I want to quote a bit of the passage where our key verse for this Rant series is found. Romans 6:11-14, "Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God. For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace." Wow. There's a lot there. What I want to pull out of it for today is the juxtaposition between sin and God. Those seem to be the two side of the coin, right? Dead to sin... alive to God. Unrighteousness on one side and righteousness on the other. Law on one side and grace on the other. Old things that HAVE passed away on one side, and the new abundant, everlasting, eternal, Resurrection Life of God on the other. The cross... the cross was so massive that I think, even 2,000 years later, that we don't fully understand it. My mom once said it like this, "Either the cross changed everything or it didn't change anything." I agree. Because everything needed to change. Not just a covenant. Not just a testament. Everything. There's a phrase in Matthew chapter 19 in the Amplified Bible where Jesus is speaking about "the new age [the Messianic rebirth of the world]." That, to me, is where we are now. On this side of the cross. BECAUSE of the cross. On the cross Jesus drew us all into Himself and died. The second death. The death OF death. The death that got us out of all of our trouble WITH sin and death. Basically making sure the coin that has God on one side and sin on the other could only ever come up on the God side. He cursed the fig tree (the tree of death, the tree of knowledge of good and evil) because it couldn't produce any fruit. He didn't want us to try to turn over a new leaf. He knew we needed to get into a totally new tree. The Tree of Life. In which He is the vine and we are the branches. The tree on which the fruit of the Spirit (which is love) grows. Jesus remade the world in His own image. Getting rid of everything NOT Him and leaving only love. The problem is with our reckoning. Sin isn't the problem. Our sin consciousness is the problem. What we need to do is yield ourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead. Use the mind of Christ that's already in us. Let God renew our minds and watch everything else flow from there. The mind, the heart, our innermost being. That's what matters. That's who we really are. Jesus--God in the flesh, love in a body. God in OUR flesh. Love in OUR body. That's how we live. We don't try to live "our" best life. We don't even try to live Jesus's life. Too much trying. Nobody can live Jesus's life except Jesus. We live IN Him. We are dead and our life is his in Him. He is the one living... in us, and through us, and as us. All we have to do is rest. Believe. Walk by faith. LET ourselves (and each other) be who we really are. Grace. Not law. You can't legislate health, or happiness, or morality. Those are issues of the heart. What you CAN do is simply believe. Leave the old behind and walk in newness of life!

The old has passed away. The new has come forth. We don't need to be held back or held down by our pasts. Or by anything else, if I'm being perfectly honest. It's my favorite verse, "Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy" (Jude 1:24). We don't have to fall. We don't have to stumble. The Lamb of God took away the sin of the world. We don't have to deal with sin. What we find ourselves dealing with is sin CONSCIOUSNESS. THINKING that we are sinners. Dragging around the corpse of that dead old man. Jesus dealt with sin. Defeated it. Took it away. Cast it into the lake of fire. It's not for us. We're not sinners. We're saints. Where sin abounded--before the cross--grace did much more abound ON the cross. Through the cross. Because of the cross. Look, if you're dead you can't be prosecuted for the crimes you committed when you were alive. It's like getting a blank page. A fresh start. A new beginning. Wherein you don't have to let anything that came before dictate to what comes next. Except in the case of experience. Learning and growing. You don't have to punish yourself, is my point. Or let anyone else punish you. You are NOT what people call you, but you ARE what you answer to. What you believe about yourself is what is, in a very real sense, what is true about yourself. So don't let anything other than Jesus define you. You are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. Look at Galatians 2:20, "I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me." This is a big one. This is the whole "doing things out of the posture of rest" idea. The life I live is lived by the faith OF the Son of God. Jesus's faith. Jesus's life. HIM living His own abundant, everlasting, eternal, Resurrection Life of love in me, and through me, and as me. HIS Spirit. HIS life. HIS love. Filling me up to overflowing until there's not room enough to receive it. Until there's not room for anything else. If I'm full of love I don't have room for sin. God is light and there is no darkness in Him at all. How could there be? How could light shine and darkness not flee? When light shines darkness has no choice BUT to flee. That's the power of light. The power of love. Like Abraham Lincoln said, "I destroy my enemies by making them my friends." We're not out to hurt anybody. We're out to love everybody! That's a life worth living. That's what this life is for, and that's what this life is all about. So focus on those good things. Those excellent and perfect things. Don't let mistakes define you or disqualify you. Nothing can drag you down when Jesus is holding you up. Glory to Him that is able to keep us from falling. When you're standing on the Rock you cannot be shaken. When you're walking in faith you're walking in the light. Walking in love! And when you're walking in love you WILL get to where you're supposed to go. A dead man can't walk unless there is a new power moving his feet. That power is Jesus. We don't follow in His foot steps. We let Him make His own foot steps with our feet. That power that gets us moving... is love!

