Wednesday, June 21, 2017

June 21 Thought for the day...believe God at His word!


Have you ever said to someone, "Wow, you did a great job!" Only to have them deny it by saying, "Thanks, I appreciate the compliment but it's not really that good!" Rejecting your praise is rude and actually, makes it seem like you are lying to them. Sometimes we do that to God.

"And when He has come, He will convict the world of righteousness....because I go to My Father and you see Me no more;" John 16:8,10

There are times we respond to each other the way I mentioned, not really meaning to be rude but either not knowing how to recognize a "God blessing" or trying to stay humble. We must remember often God is expressing His appreciation of who we are, through someone else and we need to accept it graciously.

There are many things God has done for us that we need to acknowledge, accept and live by for example Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 5:21 "For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." According to this scripture we are the righteous! If you tell some people that they will argue with you. They don't feel righteous, or act righteously all of the time so they will argue that they are righteous. The problem, Jesus paid the price on the cross for our righteousness. Likewise we are children of God, blessed, redeemed, chosen, royal priest and so much more. God calls us these things so we need to appreciate the way He sees us and say thank you in our words and by our actions.

The word "convict" can be looked at two ways in this context. First it does mean to expose or say the final judgment over sin. The Holy Spirit does speak that conviction in the life of the "not-yet-Jesus-followers as well as our lives. Convict has an additional meaning in this context. It means to convince in a legal sense of something positive. In this case Jesus is saying the Holy Spirit will convince us that we are righteous!

As the Holy Spirit convicts us of our sin, we acknowledge it, and begin to move beyond it He then convinces us that we are righteous. If you have made a committment to Christ and are trying to be who God has called you to be, stop believing the lies that you aren't good enough, you are a failure, you can never be used of God, God hasn't chosen you, you aren't important. God sees you valuable and righteous because of Jesus work on the cross for you. The Holy Spirit is working hard to daily convince you of that truth! 

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