We are save by faith. Our faith has us seeking the voice of the Lord, and that because we need His help. We need His help because we don't do everything right. When I seek Him I hear from Him, get teachings which include reproof from Him. I also get His mercy and grace, because I seek Him. I don't come into judgement, but have passed out of judgement into eternal life.
All that still doesn't mean I suddenly am doing everything right. I continually need to be going back to Him for counsel and advice, which I won't do if I think I do everything right. So I don't get into fellowship with Him who reproves me if I think I am sin free, but only if I am trying to not sin and do what is right. Self righteousness assumes you do every thing right, faith in Jesus Christ is need when you realize you don't do everything right and He can help you.
But let me give examples in my life:
When He came into my life I didn't like to wear a seat belt. That certainly was not the first things He worked on with me, but it didn't take long before He was telling me to put my seat belt on. He was telling me, and I heard it and even sometimes did put it on, but not always.
I wound up getting 2 tickets for it shortly after, and I hadn't been wearing a seat belt for years and never gotten a ticket for it. What's more is that neither time could have the cop that gave me the ticket seen I wasn't wearing one when they came upon me. Why the cop came after me one time was a complete mystery to me. It wasn't because of the seat belt, that was just something he noticed afterwards. The other time he was wrong to come after me. He did so because I he thought I had made an illegal U-turn in the middle of the street, but it was done in a residential and I found out in traffic school that U-turns in the middle of the street in a residential neighborhood was legal in the state. I could have taken that ticket to court and won it easily except for the seat belt.
So I learned to listen to the Lord and take Him more seriously and I haven't had a ticket since then, about 17 years ago. Still, that doesn't mean I do everything right. If you have ever read the sermon on the mount you should know that His standards are quite a bit higher than our standards.
Have you every rolled your eyes at someone? According to the Scriptures, which is according to God, that is an 'abomination' to the Lord. And it turns out that He is serious about that too. Fortunately for me they don't give traffic tickets out on that one. Unfortunately, I am not so sure the seat belt thing was an abomination to the Lord. It is probably better for me to not wear my seat belt than it is to rolled my eyes or shake my head at someone.
For example: I sale some things on-line at times. I had a person ask me for pictures of a new item that I had that was sealed in the original shrink wrap. I only had one. I took the pictures for the person, but they wrote me back wanting a picture of the inside of the product. I wrote back that it was sealed in the original shrink wrap, which was explained in the description. They wrote back again wondering why I could just take a picture of it.
At that point I was thinking, "OH my God. How is it that this person doesn't understand that if I take off the shrink wrap I can no longer sell it as new?" It was just my thought, which got answered by the Lord instantly. He was not impressed with my thinking. In not the most gracious of voice I have ever heard from Him, He said, "Karl, just write back the person and explain that you can no longer sell it as new if you take the shrink wrap off."
That was of course the correct answer to the question asked me, and I should not have been rolling my eyes (spiritually speaking) at the person. So again, I find out that it is not my righteousness, but His righteousness that is correct.
I write all this because if indeed we Christians are hearing from Him, then we must know exactly of what I am talking about. You must come at some point in your conversations with the Lord come to know that rolling your eyes and shaking your head at someone (even spiritually speaking) is an abomination to the Lord, and not even some little minor mistake from His point of view. He judges the heart and works with us to make our heart better.
Anyone (big mighty Christian or not) that does not understand this is not listening to Him like they should. That is probably because they don't want to hear reproof from Him.
He once told me, "Karl, if a thousand of my mighty men are doing something wrong, I still don't want you doing it." So even His mighty men can do things wrong. There are some examples of that in the Bible, are there not?
All that still doesn't mean I suddenly am doing everything right. I continually need to be going back to Him for counsel and advice, which I won't do if I think I do everything right. So I don't get into fellowship with Him who reproves me if I think I am sin free, but only if I am trying to not sin and do what is right. Self righteousness assumes you do every thing right, faith in Jesus Christ is need when you realize you don't do everything right and He can help you.
But let me give examples in my life:
When He came into my life I didn't like to wear a seat belt. That certainly was not the first things He worked on with me, but it didn't take long before He was telling me to put my seat belt on. He was telling me, and I heard it and even sometimes did put it on, but not always.
I wound up getting 2 tickets for it shortly after, and I hadn't been wearing a seat belt for years and never gotten a ticket for it. What's more is that neither time could have the cop that gave me the ticket seen I wasn't wearing one when they came upon me. Why the cop came after me one time was a complete mystery to me. It wasn't because of the seat belt, that was just something he noticed afterwards. The other time he was wrong to come after me. He did so because I he thought I had made an illegal U-turn in the middle of the street, but it was done in a residential and I found out in traffic school that U-turns in the middle of the street in a residential neighborhood was legal in the state. I could have taken that ticket to court and won it easily except for the seat belt.
So I learned to listen to the Lord and take Him more seriously and I haven't had a ticket since then, about 17 years ago. Still, that doesn't mean I do everything right. If you have ever read the sermon on the mount you should know that His standards are quite a bit higher than our standards.
Have you every rolled your eyes at someone? According to the Scriptures, which is according to God, that is an 'abomination' to the Lord. And it turns out that He is serious about that too. Fortunately for me they don't give traffic tickets out on that one. Unfortunately, I am not so sure the seat belt thing was an abomination to the Lord. It is probably better for me to not wear my seat belt than it is to rolled my eyes or shake my head at someone.
For example: I sale some things on-line at times. I had a person ask me for pictures of a new item that I had that was sealed in the original shrink wrap. I only had one. I took the pictures for the person, but they wrote me back wanting a picture of the inside of the product. I wrote back that it was sealed in the original shrink wrap, which was explained in the description. They wrote back again wondering why I could just take a picture of it.
At that point I was thinking, "OH my God. How is it that this person doesn't understand that if I take off the shrink wrap I can no longer sell it as new?" It was just my thought, which got answered by the Lord instantly. He was not impressed with my thinking. In not the most gracious of voice I have ever heard from Him, He said, "Karl, just write back the person and explain that you can no longer sell it as new if you take the shrink wrap off."
That was of course the correct answer to the question asked me, and I should not have been rolling my eyes (spiritually speaking) at the person. So again, I find out that it is not my righteousness, but His righteousness that is correct.
I write all this because if indeed we Christians are hearing from Him, then we must know exactly of what I am talking about. You must come at some point in your conversations with the Lord come to know that rolling your eyes and shaking your head at someone (even spiritually speaking) is an abomination to the Lord, and not even some little minor mistake from His point of view. He judges the heart and works with us to make our heart better.
Anyone (big mighty Christian or not) that does not understand this is not listening to Him like they should. That is probably because they don't want to hear reproof from Him.
He once told me, "Karl, if a thousand of my mighty men are doing something wrong, I still don't want you doing it." So even His mighty men can do things wrong. There are some examples of that in the Bible, are there not?