Tag: stain of sin

He Will Complete Every Good Work in Us

Hebrews 12:5
My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him.

Once we accept Jesus Christ as Our Savior, the Lord begins His work in us. He promises that He will complete every good work in us. He also promises that He will discipline us as needed to get us to the way, the truth and the life that is in Him. He will leave no blemish untouched.

As the Lord works on us, we can think of ourselves as a piece of old furniture that needs refinishing. Our old stain is no longer acceptable at the place where we will be displayed. We need a new refined finish. Our new finish cannot be applied until all of the old stain is removed. The first part of our refinishing will be relatively easy as our old stain is stripped away. This first step, however, will reveal the depth of the old stain. This then leads to the tough part of the process. To get rid of the stubborn stain will require sanding, scraping, chipping and maybe even gouging. This tedious process will be repeated over and over until all the old stain is completely gone. Only when all the stain has been removed completely will our final finish be applied.

God has various ways of completing His finishing work in our lives. Sometimes it is by the gentle urgings of the Holy Spirit, sometimes it is by our reading of His Word and sometimes it is by the spoken words of His ministers. Often He allows affliction and trials to bring us to acknowledge and confess our iniquities, to recognize our shortcomings in fulfilling our duties or to convince us of our folly in following our own nature. All of these things are done through His perfect love and forgiveness.

Let us humbly surrender to the finishing work of the Holy Spirit. Let us submit to the work of the Master, who is preparing us for a place in His house.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for preparing us to join You for all eternity. We bless the name of Jesus for His precious blood that He shed so that we may be washed clean of every stain of sin in our lives. We bow before You, Father, in full surrender to Your good work in us. We pray that You take us into Your hands and prepare us to stand before You in the image of Your Son. We rejoice in knowing that we will be in service to You in Your house forever. We ask all these things in the name of Our Lord and Master, Jesus Christ.

Strangers to Ourselves

Psalm 139:23
Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts.

It is hard to understand, but we are in many ways strangers to ourselves. We may hate sin and we may repent of all the sin in our lives, yet our natural eye is unable to see the depths of our iniquities. Our human nature with its sin stained flesh is simply incapable of making an unbiased assessment of the darkness within us. We must do as the psalmist did. We must ask God to search our hearts and reveal to us everything that is displeasing to Him.

Jesus Christ died on the Cross so that we could stand blameless before the Father. To prepare us for this time, the Holy Spirit dwells within us to guide us through the sanctification process. The Holy Spirit takes us beyond the carnal limits of our own understanding. Inspired by the light of Our Savior, we are allowed to see the full depth of the darkness of our sin and the full height of our potential in Christ. Rest assured that we would never properly examine ourselves without the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

Let us report for full inspection in humble recognition of our need. Let us pray that the Holy Spirit will search our hearts. Let us ask the Holy Spirit to uncover every speck of darkness in our hearts, especially those that we do not see ourselves. Let us faithfully repent of what is revealed to us so that we may live in the fullness of a life in Christ.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for making us righteous through the sacrifice of Your Son, Jesus. We thank You for providing the grace that we need and the ever present assistance of the Holy Spirit so that we may submit to the transformation process from sinner to saint. We pray that You open the gateways of our minds so that we may see and repent of all of the shackles of sin on our lives. We pray that we may see and grasp the fullness of your plans for our lives as revealed to us by Your Holy Spirit. We ask these things in the name of the purifier of our souls, Jesus Christ.

Stand Blameless Before the Father

Psalm 139:23
Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts.

It is hard to understand, but we are in many ways strangers to ourselves. We may hate sin and we may repent of all the sin in our lives, yet our natural eye is unable to see the depths of our iniquities. Our human nature with its sin stained flesh is simply incapable of making an unbiased assessment of the darkness within us. We must do as the psalmist did. We must ask God to search our hearts and reveal to us everything that is displeasing to Him.

Jesus Christ died on the Cross so that we could stand blameless before the Father. To prepare us for this time, the Holy Spirit dwells within us to guide us through the sanctification process. The Holy Spirit takes us beyond the carnal limits of our own understanding. Inspired by the light of Our Savior, we are allowed to see the full depth of the darkness of our sin and the full height of our potential in Christ. Rest assured that we would never properly examine ourselves without the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

Let us report for full inspection in humble recognition of our need. Let us pray that the Holy Spirit will search our hearts. Let us ask the Holy Spirit to uncover every speck of darkness in our hearts, especially those that we do not see ourselves. Let us faithfully repent of what is revealed to us so that we may live in the fullness of a life in Christ.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for making us righteous through the sacrifice of Your Son, Jesus. We thank You for providing the grace that we need and the ever present assistance of the Holy Spirit so that we may submit to the transformation process from sinner to saint. We pray that You open the gateways of our minds so that we may see and repent of all of the shackles of sin on our lives. We pray that we may see and grasp the fullness of your plans for our lives as revealed to us by Your Holy Spirit. We ask these things in the name of the purifier of our souls, Jesus Christ.

Made Righteous

Romans 5:19
For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous.

As a result of the disobedience of Adam, we were born with a sin nature. Because of Adam’s disobedience, we naturally put ourselves first in all things. This behavior alone puts us in direct violation of what Jesus taught were God’s greatest commands. “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself.” Matthew 22:38-39

The violation of either one of these two commands is enough to condemn us to eternal death. We cannot remove the condemning stain of this sin on our own. There is no escape or recovery from this sin except through the redemption provided through Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

As a result of the obedience of Jesus to the calling of His Father in heaven, we are made righteous in the eyes of the Father. God removed our sin through the sacrifice of His own Son. He removed our sin in the only way that was acceptable to Him – through the shed blood of His Son which cleanses us. We accept His mercy and eternal atonement through our surrender to His Son, Jesus Christ.

It is important to understand that God does not hold us responsible for inheriting sin. He will not condemn anyone because of the sin that was inherited. He will condemn those that refuse to accept Jesus as the only measure of deliverance from their inherited sin and their ongoing iniquities. He will condemn those who choose to live in submission to the darkness of the flesh rather than under surrender to the light of the world, Jesus Christ.

Let us strive to have those around us see that we love God above all things and that we love them as we love ourselves. Let us show the world what is only possible through Jesus Christ.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we ask forgiveness for the sin in our lives. We pray that You will reveal to us all the places in our lives where we are living in darkness, instead of in the Light. We ask You, Lord, for the grace to be able to repent of all the sin that remains in our lives. We thank You, Father, that through Your mercy You have made a way for us to be delivered from the condemnation that we deserve. We praise Your name, Father God, because through Your perfect love we have been given an eternal inheritance that we did not and cannot earn on our own. We bless the name of Jesus who now dwells within us. We pray that we may become Light to the darkness in world around us through His presence. We ask all these things in the name of the Lamb of God, Jesus Christ.