Not the Victim

Colossians 1:22-23, “…he has brought you back as his friends. He has done this through his death on the cross in his own human body. As a result, he has brought you into the very presence of God, and you are holy and blameless as you stand before him without a single fault. But you must continue to believe this truth and stand in it firmly. Don’t drift away from the assurance you received when you heard the Good News. The Good News has been preached all over the world, and I, Paul, have been appointed by God to proclaim it.” 

Galatians 5:1,4, “So Christ has really set us free. Now make sure that you stay free, and don’t get tied up again in slavery to the law… For if you are trying to make yourselves right with God by keeping the law, you have been cut off from Christ! You have fallen away from God’s grace.”

I have spent months writing about what God has shown me.  As I read some of my writings, I realized that sometimes what I want to convey just isn’t there.  I hear in my head what I want to say and I know in my heart what I’m learning but it doesn’t always translate the way I would want.

God is working wonders in my life.  I am changing daily and growing stronger in Him but all of this started with God getting a hold of my heart and setting me back on solid ground. 

As I have gone through the past few years of my life, I have encountered many trials.  Some I have come through with great success while other times, I have fallen flat on my face.  I am not perfect, have never claimed to be, and have many flaws but that is where God steps in and begins to work.

When we fall into sin or experience a difficult trial, we reach a place where we cannot hold on any longer and we have to release control to God.  It is then that He begins to reveal our flaws and sinful ways.  He brings them to the surface.  Not to condemn but to correct and to make us more like Him.  It is a process but God has brought to light the areas of my life that are strongholds.  Areas that I need to work on in order to be more like Him and less like the world.  I am learning to surrender daily and remember my First Love.


The enemy is constantly attacking and condemning.  He is quick to remind me of my past and all of our failures.  He uses people around me to accuse and remind but I must not become distracted.  Those types of things take my focus off of God and the price that Christ paid for my sins.  When that happens my focus is placed back on myself, which leads me right back into sin.  The pattern is simple and easy to fall into and Satan knows this very thing. He has great success in this way.


Here is what I have learned.  I have made mistakes.  I have sinned.  I have repented of my sin. I have been forgiven of my sin.  I now choose to move forward, surrender my life to God and serve Him.


I have been through a lot.  I am not a victim.  I refuse to be the victim.  I do not want to be weak and will admit my failures. I am suffering consequences of my own choices as well as choices of others in my life but I am choosing to advance down the path that God has laid out before me.  I want to reflect THE light for others who have found themselves in a dark place.  I want to use my experiences to share with others what God has done in my life and what He can do in theirs as well.


From here forward, I want to be the friend that stays.  I have learned much over the course of my journey.  I have learned to love the unlovable.  Forgive the unforgiveable.  Cherish those that have done evil.  See those that are evil as children of God. Friends have failed me through my darkest days. They didn’t understand my choices. They couldn’t endorse my actions. They chose to walk away, not physically but withdrew their availability to me and shut themselves up into a safe box where they were able to avoid my situation. It was painful and it still hurts but God is using it in my life.  He is teaching me to love and not condemn.  He is teaching me to speak the truth in love not in judgment.  He is teaching me to stay and be there when the world says walk away. He is teaching me to stay through the conflict.  To stay through the struggles.  To stay through the suffering.  To stay through the discomfort.  To stay through the misunderstandings.  He is beginning to weave His character into mine and I am becoming more like Him.


Because of His great love, His great mercy and His great forgiveness I am usable despite my failures.  That is how awesome and amazing God is and He offers it to everyone who comes to Him. 


There is no condemnation when Christ is within us.


“Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, ² because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you<sup value="[a]”>[a] free from the law of sin and death.” Romans 8:1-2  

Counterfeit Christians

“But blessed is the one who trusts in the LORD, whose confidence is in him. They will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.”

Jeremiah 17:7-8



No you are not seeing things, I did write about this yesterday but I needed the reminder today. I opened up my devotionals this evening and found this from Greg Laurie. It was really helpful and just what I needed. It is all about God’s timing. WOW!!


 
Here is another story Jesus told: “The Kingdom of Heaven is like a farmer who planted good seed in his field. But that night as the workers slept, his enemy came and planted weeds among the wheat, then slipped away.”

— Matthew 13:24–25

Even back in the apostle Paul’s day, there were counterfeit Christians. He wrote to the church at Corinth, “I have traveled on many long journeys. I have faced danger from rivers and from robbers. I have faced danger from my own people, the Jews, as well as from the Gentiles. I have faced danger in the cities, in the deserts, and on the seas. And I have faced danger from men who claim to be believers but are not” (2 Corinthians 11:26). There are a lot of people today who are putting on a great performance, but it is not genuine. It is not real. They are posers.

In the Parable of the Wheat and the Tares found in Matthew 13, Jesus talked about people like these—genuine imitations. Jesus was not referring to struggling believers, but to phonies. He was talking about actors. And in this parable, He exposed one of the ways in which the devil works. Specifically it is one of the ways the devil will be working in the end times: through imitation.

This parable mentions two sowings. The first is by a farmer who sows seed in his field, hoping for a good crop. The second sowing is done by an enemy who plants tares, or weeds, right next to what the farmer just sowed, with the purpose of uprooting the good seed. A tare was a darnel seed that initially looked like wheat. But it is not until it is fully grown that it becomes evident that it is not wheat at all.

There are counterfeit Christians today, just as there were in the first century. Yet it will be up to God to ultimately decide who they are. In that final day, He will determine whether someone is the Christian they profess to be.


 
Greg Laurie