Isn't it finished yet‽❢

[GospelS]

After many years of their Christian walk, I hear many still saying they (we) have a sinful nature. They are being let down most of the time by guilt, lamenting, trying to pay for it, and stuck in that same place for years. Isn't it finished yet? Have you not dead to sin? Why do you still dwell on it? Sin is sin. But God looks at the heart. In the Old Testament, God weighs intentional sins separately from unintentional sins. God has already forgiven you. The issue is you don't understand how true it is and haven't learned to forgive yourself completely. It is written, "to the one knowing to do good, and not doing, it is sin." James 4. "Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it. Romans 7. It is finished. It is paid. The tomb is empty, really. Why do you not make it your own and still keep doubting? It is because you don't fully accept and believe that you fall into temptation and struggle with sin.

I'm born again and all that I experience is the resurrected life of Christ in me. I see His power and holiness manifested in me. Mistakes are inevitable because of this evil world and the limitations that come with this life. The world is dark and imperfect. Not me. I see His light and His perfect image in me. Not that I reached perfection. For the work of perfection goes on for all eternity as I keep pursuing His perfection. I'm getting brighter and more perfected by each day. I'm clean and He delights in me. I'm being transfigured. I've mastered over sin and it has no dominion over me. I've crushed that serpent's head and it's dead. Not me, but the Christ in me. He really has set me free. With every hardship, there's only more life flowing out from within. No enemy is able to touch my fruit. He brought me to death and to life again. All things are mine in Christ. I'm seated with Christ and subdue the earth alongside Him in the heavenly places.

I'm not boasting about me. I understand not everyone's journey is the same. But can we leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, and of instruction about washings, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment. And this we will do if God permits. For it is impossible, in the case of those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, to restore them again to repentance, since they are crucifying once again the Son of God to their own harm and holding Him up to contempt. For land that has drunk the rain that often falls on it, and produces a crop useful to those for whose sake it is cultivated, receives a blessing from God. But if it bears thorns and thistles, it is worthless and near to being cursed, and its end is to be burned. Hebrews 6.

 

[GospelS]

His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us to His own glory and excellence, by which He has granted to us His precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.

For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins. Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall. For in this way there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Therefore I intend always to remind you of these qualities, though you know them and are established in the truth that you have. I think it right, as long as I am in this body, to stir you up by way of reminder, since I know that the putting off of my body will be soon, as our Lord Jesus Christ made clear to me. And I will make every effort so that after my departure you may be able at any time to recall these things. 2 Peter 1

 

[GospelS]

Do you not know, brothers that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives? For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage. Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.

Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to Him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God. For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code.

What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means! Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.” But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead. I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.

Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure. Romans 7