I remember very clearly being at a camp meeting in West Virginia and the preacher saying, "If you've ever sinned raise your hand." And, of course, everybody did. Which was the point. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, right? Well, when I say "everybody did" I'm exaggerating. Because the person sitting next to me... didn't. And when I asked them about it they said, "That's the old me. The dead me. I'm not taking the rap for that." Blew my mind. Because it was a practical application of all the stuff we had been learning. To a degree that even the preacher himself didn't see. Changed my whole outlook on just about everything. Swept the whole, "I'm just a sinner saved by grace" mentality out of my head and out of my heart. Because the truth is... if you're saved by grace you aren't a sinner anymore. If you've been transformed... you aren't what you used to be anymore. There was a change. A shift. And not the turning over of a new leaf. Something much more radical and complete than that. It was going from one tree (the tree of knowledge of good and evil, the tree of death) to the other tree (the Tree of Life that is Jesus... that is love). Jesus cursed the fig tree because it couldn't produce fruit. God rid of it. Took it off the table and out of our road. So that we don't have to deal with it anymore. Or struggle with it. We can enjoy the love feast that God is and eat the fruit of the Spirit. "Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God" (John 3:3). We can't be born again until we die again. The first death was Adam eating from that tree of death. The second death was Jesus dying on the cross. The death OF death. So, really, we don't need to die again. Jesus's death WAS our death. And I hear a lot of people say it like this, "Jesus died so we could live." And that's not exactly true. The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth is that Jesus died so we could die. We needed that second death so we could be born again. We needed to let go of everything that had come before so that we could move on without it. So that we could walk in newness of life. So that we could be who we were created to be. Let me quote 2 Corinthinas 5:17, "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." A new creature. With old things done and gone. How many of you have sinned? Oh. None of you? Perfect. Bunch of saints in here. Bunch of the righteousness of God in here. Now that JESUS has dealt with sin--the Lamb of God who took away the sin of the world--all we need to do is take care of the sin consciousness. BE transformed into what we've already BEEN transformed into. By the renewing of our mind. By the realization of the truth about who we are. Who we are in Christ. Which is who Christ is in us. Letting the mind of Christ that is already in us... BE in us. Using that mind. Thinking the thoughts of God. Thoughts of peace and not evil. That expected end that is really life without end. Seeing God clearly so that we can see ourselves clearly. The sinner is dead and gone. The saint is walking in newness of life. Jesus's death freed us from sin and death and now we simply need to reckon ourselves dead to sin and alive unto God!

