Fresh Start part 2
Let me drop a little bit of Scripture and then build on it. 1 Corinthians 13:4-5 in the Message Bible, "Love never gives up. Love cares more for others than for self. Love doesn't want what it doesn't have. Love doesn't strut, Doesn't have a swelled head, Doesn't force itself on others, Isn't always "me first," Doesn't fly off the handle, Doesn't keep score of the sins of others." And, of course, with our idea of a fresh start, the part I wanted was at the very end there. Love doesn't keep score of the sins of others. One of the worst things I've ever heard in my life was when someone I love told me, "I'm going to hell anyway, so what's the point?" That'll break your heart, man. Someone giving up because they've bought into the (in my opinion erronous) idea that God punishes sinners with eternal hellfire. I've noticed that there aren't really many people that have been scared straight by this kind of religion. Mostly it seems like people who grew up in this kind of religious background are people who don't even practice religion anymore. They get so discouraged that they just give up. "What's the point in trying when I've already screwed up so much?" Well, let me say it again: Love doesn't keep score of the sins of others. And, by the way, God is love. So GOD doesn't keep score of the sins of others. Psalm 103:12 tells us, "As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us." And check this out--you can only go so far north before you start going south. But you can go east forever and never go west. So this OLD TESTAMENT verse shows us a loving God who isn't interested in our sins or transgressions. It never seems to occur to anybody that even in the Old Testament, the Old Covenant, God set up an entire system of animal sacrifice so that we wouldn't be judged or punished for our sins and transgressions. And, of course, this was fully manifested in the sacrificial Lamb that is Jesus. He became sin so that we might become the righteousness of God in Christ. He took away the sin--unbelief--of the world. And He did so by giving us something--someONE, Himself, love--to believe in. So here's what I'm trying to say, both today and in this Rant series as a whole, if God has forgiven and forgotten... if God isn't interested in our sins and transgressions... why are we? We let that stuff drag us down when we don't have to. We let our past--specifically our past mistakes--define us. We let what other people say about us define us. Listen: You are not what people call you. But you ARE what you answer to. What you believe about yourself is what defines you. And you can either believe the lie of the world... or the report of the Lord. You can either experience the mess you've made... or let God make your mess into a message. You can use what you've been through as a testimony to help other people through it. Because we all go through the same things. The human condition. But we don't have to let things go through us. We can rise above what's trying to drag us down. We can walk in newness of life as new creature's in Christ. We can experience and enjoy a fresh start and a new life. Jesus' abundant, everlasting, eternal, Resurrection Life of love!