Cannot be Shaken

“Though the mountains be shaken and the hills be removed, yet my (God) unfailing love for you will not be shaken nor my covenant of peace be removed," says the LORD, who has compassion on you.” 
– Isaiah 54:10

Do you remember the story “The Little Engine That Could”?  A trainload of toys was being taken over the mountain to all the children in Sunshine Valley, but unfortunately, the engine broke down. One by one, different engines came by, but none were willing to take the trainload of toys over the mountain. At last, a small blue switching engine happened by, and all the toys asked if it would please take them to all the boys and girls on the other side of the mountain. The Little Engine had never been out of the switching yard before—let alone to travel over the mountain. You know the story; the little blue engine hooked itself up to the trainload of toys and began the journey over the mountain. As the Little Engine began to pull the toys up the mountain, you could hear it saying “I think I can, I think I can. . . ”  At long last, the Little Engine crested the top of the mountain, and as it started its descent into Sunshine Valley, it could be heard singing, ‘I thought I could, I thought I could, I thought I could”

Each of us faces a variety of different mountains to cross every day.  Mountains take on the shape of bills due, disrespectful children, loss of a job, relationship issues, tragedies in life, and addictions, amongst other things.  These mountains seem impassible and unconquerable as we stand at the foot of the mountain and look up.  Many times, like the large, powerful train engines, we head off to take on these challenges, only resulting in spinning our wheels and stalling out.  We read, we study, and we try again, and again, and again, without changing the outcome.  Something is missing from your repertoire, though, and that is the strength of the Lord. 

God is a solid foundation that can be trusted upon in all circumstances.  When your life is shaken and you are challenged beyond measure, the Lord provides wisdom, peace, and comfort.  He comes forth with the confidence that you are loved and you can overcome anything the world puts in front of you.  The problem is that we often push Him away rather than embracing Him and allowing Him to guide our footsteps.  The Holy Spirit dwells within each of us and provides the loving confidence of the Father in all things.  The bible calls the Holy Spirit by a few different names: “the Counselor”, “the Helper”, “the Spirit of Truth”, or “the Teacher”.  He lives in you, giving you the wisdom and encouragement to be an overcomer in a world filled with pain and suffering.  When you call upon the Spirit, He will provide for you what is needed in the situation.

God has given you this helper to be a constant reminder of His love for you.  God knows you are easily shaken and will lose faith when struggles arise.  It is at these times that He wants you to come to Him for help.  He can easily overcome the mountains in front of you if you give Him the ability to.  Nothing can stand in the way of your ability to fulfill God’s plan in your life except you.  By not calling upon the love of the Lord, you have chosen to stay in your current state of struggling.  Simply lay it before the Lord in your prayers today and let Him walk you through the answer, by His love.

Yeah, but Look at Him

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“All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”  –Romans 3:23

“But officer, the guy in front of me was going faster than I was.”


How would this argument hold up if you were attempting to get out of a ticket for speeding?  It’s not likely that this would free you from your punishment.  We naturally have a tendency to justify our actions through a means of excuses or blaming others for our wrong-doing.  I’ve noticed it starts as a child.  Even at the age of 11 my daughter will look to avoid taking the blame for something when it’s obvious that she is the one at fault.  A glass of milk spills and she immediately looks to blame her brother, sister or dog.  Not one of us enjoy the realization that we are wrong in our actions.  Often times pride or arrogance will get in the way of us humbly accepting that we are wrong and then pursue a corrective action to overcome the problem.  It’s much easier to justify our actions or place blame elsewhere and continue down the path of denial than to face the circumstance, learn from it and repent.

So it is with God’s love.  I have spoken to so many people who view God as the policeman in heaven watching over every move we make and writing down the details in a police blotter somewhere near the pearly gates.  They have a difficult time realizing that God is a loving Father longing to fellowship with His children and sees us through the image of Jesus Christ.  I look at it from this perspective.  Despite my desire, I cannot stop sinning.  As much as I want to not sin against God, it’s going to happen.  I estimate that I sin multiple times a day, but for this exercise let’s say it’s 3x / day from the moment I accepted Jesus Christ as my Savior and Lord (I was 12).  At this point in my life with this calculation, I have sinned 46,020 times in my life {of course in reality it is much higher}.  If I live to be 80 years old, I would have sinned nearly 75,000 times (using this math).  How does God let someone with 75,000 sins into His perfect heaven to fellowship with Him for eternity?

He doesn’t!

So, I’m sure you’ve caught on by now, we will all sin. That’s it.  It’s a fact of life and death.  From the moment we are born until the moment we die we will sin against God the Father.  Billy Graham, Mother Theresa, the Pope, Gandhi, Muhammad, Peter, Paul and yes even Mary equally sinned against the Father.  Because He demands perfection to enter heaven, He had to create a means of covering this gap.  In the old covenant, man would sacrifice the spotless perfect lamb in order for him and his family’s sins to be forgiven.  Enter in Jesus Christ and the new covenant between God and man.  God’s plan of closing the gap between our propensity to sin and His requirement for perfection was done through the death of a sacrificial lamb, namely His own Son.  Because Jesus Christ lived a perfect, spotless and sin-free life from birth to his death on the cross; He became the sacrifice for all mankind.  His death was sufficient to cover every sin ever committed up to that point, just like a lamb’s death would have covered the sins of a man and his family.  But, since that point in time (26 AD or so) there have been billions and billions of people on the face of the earth.  What about their sins?

