Sometimes I leave church
feeling like garbage. It’s not the church’s fault. It is mine. While I want to
please my Lord in every way, my thoughts and feelings are leading me away to a
place I don’t want to go. The Apostle Paul described this very thing:
· Romans 7:19-20
NLT
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.
Why is it that those who want
to do the good cannot do it? Clearly, God allows our fleshly nature to remain
in us, but why? To humble us and teach us indispensable lessons. They deprive
us of pride and self-righteousness and force us to trust in God’s righteousness
and mercy alone, as Paul had explained about his own experience:
· 2 Corinthians 1:8-9 …For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired
of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But
that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead.
The quicker we realize that
we are morally inadequate, the quicker we will really on God’s adequacy, the
very thing He wants us to do! Consequently, we will love Him all the more and
rejoice in Him:
· Psalm 94:18-19
When I thought, “My foot slips,” your steadfast love, O Lord, held me up. When
the cares of my heart are many, your consolations cheer my soul.”
· Psalm 116:1-2I
love the Lord, because he has heard my voice and my pleas for mercy. Because he
inclined his ear to me, therefore I will call on him as long as I live.”
He is able to transform any
of our failings into blessings, hope, and adoration for Him. Consequently, I
cry, “I love You; I love You!” He is everything to me. There is no problem too
great for Him. I can entrust all of my petty concerns to Him:
· 1 Peter 5:6–7
Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the
proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he
cares for you.
But how amid our continual
humbling? By seeing ourselves as God does. He is moved by our suffering. Our
Lord refused to heal Paul from his satanically induced suffering explaining:
· 2 Corinthians 12:9 …“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
Even amid our sins? Yep! Let’s
return to: Romans 7:20:… “if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I
who do it, but sin that dwells within me.”
Are we issued a free ticket to sin? Not at all! This is not a ticket but
the mercy and patience of God to
those who have placed Christ first in their lives, (Matthew 6:33; 10:37-39), and these will always confess their sins and
receive a fresh start. We are children who want to honor our Father but often
fail, are humbled, and then are tenderly comforted. Consequently, we love our
Father more and more.
