God is not a bookkeeper, but there are certainly books being kept on each of us, and not just by Google and the credit bureaus.
The book on me contains everything I've done, which is basically a book about my sin, because everything I do (including my righteousness) is as "filthy rags" before God. There is absolutely nothing I could do to zero out this book. There is nothing you could do, or all of us could do together to zero out these books. Add to this debt the infinite debt incurred by all of us, when we rejected His Son and put Him through a most painful and unjust death on the cross. That's a pretty heavy load of debt.
On the other side of the ledger is only one act that can balance the books. That is the sacrifice of the pure and spotless Lamb of God. His blood can cover every line in your book. The good new is - Jesus lives and He forgives. You know in your heart that you could not stand and account for your life before God. Without Jesus we are toast. Only Jesus can get us out of this jam.
Let me share one of my favorite Psalms 130 with you in music.
In this Psalm, verse 4 says "If you, O Lord, kept a record of sins,
O Lord, who could stand? But with you there is
forgiveness; therefore you are feared.."
God doesn't want to read my book, He just wants to see my heart pumping the blood of Jesus through my veins, giving me new life.
Live in me LORD, and pour out your blessings through me to others! In Jesus name...
Monday, February 20, 2012
Saturday, February 18, 2012
Dying in the Wilderness
I had a dream. It was a troubling dream. I found myself in the middle of a desert, lost. I wandered seemingly endlessly searching for a way out, through one scene after another of bleak lonely wilderness. Then I awakened. It was 1976 in my garage apartment in Waco where I was enrolled in college. I still remember that dream and the disturbing impression left on my heart.
Some time later the Lord put a song on my heart. The song was about a man who knew God but lost his way and returned to the world. This song continued to haunt me through my years of wandering. Many times the Lord reached out to me and touched my heart with new songs and fresh understanding of His Word. But the warning reminded me - continue to wander and let the world harden your heart and you'll come to an end like the miserable old soul in this song.
A few years ago my father passed away while I was away on business. The tremendous weight of this experience caused me to become desperate for God. I asked for Him to give me the faith I needed to become truly free from the world. That is when I started to die. By that I mean that I began to lose interest in the things that took me away from God.
A few months ago one of the associate pastors at my church spoke about Joshua leading the nation of Israel into the promised land. Through him God showed me what had happened to me over those years of wandering. More than thirty years of my life was wasted pursuing wealth and fulfillment in the world while gradually losing touch with God. Like the children of Israel, God had taken me out of Egypt but there was still a lot of Egypt left in me that had to die in the wilderness.
Thank God I now see the green fields of the promised land. I know now that as long as I bear this "body of sin and death" I will still need to die daily, but I also have the spirit of Christ giving life to my spirit, and the spirit of God giving life to my mortal body!
Let me also say that Jesus' parable of the sower has been fulfilled in me (see Matthew 13). Some of the seed (the word of God) fell by the side of the road while I was a young skeptic. Some of the seed fell on sandy soil, sprouted early but perished because it had no depth of root. Some of the seed fell on thorny soil and was choked by my years of wandering in the cares of this world. And some of the seed has fallen in good soil, deeply rooted in me and about to bear eternal fruit!
Does any of this ring true with you? Are you lost in the wilderness? There is still a way out, if you are still alive and able to call upon Jesus. He will NEVER give up on you.
Some time later the Lord put a song on my heart. The song was about a man who knew God but lost his way and returned to the world. This song continued to haunt me through my years of wandering. Many times the Lord reached out to me and touched my heart with new songs and fresh understanding of His Word. But the warning reminded me - continue to wander and let the world harden your heart and you'll come to an end like the miserable old soul in this song.
A few years ago my father passed away while I was away on business. The tremendous weight of this experience caused me to become desperate for God. I asked for Him to give me the faith I needed to become truly free from the world. That is when I started to die. By that I mean that I began to lose interest in the things that took me away from God.
A few months ago one of the associate pastors at my church spoke about Joshua leading the nation of Israel into the promised land. Through him God showed me what had happened to me over those years of wandering. More than thirty years of my life was wasted pursuing wealth and fulfillment in the world while gradually losing touch with God. Like the children of Israel, God had taken me out of Egypt but there was still a lot of Egypt left in me that had to die in the wilderness.
Thank God I now see the green fields of the promised land. I know now that as long as I bear this "body of sin and death" I will still need to die daily, but I also have the spirit of Christ giving life to my spirit, and the spirit of God giving life to my mortal body!
Let me also say that Jesus' parable of the sower has been fulfilled in me (see Matthew 13). Some of the seed (the word of God) fell by the side of the road while I was a young skeptic. Some of the seed fell on sandy soil, sprouted early but perished because it had no depth of root. Some of the seed fell on thorny soil and was choked by my years of wandering in the cares of this world. And some of the seed has fallen in good soil, deeply rooted in me and about to bear eternal fruit!
Does any of this ring true with you? Are you lost in the wilderness? There is still a way out, if you are still alive and able to call upon Jesus. He will NEVER give up on you.
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