Growing Personally

In the garden, Adam became conscious of himself instead of God. His conscience was ignited. Shame became a reality for the first time. “I’ve not done right; I made a mistake there, I messed up. I’m embarrassed by that. Satan awakened the knowledge of good and evil -that was good that was bad. And while we are dealing with the conscience (that was good or bad) we are far from the tree of Life. After the confession of our sin, we have a clear conscience with God and with men.
When we receive Life from Him, we leave Gods presence with joy, direction, confidence, and authority. So Satan tries to keep us from Life in God's presence by bringing an accusation to us whenever we approach Gods presence. His favorite weapon is an accusation
Jesus said “I come that you might have life, but Satan comes only to steal and destroy. To rob, steal and destroy what? Life! Those precious, holy, inspiring moments when God speaks to our spirit. He comes to rob that life!
Maybe this week you have been robbed by condemnation but it won’t be your conscience accusing you any longer - It is only the devil.
Heb 9:14 how much more will the blood of the Messiah, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from dead actions so that we may serve the living God!
Christ has purged our conscience from an evil conscience. We are to be only conscious of God now. Satan seeks to deceive us into thinking we should be still conscious of our past struggles.
Friend our conscience is purged of all the past dead works of the flesh we have done. We are not conscious of ourselves but conscious of Him. We are no longer sin conscious but Son conscious.

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God forgives and He forgets. God's forgiveness is full, it's free and it's final.

I will remember sin no more, for I will be merciful regarding their wrong deeds, and I will never again remember their sins." Hebrews 8:12

Satan wants us remembering and feeling bad about the sin which God does not even remember. God is over it. He's moved on- it’s a new day. He only has mercy for you today, no thoughts of yesterday, He does not remember past mistakes and failures. As distant as the east is from the west, that is how far He has removed our sins from us. Psalms 103:12

God has dealt with our sin and our shame. Oftentimes we confess sins and we believe we are forgiven but we still feel some sense of shame. Shame hangs over us like a cloud. Many times we know we are forgiven but we don't feel cleansed. That feeling of failure and unworthiness Satan will seek to exploit. Regrets can be about what you think of your past. But God has made provision for not only our guilt but our shame too. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 1Jn 1:9

God only sees our failures as a lesson. A lesson in Love!. When Jonah failed God in his mission to Nineveh, the lesson God wanted him to learn was the lesson of love. When the gourd grew overhead then died, Jonah was miserable for himself, but Gods point was - shouldn’t I have had compassion on these people? Jonah couldn’t be a success until he learned to love like God.

When Peter failed three times, Jesus asked him “do you love me?” three times. The declaration of love was necessary to undo the sense of failure. When Peter was asked to feed the sheep it was to show love. The essence of success is love.
Friend failure is only ever a failure if the lesson of God love for us and others is not learned. Love never fails and love re-stores failure.

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You are no different from everybody else in the world. The devil will tell you that your sins are worse, and your mistakes are unique. That nobody else has ever had those terrible thoughts, but friend your struggles are the same as everybody else’s. Your critical thoughts about others or about sex have all been thought before, and God knew all of this before He chose you.

God never looks at people as failures, only learners. God uses failure to reveal Himself as a God of steadfast love. How else can you reveal yourself to your wife as a forgiving, loving, kind, patient person until she disappoints you, annoys you, or opposes you? You can't. This is why the angels don't preach. They can't sing the song of the redeemed. But we can -we know what it is like to be forgiven.

Through our failure, God is teaching us of His steadfast love. He is not saying we should fail or try to fail but He knows we will. Think of the story of a woman caught in adultery. What amazes you the failure of the lady? No the beauty of Jesus!

In the parable of the two debtors, one man owed 50 dollars to the man who owed 5 million dollars to a third man. The third man forgave the debt of 5 million but the forgiven man still went out and demanded the 50 dollars from the man who owed him such a small amount. Jesus said that He expected the behaviour of the 5 million dollar debtor, to be changed by the love and compassion that he had been shown. In the same way, God shows steadfast love and forgiveness to us so it will produce the same characteristic in us. If we are not able to rejoice and receive his full forgiveness and release from guilt, we don’t become people of graciousness and mercy towards others.

Friend, God uses our failures to demonstrate his continuing heartfelt grace and love toward us.

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God’s love never fails and his mercy never runs dry. God loves you with an everlasting and steadfast love. He loved us when we were sinners and nothing has changed. If He loved you then, He must love you more now that you are His child.

Deut 7:9 Be certain, then, that the Lord your God is God; whose faith and mercy are unchanging, who keeps His word through a thousand generations to those who have love for him and keep His laws;

Mercy is a more common word in the Old Testament than love, but it means the same so it is usually translated loving-kindness. Or covenant mercies - kheh'-sed from the Hebrew means kindness; loving-kindness, mercy, pity. Mercy is the motivation in Gods' heart that makes Him good toward men and leads Him to offer covenants to relieve man’s misery. Mercy is the core of His being.

Ps 136, Says God lays out the heavens because of His mercy. God also made covenants because of His mercy. Everything waits on His mercy.

