenly future. But we need to remember that it is only God who has the final word. We trust Him for His righteousness and His fairness, and praise and thank Him for His grace and mercy. After all, we may not have violated any laws of our country, or at least we haven’t been caught offending, but we are all sinners. There is no distinction in God’s eyes between the seriousness of sins. They are all enough to ensure a “Guilty” verdict before God’s throne. 

I am always touched by mothers who have lost a son, killed in some event in the street, and who are able to forgive their son’s killer. They are the ones who have truly discovered God’s heart and perhaps they too will find themselves in paradise. They are able to trust God for the right outcome. Only He can see the end from the beginning. 

Dear Father God. Your grace and mercy knows no bounds. We praise and thank You today. Amen.

The Wages of Sin

Posted on by korgrocker

“But now you are free from the power of sin and have become slaves of God. Now you do those things that lead to holiness and result in eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord.”
Romans 6:22-23 NLT

Those of us who are working get paid for our services. We call it a wage or a salary. But the principle is the same – we provide a service to someone and get paid in return. Sadly, governments want to break into what should be a simple business transaction and take their cut – we call it income tax – but we end up with enough money, hopefully, to pay our bills and provide for ourselves and our dependent families. 

It doesn’t matter what we do because there is always a consequent response. So we work and get paid. Of course, someone can volunteer to do work and not get a monetary reward, but they will get their “wages” in other ways. In a wider sense, everything that we do will have some sort of payback. If we do something kind for someone else, such as doing the shopping for an elderly neighbour, then they will be blessed by our work. And we receive our “wages” spiritually, because we are doing what God has asked us to do. Jesus said one of the greatest commandments was loving your neighbour, as recorded in Matthew 22:39, “A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.” So a law of cause and effect is in play here. Jesus said in Luke 6:38, “Give, and you will receive. Your gift will return to you in full—pressed down, shaken together to make room for more, running over, and poured into your lap. The amount you give will determine the amount you get back”. 

But we now come to what Paul said about sin. He said “the wages of sin is death”. Sin has a root, which is rebellion against God. When this happens, the sinner is doing or thinking something that contravenes God’s design for them. Sin has two serious consequences – a sinner cannot be in God’s presence, and a sinner will not enjoy God’s covering and protection. I often go to Psalm 91 – here are the first four verses, “Those who live in the shelter of the Most High will find rest in the shadow of the Almighty. This I declare about the Lord: He alone is my refuge, my place of safety; he is my God, and I trust him. For he will rescue you from every trap and protect you from deadly disease. He will cover you with his feathers. He will shelter you with his wings. His faithful promises are your armour and protection“. Notice that only those with the right qualifications of living close to God will receive the assurance of finding His rest and safety. At a time of danger, a mother hen will cover her chicks with her wings. A lovely picture of God’s protection for His people. Another encouraging verse about God’s care and protection for His people can be found in Isaiah 41:10, “Don’t be afraid, for I am with you. Don’t be discouraged, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you. I will hold you up with my victorious right hand.” 

Those who sin and who never repent and turn to God will one day receive the wages for their rebellion and sin. They will find eternal death in a place where they don’t want to be. But Paul continues to write about the “free gift of God”. Which is “eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord”. We all love gifts, don’t we? And yet most people will choose sin and eternal death rather than turn to God and receive His free gift of eternal life. 

I was often puzzled by the propensity of some of my workmates to choose to be rebellious and awkward when asked to do something by the boss, purely because they thought it violated their “rights”. Without a knowledge of a bigger picture and the goal to which the company was heading, they thought they knew better. They chose to go a different way, often with consequences they had not foreseen. Regarding sin, it is of course someone’s “right” to continue their evil ways, but such people choose to ignore the consequences. 

How better it is to listen to God and follow His ways, assuring a future that starts with the free gift of salvation and continues with a life eternally spent in a wonderful place we call Heaven.

Dear Father. What else can we say other than “thank You”? Amen.

