Have you ever heard a minister say that Sin is Sin and that no sin is greater than another; they are all an abomination in the eyes of God?
I have heard this since a child and believed it true. But had never understood why and had always thought there might be some mistake in the translation. Because, after all how could God look at the sin of telling a white lie the same as the sins of someone like Jeffrey Dahmer; (homosexual, cannibal, serial killer). I knew what the Word said, but how could this be true? Do we really have a God that is so narrow minded that He can’t see the difference between doing something that may only hurt yourself and someone doing something that destroys the lives of countless people. How could stealing a gum ball from the Quick-Mart be looked at the same way as what Hitler did in Germany to millions of God’s people?
This question plagued me for a long time and when I would ask pastors about it they would respond that God can’t look at sin, no matter what it is. Sin is Sin. However, this seemed contrary to common sense.
James 2:10 says “For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.” Well, that is pretty clear.
This bothered me for a long time until I received the following revelation. It was one of those (Ohhhh!; now I get it moments.) Thank you Jesus that you came to fulfill the law and brought us under Grace!
Stay with me till then end here because this is going to get a little deep …
Did you know that when Jesus shed his blood and submitted himself to die on the cross, that act of atonement was sufficient to wash away the sins of the world? Not only did that wash away the sins for believers, it washed away the sins of the non-believers too. Sure it did. 1 John 2:2 says, “And he is the propitiation (atoning sacrifice) for our sins: and not for ours only (the born again believers), but also for the sins of the whole world.” When Jesus died on the cross, his sacrifice was so great that it covered the sins for everyone, until the end of time.
Did you know that when God looks at us, he doesn’t see our sin? He sees us white as snow through the blood of Jesus. He sees you as an heir and child. He sees you as so clean that you may come to him boldly in the Holy of Holies. This is cleaner than the high priests in the Old Testament. The high priests were worried that they were going to be found unclean and would tie a rope around their waist, so that in case they were killed in the presence of Jehovah, they could be pulled back outside. God sees us as perfect. When he sees us through the atoning sacrifice of Jesus, he sees his pride and joy. That is the Grace of Jesus.
Now here’s the part that is hard for our religiosity to receive, He sees the lost people the same way. Jesus’ atonement was for the world, not just for those born again. He washed their sins too. Now before you send me hate-mail, please read on and open your heart to what I am sharing.
The only sin that God sees is the sin of Unbelief…
What have you done with the knowledge of the sacrifice God made for you in His son, Jesus. Have you believed in the Good News of Jesus’ atonement and received that revelation into your spirit? Have you believed that he is that is the Messiah and is the atoning sacrifice for the sins of the world? If you believe, he will make you a new creature, in him.
Unbelief is the sin that will keep you out of heaven. That is the sin that the Holy Spirit came to convict the world of. John 16:9 says that the Holy Spirit came to convict the world of sin … of sin, because they do not believe in me. God’s problem is with Unbelief. The Holy Spirit is here to bring us into fellowship with Jesus.
So since God sees us white as snow through Jesus’ atonement, what is the problem with sin?
The problem with sin, is that it brings us out of fellowship with Jesus. This is the case with all sin regardless of severity. And, this is why, in God’s eyes, all sin is the same. You see, when you are making a conscience decision to do what you know is wrong, you are distancing yourself from God. You give Satan the opportunity to start planting seeds into your mind that distance you even further from God. For example, he will shoot thoughts into your head of … You’re a sinner. You’re ashamed to come back into fellowship with God, because you’re embarrassed. You’re powerless to change. You’ve committed the unpardonable sin! God’s ashamed of you. You let Him down. He doesn’t love you now. These are lies from the devourer himself.
The truth is, that even though you sinned and failed to meet the expectations that you have for yourself, in your self-righteousness, God has not changed his opinion of you. He still loves you. He knew you were going to mess up. His desire for you when you mess up is to get right back into fellowship with him. He wants you to receive, in your spirit and visualize in your conscience, that you are righteous and spotless. He wants you to come back boldly to the throne and take your position as heir.
He wants you repent (change your mind about sin). He wants you to come to him boldly and say, Abba Father, I am sorry that I missed the mark. I thank you that you have provided the atoning blood of your Son to cleanse the sins of the world so I can stand boldly in front of you spotless. I receive the sacrifice you made for me, Jesus. Holy Spirit, thank you for guiding me down the path of righteousness. I will strive to be your light in this dark world. Thank you Jesus for your sacrifice.
You know King David was a big sinner, but he was God’s pride and joy because he had a heart for God. Moses … sinner. Abraham and Sarah … sinners. But, they knew how to reestablish fellowship with God.
