A couple days ago someone I follow on Facebook posted a quote that has stayed with me through the whole week.
” How dare we use Christ as a deadly weapon when he has come to give us life? How dare we kill with what was given for life? “
I know as a believer of Christ I don’t share the same views as many Christians. I had people raise their eye brows when it came to my stance on abortions, same sex marriages, and other issues as such that the Church usually takes a strong hard stance against.
However I have always found myself believing that it was quicker for a believer to become a Pharisee then to truly be delivered.
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Hear me out.
It is so easy to say what sins are unacceptable when you are not the one struggling with it.
When I reflect on my own salvation, there was nothing I did that made it possible. I simply no longer had the desire to do those things anymore.
And when it comes to desires, how could I change what once brought me joy into something that I just was numb to ?
I stopped smoking cigarettes cold turkey because I had no desire to smoke anymore .
I stopped drinking because I just simply had no desire to drink anymore.
I stopped going to the club because I had no more desire to be in that environment anymore.
Everything that I stopped doing was stopped for me. While there was an inner struggle at times, it didn’t compare to the struggle I could’ve suffered had I still wanted those things and tried to stop them in my own power.
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If we really read the bible as it’s written, Jesus never judged the sin but he simply started a conversation around it.
He didn’t have to tell people what they were doing wrong because their own convictions gave them up.
The woman at the well didn’t tell Jesus she had multiple men, her own conviction is what kept her silent on it. (John 4:4–26)
We never see where the woman who was being stoned cried out for them to stop. Her own conviction made her feel she deserved it. (John 8:1-11)
The woman with the issue of blood quietly touched him because her conviction made her feel she didn’t deserve to ask for healing. (Matthew 9:20-22)
The soldier whose servant was sick begged Jesus not to come to his house to heal because he was convicted and knew his house wasn’t in order. (Luke 7:1-10)
Yet if you focus on what Jesus was doing in the midst of what they “deserved” you will see that he simply came into that place of shame and removed it.
He wouldn’t let them hide in their convictions because their convictions didn’t stop him from healing and being who he is.
He was still Jesus despite what they did.
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It’s only grace that allows me to be delivered from any sin I find myself entrapped in.
Had deliverance been forced on me, the change would not have taken place.
It was an inner thing not an outer.
It’s nothing I did, said, or could ever do to free myself.
If it wasn’t for his spirit in me, I wouldn’t recognize half the sins I commit.
His grace and mercy is what keeps me straight.
And even if I did try to heal myself , I would never possess the power to do it without his help.
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So I say all this to say there was a reason the second most important commandment in the bible is to LOVE. (Mark 12:28-31)
Because what you love, you cover.
And what you cover, you protect.
And what you protect, you care about.
And the success, not the detriment, of what you care about is always more important to you than anything.
