Grasping Freedom

Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.
2 Corinthians 5:17

I was shredding old paperwork today and came across one that said, “Past Due Notice.” I pay the bills around our house and generally I stay on top of it. There is a bill or two that slips through the cracks once in a while, though. Now this particular bill was from a couple years ago, it’d been long paid – along with the penalty added for its lateness – but it was still in my records.

As I passed it through the shredder I was first assaulted with a bit of guilt. I don’t like not being perfect. I don’t like being behind or letting things go undone. However, the evidence of one of these times was right in my hands.

My next thought, though, was that thanks to the shredder, I’ll never have to see that past due notice and reminder of that particular lapse again.

The experience could have stopped there, but God is so very gracious that He used this particular moment – like He does so many others when my spirit is tuned to His – to remind me of His character and what He’s done for me.

My sin, our sin, is like that past due notice. There was a debt to be paid. And all too often we let them go too long before taking care of them. While with a bill I was the one who took care of it, there is nothing we can do to take care of the debt created by our sin. God, who is holy, holy, holy, cannot by His very nature accept or ignore sin. It’s a blemish on Him, as we are to be a representative of Who He is. He did, after all, create us in His own image.

Because He is love also, He in that love paid the payment for us. All we have to do is acknowledge His payment and thank Him – living our lives in faith and gratitude based on what has already been done.

I took that step a long time ago, but how many times have I held onto my sin anyway? Keeping the past due notice? Letting the devil remind me of my faults, failures, and disobedience? 

TOO MANY TIMES!

We as children of God are not to hang on to old notices. God has paid the price. By Jesus’ stripes our penalty was paid and ripped to shreds. Let’s not hang onto them. The past is gone. The debt is paid. The reminders bringing condemnation are not from the Lord, but from the devil and should be banished – from our minds, our hearts, and our spirits. Yes, we are fallen. But He is greater. Yes, we will mess up again. But His grace is bigger.

I am deciding today to let all of my past – ALL OF IT: the laziness, the complacency, the time-wasting, the lust, the anger, the gossip, the judgment, the pride, the arrogance, the lack of reverence for God – and shredding it at the altar of Jesus’ feet. He has covered the penalty for every single one of my sins. I will no longer keep the notices reminding me of them. Instead, I will grasp hold of the freedom Jesus handed me a long time ago and live in it. 

Won't you join me?

#noexcuses #layingdownmylife #usemeJesus