Freedom from guilt

“Blessed is the man whose sin the Lord will never count against him,” that a beautiful verse from Romans 4:8. God through his word tells us of his so many blessings upon us and one of those best verses is the verse above. I realize that the guilt that we get from our sins can eat us away despite the fact that we are forgiven. Guilt is a terrible thing.  The bible tells us of the story of Judas Iscariot who as a result of guilt ended up hanging himself (Mat 27:1-5). Judas had betrayed Jesus and when he realized that he had betrayed an innocent man, he decided to return the money that he had been paid for his act. However, when he went to the authorities to try ‘withdrawal his statement’, they ignored him and told him that it was his responsibility. This led Judas to the act of suicide through hanging himself. 

This is usually our fate many times. Our lives before receiving Christ are sinful and a betrayal of Christ. During this time we are usually guilty of our sin. Worse is when someone tells us about Christ or we come to the realization of our sins. This causes so much guilt in us that many times leads us to repentance and therefore to receiving Christ, who unlike the authorities in the case of Judas forgives us instead of sending us away.

However, there are many times despite being forgiven, we still hold on to guilt. This guilt holds us down for so long that it affects our relationship with God. This guilt tries to convince us that we are not good enough, that we are still sinful and that God can’t love us well. I speak about it because I have been there. During these times it becomes so difficult to pray because when we begin, we remember of our sins and instead of moving to higher levels of prayer, we just keep repenting. Other times we even feel so unworthy to even serve God in ministry because this guilt makes us feel worthless. I had suffered this for a long time after coming back to Christ, until one day God through someone helped me to realize that guilt is the devil’s weapon to drag us down and to keep us from rising to where God intended for us.

The bible tells us that Jesus came to set the captives/oppressed free and I have come to realize that guilt is a form of captivity/oppression. There is freedom from this oppression because Jesus took the guilt away that we may be free. The bible says that God remembers our sins no more when we repent. When we realize this, we gain the key to living a life of freedom, freedom to live according to the promises of God and like the children of God enjoying the benefits. The key to this once more is realizing that Jesus came to set us free (Luke 4:18-19).

God bless you and keep growing in Him!

What a beautiful thing

Many of us love new born babies, they all look beautiful to us. I have never heard anyone call a new born baby ugly because to us new things are beautiful. Although the future turn out of the new born is usually unknown to us, we all look at the current state of the baby and celebrate them. However, I realize that this is never usually the case for us to God.  You see, when we are born physically, we are ugly to God. This is because we are born with the seed of sin in us and this makes us ugly. The bible says that our sins hide us from God. This ugliness can make it difficult for God to look at us and even come to our rescue when we call to  him. However, I thank God for grace and His great plans for us.

I like to say that God does not look to us just physically, He doesn’t look at our current state when we are born by our mothers and before we receive him, instead, he looks at the future. I love how the bible in Psalms 139 explains how God saw us before we were formed in our mothers wombs. I love how Jeremiah 1:5 says how God ordained our purposes even before we were born. I love how most part of the bible talks about the future that God saw for us and has made for us. My favorite is Psalms 139:16 that says that all my days were ordained before my birth. This keeps me free from worry about the future because it has already been laid down. All I always pray is for God to help me walk in that path laid down for me.

Reading Ephesians 1:4-14,I see that despite our ugliness at the time of physical birth due to the seed of sin in us, God had already predestined us to be adopted in His family through Christ Jesus. He had already chose us to be holy and blameless in Him before the creation of the earth.  In Christ we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins in accordance with the riches of God’s grace that he has lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding. What a beautiful thing!

It is a blessing to have God who doesn’t so much dwell on our ugliness but who is so determined to make us beautiful through redemption. Who looks at the beauty in our future not the ugly that we are or were in. He gives us grace to live a holy life of saying no to sin. He goes ahead of us giving us victory and when we fall, he lifts us up. The bible says that “greater love has no- one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends,”(John 15:13) Christ did that. What a beautiful thing!

Dedz:

"Beautiful, Beautiful" 

Don't know how it is you looked at me

And saw the person that I could be
Awakening my heart
Breaking through the dark
Suddenly your grace

Like sunlight burning at midnight
Making my life something so beautiful, beautiful
Mercy reaching to save me
All that I need you are so beautiful, beautiful

Now there's a joy inside I can't contain
But even perfect days can end in rain
And though it's pouring down
I see you through the clouds
Shining on my face

Like sunlight burning at midnight
Making my life something so beautiful, beautiful
Mercy reaching to save me
All that I need you are so beautiful, beautiful

I have come undone
But I have just begun
Changing by your grace

Like sunlight burning at midnight
Making my life something so beautiful, beautiful
Mercy reaching to save me
All that I need you are so beautiful.

Like sunlight burning at midnight
Making my life something so beautiful, beautiful
Mercy reaching to save me
All that I need you are so beautiful, beautiful..

(Francesca Batistelli)

God bless you and keep growing in Him.