I thought I was going to Rant about Jesus (love) as our safe hiding place, but then my Spirit got filled up with two verses that I feel are important to explore. The first one is Colossians 3:3, "For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God." Which does actually fit with the hiding place theme. Safe and sound. But what I want to really look at for the next few days is the connection between that verse and this one, "Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord" (Romans 6:11). Here's the deal. We ARE dead. That has happened, well, twice actually. It happened first when we were "in" Adam and he ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil (the tree of death) and on that day he (we) surely died. And then we had a second death on the cross. Which was the death OF death. Look at Revelation 20:14, "And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death." Which, by the way, is why I don't believe hell is a lake of fire where God sends people in order to receive eternal torment. How can hell BE a lake of fire, when hell was cast INTO the lake of fire? And if God is a consuming fire, why do we think fire is anything but that purifying LOVE that is God? But I digress. My point is, death died on the cross. Or, really, three days after the cross when Jesus rose from the dead. Point being, we have had two deaths already. And that's plenty. We don't need to die. We need to understand that we already did. We need to reckon ourselves dead. Dead to sin. Dead to unbelief. We need to get to the place where we understand what it means in 2 Corinthians 5:17, "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." The old man died. And I like the picture of that old man dying in the watery grave of baptism. That, to me, is HOW we reckon ourselves dead to sin. That, to me, is how we walk in newness of life. It isn't about eternal salvation in the sense that we need to do something in order to get "saved." Absent from the body is present with the Lord (2 Corinthians 5:8). Jesus wasn't worried about the "afterlife." He came that we might have LIFE and have it more abundantly. He came that we might experience and enjoy HIS abundant, everlasting, eternal, Resurrection Life of love HERE. Now. On this earth. Ruling and reigning in love as kings and priests. But in order for us to be able to experience and enjoy His life... we had to get rid of that "Adam" life. And when I say "we" had to get rid of it, I mean HE had to get rid of it. For us. Because we couldn't do it. Trying as hard as we could to be someone we're not only ever amounted in frustration and failure. You can't be someone you're not. So stop trying. If you want to find your life you have to look for it in the right place. It is hid with Christ in God. In love. Look there, and you will find it. Look in the mirror with an open face and see your true identity. Which is Jesus. God in the flesh. Love in a body. God in YOUR flesh. Love in YOUR body. Stop trying to be someone you're not and embrace who you really are. Which is who you are in Christ. Which is who Christ is in you. You're dead. Don't worry about what has come before. You live in Him as He lives in you. Walk in newness of life!

This is one aspect of the cloud that I didn't have a chance to really get into in this Rant series. When the people of Israel left Egypt, "...the LORD went before them by day in the pillar of acloud, to lead them the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light; to go by day and night: He took not away the pilar of the cloud by day, nor the pillar of fire by night, from before the people." (Exodus 13:21-22). God was the cloud. Not just His hand--though that, to me, is a powerful picture of His provision from us. Giving, as John 3:35 says, all things into Jesus's hand (our hand). Because of His love for us. When it was light outside, He showed us the way by showing us a cloud. When it was dark out, He showed us the way by showing us a pillar of fire. Point being, no matter what it looks like... God has our back. He's always there for us. No matter what. Nothing can separate us from the love of God. He will lead, if we are willing to follow. And I think it's both powerful and important that He was leading from the shape and image and picture of a cloud. Look at what Paul has to say about this in 1 Corinthians 10:1-4, "Moreover, brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant, how that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through the sea; And were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea; And did all eat the same spiritual meat; And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ." It wasn't just God leading them. It was God baptizing them. Into Himself. The cloud engulfed the temple that Solomon built to the point that the priests couldn't even enter into it or minister therein. Because, when you get right down to it, it's all about God. HE will minister HIMSELF, if we get out of the way and let Him. If we stop trying so hard. If we assume a posture of rest. I heard a preacher say it like this, "When you work, God will rest. But when you rest, God will work." I believe God is too much of a gentleman to force His will and His way upon us. He makes it available to us. He makes HIMSELF available to us. He leads... but He doesn't drag us behind Him kicking and screaming. And I really like the part that Paul wrote about the Rock that followed them. The people had God in front (as a cloud or a pillar of fire) and Jesus behind them. They were completely covered. He was leading the way, and He was their rear guard. A father is a protecter. And there is no greater father than our heavenly Father. There is no greater protector than God. I think I might get into that starting tomorrow. How He is our refuge and our safe place. But for tonight I want to finish this Rant series with the idea that we've been working on for the last few days. Clouds aren't necessarily bad. The "bad," black, low-flying cloud was swept away by the wind of the Holy Spirit. The Lamb of God took away the sin of the world. And now we can see things clearly--whether it is light outside or dark. Because God takes the shape that we need Him to take. Be it a rain cloud in a dry season or a pillar of fire in a cold, dark night. Whatever we need... we find it in God. Whatever we need, we find it in love!