Jesus Christ resurrection formed the new covenant between God and man.  Jesus went to hell on our behalf and took the sins of the world with him.  Then He rose from the grave and created a path of salvation for all mankind, for ever more.  God’s love for you is so unbelievable that He has given you a means to obtain forgiveness for the sins that separate you and He.  Because of our daily sin filled lives, we certainly don’t deserve this love, but He gives it anyway.  This is the grace by which Paul references throughout his New Testament writings.  Jesus Christ came to restore our connection and eternity with God the Father.  He alone has been set in place by God for this purpose.  Those that do not accept Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord are outside of this grace, and their unrighteousness will be judged by the Father one day.

As we draw closer to Easter, I want you to begin thinking about His sacrifice.  Accept the fact that you are sinful.  Since Adam’s original sin, man has been born into a sin filled existence.  We want to think we are not that bad, “I mean look at that guy over there, he’s much worse than me.”, seems to be a common belief.  We need to get over this feeling of superiority and comparing ourselves to other men.  There is only one benchmark to compare your life to and that is Jesus Christ.  To enter heaven requires that you have lived a life of equal perfection and sinlessness when compared to Him, not when compared to “that guy over there”.  Acknowledge your sin daily and lay it down before the sacrificial Lamb of God.  Then pray for strength to turn from these ways.  Only through Him and His strength is this possible.  You cannot avoid sin on your own.



Prayer:
Heavenly Father,
Your grace is sufficient for my unrighteousness.  I am forgiven and washed by the death and resurrection of Your Son.  I stand before You condemned in my sin, yet take hold of Your salvation through my profession of Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord of my life.  I lay my sins at the foot of His cross and pray for strength to overcome this filth in my life.  In Your name I pray – Amen

 

© Sondove Enterprises, 2019
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Bible Study – James (day 8)

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“Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.” – James 1:22 (click here for context v.22-25)

What are you afraid of?  Is there anything that fills you with complete fear and thereby reverses your action?  Lisa and I were once on a bike ride.  As we peddled down the bike path along side of a small retention pond near a golf course, we came upon a large black coiled up water moccasin in the middle of the bike path. It’s body was as round as my forearm, it was hard to determine how long it was based on it’s position. It raised it’s head, hissed and that was that.  We turned our bikes away, went to the other side of the road, peddled down the road and then came back onto the bike path 20 or 30 yards away from the slithery fellow.  There are certain things which strike fear in all of us.

There was a point in time when people feared God.  The scriptures were personal to the children of God in the times leading up to and around Jesus birth and life.  The engagement between the divine presence of God Almighty and mankind was evidenced to those familiar with Moses, Abraham, David and the other heroes from the Bible.  There is a story in 2 Samuel 6 where Uzzah was struck dead by God Almighty for touching the Ark of the Covenant when it became unsteady as they were transporting it.  This seems radical by our standards, but not by God’s.  There were many laws regarding the Ark of the Covenant throughout the Old Testament.  You see the Ark of the Covenant represented God’s Holy presence with the Israelites and was to be kept in the temple, sacred and hidden from view behind the curtain in the Most Holy Place.  Approaching the Ark was to be in God’s presence, His holiness and perfection; intolerable of man’s sinful nature.  Only the High Priest could enter the Most Holy Place and look upon the Ark of the Covenant after considerable cleansing and purification.  God’s actions against Uzzah were clearly defined and known by the scriptures regarding the Ark, yet he chose to defy God’s directions and take action (reaching out to steady the Ark) anyway, rather than grabbing the pole it was being carried on.

The new covenant with God holds just as much authority over mankind.  This new covenant based on the blood of Jesus Christ, has clearly defined how we are to live our lives.  Yet, many of us take it lightly, interpret it to fit into our lifestyle and thereby defy the actual word of the Lord.  God has demonstrated that He has little tolerance for mankind to take His word and adjust it to fit our means.  It was written down, by those He appointed, with the specific purpose of becoming a living document for all of mankind.  We are held accountable to living by the guidelines established by the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, just as Paul, John and the others were held accountable.  Time has not minimized the relevance or intentions of the word.  It is still God’s commands to you and I, and we ought not take it lightly. 

The bible tells us clearly there is but one path to righteousness and eternity with God Almighty and that is through His Son – Jesus Christ.  Others may choose to believe that there are many paths and that all God’s are equal, they will one day discover that were deceived.  God tells us in Matthew 7:21-22 that many will come calling “Lord, Lord” but will not enter the kingdom of heaven; and many will claim that they have prophesied or cast out demons in His name, but will hear the Son state “Away from me you evil doers”  Trust in His word and the truth that is contained therein.  He has given you the path to righteousness, act on it and live by it, so that one day in the presence of the Lord you will hear the words, “Well done, good and faithful servant.  Enter into my presence.”

ACTIONS for Growth: Have you no fear of God’s wrath on mankind?  Do you not fear the judgment seat of God Almighty, or do you even think about or care about it?  It is critical that you take this aspect of your life with the utmost sincerity and seriousness.  Studying the word of God and learning of His love, grace and mercy is the most important part of your entire life.  Are you committed as much to Him and His ways as you are to your own plans in life?     

© Sondove Enterprises, 2019
For more Daily Thoughts go to: http://sondove.blogspot.com
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