He Has You

I want to preface this message, that I do not condone either the hyper-grace message nor the hyper-obedience message of our day. We are saved by His power and we can overcome by His power, and neither can we do of ourselves. ”Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think of anything as being from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God” (2 Corinthians 3:5).

You cannot out sin God’s ability to forgive you.

You don’t need to feel forgiven to be forgiven.

Give yourself grace, God does. “Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:16).

You cannot surprise Jesus by how much you have sinned, but He can surprise you with how much He will forgive.

It does not matter how far you have fallen, yet the Lord Jesus can pick you up.

Though we may fail God, He will never fail us. “Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not” (Lamentations 3:22).

Don’t regret your mistakes, but simply learn from them. Stop thinking of the price you are paying for your sins, but instead think on the price Jesus paid to cover them.

You must be forgiven of the old that you can walk in the new.

We must know we are forgiven such that we can serve God more fully. “how much more shall the blood of Christ…cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?” (Hebrews 9:14).

Past sin

I used to worry that people would find out about my past, and that it would ruin my testimony. But the opposite is true. The Lord Jesus is glorified by all He has done in you and me. The Lord Jesus said, “Therefore I say to you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much. But to whom little is forgiven, the same loves little” (Luke 7:47).

Your past does not define you, God does.

Stop hurting the Lord by questioning His ability to forgive your past, and just follow Him.

He loves you by His qualifications, not yours. “Then He said to her, ‘Your sins are forgiven.’” (Luke 7:48).

Present sin

The greatest error we have is the delusion where we imagine ourselves not quite as fallen as we actually are. “The Lord upholds all who fall, and raises up all who are bowed down” (Psalm 145:14). It may be that you had to fall in order to bow down to Him.

Fall seven times, get back up seven times. Then stop counting, but keep getting back up. Never give up.

Just as you cannot earn salvation by your good deeds, you will not lose salvation by your failures. “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8).

Until you learn to fail with dignity, you will never be able to succeed with humility. Consider your failures are the preparation for your ministry.

We all fall short, but never too short for His outstretched arms on the Cross. “…for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).

The Devil condemns

The Devil condemns you in your sin to shame you away from God. The Holy Spirit convicts you of your sin to restore you to God. One is meant to destroy you, the other to restore you. You can discern the voice by where it points you.

It is the devil that tells you to try harder. “for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure” (Philippians 2:13). You can’t change you, but He can.

God forgives

Stop agonizing about not being able to do what nobody can do, and simply thank Jesus for what He has done. “…without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness” (Hebrews 9:22).

I hear people say that they can’t forgive themselves for what they have done. Well of course not. When we are the perpetrator we are not the victim. God is the victim of your sin, that’s why only He can forgive you.

Stop trying to redeem yourself, you don’t have the right type of blood. “…you were not redeemed with…your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot” (1 Peter 1:18-19).

Stop agonizing about how far you fall short and start rejoicing in how far Jesus came down to save you.

Confess

There is no greater hindrance to the life a saint, but the anchor of sin not confessed.

You have to own your sin before you can get rid of it. “As it is written: ‘There is none righteous, no, not one'” (Romans 3:10).

It is not blatant sin that hinders a saint, but an unrepentant heart. Learn to be wrong to be made right.

Confess each sin only one time, knowing God doesn’t need extra tries to forgive you. “For You, Lord, are good, and ready to forgive, and abundant in mercy to all those who call upon You” (Psalm 86:5).

Confession does not reveal you to God, but God to you.

Rejoice in confession knowing God is faithful even though you are not. “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).

Bare your soul to God that the Devil would have nothing on you.

Blessings to you,

Paul

 

All Scripture is in red and uses the NKJV (New King James Version) translation unless otherwise noted.