Deuteronomy 7.6 says that God delivers men because of His covenant mercy and His mercy leads people to repentance. Preaching the mercy of God does not make people sin more but it creates a response and a desire to please Him.

“Solomon said, “O Jehovah, the God of Israel, there is no God like thee, in heaven above, or on the earth beneath; who keeps covenant and loving kindness with thy servants, that walk before thee with all their heart” 1Ki 8:23

Friend, His mercy is not running out. The answer to shame and insecurity is to understand that the loving-kindness, steadfast love or the mercies of God are new every morning for you.

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The degree of our repentance will determine the degree of supernatural life that God can invade your life with. Paul tells us what true repentance looks like.

2Co 7:10 For godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation, not to be regretted; but the sorrow of the world produces death.

2Co 7:11 For observe this very thing, that you sorrowed in a godly manner: What diligence it produced in you, what clearing of yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what vehement desire, what zeal, what vindication! In all things you proved yourselves to be clear in this matter.

When you have godly sorrow it will work in you:

Diligence; where we take up your sins one by one and ask the Holy Spirit to show you what you have done to hurt your own life, the life of others and most of all, the Living God. If need be, make a list.

Repentance means that we will want to clear ourselves; where we ask God to help us be absolutely honest and real. Let nothing remain hidden in the heart and remove it from yourself thoroughly.

It means indignation, where we allow the Holy Spirit to help us to first see and convict us of sin, then to hate and forsake our sin. Also fear, as if the list of your behaviors will be read out by God on judgment day and Zeal, where you have an intensely strong passion for making things right.

Finally to repent means, Revenge, where we take some kind of destructive action towards a representation of your wrong. Break or burn it or make restitution.

Friend, repentance is Christ’s keyword to all people in the Gospels and still to the Church. “Remember therefore from whence you are fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come to you quickly, and will remove your candlestick out of his place, except you repent.” Revelation 2:5

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The disciples were worried but safe. Still the water was in the boat. It doesn’t say in the story but somehow they got the water out of their boat and got to the other side.
Jesus said “Let us cross over.” And He will take His church across the sea of life no matter how big the storm. We will get to the other side. Jesus started this trip and he will finish it.
He accepts responsibility for your finishing while you are with him on His boat on his mission this is what He says. - I will build my church. - I will let no one snatch them out of my hand. - The gates of hell shall not prevail. - Having begun a good working you he shall perform it.

Friend, this is about reaching the other side. Getting through life and finishing the race. God intends we cross over the sea of life and finish life well. He is committed to getting us over. Our faith just needs to be in His ability to keep us not in our ability to hold on.

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A number of years ago I was in a worship time and I heard a voice speak to me to do something with was not bad in any way but I just wasn’t sure it was God. Initially, because I heard this voice in the worship time, I thought it must be God. However it didn't sound like Him and I'd never heard a voice like that before, so I wasn’t sure. If it hadn’t of been a good thing it was suggesting, I would have dismissed it straight away. I was confused and then condemned as I struggle to reconcile who had spoken. If it was the devil, I would never do it but if it was God and I don’t do it, I could lose His blessing because of disobedience.

I decided it was the devil and still fought condemnation for some time. Part of the problem was I didn’t think that the devil could just turn up in the presence of God like that, when I was worshipping God. I guess I should have twigged but have since then I’ve discovered that he often turns up in God’s presence to condemn.

In the book of Zachariah 3, Joshua the High Priest is standing before the Lord and Satan was standing at his right hand to oppose him. There is Satan right in the presence of God. Right when God is speaking to you and wanting to bless you and speak to you the devil is accusing you. We might come into the presence of God to hear and to receive life but many times there is a battle that first must be won. The battle to hear the Lords voice, over the enemy's voice. “You’re not worthy of blessing; God has nothing to say to you; you’ll have to much better that that, if you expect God to really love you.”

But v4 God speaks above the accusation, “See I have removed your iniquity from you and I will clothe on with rich robes of my righteousness”

And friend, our Fathers word, is the final word.

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In the early days, secular work was seen as a lesser calling, but somehow now it has been reversed - work is now the new idol tackled with religious devotion. Work is not meant to be the goal; it is meant to the goal, which is to find fulfilment in serving others and glorifying God. Lately, what used to be work ethic, morphed into idolatry. Work has become God. People are offering their lives to work - sacrificing the family and health on the altar of the corporation. Service becomes a human achievement. Divine calling became a personal career. Fulfilment from feeling accepted by God now comes from the degree of success at work. Work becomes everything for the wrong reasons and motivation is everything.

When work becomes addictive or a buzz so you have to do more of it, we are beginning to define our identity by it to gain our sense of worth from it.

The reason we live and work is all-important. It defines our growth as a disciple of Jesus Christ. The boss wants more and more time; the family is seeing less and less so there is no time for ministry at the church. Soon Sunday is a recovery day and people cease to live as Christians.

Friend, it’s about balance. There is a vital ministry in the market place but there is to be a vital ministry in the family of God too.

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