Hello, beautiful family.
One of my favorite musician/singer/songwriters is Rich Mullins. He wrote “Our God is an Awesome God” and so many other great songs about Jesus and our lives in God. Rich died in a car crash when he was still pretty young. After his death, a couple of books were written about him, and I remember one of his closest friends was interviewed and he said, “Rich was the most sinful man I’ve ever known.” And you could tell that it was said matter of factly and with affection. I love this fact. Here’s why.
I wrote to you before about Adam and Eve disobeying God and then when God came to be with them in the garden, they hid from God. For the first time, they were ashamed. Embarrassed. Self-conscious. Their sin made them want to hide from the One Who loved them best.
After that, people were sinning and making sacrifices for their sins, somehow trying to keep in God’s good graces, using the blood of animals to atone. Then, God came to earth. Completely human and completely God, and He said “Here I am, the only truly perfect sacrifice. I take all of your sins, every last one, past, present, future, and I carry them to the cross and make the final, only ever needed sacrifice. I destroy sin forever. It no longer has any power.”
With this glorious act, the veil of the temple is torn in two, and the way is made for us to enter into the presence of God, clean and perfect. Jesus took us in.
So why are we still hiding from God? Why are we still embarrassed, and ashamed, and self-conscious? Everything Jesus did when He walked and lived and died on this planet was to show us the love of the Father and make the way for us to, once again dwell in the rest and presence of our loving God forever.
But we still hide. Do you think, as I once did, that you still must stop sinning and behave yourself before you can dwell in His rest, in His glorious presence, unashamed? I will tell you here and now, you don’t! You are completely acceptable to God, right now, exactly as you are.
Will we always sin? No. We will surely change. But Who is going to change us? Can we do it? Can we make ourselves into what God wants? Can we stop ourselves from doing, saying, all the cruddy things that seem to come to us so easily?
You know the answer. We can’t do it. We can’t change ourselves. All the repentance in the world will not get us to that place. It is only by God’s grace, His perfect sacrifice, His unconditional love, that we can dwell in His presence all the days of our lives.
We come to Him as we are, because we can, and God shapes us and makes us. The time will come when you will not even be able to sin. It won’t be because you’re a good person. It will be because we can be “confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ.” Phillipians 1:6
You are God’s work now. Not your own. If we stop sinning (and yes, that will happen) it is only because of the work of God in us. His work. So, let’s trust Him with it and stop hiding. Let’s be free, as He has called us to be. John 8:36 “If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.”
I think Rich Mullins got that. He didn’t focus on the sin in his life and let it distract him. He just looked to Jesus, the Author and Finisher of our faith.
So, my beloved family, “Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.” (Hebrews 4:16) Bold. Free. Forgiven. Loved unconditionally. No exceptions.
I love you all.
This is a Rich Mullins song that speaks of God’s glory and His glorious grace.
This reminds me of Jesus’ warnings about self-righteousness. He said our righteousness is from God, and it is given freely to us without conditions. So, anything we think we have to do, or say, or feel, or believe… makes no difference in the eyes of God. And, as soon as we believe it’s something we’ve done to earn our righteousness, that makes it “self-righteousness” and that will fail us. We must remember that we are fallible humans (on this earth) and anything we build for ourselves can be lost. If we can make it, we can lose it. And, I’ve seen it so many times… in a moment of weakness, we can lose hope in God, because we feel he will see us as fearful, angry, SINFUL… because the righteousness we create for ourselves by the things we do, say, act, feel, etc., can so easily evaporate. Jesus said, “only God is good.” And that means we are not. Not within our own being, anyway. But, God’s freely given righteousness covers everything and anything we can do, or not do… good or bad, without exception… without condition. It is His gift to us, whether we want it or not, whether we feel we’ve earned it or not, whether we feel we deserve it or not. If we can only believe that, it would change our lives completely. No more struggles, no more fear, no more shame, no more guilt… complete freedom from earthly constructs. And he who is free in Christ, is free indeed. That’s what God wants for us, and He knows we will have it. For those who believe righteousness is His unconditional gift to us, it is immediate. But for those who cannot make that leap of faith, know that it will come. That is His plan, and His will be done.
Amen, friend! Thank you for sharing. God is so good!