Great is His Faithfulness

Posted on by korgrocker

“The faithful love of the Lord never ends! His mercies never cease. Great is his faithfulness; his mercies begin afresh each morning. I say to myself, “The Lord is my inheritance; therefore, I will hope in him!””
Lamentations 3:22-24 NLT

I believe that the Lord has taken us out of our Roman journey to another place in the Bible this morning. A nudge from the Holy Spirit perhaps? Is there someone out there in cyberspace this morning who desperately needs some encouragement, someone who is struggling with feelings of despair, someone who perhaps is thinking of giving up? Perhaps a night has just been spent sleeplessly on the rack of anxious feelings, not knowing how today can be faced. Well, these three verses were planted in the Bible just for you. Your name is written all over them. Let’s personalise them this morning. Where I have written “me” add your name in if it helps.

The Lord loves me – He always has done and He will never stop now. And not only that, He has mercifully forgiven me for all my sins, past present and future, as I remain close to Him. You see, He is so faithful, that He will never give up on me. His love for me is unending and unstoppable. All the resources I need for life God has made available to me, and the source of them has been refreshed again this morning. There is an unending and bottomless well containing all of God’s resources and His Spirit is within reach revealing them to me. There is patience and joy, peace and faith, love, and more besides, all there for me without limit. And all I have to do is remind myself of the riches I have in Him, each and every day. The future may look difficult and I may not know how I am going to get through all that is coming to me, but regardless of it all, the Lord is there for me, providing hope for the future. He is my inheritance, and as I think of the Creator of the Universe and all that He is, I realise what an amazing God I worship. I’m humbled by the fact that He has made all that He is available to me through His Spirit. So whatever is facing me today, I know that God will be holding my hand, and even carrying me along if necessary.

I pray today that these verses encourage us all in these difficult times of war and inflation, earthquakes and famines. We may not know what the future holds for us, but we do know the One who holds the future. 

Shame

Posted on by korgrocker

“When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the obligation to do right. And what was the result? You are now ashamed of the things you used to do, things that end in eternal doom.“
Romans 6:20-21 NLT

Isn’t it strange? In our previous lives, before our eyes were opened to God’s saving grace through Jesus, we sinned and thought nothing of it. A speed limit broken, a glass of some alcoholic beverage too many before the drive home, a couple of pencils taken from the office stationery cupboard, an extra-marital affair with someone else’s husband or wife, and probably many other things we want to push down into the dark corners of our minds, hoping they stay there hidden. We really were in a dark place, enslaved to a way of life that involved sinful thoughts and deeds. Yes, we may have felt the odd twinge of guilt. Yes, intuitively, we knew we were doing wrong. But the thrills and attractions of living a sinful life drowned out all other feelings of conscience. Because “[we] were slaves to sin, [we] were free from the obligation to do right”. 

Now our past lives have been exposed to us through the light of God. And we feel a deep sense of shame. We realise now that what we did in the past really would have ended “in eternal doom”. We realise now that all our past sinful deeds and thoughts violated God’s principles. Meaning that although He loved us, He couldn’t be anywhere near us. Our sins and God’s presence were, and still are, incompatible.

We pilgrims have a constant problem though. There is something within us that constantly urges us to return to the old way of living, with its sin and shame. We were steeped in sinful practices and it takes a long time, punctuated by repentance and God’s forgiveness, before the old ways are leached out of us, and we leave behind us the old life. We now have an obligation to do what is right. The old ways are always there, beckoning to us, but increasingly we are being saved from them. We read in Ephesians 4:23-24, “Instead, let the Spirit renew your thoughts and attitudes. Put on your new nature, created to be like God—truly righteous and holy.” Through Jesus’ sacrifice at Calvary we are made new, and His Spirit will work within us, helping us to become “truly righteous and holy”.  It will take a lifetime but its worth it.

Dear Father, we thank You that You have lifted us up out of the “miry clay” through Jesus, and what He did for us. We are so grateful. Amen.