We all know I like the law of first mention, right? When the first use of something in the Bible sets the stage for how it that term or concept will be used going forward. The first time the word "cloud" is used in the KVJ is Genesis 9:13. This was after the flood, right? God talking to man. Let's read verses 13-15. "I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant berween me and the earth. And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud: And I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh." There's a lot there. I want to pick out and point out a few key things. The first being, I've been talking about the silver lining that I believe every cloud has. But how this takes it even a bit further. God put his bow on it. As a token. A covenant. A promise. The cloud ran out of rain. And God said He would remember that and not use a flood as a means of destroying the flesh. But if I can get a little bit deep here, the destruction of the flesh is not a bad thing. It's a good thing. Look at Romans 7:18, "For I know tha in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing..." The flesh needed to be washed in the water of baptism. Destroyed, in a very real sense. But the point for today is that God did what needed to be done and never needs to do it again. He put a bow on it. Put a rainbow in it. So that we could see and know and so that HE could see and know. It's a token. A reminder. God brings the rain clouds (filled with living water) into dry situations. But He doesn't want to, or need to, drown us. He gives each situation and season exactly what it needs. All in God's timing. That's the key we need to learn. We are so impatient so often. That microwave mentality. We want it hot and we want it now. We have trouble looking at the big picture. Seeing that all things work together for good. We don't always have to see clouds in a negative way. Jesus (LOVE) blew away the dark cloud. Any clouds left are here for our benefit. They have what we need sometimes. Rain in a drought that DOESN'T turn into a flood. We need rain. It's necessary for life. Rain comes from clouds. Clouds are not a bad thing. God uses them for our benefit. Even if someone means something for evil, God can use it for good. Again, He got rid of the "bad" cloud. So we don't have to worry about that anymore. We can enjoy the benefits from the goodness of our heavenly Father taking care of us and giving us everything we need. That is a father's main role: Providing for his family. God is not only our provider, He is our provision. He has given us everything we need by giving us... Himself. In a very real sense--and we saw this the other day--the cloud is His hand. It is one of the methods He uses in order to bring us water in a dry place. To cleanse us. To restore us. To heal us. Everything has it's time. Everything has it's measure. Rain isn't bad. Clouds aren't bad. We need to see things the way God sees them. And experience and enjoy them as He has set out for us to do. AFTER the flood God put a bow on the cloud. After the cross Jesus blew away the black cloud. And now... all is well!

When it's dark out you can't see clearly. I think we can all agree with that. And for a long long time, a world existed where everybody DIDN'T have a flashlight in their pocket at all times. The night was a very different time and place. But even during the day sometimes it can be dark out. Especially if a storm is coming. If the clouds gather. And I think that's where a lot of us live a lot of the time. Kind of in anticipation of the other shoe dropping. That suspicious feeling when things are going pretty ok... or, in our minds, way too good. "When is the bad stuff going to hit?" So we kind of stumble around under that low-lying black cloud. We let worries and anxieties consume and control us. When, really, what we should be doing is found in 1 Peter 5:7, "Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you." Which, in my opinion, doesn't mean complaining to God all the time. You've probably heard the saying, "Don't tell God how big the storm is, tell the storm how big God is!" It's a shift of focus. A shift of perspective. Casting your cares on the Lord, to me, means simply not worrying anymore. Trusting that your heavenly Father will handle things. Trusting that He cares about you. That's the real issue--it's about trust. Knowing that the storm WILL run out of rain. Knowing that the wind WILL blow the storm clouds away. And, really, HAS blown the storm clouds away. We don't need to wait for God to do anything. Or hope that He will do anything. He already did everything that needed to be done 2,000 years ago on the cross. And, really, even before that. Revelation 13:8 identifies Jesus as, "...the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." Before there was ever a sinner, there was a Saviour. Before there was ever a cloud, there was the light of the world. In the third verse of the Bible it is written, "And God said, Let there be light: and there was light" (Genesis 1:3). Darkness was on the face of the deep, but then God spoke. He interjected something into that darkness. He introduced HIMSELF into that situation. Because He didn't want us to stumble around in the dark. He didn't want us to suffer, or stumble, or fall. Let me quote my key verse for this Rant series again. I think it's so powerful. Romans 8:1-2 in the Message Bible, "With the arrival of Jesus, the Messiah, that fateful dilemma is resolved. Those who enter into Christ's being-here-for-us no longer have to live under a continuous, low-lying black cloud. A new power is in operation. The Spirit of life in Christ, like a strong wind, has magnificently cleared the air, freeing you from a fated lifetime of brutal tyranny at the hands of sin and death." Wow that's good! A way things were and then the way they are now. The more excellent way! Christ's being-here-for-us. Casting our cares on Him because we know He cares for us. That's such a peaceful, easy feeling. Such an amazing way to live. That, in fact and in truth, is how we're SUPPOSED to live! That's who we are, because that's who HE is. So we don't have to worry all the time. We don't have to stumble and fall. He is the One who KEEPS us from falling. Who shines His light (of love) on us, and in us, and through us, and as us!

