Continuing in the key verse we see what specifically we can
forget about God. We can forget that God brought us up out of
I waited patiently for the LORD; he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear and put their trust in the LORD. Psalm 40: 10-3
Jesus Christ reached down into the depths of our
And so the heart hardens with pride. We think that by telling the world how bad they are that we are somehow doing the will of God. Somehow Christ is left out of their Christianity. If we are not careful we can become paragons of virtuous perfection; forgetting that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. We can even twist Scripture to fit our burgeoning pride. Recently, I had someone actually tell me that their harsh stance with the world was Christian because Jesus "beat people with a whip." No He did not. In the story about the moneychangers, Jesus used the whip to scatter the animals and he overturned their tables. He did not hit them. He did not whip them. Furthermore, if you understand the situation, you would understand that the moneychangers were fleecing people, primarily unbelievers. This was not Jesus taking a stand against the immorality of the world but rather against those who would seek to treat the unsaved poorly or take advantage of them.
These are the people who stand at gay parades with signs saying God hates them. There's an effective witnessing tool. God does not hate them beloved. He hates the sin; just as much as he hates our sin. The truth is we can feel better about our own sin by decrying the sins of others. Now, does this mean we turn a blind eye toward sin? Absolutely not. Does this mean that we cannot take a principled stand as Christians in a fallen world? Of course we can. But we should not be Jonah. We should not stand off on a hill hoping against the world. We should not be surprised or angry when the world that walks in darkness does not understand the things of God. We should not approach things in arrogance and then hide behind Christ for our defense. The Apostle Paul reminds us:
Do everything in love. 1Corinthians 16:14
Jesus actually said that they will know we are His when we treat each other in love. If we cannot witness in love, then we should not witness. In our zeal to teach about hell, let us not forget heaven. In our passion for speaking against sin, let us not forget there is forgiveness. The world may be in darkness but they understand hypocrisy when they see it. A study has concluded that 72% of unchurched people believe that Christians are hypocrites. How does that affect the witness of Christ? Amidst all the political rhetoric about what Christians are supposed to stand for we have been given one charge winning the lost. But that is difficult for a lot of us. It is hard work to have to live correctly as your first witness to the lost. It is even harder sometimes to have to break down those barriers of communication and actually tell someone what Jesus has done for us. It's much easier to just tell them they are wrong and going to hell. But there is no love in that. It is a loveless Christianity being practiced by some whose hearts have grown hard with pride. Who think they know better. Who have forgotten how far down God had to go to save them. They stand off on a hill and wait for judgment against a world that doesn't know its left hand from its right. I just pray that we realize arrogance will not save anyone. Only the God we too easily forget can do that.
Father God, we come to you in thanks today. We thank you for
saving us when we did not deserve it. When we were still deep
in our pit. Deep in our sin. Deep
in our slavery. But we thank you that you reached down into