I have many masks, all colors, some plain, some printed, all constrict my breathing and fog up my glasses. My friends and I are planning a bonfire party and asking everyone to bring their masks, we'll burn them and they will be gone! Of course we'll wait until the vaccine is officially out and everyone has been innoculated. We don't want Covid to stay around, so we try to follow the rules.
This is a bit like our sinful nature - if we don't confront it and smash it dead, you can be sure it will reappear in our lives. There is only one way to remove our sin. God didn't send us a vaccine, He sent us Jesus. We need to accept Jesus who died to pay the penalty for our sin so we can be "holy and blameless" in God's eyes.
Jude 24 - 25 "To him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy--to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore!"
These are such powerful verses. Notice that we don't keep ourselves from falling (failing) 'him' refers to Jesus. Because we've been reconciled to God through Christ, God our heavenly Father sees us as perfect. He sees his son Jesus in us, not our flesh that continues to want to sin. We are no longer under a law of behavior - Jesus fulfilled the law so now we live according to God's grace. We don't keep the law to be a Christian, we keep the law to our best ability because we are a Christian. We have the Holy Spirit living in us and this is where we get our strength to resist a sinful life.
Romans 8: "...the Spirit helps us in our weakness". vs.29 "For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son..."
Amazing, isn't it? God gave us his Holy Spirit to help us in our weakness and He has predestined us to be like Jesus! From my very practical experience of living as a believer for so many years, I know this will not completely take place until we are in heaven with the Lord. But, in God's eyes it has already happened. Amen!
The more we see ourselves through God's perspective, the easier it will be to 'behave'. When we lift each up instead of being critical and mean-spirited, we are encouraging others to 'walk in the Spirit' and be who we are - a child of God; nothing can be better than that.
Our American holiday of Thanksgiving won't be the same this year due to the Covid pandemic. This is a world-wide problem so you all are suffering the restrictions. We do the best we can and praise the Lord for allowing us to find a vaccine. The U.S. will be sending it all over the world as I understand. In spite of our problems this year, we can find something to be grateful for - first on my list is being loved by God. I can handle anything if I remember that. Many blessings to all of you readers.💗😇
Thank you Lord for sending many requests my way to continue writing my blog. I will be faithful in doing that.
