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If you believe you are not really loved by God, or if you have doubts of guilt and feel unworthy, your not alone. This is a common element of our fallen human nature, our living in a society structure that depends on the fallen nature of man to function and the internal negative spiritual forces. With these three factors in mind, many loose entirely the real perspective of God and Christ: Forgiveness under God's Grace. It is an undeserved forgiveness, one we are totally incapable of earning, no matter how hard we try, we ALL fail. Does this mean God will accept no one? He let his own son die for us, who willingly died for us and suffered intensely along the way. All because of His love for you and me. Should we let guilt and despair remove our faith and confidence? We all sin, but guilt speaks for us. It is a feeling of admission. How should we use this?
We are under a Grace, an undeserved kindness. It is living under God's Grace that we MUST acknowledge God truly forgives us and NEVER takes it back. There is a difference of those committing wrong acts with a real repentance and those who simply do not care or use God's Grace as an excuse to do wrong. But if you have bad feelings of your actions and truly want to do what is right, despite your failing at times, it is a clear cut sign that you have faith and the fact of the matter is, God does NOT just leave you. He never forsakes you. He is always there. The day you came to him in faith, was the day He anointed you with His Spirit, choosing you as part of His family. That's right, a little nobody like you, a sinner who fails in so many ways and falls short in large degrees, He has chosen you as part of his royal priesthood, to be one of His sons, as part of a holy nation. He does not take this back every time you sin. If your sin is without repentance and you have no guilt, no worry, no feelings of distress ever, then your not exhibiting your faith. You repentance and worry proves your faith. However, if your distress and worry, guilt and pain are overwhelming you, you are ignoring God, you are the one telling Him, "I don't believe you have really forgiven me." But He does, and He is there for you. He loves and never ceases. Rest assure, He neither leaves you, nor forsakes you. And for this WE CAN have the confidence that no matter what it is that we pray for, according to his will, he hears us. And when we pray against His will, he hears us too, forgiving us. Now comes the question as to: what is sin? Living a life out of the fallible words of men who wrote creeds, dogma and even the words in the bible is not always sin. This is the difference between the fundamental who sees only the letter of the law and the mystic who can see outside the written words of fallible men, seeing the Spirit of peace, joy and agape love in All humanity. This is a place we only come to in our spiritual journey of growth, after our questioning and skepticism seeing beyond concise black and white answers, willing to enter into the uncertainty of the unknown, yet with the inner peaceful confidence of the living Spirit that gives interior strength. You may be told by your church or religious organization that you are not doing your best, that you are not living a life full enough to serve him, that you are failing Him and will be punished, that you have left Him, that any rebellion against certain people is equated the same as rebellion against Moses, Jesus and God, but the fact is you are not. "Who is he that condemns? Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?" Shall men, religious organizations, Slave Classes, Elders, Deacons or Popes? God sent his only begotten Son, who came down from heaven to earth and willingly died for YOU, while you where yet a sinner, and do think a religious organization or men can separate you from God's love of you? "He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all--how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord." All of us are sinners and fall short of the glory of God, NO ONE is righteous. We can NEVER let any men convince us otherwise! We are saved under Grace, under an undeserved kindness and that means you! That's right, you, you tax collector, you adulterer, you fornicator, you prostitute. Your repentance and faith in Christ saves you. Were not talking about continually sinning with a evil lifestyle, using God's Grace as an excuse for bad conduct, were talking repentance. If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there is no sacrifice for sins is left. But if we have true repentance that is different. We do our best. With set backs? Yes! We make an honest attempt to love God, serve God and serve ALL of our fellow men with mercy and agape love, messing up many times, falling down and picking ourselves right back up, where we left off! We don't give up. Why should we? God doesn't and He's there. He never leaves. (Ecclesiastes 7:20; Romans 3:23, 5:8, 8:32-39; John 3:16; Hebrews 10:26; Jude 4) You feel that you have not lived up to God's standards. You have sinned and have failed in some or many ways. It's never too late to continue trying. God never stops. He never leaves. He is always there, waiting, just waiting for us to turn to Him. Take your guilt and despair and recognize it as a positive sign of your faith and love of God and that you are loved by Him, more than you can ever know. His love is beyond human comprehension. It is a just and fair love and real love, one of strength and character, one of mercy and compassion, one of true empathy. Jesus, God's Son Himself, a very part of Almighty God, emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men, for we have Him, Jesus, as "a high priest, not one who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses but one who has been tested in all respects like ourselves, but without sin." He knows what we are going through, he understands and he has the compassion, mercy and empathy with forgiveness to truly be there for us and never leave us. (Hebrews 4:15) Jesus Christ was thrown out of God's only true religion of His day. Do you know what that means? His church, His "Slave Class," His Governing Body of Elders, God's very true religious organization, threw Him out! They disfellowshipped Him! They labeled him a sinner who has both left Jehovah and will die for leaving God. They imputed wrong motives, as they could easily say accusingly that Jesus was a threat to God's true people, who in addition threatened the Roman government with His Kingdom, who was causing mutiny, causing divisions among the people, walking the path of Balam, Korah and Abiram. Jesus did all this and more according to His church, the Pharisees, and all the religious leaders of His day. Did Jesus let this stop Him? Unlike us, Jesus was without sin, however, did he let the rejection and hurtful actions against him, weaken His faith, preventing him from doing God's will? Never! And notice how he did this: He prayed everyday, mostly alone in total solitude, sometimes all night long. He meditated on God, talked to God, fasted and spoke of God, sung about God and worshipped Him. These very tools, are at our disposal to fight against all the men that are against us and all the sins we do that weaken our faith. Our solitude, mediation, prayer, study of God's word -the bible, willingness to see outside the words of the bible to the Spirit that can never be explained in human words, no matter how inspired they may be. Our finding others who also have a genuine internal love of God and his Son, Jesus, will strengthen us with the power of God's Spirit enabling us to fully crush and defeat the guilt and despair that attempts to overwhelm us, to chew us up and spit us out. When we use these Spiritual disciplines and form an true internal bonding with God, our confidence and strength will increase. Our faith, like a muscle will slowly get stronger and stronger. We must never give up to guilt and despair. Instead we must "get up and walk, our sins are forgiven." God has open arms. God is here, He is waiting, right now, always.
