Growing in faith (3)

No trash!

So what does the gospel mean for daily living and what does it NOT mean?
It does NOT mean that all of a sudden we have to perform, to measure up in our own strength to God’s standards of living.
It does not mean that we have to walk on our toes for the rest of our lives trying hard to obey and live up to God’s instructions without him enabling us to live in his ways.
It does not mean that we are worthless trash because we sinned.
The worst garbage, fit for nothing, since after all Jesus had to clean up our messes and whipe us clean from our own filth.
This is actually what many people believe, unfortunately.
Their whole lives, although they are saved through faith, they keep proclaiming how worthless and undeserving they are.
But that is NOT the gospel.
The gospel means good news by the way.
Not bad news mixed with a little bit of good.

NO!

It’s ALL good!

Now the gospel doesn’t deny our hopeless sinful state.
However that’s not news.
Most people have some sense of sin and failure.
They might just brush it away though, comparing themselves with others who seem worse than they are. Saying they are not that bad, in an attempt to remain a sense of value, which we all so desperately need right?
The worse we feel about ourselves the more we’ll deny it. Holding on for dear life to the dignity we feel we need to have in front of others. But also deceiving ourselves.
The truth that we do fail in living in love, selfcentered where we should have loved others as much as we love ourselves, since otherwise we put ourselves above them, is not something we want to hear.
And even if we are very loving persons indeed, there’s always a place where this love comes to an end and we put ourselves in the first place. After all who’s going to take care of us if we don’t stick up for ourselves. (the answer is: God does!)

Read also “Giving”.

So out of fear for selfpreservation we place ourselves above others.
And out of that same fear, we deny it.
I am talking about both believers and unbelievers here by the way.
Don’t think that as a believer you’re better than your neighbour.
The difference is though that believers have a choice.
They received a change of heart.
And now they are able to live selfless lives in complete love.
Yet they can only do this when they connect with their Maker daily.
It’s an ongoing journey where they become more like him as they go.

But yet, despite the fact that we all are more sinful and selfish than we even admit to ourselves,
God saw something of great worth in us. Something worth redeeming.
Now THAT is good news indeed.
Don’t throw yourself on the garbage dump because you got convicted of sin.
God didn’t do that so neither should we!

Yes we should be able to honostly look at ourselves and admit the filth in our lives.
However the purpose should be that we come to the realisation that we need Jesus to save us from ourselves.
Don’t keep digging in the dirt once you’ve had a conviction of sin and received Jesus as your Savior.
He will do all the future weeding that is needed.
Just trust him.
He is now your righteousness and He lives inside of you.
Be honost and make right your wrongs if you need to, but don’t continue living on your own merit like you did as a non-believer.
The good news is that now the merit of Jesus’s perfect life is accounted to you.
This is not just to get you to heaven one day but it’s the basis on wich God accepts you every sinlge day.

Life for believers is not a waiting time.
We’re not standing in line, waiting to die so we are saved from this life including our own mistakes.
No, salvation is for now.
In the spirit realm we already have acces to God, who lives in heaven.
And it’s exactly through drawing near to him that we get changed and delivered from our old ways of living.

Death is not our savior.
Jesus is.
And because He died in our place we are now in rightstanding with God.
That’s the only basis on which God accepts us.
When we received this sacrifice of his life in our place, on our behalf.
But Jesus death and resurrection are a doorway.
The gospel is not a historic fact alone.
The gospel is that we get to be in God’s presence daily.
It’s only then that we get changed indeed and live according to whom He already changed us into on the inside.

The gospel is not that you live towards something but from something.
Or rather Someone.
We don’t live to get value and acceptance but we live from the value and acceptance we already have.
That’s the only way we can ever live accorcing to God’s standards of life.

Activation

This is for anyone who doesn’t think they’re sinful…
Just take a regular day of your life, like today or yesterday, and ask yourself honostly how many decisions, actions and attitudes and words you spoke were done out of selfpreservation and not out of love and care for others…be honost you don’t have to tell anyone, it’s just you.
How many of you activities did you do for yourselves?
Even when they outwardly appeared to be for others, where your motivations mingled with selfish desires?
Did you do it to feel good about yourself or to receive a thank you or paycheck?
Did you expect anything in return?
What did you do with 100% selfless motivation?
(Don’t get me wrong, you’re allowed to have fun! That’s not sinful in itself. This is just a check to see that our good works are often mixed with selfcenteredness and that our core drive is often selfpreservation.)

Now don’t get all hang up on how bad you are. That can be a form of selfcenteredness as well! Then you try to earn life which is never possible. Read also “5. Blockages (3)”.
Just give your life to God, including your sin (!) and receive him as your Savior.
See “Free Gift”.

For believers:
Just repent and lay it down at the foot of the cross if you see any sin in yourselves.
And of course make it right and ask forgiveness from the people you wronged.
Thank God that Jesus is your righteousness and lives inside you.
Just spend time in his presence daily and He will change you from the inside.