So there was a drought, right? No rain falling. A very dry season. Which has all sorts of Spiritual connotations. Then this happened, "And Elijah said unto Ahab, Get thee up, eat and drink; for there is a sound of abundance of rain" (1 Kings 18:41). Skip ahead a few verses, "And he said to his servant, Go up now, look toward the sea. And he went up, and looked, and said, There is nothing. And he said, Go again seven times. And it came to pass the seventh time, that he said, Behold, there ariseth a little cloud out of the sea, like a man's hand..." (verses 43, 44). The cloud. The hand of God. That's what brought the rain to the dry land. That's what brought the living water. See, if you only ever think of a cloud like that low-flying black cloud that overshadows you... you will miss out. Not only on the silver lining, but on the cloud's true purpose. Not the black cloud. Not the storm cloud. That's not our focus. But, again, if we see every cloud as bad then we are missing out on the silver lining. We are missing out on the cloud's true purpose. To bring rain. And I, for one, like the rain. It's so important. Such a big part of life. And we see the picture of water in the Bible over and over again. Bread and water. The living water that flows out of our innermost being. Water baptism. There's so much there. And I picked this passage of Scripture specifically because of the connection between the cloud and the hand. The hand of God that holds OUR hand and leads us like the children (of God) that we are. There's a big difference between childish and childlike. Being childish is like throwing a fit when you don't get your way. Being childlike is trusting your heavenly Father to take care of you. One of those is good, and acceptable, and perfect. The other one is throwing a fit when you don't get your own way. One of those is a rain cloud that brings restoration and healing rain. The other one is a black cloud. I guess what I'm trying to say today is that we need to use wisdom and discernment. We need to get to a place where we can see how things are working together for good. Where we can see the big picture. That way we can... if not exactly "accept" everything (because there are things in this life that are unacceptable) but at the very least we can bear things in order to learn the lessons from them. We can grow in one of my favorite fruits of the Spirit--longsuffering. Not fighting back against everything that happens, but sometimes letting things play out. Picking our battles. And really understanding that the only fight left (after Jesus went to the cross and won the war to end all wars) is the good fight of faith. Which isn't fighting to get something, but to lay hold of what we already have. To receive and release, to experience and enjoy, what we've already been given. That's the only fight we should be fighting. Fighting to believe the Word (which is Jesus, which is love) of God. If you're in a dry season... pray for rain. But don't freak out when the clouds start to gather. And remember, on the other side of the coin, that every storm DOES run out of rain. It came to pass, not to stay. Take what you can from situations. Eat the watermelon and spit out the seeds. It's all working together for your good! God is holding you in His hand!

