07/27/2024
✍🏼 ✍🏼
I read on the wall of my dear Sister Michele Kingdom Royalty that when people saw a barren woman named Sarah, Abraham’s wife, God saw the mother of all nations. When people saw a young impoverished simple shepard of sheep in David, God already saw a mighty King of Israel. When the people saw a shackled unworthy prisoner in Joseph, God saw an extraordinary minister of Egypt. Then it went on to say:
“Never mind what people see in you. God has a perfect plan for you!”
Well, praise Jesus for those words being one of the first things I read this morning when I opened this app! I’ll tell you, if I ever believed that being a follower of Christ was going to bring “less” unjust treatment by others into my life I was sorely mistaken…
…but I was mistaken by something else too.
See, much of the suffering I endured before meeting Christ was truly avoidable and unnecessary, or so it seems, but was it? Would I be here telling you that this world not only NEEDS a Savior, but “HAS” a Savior if I didn’t endure the anguish that moved me to finally stop searching for truth and meaning in every corner of the world but up? Would I have finally confessed that I needed saving at all, and that no other “god” (including me, myself and YOU) is capable of rescuing this once broken and beat blindly lost sheep? Most definitely not.
When once of this world while in this world I was often persecuted for trying to hold people accountable for the harm they caused, because trust and believe, people will go to deadly extremes when forced to face a mirror they are not in control of; but who am I to tell you how wrong or unrighteous you are? Even if I stood eye to eye, judging Jack the Ripper, I’d still be pointing at a speck of dust next to the plank poisoning my own eye!
When Jesus’ disciple, Paul, wrote to his people saying, “I am the biggest sinner,” he was already saved, yet he didn’t write I “was” the biggest sinner. He said I AM the biggest sinner. Our ever so limited carnal minds are wonted to make comparisons of all kinds, but especially when it comes to the case of our own wickedness- the wickedness we are born with and the wickedness we reap as we move through this world without God, and even more so after we have our “Jesus-encounter.”
Honestly, the carnal mind of man is so often a grave hindrance to the potential which awaits the promise of our eternal minds, or shall I say our “God-gifted souls.” This is why it was so easy for me to believe those who called me worthless, and “too far gone” to bring any good to this world, and thank God I did, because I realized in my defeat that I AM unworthy and without Jesus I am also soon to be “too far gone,” perhaps given over to my reprobate self-righteous mind!
The system of this world, with the enemy of God as its CEO, will convince us that we are the “gods of ourselves” and worthy of conquering the world! It’s an attractive and alluring trap for sure, but it is void of our true purpose, which is to access that certain measure of faith He instilled within each of us, and when we finally realize we are all drowning men who need Jesus, use it to trust that He will not allow us to sink, but not because we have earned such a lifeboat.
No, we cannot “earn” God’s love. He is love in its most genuine form, therefore His love is fixed. The only love between us and God that needs adjusting is our love for Him, and trust that He is a gracious God- slow to anger and quick to forgive. Nevertheless, we cannot be forgiven in self-righteousness. We cannot be saved in resistance. We cannot
be liberated from what we see as freedom. We cannot be trusted in disobedience. We cannot be believed in rebellion. We cannot be redeemed from safety, and we most definitely cannot see how loved we are while in denial!
I AM the biggest sinner who needs forgiveness, and so are you my friend, yet if you believe your redemption stems from any ground but the golden roads of Heaven, you will continue to sail the seas of this world a drowning man who rejects rescue- unwilling to grab ahold of your only source of life because you’ve been deceived into believing that if you could just trust in “yourself” enough- just believe in “yourself” a little more- just follow “your” heart a little further- you too could walk on water.
It is true that God works in mysterious ways. For some He will break every chain of His captive in a moment’s time, while for others He rips off one vail at a time. According to our faith He will do whatever He has purposed for us, and given He is the God of love, we should be chasing His purpose for us as fast as I have admittedly chased a waxed bag of he**in.
I pray that for all today. I pray that you awaken to that certain measure of faith within you, and that you understand that it is the very essence behind your searching- searching high, searching low, searching yourself, searching me, him and her, searching every lower case “god” in decks of cards, glass balls, planets and stars, trees and soil… yes, you are searching for a reason and yes, the god of this world will pull out every punch to deceive you into his kingdom, but the God of all that ever was, is and will be- of all that is good, sweet and serene- is WHY you search and He longs for you to stop chasing shadows!
How did I turn from being a free-loving, all truths are “the truth” believing, baby-killing, bisexual Jezebel into a biblically-believing, blood-washed, sold-out follower of the Gospel of Christ?? How did I go from never escaping constant pain to knowing eternal peace? How did I go from trying to disprove Christ as God to longing to share His Grace with the world? Well, when I realized that every god I served led to destruction or to nowhere, I finally looked up and said, “Ok, Jesus, if You are real, then reveal Yourself in a way that “I” can understand You!” And well… He did, and still does!
If you haven’t had your Jesus-encounter yet trust that you will, for whether you believe or not there will come a day very soon when every knee shall bow and every tongue confess Him as the One true Lord. Now, whether in return you hear from Him, “Depart from Me! I never knew you,” or you hear, “Well done My good and faithful servant,” will have a lot to do with how you choose to go from this moment onward.
So I invite you to ask that same question of Him that I asked from that lonely hospital bed a hundred miles from anything I knew as home, almost fully submerged in the waters I was fooled into believing I could walk on without Him. However, I first invite you to admit you need saving before you call on Your only Savior, for that Savior sees in you what no one else can see, and He sees it with a love no one else can give.
God bless you all abundantly, but more than that, may God bless you ETERNALLY!
🔥☝🏼🙏
“For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him. Whoever believes in Him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s One and Only Son.”
~ [ John 3:16-18 ] 📖