I am up early thinking about the grace of God. I am so thankful for it! I was lost and now I am found, blind but now I see! However, lately my attention has been focused on how we treat the grace of God like a COMMON thing. Our sin seems to be no big deal, we do not treat it like the cancer that it is.
While it is true that I have sin just like the next person, my sin grieves me. It is detestable. I do not give my flesh a pass just because I am human. It isn't that I am better than anyone else. I just find it offensive that we wouldn't press forward towards the mark, knowing that our sin caused such a gruesome death upon the cross to a man that was innocent. I guess to Americans it is not a big deal...I mean it is just the story of Jesus right? Wrong! It is so much more than that.
I really believe it is a lack of understanding when we throw off restraint and give ourselves a pass or licence to sin. We need to stay sensitive to what the spirit is saying, keeping our hearts tender and not hardened by the world around us or by the things that happen to us. Easier said than done-right?
Lately, I have been tested on this very thing. Wanting to pay evil for evil and wanting to live in the flesh instead of the spirit.. In fact I have failed on several occasions this past year. I have had things in my heart that I have shared with a select few and it grieves my sole. I have been reminded that murder begins in the heart with hatred (Matt 5:21) and I am ashamed to even repeat some of the thoughts that I have had. The spirit of hatred has been dangling in my face like candy. However, even though I feel that I have a right to these feelings- I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
Let those of us who are mature think this way. It is so easy to let the pains we experience turn to these unhealthy feelings that rob us from what God intended for us. It is in our best interest that we release those feelings, we have heard it so many times we are numb to it. Hatred, anger and other unhealthy emotions literally lead to death, even physical death (cancer, heart attaches etc. ).
We need to be imitators of Christ and walk according to the spirit . If we don't ....we walk as enemies of the cross of Christ (Philippians 3:12-21). Let this not be. Let us not recrucify Christ (Hebrews 6:6) by sinning deliberately and treating His Grace like a common thing (Hebrews 10:26-29).