Unlike Jesus, Apostle Peter had sin. He denied our LORD, three times! He cut off a man's ear with the intent to kill. He competed with Jesus' other disciples for the greatest position. He failed miserably in understanding what Jesus said to him on many occasions. Yet God never stopped using him, never ceased supplying him His Holy Spirit. Years later, Peter slipped again, with his association of those promoting circumcision for the newly formed Christian congregations, avoiding those who were not circumcised, being publicly corrected by Apostle Paul. Did Peter loose faith? Did he allow guilt to overcome him and despair to overtake him? Peter never did. He never let guilt of his sins, mistakes and shortcomings, including the very denial of Jesus Himself, allow him to loose his will and faith to continue his service to God. His service failed in works of righteousness, but God's Grace was upon him, as it is on us. And our love of God with love of our fellow man, with shortcomings like Peter, will bring us into God's Kingdom, a future that cannot be shaken. Another example of God's grace and security in his loving us, is the account of Apostle Paul. Here is a man the "chief foremost of sinners," who personally contributed to the death of God's servant, Stephen. He watched him die with "the face of an angel," as he was murdered in cold blood, stoned to death. He heard Stephen's speech, both hearing and seeing the reflection of God and the power of His Spirit and yet contributing to this terrible act. In addition he persecuted innocent Christians and their suffering was on his shoulders. For this Paul could not get over the marvel of a salvation that would include him, one who had killed Stephen, an innocent man with the face of an angel. But it was precisely this perspective of his recognition of his own personal depravity, weakness and evil, that qualified Paul to be used by God to bring the truth of the gospel to the world. (1 Timothy 1:12-17; Acts 6:15)
On the one side is the person who cannot accept criticism Rather than accept his failure,
he will deny it, or lash
Exposure to our depravity without accessing God's divine
power is a counterfeit emotion replacing those "poor in spirit" to having poor spirits, replacing those "broken in spirit,"
to a spirit that cannot be fixed.
Regarding the one of the nine principles for healthy Spiritual life, Honoring our worthiness to receive from others, Dr. Wayne W. Dyer states:
This statement requires you to know the difference between A) genuine regret and learning from the past; and B) remaining in a state of reproach of guilt today. Learning from one's mistakes and taking corrective action are spiritually and psychologically sound practices. You did it, you didn't like the way you felt afterward, so you decide not to repeat the behavior. Thai is not guilt. Guilt is when you continue to feel immobilized and depressed; those feelings keep you from living effectively in the present. When you are filled with guilt, your energy is awash with anguish and self-reproach. You are so down on yourself that you feel unworthy of receiving blessings from the universe or anyone in it. Persistent feelings of guilt will prevent you from manifesting anything worthwhile because you are attracting the very same things that you are putting out to the universe. More anguish, more reasons to feel bad, and more evidence to prove that you are not worth what you desire. When you put past behavior into a context of learning from them and moving on, regardless of how horrible they may seem to you, you clear yourself of the negativity surrounding these actions. Forgiving yourself means that you are able to extend love in yourself even when your perceived shortcomings are painfully evident to you. Once you learn this valuable lesson, you seek God's forgiveness, too. But if you continue to harbor the pain internally you will feel unworthy of God's forgiveness and consequently will be unable to accept any of your divine rights as a child of God. No matter what you do not particularly love about yourself, including your behaviors and your appearance, to be successful at manifesting, you need to love yourself in spite of your perceived flaws, For example, if you are chronically overweight, or addicted, your internal sentences of guilt sound something like this: "I am really going to love myself when I am finally a normal weight" or "I will truly value myself as a worthwhile human being when I am finally over this addiction once and for all." These are the sentences of guilt that reinforce an attitude of unworthiness and inhibit the manifestation process. These internal sentences need to be shift to: "I love myself while I am overweight. I am not this weight in the first place and I refuse to think of myself in self-degrading terms regardless of the condition of my body. I am love, and I extend this love to all of me." The same kind of inner programming must take place for addictions or anything else that you feel guilty about. There are 483,364 words in A Course in Miracles. The words "beware" appears only once: "Beware of the temptation to see yourself as unfairly treated." The warning speaks of removing guilt and taking responsibility for one's life. By removing the inclination to wallow in self-reproach, we also remove the idea that by suffering in the present moment we will redeem ourselves and can pay for our sins with guilt. Life doesn't work this way. Your suffering keeps you in a state of fear and immobilization. That is not a solution to handling your life problems. There is a solution, and that solution is in loving yourself, and in trusting God that your "shortcomings" are nothing more than lessons leading you to a new spiritual level. By refusing to buy into the conditioned notion that guilt is good and you deserve to feel guilty, and that guilt will help you pay for your sins, you reinforce that idea that you are worthy of any desires of yours that you want to manifest in your life. (1) 1
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