Happy New Year!
I have been thinking about the title for this blog for several days. And it’s been 20 days since my last blog so I am sure you are thinking…what took you so long to write??? Well, it is exactly this…I am a terrible racer/ human being. This is the realization I have been reflecting for the past month.
Before coming on the race, I knew there were things I needed to grow in. For example, I need to grow in confidence in how God created me and practice my spiritual gifts. Yet, God keeps revealing more and more darkness in me. I am realizing how broken my human nature is, and I am realizing how much my identity was based on being good or being seen as good.
Here’s some darkness in me that God has shined His light: pride, gossip, bitterness, comparison, laziness, deceitfulness and unbelief. All of these are ugly and i have been tempted to avoid the pain and damage they bring.
It seems the deeper I follow Jesus the more I see how terrible I am. So I’ve been wrestling within myself. How do I love this terrible person? How do I forgive her? How do I stop messing up?
Every where I turn, I see myself falling short of the glory of God.
But then I read, Romans 8. “There is now NO condemnation for those IN Christ Jesus…what the law could not do since it was weakened by the flesh, God did.” Paul later asks, “who can bring an accusation to God’s elect?”
(Michelle, this means you!)
If God has no condemnation for me because I am chosen and called by Him, then I need to release my own accusations to Him. If Christ is for me, even I can’t be against me.
Therefore, I rest in the blood of Jesus Christ. Only in Christ, I am free from the law. Only through His blood, I am clean and made good.
Nothing I do accomplishes this. But by seeing my own terribleness, I am more and more in awe of God’s love and grace! Because God loves me, I can love me. Because God forgives me, I can forgive me.
I am realizing that I have to choose to do this daily. Each day, I must preach the gospel to myself and rely on God’s goodness rather than my own. I must release my sin at the cross and believe in His truth.
So the truth: I am a terrible human but God chose me, rescued me from the dominion of darkness and has brought me into His light. Because of His lavish love and abundant grace, I am a righteous Daughter of God.
No words are enough. My life is yours, Jesus. Amen and amen!
