Struggling with condemnation

[Lady O]

Peter had a temper.
David had an affair.
Jonah ran from God. Mic
Paul was a murderer.
Thomas doubted.
Sara was impatient.
Elijah was moody.
Abraham was old.
Lazarus was dead.

Don't think for one moment in your life that God cannot use you. (2 Corinthians 12:9)

 

[lamb7]

What if God hardens your heart? Like when Judas betrayed Jesus, his heart was so hardened. Same with Pharoah.

I hope I am not an enemy of God. All I know is I don't have a gentle conscience like I did before.



The problem is I chose the world and loved the world. God says if I for

sake him, he will forsake me. I try not to presume unforgiveness but my heart condemns me.

If you truly were reprobate you wouldn't care to even post this! You are not Esau, Esau is Esau. You are separate from him or anyone else. I think you just feel condemned.

 

[S.O.J.I.A.]

Those were very gross sins I admit. However he didn't ignore God for 8 years and then just sear his conscience beyond recovery.

so you've been under the bondage of pornography for the last 8 years?

 

[Invalidusername]

so you've been under the bondage of pornography for the last 8 years?

Yes.

 

[Invalidusername]

so you've been under the bondage of pornography for the last 8 years?

Tried to quit on my own strength many times. Failed and gave up after a while.

 

[aiki]

How can I do such a thing if the Holy Spirit is not revealing Himself to me?

I'm not sure what you mean. How is the Holy Spirit supposed to reveal himself to you, exactly?

Really, you should expect to experience the inner transforming work of the Spirit in your life only after you've yielded yourself to him. So, how do you submit, surrender, yield yourself to the Spirit?

1. Consciously and intentionally.
2. Moment-by-moment.
3. Persistently.
4. Entirely.

If you find yourself unwilling to surrender the throne of your life to God, you must ask Him to bring you to the place where you will. And keep asking until He does. Your life in Christ is, in the end, all His doing, you see. This way, He gets all the glory for your changed life - as He should.

 

[Romansthruphilemon]

 

[lamb7]

THANK YOU! Yes some scriptures were descriptive NOT perceptive! When I learned that I felt at ease too!


A lot of confusion arises when people think all of it is to "them" me included lol

 

[paul1149]

I hope I am not an enemy of God. All I know is I don't have a gentle conscience like I did before.

Brother, please listen to me once again. I haven't read everything here, but from what I have read it seems you are playing the role of your prosecutor. That's understandable, because you obviously have a love for truth. But consider "the rest of the story" before you come to conclusions. One of the devil's greatest weapons is to tell something that is true, but that is not the whole truth. This is what he did to Eve way back in the Garden.

Now consider:

Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.
By this we shall know that we are of the truth and reassure our heart before him;
for whenever our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and he knows everything. -1John 3:18-20​

You see, love is a protection for the heart. We have, "he who is forgiven much, loves much", and "we love because He first loved us". Everything is driven by the will of God, which is so kind and compassionate toward us. We respond to that love, by walking in His love, and as we do our hearts are strengthened in grace.

Now look at the last verse. "He knows everything". And we don't. Are you really a qualified judge of yourself? Not even close. Man looks on the outer appearance of things, but God looks on the heart. And God knows all things.

Recall the Heb 10.26 verse:

For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins,​

Foiled by the translation once again! "Knowledge" there is not merely gnosis, it is epignosis. the epi is an intensifier. We have "epitome", and "epic". The verse refers then to "full knowledge". The writer is careful to stipulate that the person who loses the sacrifice for his sins would have to know exactly what he is doing. It's not something done flippantly, or in immaturity. It's done with deliberate knowledge and forethought.

Jesus warned us sternly not to judge other eschatologically. We are neither called nor equipped to do so righteously. There is only one who sees the secret intentions of the heart.

Jesus also charged us with loving our neighbor as ourselves. Now, if we are not to judge our neighbor, because we are not equipped to do so rightly, then why would we think we are able to judge ourselves accurately? As 1jn 3.20 says above, He knows our hearts far better than we.

When you take the prosecutor's side against yourself, you are limiting the power of God due to lack of faith. In effect you actually are saying that the blood of the cross is not powerful enough to save you. This is surely a grief to the Spirit of Grace, who painfully knows how great a sacrifice Jesus made for us, and wants all to come to salvation.

The devil is the accuser of the brethren, and you are doing his work for him. That's exactly what his game plan is for each of us, but knowledge of the truth reveals his dastardly tactics and sets us free.

The answer is to simply take God at His word. He wants ALL to come to saving knowledge of the truth. The devil has been ripping you off. You should tell him to take a hike, and resolve to take Heb 11.6 seriously - God is pleased when we exercise a positive faith in Him.

To refresh the emotional side of this, spend some time in Php 3 and 4. It's about leaving the past behind, and about how rejoicing in the Lord is a protection to our souls.

We are not saved by our works, or no one would make it. It is all a gift. We need to understand that, else we cheapen the magnitude of the Gift given us.

For we are the circumcision, who worship by the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh —php 3.3​

Does that help? I hope so. Sometimes I think I have the answer, and either it goes nowhere or my motives are actually misunderstood. I hope that's not the case.

