Will Jesus know you?
This blog isn’t me trying to attack anyone’s salvation or in the end question their salvation. What it’s meant to do is to make someone examine whether or not they are living a life according to God’s will.
There are two passages in scripture that I want to highlight exactly as to what I am referring too. Both are in Matthew. The First being in Matthew 7:21-23,
“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter into the kingdom of heaven- only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. On that day, many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, didn’t we prophesy in your name, and in your name cast out demons and do many powerful deeds?’ Then I will declare to them, ‘ I never knew you. Go away from me, you lawbreakers!’”
The second one is Matthew 25: 31- 46, in this passage Jesus separates people into two groups, the Sheep and the Goats. The Sheep are people who Jesus said cared for the least of these and the Goats are just the opposite.
What I get from this scripture is that there will be people living with the mindset that just because they got baptized and say they are they are believers they think that they are good. They will go back to their old ways of life based on that and will not have the true heart change. So I just think of how crappy it would be to think you are living your life in relationship with Jesus only to be turned away at Judgement. The reason being is because their Hearts were never given to Jesus and they never did the Father’s will. For me, thats the biggest rejection in my life.
This next part isn’t easy to write. With this comes a great shame, a side of myself that I’m not proud of, even a lot of fear as to how my image would change, but I believe this is something that the Lord is leading me into in order to be redeemed and to lay those chains at his feet. So for me to find this freedom I need to be above reproach, I no longer need to keep this in the dark.
Galatians 5:1- “For freedom Christ has us free. Stand Firm, then, and do not be subject again to the yoke of slavery.”
Sorry God, and mom and dad. There was a time that I wasn’t living under God’s will. That I actually feel that in this stage of life if I had died I would have been judged as a goat. I would have been one those who by word claimed Jesus as Lord, but by actions and my heart wouldn’t have been his.
So I have to confess that part of my life before this Race and most of my college career I had been living a life of sexual immorality. I had relationships with women and formed these relationships on no other basis than to give into the desires of my flesh.
So, starting it off, here is my background and a small peace of my testimony. I was saved at 7 years old, being baptized again my junior year of high school, I was always involved in church during this whole time. I never walked away or doubted God as being alive or my creator. I did consider what I had was a relationship with God.
However, during this time I got into a relationship that I let take my focus, heart, and identity. I was so infatuated by this girl that I saw nothing outside of our relationship. Day in and day out I was thinking of her, and the idea of our future. I used this relationship as a status symbol. While at the same time it brought harassment and stress that I didn’t know how to handle. The harassment was never physical. It was just the expectation and surprise of people when they saw that I was dating her. The relationship started quicker than normal ones so that led to a lot of my future relationships failure. I just expected that to happen. That pursuit or courting wasn’t necessary. I saw women as potential girlfriends and never tried to develop relationships based on friendship.
So me and her never crossed any boundaries physically. However, emotionally and spiritually we did. So when we broke up, I was lost. I had no identity outside of this relationship. I couldn’t think of anything but her for years. When asked by other dudes, about how far we went. I would tell the truth, and I would get teased with surprise for never sealing the deal.
With that came a sense of failure as a man. This is what lead me on a spiral of going from girl to girl (not always physically). I would never date them because I would compare their beauty to hers. I had this thought that I couldn’t date a girl that I saw as less attractive than her. So I would build up emotionally with girls but never commit to them.
Then when I had the freedom of college, that’s when things became more physical. I just sought to be satisfied physically, never once to be satisfied by the Lord. So until 2016, I was living outside of God’s will. He slowly began to convict me of my way of life. I knew what I was doing wasn’t right, but beyond that I didn’t know what else to do. In 2016 the Lord finally had enough. He began convicting me. My spirit was groaning, and after the Passion conference that year, which I felt like every sermon was directed at me, I began to see the need for change in my life. I would distance myself from those desires and cut relationships. I wasn’t perfect and I had moments of slip up. However, I was continuing to fight the undergrowth to find the path God wanted me to return to, which felt like every sermon was meant for me.
So now that I got this blog that has brought a dread of fear into my life. I can declare with it that God has redeemed and healed me from this past. I stand with Jesus and his authority over my life. I am no longer a slave or bound by this way of life. My life is now committed to doing his will in all manners and ways. Some days, it will be easy for me. Other days, it is hard for me. However, I have good news and that is that it will be Jesus who gives me strength to overcome this. I will be sustained on the word, and Jesus to overcome the temptation of the flesh. I say all of this because I want no secrets in my life that the enemy can use to bring reproach into my life.
