My dear brothers and sisters. I am writing this from my heart as a fellow believer who has chosen to pick up his cross and follow Him everyday.
"Then Jesus said to His disciples,
"Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me." (Matthew 16:14). We are all Human and as being such, we are all sinners and fall short EVERY day. That is why Jesus came. So we have the assurance that the shedding of His blood was not in vain and we are FORGIVEN...now and forever!! We will all go through much stress, fear, and doubt. But, when in our stress, fear, and doubts, (and we will all go through these things and this is not unique to any one person and we do not stand alone in these), rather than focusing on these turn our eyes and thoughts to the Lord. Bringing to mind His Word's and promises. I have found that the Lord will then, and suddenly when not expecting it, pour His peace upon us and whisper to us 'everything is going to be OK'. It is a reminder to all of us. We are in His hands and nothing, not our doubts, fears, or stress, can remove us form His hands and His Love. We have these doubts, fears and stress in our lives because we allow them in. Again, that is a part of the human condition and He understands this. What is important is where we turn our attention in these moments. This is part of fighting the good fight. It is, and will be, a daily fight until we are with Him. We have to decide weather we will fight, or surrender. But even in all this His Love is steadfast. His forgiveness and mercies unending. I thank God that our salvation and cleansing of our sins is not dependent on us but Him alone. He paid the price for us and in our place. So don't look to yourself and judge yourself to be unworthy of His salvation and forgiveness any longer. His victory is COMPLETE in ALL ways and will never change or end. Remember, we are told, and it is pleasing to Him, to give thanks in ALL circumstances. And in thanking Him, we are also acknowledging our trust in Him. What people seem to never do is in their prayer requests, in times or trouble and pain, is to follow their prayer request with giving thanks to our God and Father for allowing this in our lives...He DOES have a purpose and plan in all this. He is in complete control. Have you EVER seen anyone thank our Lord for Him allowing these circumstances in our lives? He tells us to:
"Give thanks in ALL circumstances, for this is the Will of God in Christ Jesus". (1 Thessalonians 5:18). And if we are not doing as He tells us to do, is that not sinning? We are choosing not to give Him thanks as He commands us to. This would be a unique and powerful witness to follow our prayer requests with thanksgiving to Him!!! This will disarm the enemy also as they are the commands of our God and we are choosing to follow Him. This is what the Lord places on our hearts. All this which He brings us through, will be used by Him to minister to others going through the same.
"..From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who is entrusted much, much more will be asked". (Luke 12:48). He brings us through all these things because He loves us beyond words. And He has forgiven us of all our sins completely and forever. Never more to remember them.
"As far as east is from west, so far as He removed our sins from us". (Psalm 103:12). Let us accept His forgiveness and with all thanksgiving to Him. The enemy will continue to keep bringing up our past sins before us and getting us to focus on them. Let go and accept His forgiveness and move on. Show the enemy to be the liar he is. Stand strong. Stay on the hard path. The easy road is a road going away from Him. Thank Him for all this. God bless you always my dear brothers and sisters and know that you are never alone and that He has a purpose for you in all of this...give Him thanks. He IS faithful to His Word even though we fight this in ourselves...thank you Jesus for your will and purpose in my life even though I don't yet understand.
AMEN AND SO BE IT.
As always, you comments are welcomed and appreciated.
