"And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might." Deuteronomy 6:5
There are several words which leap out to me above - all, heart, soul and might.
The other day I was pondering on how to take control of "that sin which so easily besets me." You know, . . that one. Everyone one of us has "that one." It may not be the same one for me that it is for you. But if you take a quick moment, you will know EXACTLY which one that is. Just think, what am I constantly going back to God and asking forgiveness for?
Yeah, now you have it . . . "that one!"
It disturbed me that I seemed to constantly be back over, asking God to forgive me for "that one." Sure we have grace and mercy, and we have spent any time in the Christian church we have been taught that "where sin abounds, grace abounds." To this we shout "Hallelujah!" and "Thank you Jesus!" We look at our lives and see that we are not destroyed because of our sin and think . . . Aaahh thank you Lord for your grace and mercy!
But is it really grace and mercy or is His silence, His staying His judgment actually our experiencing His wrath?
". . . since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the
knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought
not to be done. They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and
depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice . . ." Romans 1:28-29
Are we experiencing God's grace or His wrath? When He is silent, when we are not receiving the due consequence for our wrongs, for our sin, is it grace we are experiencing or has He simply given us over to our "depraved mind"? When we are continuing approaching God for forgiveness of the same thing over and over and there is no growth away from it, or . . . even worse . . . we have decided . . . NEVER EVER spoken out loud . . . that, . . . well, God will just understand and forgive me. Is it grace and mercy we are receiving from him or is it His wrath.
Ouch!! I don't know about you, but it's getting a little hot in here.
"What if God, choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore
with great patience the objects of his wrath--prepared for destruction? What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory--even us, whom he also called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles? Romans 9:22 - 23
See we take comfort in verse 23 above, that God has prepared us as objects of His mercy, however, before we get comfortable don't forget about the previous "they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God." Is it wrath or mercy? What, or whether how do you "retain the knowledge of God"?
"And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might." Deuteronomy 6:5
Remember those few words: all, heart, soul and might.
It is in my heart that Christ comes to reside when I have accepted Him. It is to my heart that Holy Spirit speaks. It is in transforming my soul, my flesh that I become more like Him NOW. And it takes my determined might to do so - action, not just words.
Now I could wax on about all of these, but time is running thin, and you are probably, like I was, a little bent out of shape with this wrath and grace comparison.
" Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses,
let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily
entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us." Hebrews 12:1
God does love us. God does forgive us, and God does grant us grace and mercy. But He also has His wrath. Does He want any of us to experience it . . . NO. But is it there. Yes. For us to be sure that we are receiving his grace and mercy and not experiencing His wrath we need to be about retaining the knowledge of Him . . . we need to love the Lord with ALL of our heart, soul and might. We must actively seek His transformation through the study of His word, spending time with Him and doing with ALL our might what He has told us to do . . . throwing off everything that hinders us and the sin that so easily trips us up.
It is work. Yes. But truly God ordained work and God filled work. Where the light of God is there is no room for darkness. So . . . if we are loving Him with All our heart, soul and might there is no room for the darkness.
Fill yourself up with His word, abide in his presence, live in His light, do the work . . . Then rest assure that the silence is His grace and mercy, . . . not His wrath.
Got Word?
Love yah,
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