 

[Invalidusername]

Brother, please listen to me once again. I haven't read everything here, but from what I have read it seems you are playing the role of your prosecutor. That's understandable, because you obviously have a love for truth. But consider "the rest of the story" before you come to conclusions. One of the devil's greatest weapons is to tell something that is true, but that is not the whole truth. This is what he did to Eve way back in the Garden.

Now consider:

Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.
By this we shall know that we are of the truth and reassure our heart before him;
for whenever our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and he knows everything. -1John 3:18-20​

You see, love is a protection for the heart. We have, "he who is forgiven much, loves much", and "we love because He first loved us". Everything is driven by the will of God, which is so kind and compassionate toward us. We respond to that love, by walking in His love, and as we do our hearts are strengthened in grace.

Now look at the last verse. "He knows everything". And we don't. Are you really a qualified judge of yourself? Not even close. Man looks on the outer appearance of things, but God looks on the heart. And God knows all things.

Recall the Heb 10.26 verse:

For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins,​

Foiled by the translation once again! "Knowledge" there is not merely gnosis, it is epignosis. the epi is an intensifier. We have "epitome", and "epic". The verse refers then to "full knowledge". The writer is careful to stipulate that the person who loses the sacrifice for his sins would have to know exactly what he is doing. It's not something done flippantly, or in immaturity. It's done with deliberate knowledge and forethought.

Jesus warned us sternly not to judge other eschatologically. We are neither called nor equipped to do so righteously. There is only one who sees the secret intentions of the heart.

Jesus also charged us with loving our neighbor as ourselves. Now, if we are not to judge our neighbor, because we are not equipped to do so rightly, then why would we think we are able to judge ourselves accurately? As 1jn 3.20 says above, He knows our hearts far better than we.

When you take the prosecutor's side against yourself, you are limiting the power of God due to lack of faith. In effect you actually are saying that the blood of the cross is not powerful enough to save you. This is surely a grief to the Spirit of Grace, who painfully knows how great a sacrifice Jesus made for us, and wants all to come to salvation.

The devil is the accuser of the brethren, and you are doing his work for him. That's exactly what his game plan is for each of us, but knowledge of the truth reveals his dastardly tactics and sets us free.

The answer is to simply take God at His word. He wants ALL to come to saving knowledge of the truth. The devil has been ripping you off. You should tell him to take a hike, and resolve to take Heb 11.6 seriously - God is pleased when we exercise a positive faith in Him.

To refresh the emotional side of this, spend some time in Php 3 and 4. It's about leaving the past behind, and about how rejoicing in the Lord is a protection to our souls.

We are not saved by our works, or no one would make it. It is all a gift. We need to understand that, else we cheapen the magnitude of the Gift given us.

For we are the circumcision, who worship by the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh —php 3.3​

Does that help? I hope so. Sometimes I think I have the answer, and either it goes nowhere or my motives are actually misunderstood. I hope that's not the case.

Thank you for your words. I did sin with the knowledge that it was 100% wrong but maybe you are right that I've concluded my judgement on myself when it isn't my place. I still can't imagine how anyone could have more knowledge than me that a sin is wrong and still do it. But I will try to just let God do the judging and live my life. Please say a prayer for me since I think I've lost all ability to live an effective Christian life now due to a sense of hopelessness and alienation from God.

 

[paul1149]

Remember the story of the unrighteous servant. He made a way forward for himself by defrauding his master big time. And the Lord commended him for it, and told us to also "make friends by means of unrighteous riches"!

Or the Syro-Phoenician woman with the demonized daughter? The Lord engineered that whole interchange to bring the woman out of herself, and into a bold faith in His goodness. And when she stepped up to the challenge, He was delighted. Not only was her daughter cleansed, the woman found out she was loved and accepted by God even as a Gentile.

So the Lord taught and lived the message that He wants us to respond radically to His offer of grace. he does not want you wasting the rest of your life absorbed in your past mistakes. He wants you to step up to the plate and hit it out of the park. That's the way you can honor what He did for you. Anything else is a waste, it's like pouring His blood out on the ground.

Put all this doubt an unbelief behind you and resolve that, to the degree you erred before, you now are going to excel for the Lord. You are going to make the devil very sorry he ever touched you. You are going to make the thief pay back seven times what he stole.

Think about it. This is the only rational response to the astonishing grace that is offered to us. If you really want to honor Christ, the only way to do it is to accept His offer, which He already paid for in full. Everything in the Word points to living out a radical life for Him. And to do that, you have to put the past behind you and step into the newness of life.

For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you.
For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all have died;
and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.
From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer.
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ - new creation! The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.
All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation;
that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.
Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.
For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. -2Cor 5:13-21​

 

[Nigel]

Hey man, let me know if you still check this website. I went through EXACTLY the same thing. I was in love with Jesus and his Holy Spirit spoke to me and opened up the verses to me. I spent a couple hours a day worshiping and praying and thanking him for his love and salvation. There was no doubt in me I was truly saved. Then I fell into A lot of sin a year later that lasted for awhile and ended in depression. I can go into it more but I’m also struggling but still searching and I think I’ve figured out a lot of things. Let me know if you use this website and I can go into it more. God bless