Everyone knows what Adam and Eve’s big sin was right? They ate the apple that they were forbidden to eat. Not exactly, the sin that Adam and Eve committed was that of Unbelief. They believed what the serpent said over God. They fell out of fellowship with God because they believed the lie that God was hiding something from them that was in their best interest. They fell out of fellowship with God and hid themselves naked and ashamed. The original sin was unbelief. Nothing has changed with human nature since the beginning of time. We still have the same vulnerabilities and Satan still uses the same tricks to foul us up.
When we sin, God doesn’t want us to wail and cry, “Oh, I am so unworthy. I am nothing but a lowly sinner. I deserve to be cast into the pit of hell for my sin. Oh God, please find mercy and grant me, just one more time, forgiveness. I promise I will never do it again.” How insulting is that to God. You are telling Him that the sacrifice of his Son wasn’t enough to wash your sins. You’re asking him to make another atonement for you because the first wasn’t good enough. God is looking at you saying, you are my child. You are spotless. You have been given access to the Holy of Holies and My throne. You are my heir. Stand up and come to Me boldly and say, Abba Father.
All you need to do is cast the devil off your shoulder and get back into fellowship with God. Don’t believe the lie for another hour that you are not worthy. Don’t believe for another minute that God is ashamed of you. Don’t distance yourself one step further from God saying you’ll get right with God tomorrow. Just stop what you are doing and say, Jesus your Grace is all that I need. Thank you for making me a new creature in you. I receive your Grace. Teach me how to be more like you.
Monday, August 31, 2009
Revelation
About five years ago, God gave me a powerful revelation that changed my life spiritually forever. I came from a Baptist/Nazarene background and knew of, and believed in, the Trinity since before I can remember. However, at 35 years old, I could not tell you much about the Holy Spirit other than you are baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. I was hungering for knowing more when I ran into Andrew Wommack’s teaching. I was listening to a series called “The Positive Ministry Of The Holy Spirit”. While listening to the second CD, “The Comforter”.( http://www.awmi.net/extra/audio/1020 ), I had an experience where the Holy Spirit witnessed to my spirit some truths about Jesus.
It was an experience that I have had since, but not anywhere near the same in magnitude. I have not effectively been able to clearly communicate all that I experienced and felt , although I have tried many times. When I do try to explain the content of the revelation and the feeling of assurance that I received, I get reactions from people like “you didn’t know that?”, or “didn’t they teach you that in Sunday School?”. So I share one more time, more for myself so I never forget, and also so that it might be of some benefit to anyone else who hungers.
I always understood (from Sunday School) that Jesus was man and God. However, I always believed that Jesus had so many more advantages over man because of His Deity. I believed that he suffered on the cross, because it was painful, but he was God, so he knew how everything was going to turn out. He was God, so He had to know that this was going to happen and that it would only be for a short time and then He would rise in victory. How bad could it have been? I saw the temptation of Jesus in the Desert by Satan the same way. He was God, how tempted could he have really been. He was God, he just touched people and the power flowed through him and he raised the dead and healed the sick and cleansed lepers. He lived a perfect life and never sinned; yeah but He was God. He couldn’t have sinned if He wanted to. There are many others, pick a Bible story. This bad seed had worked it’s way into my understanding of who Jesus is and had diminished the sacrifice and cheapened the love He had for me.
Wommack was reading and expanding on scripture I have read and heard before when something bore witness to my spirit. Wommack started talking about how Jesus was a man, almost just like me (ok, I’ve heard it before). He was different because he was born without a sin-nature (Again, been there, understand that.). Jesus had to perceive everything through faith just as I do (wait a minute!!!, Woosh!!! A wave of revelation!). Jesus had to perceive through faith that he was the Messiah (What! He didn’t know he was the Messiah because he was ½ God? Woosh!!!). Jesus had a body, soul, and spirit just as I do. He had the Spirit of God indwelling in him at a time when the Spirit primarily only walked among people. He had the same Spirit of God inside of him, just as I do now as a born again believer. (The same spirit of God? Woosh!) He had to perceive revelation from his spirit-man into his conscience, just as I do (What, Jesus didn’t know everything? Woosh). He had to pray and believe by faith that laying down his life, as he did, was to fulfill prophesy and would be essential for the future of the Kingdom (Woosh!). He had to perceive and have faith that the spoken word of God through his lips had the power to heal, forgive sins, raise the dead, deliver from the demonic, and to fulfill messianic prophesy(Are you kidding me? I have to perceive this through faith also! Woooooosh!! )
All this hit me over and over again, as in waves the stories in the Bible all started having new meaning and clarity. I felt the love Jesus has for me and more clearly understood the sacrifice Jesus made for me. So many different parts of the scriptures were making more sense. Here I am, hungering to get a better understanding of the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit is saying ‘You want to know about me, let me introduce you to Jesus’. The Comforter will always bear witness of Jesus and bring revelation to His Word. Oh, we have such a good God in Jehovah.
