Pastor's Pen
by Pastor Jimmy Sharp
January 2004
Have
you started the New Year yet? Have you figured out why you are one of the
fortunate ones to be given this very special gift of life TODAY? New Years
seem to be the time when we reflect on what happened in the old year. I am not
real sure why, but, I do think reflection can be healthy if we are using it to
help us look forward. Sometimes reflection can be dangerous. We can easily get
lost in the past. In fact, some people wish they could change the past to make
them feel better in the present. So when they discover they can't change the
past, they continue to feel rotten in the present. That's a real shame when
people spend so much of the present preoccupied with the past because that
leaves them so much less time to fulfill the purpose they were created for in
the first place.
Now the way God
deals with the past is forgiveness. This is a concept that most of us humans
have difficulty with and I believe the reason is that it is a God concept. We
know for ourselves that forgiveness is not easy. In fact, it is about the most
difficult thing we can do. So many think that to forgive someone is to tell
them that what ever they did was OK. That's not forgiveness, that's stupidity.
When God forgives us for doing wrong He does not tell us that what we did was
OK. God points us to His Son Jesus, the Christ, the Messiah, the Savior, the
Redeemer, the One that became the disease that barred us from God's presence.
He killed this disease and buried it. Jesus has become our doctor, our healer,
the source through which we can be free from the past. WOW! This means that
you can receive forgiveness for the past and spend more time in the present.
You might even find time to look forward and see where God is growing you. You
might find out that God has a future for you and a plan for your life. WOW!
This God that created us is a really wonderful person.
Forgiveness is the
concept that God developed so that He could have a life with you and me. We
are part of God's past that has caused God much pain. We were created to give
God pleasure. We were created in the image of God with a purpose in mind and
we decided not to fulfill our purpose and that grieved God. What we did was
not OK. God developed a concept and devised a plan that would allow us to
fulfill the purpose He created us to accomplish. The concept is forgiveness
and the plan was the sacrifice of God's Son, Jesus, the Christ. So you see
forgiveness is very difficult, forgiveness is very costly, forgiveness does
not mean that wrong is right. When we receive forgiveness from God we are
restored to relationship with God. God does not hold any of our past against
us. We are free from our past. We are free to be in the present time with
God as well as in the presence of God. WOW! Our Creator God is awesome!
Being created in
the image of God is an awesome privilege. Being the child of God has many
wonders yet to unfold. Being the child of God, we are raised to be like our
parent God. As a good parent, God wants us to do for others what God has done
for us, forgive. It does not mean that what was done is right or OK.
Forgiveness is not easy and forgiveness is not cheap. Forgiveness is no
accident. Forgiveness is deliberate and intentional, planned out and carried
out to restore another person like me, lost in their past.
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