God’s Greatness

I remove the guilt of your rebellious deeds as if they were a cloud, the guilt of your sins as if they were a cloud. Come back to Me, for I protect you.  Isaiah 44:22 TPT

And my friends, as we see and experience our transgressions being blotted out by the Lord, our rightful response is doing likewise with others’ sins against us. When God blows away our sin like the mist, we can imitate Him and forgive others. It is so freeing to let go of offences and let God handle them. And it is also freeing to the other person, like we talked about a few weeks back, we are not to be barriers on the road to someone else’s repenting, redemption, salvation. 

The Lord commands us to share the gospel and let our light shine before the world. In truth, the darker the world around us becomes, the more important it is for us to share with others the only hope for our future and theirs—salvation through Jesus Christ.

The instruction, command, to repent is spoken throughout the Bible - it’s a summons to a personal, absolute and ultimate unconditional surrender to God as Sovereign. Though it includes sorrow and regret, it is more than that. ... When we repent we are refined by fire, we get to make a complete change of direction (180° turn) toward God.

A person is going one way, then realizes it is the wrong direction and so turns to the right direction.  

Repentance is a turning from sin. It is a change of thinking, a renewing of the mind, that produces a change of living. 

But we know too that repentance is not a one-time occurrence. It is a way of life. When we turn from our sin to our Savior, repentance becomes our forever road map, so we will walk in reverent fear of the Lord, knowing the time of eternal judgement is coming. 

Acts 17:30-31 NET Therefore, although God has overlooked such times of ignorance, He now commands all people everywhere to repent, because He has set a day on which he is going to judge the world in righteousness, by a man whom He designated, having provided proof to everyone by raising Him from the dead.

And repentance will produce a change in the way we live our everyday lives. The New Testament books Matthew and Luke teach us that man must “bear fruit in keeping with repentance” (Matthew 3:8, Luke 3:8). What God requires of us is a humble admission of the sins we’ve committed, the will of God we have violated, and for us to offer Him a willingness (action) to have a change of mind and heart, and to walk in the fruits that repentance brings, which are joy in the Lord and freedom in Christ.

So stop looking backwards and carrying a false identity based on your past behaviours, mistakes, limitations.  Talk to God, pray, sincerely repent, ask for His forgiveness and mercy. I don’t know the specific circumstances in your life. I know they’re real though, and I don’t want to discount what you are experiencing or what you’ve done or had happen to you. 

However, I do want to encourage you to fix your eyes on the greatness of God. Let Him give you perspective for what surrounds you. 

Let His vision for your life supersede shame, your fear, worry, and anxiety.

recognize what you have done, repent, entrust it to God, and follow His Word. 

It’s probably a safe assumption to agree  we’ve been testing the boundaries ever since we were told as toddlers not to touch the hot stove. But we touched it anyway. 

The thing is, we aren’t toddlers  anymore, so hot stoves don’t intrigue us. Now temptation shows up on your screen, and you take the bait. More than once. 

The burn marks from sins we have committed, in private or out in public, strip us of the ability to keep sin hidden. We repent, and by His redeeming grace Christ’s blood grants us reconciliation yet we wonder if God can restore us to fellowship and allow us to serve Him again.  Yes God can!

Listen to the heart of David as he prays for restoration in relationship to God after his adultery with Bathsheba made the “headlines”. 

Psalms 51:10-13 CSB God, create a clean heart for me and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not banish me from Your presence or take Holy Spirit from me. Restore the joy of Your salvation to me, and sustain me by giving me a willing spirit. Then I will teach the rebellious Your ways, and sinners will return to You. 

This is a sombre prayer, sung as pieces of a famous hymn, for us to be restored to God.  

When God uses repentance to turn us in His direction, revive us and reconcile us into right relationship through the blood of Jesus, He graciously restores us and invites us to reach others who—like us—have been burned by sinful choices. As the body of Christ, we need healing as we begin to walk in the fullness of forgiveness, repentance, reconciliation, and restoration. And revival. 

God may use our story to reach those far off from Him to come to know that He is the Messiah and to understand His unconditional love and forgiveness.

Imagine it this way.... It’s the middle of the night and the sound of your phone startles you awake. Good news doesn’t usually ring at this hour.

2 Chronicles 7:12-15 NET ....the LORD appeared to Solomon at night and said to him: “I have answered your prayer and chosen this place to be My temple where sacrifices are to be made. When I close up the sky so that it doesn’t rain, or command locusts to devour the land’s vegetation, or send a plague among My people, if My people, who belong to Me, humble themselves, pray, seek to please me, and repudiate their sinful practices, then I will respond from heaven, forgive their sin, and heal their land. Now I will be attentive and responsive to the prayers offered in this place.

“When I close up the sky”.... 

That’s the bad news part. It’s God telling the truth about humanity: We have disobeyed personally, corporately, and nationally, and He is sending consequences. 

Yet true to His redemptive nature, God continues the middle-of-the-night thought with the following promise: 

“if My people, who belong to Me, humble themselves, pray, seek to please me, and repent their sinful practices, then I will respond from heaven, forgive their sin, and heal their land”

As we humble ourselves, pray, and repent of our personal, national, and corporate sins, because we are commanded to pray always 

we will experience revival, which will then usher in the favor of God to cleanse His church, His sons and daughters, as we invite Him to return to us as we return to Him.

1 Thessalonians 5:15-18 NET See that no one pays back evil for evil to anyone, but always pursue what is good for one another and for all. Always rejoice, constantly pray, in everything give thanks. For this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.

Oh my friends, thank you for joining us, welcome to Gospel Garage  Every day is the day that the Lord has made, and each day we will praise Jesus.  What an easy thing it is- because He is so worthy.  We praise Him for His teaching, His power, His presence, His wisdom, His ultimate sacrifice, and a million other things that spring forth from inside us. 

Praise Him for all the things that are personal to you and to Jesus.  When you first decided to follow Jesus so many things came into focus.  He went from “a savior” to “your savior.”  

He fights the battle with us.  He picks us up in times of despair.  He carries us to victory.  He sits beside us in failures. He talks us out of acting on our temptations.