If you have ever hungered to know more about the Holy Spirit, what His role is, why He is here, and why it is important to have a relationship with Him, please let me know. Bishop Jerry Pruitt has been teaching on The Holy Spirit for weeks now at Faith Builders on Wednesday night. You ought to join us one night. Also, the sermons for this series are free and available online at http://www.fbimaz-media.com/ . Another great place to get free downloads on the Holy Spirit is on Andrew Wommack’s website (http://www.awmi.net/extra/audio/1020 ) If this is really new to you, as it was to me, you might want to listen to a foundational series first called “Spirit, Soul, and Body” ( http://www.awmi.net/extra/audio/1027 )
It was an experience that I have had since, but not anywhere near the same in magnitude. I have not effectively been able to clearly communicate all that I experienced and felt , although I have tried many times. When I do try to explain the content of the revelation and the feeling of assurance that I received, I get reactions from people like “you didn’t know that?”, or “didn’t they teach you that in Sunday School?”. So I share one more time, more for myself so I never forget, and also so that it might be of some benefit to anyone else who hungers.
I always understood (from Sunday School) that Jesus was man and God. However, I always believed that Jesus had so many more advantages over man because of His Deity. I believed that he suffered on the cross, because it was painful, but he was God, so he knew how everything was going to turn out. He was God, so He had to know that this was going to happen and that it would only be for a short time and then He would rise in victory. How bad could it have been? I saw the temptation of Jesus in the Desert by Satan the same way. He was God, how tempted could he have really been. He was God, he just touched people and the power flowed through him and he raised the dead and healed the sick and cleansed lepers. He lived a perfect life and never sinned; yeah but He was God. He couldn’t have sinned if He wanted to. There are many others, pick a Bible story. This bad seed had worked it’s way into my understanding of who Jesus is and had diminished the sacrifice and cheapened the love He had for me.
Wommack was reading and expanding on scripture I have read and heard before when something bore witness to my spirit. Wommack started talking about how Jesus was a man, almost just like me (ok, I’ve heard it before). He was different because he was born without a sin-nature (Again, been there, understand that.). Jesus had to perceive everything through faith just as I do (wait a minute!!!, Woosh!!! A wave of revelation!). Jesus had to perceive through faith that he was the Messiah (What! He didn’t know he was the Messiah because he was ½ God? Woosh!!!). Jesus had a body, soul, and spirit just as I do. He had the Spirit of God indwelling in him at a time when the Spirit primarily only walked among people. He had the same Spirit of God inside of him, just as I do now as a born again believer. (The same spirit of God? Woosh!) He had to perceive revelation from his spirit-man into his conscience, just as I do (What, Jesus didn’t know everything? Woosh). He had to pray and believe by faith that laying down his life, as he did, was to fulfill prophesy and would be essential for the future of the Kingdom (Woosh!). He had to perceive and have faith that the spoken word of God through his lips had the power to heal, forgive sins, raise the dead, deliver from the demonic, and to fulfill messianic prophesy(Are you kidding me? I have to perceive this through faith also! Woooooosh!! )
All this hit me over and over again, as in waves the stories in the Bible all started having new meaning and clarity. I felt the love Jesus has for me and more clearly understood the sacrifice Jesus made for me. So many different parts of the scriptures were making more sense. Here I am, hungering to get a better understanding of the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit is saying ‘You want to know about me, let me introduce you to Jesus’. The Comforter will always bear witness of Jesus and bring revelation to His Word. Oh, we have such a good God in Jehovah.
If you have ever hungered to know more about the Holy Spirit, what His role is, why He is here, and why it is important to have a relationship with Him, please let me know. Bishop Jerry Pruitt has been teaching on The Holy Spirit for weeks now at Faith Builders on Wednesday night. You ought to join us one night. Also, the sermons for this series are free and available online at http://www.fbimaz-media.com/ . Another great place to get free downloads on the Holy Spirit is on Andrew Wommack’s website (http://www.awmi.net/extra/audio/1020 ) If this is really new to you, as it was to me, you might want to listen to a foundational series first called “Spirit, Soul, and Body” ( http://www.awmi.net/extra/audio/1027 )