One of my favorite sayings is that every cloud has a silver lining. Because I believe you can always find the good in a situation if you look for it. What you seek is what you will find. What you magnify in your life is what will manifest in your life. Everything--EVERYTHING--can fall into either one of two categorgies: A blessing or a lesson. And, really, when it look at it that way, the lesson is a blessing. The whole blessing in disguise, right? We can always learn and we can always grow and we can always move forward. Romans 8:1-2 in the Message Bible reads like this, "With the arrival of Jesus, the Messiah, that fateful dilemma is resolved. Those who enter into Christ's being-here-for-us no longer have to live under a continuous, low-lying black cloud. A new power is in operation. The Spirit of life in Christ, like a strong wind, has magnificently cleared the air, freeing you from a fated lifetime of brutal tyranny at the hands of sin and death." Kind of a lot there. The point I want to focus on for this Rant series is no longer having to live under a continuous, low-lying black cloud. Because while every cloud DOES have a silver lining, it's even better when the sky is clear and you can see the light shining. The sunshine. The SONshine. And that's where trusting in Jesus comes in. His Spirit of life. Remember when the Holy Spirit descended on the day of Pentecost? "And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting" (Acts 2:2). Add this to that, "The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit" (John 3:8). A very clear and direct connection between the wind and the Holy Spirit. Just so we're clear on what we're talking about. The Holy Spirit, or the Spirit of life in Christ, blows away that black cloud. And guys, I'm telling you, that wind is the only thing that CAN blow away that dark cloud. I always say it like this: If you have a God-shaped, love-shaped hole inside of you... the only thing that could possibly fill iit is God. Love. So when we're looking for answers all over the place, looking for love in all the wrong places, we're just wearing ourselves out and making things worse for ourselves. The thief comes to steal and to kill and to destroy. The thief is the one who tries to enter into the sheepfold any way except through the door. WE rob ourselves of the gift we've been given by trying to earn it. Or by thinking we don't have it. By letting that dark cloud overshadow us. We think WE have to resolve that dilemma. When really, Jesus resolved it for us. He did what needed to be done. He took care of what needed taking care of. You don't need to blow that cloud away. Jesus took care of it. A new power is in operation. Not by my might, nor by my power, it's by the Spirit of God. The Spirit of life. The Spirit of love. Love is the refreshing wind that blew away that dark cloud. The cloud of thinking we are unloved was blown away... by love. The silver lining on every cloud... is love. The sun that shines... is love. It's all about love!

I like to quote Romans 8:28 a lot. It's one of my favorite verses. Today let's start there and go a little further. "And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according ot his purpose. For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed ot the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified" (Romans 8:28-30). Good, good stuff. And to close out this Rant series I really want to focus on the part about being called, justified, and glorified. I think it's important that we understand this. God never requires something that He doesn't first provide. He made grass before he ever made a cow, right? Because he knew the cow would need grass to eat. He is our provider, and He is our provision. He is what we need, and He has given us what we need. By giving us... Himself. Look at the story of Abraham and Isaac. God told Abraham to give his son (which is a type and shadow of God giving His own Son, Jesus) but then, at the end of the day, the true sacrifice was the ram caught in the thicket. The male lamb. God gave HIMSELF as the sacrifice. He has always done, and will always do, what needs to be done. That's what love is. Love is maximum effort. Love is giving everything you have and everything you are. So when we're talking about our calling, or our vocation, or the invitation that God has extended to us, we need to understand that He didn't just call us. He also qualified us. And when we get that settled we can stop disqualifying ourselves (and each other). Like the revelation Peter had when he was struggling with what he could and couldn't eat. God basically said, "It's all from me. It's all good. Give thanks and eat." Acts 10:15 says, "And the voice came to him again a second time, "What God has made clean, do not call common."" We have been called, justified, and glorified. As we look in the mirror and see Jesus we are changed into that image from glory to glory. Again: What needed to happen... happened. It happened 2,000 years ago on an old rugged cross. And really, Jesus is the lamb slain from the foundation of the world. So it happened before anything else happened. Before there was ever a sinner, there was a Saviour. And if you WERE a sinner, and then you got saved by grace, you aren't a sinner anymore. If God calls you clean, don't call yourself common. You've been called, justified, and glorified. Jesus presented you to Himself as a clean bride without spot, wrinkle, or any such thing. Without blemish. God is light and there is no darkness in Him at all. YOU are the light of the world. How could there be any darkness in you at all? How can a believer sin, when you understand that sin is unbelief? So walk worthy of your calling. Don't think you can't do what you were created to do. Doing it is what makes you... you. Doing it is what makes you truly live. Jesus came that we might have life and have it more abundantly. Love is what makes life abundant. Love is our calling, and our vocation, and our invitation!