Shalom,

I love to share the things I learn every day from our Spoken Word Bible Reading Plan, but some days the devotionals I read have something so important and so well presented that I have to share! Today it is Joseph Prince's "Grace Inspirations" that is SO good!

YOUR SINS ARE NOT BEING RECORDED

Hebrews 8:12 "For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.”

I once read a comic book which showed how a man lusted after a woman, then died of a heart attack and went to heaven. In heaven, he saw a big screen showing everyone present a recording of all the sins which he had committed while on earth, including the last one. How embarrassing!

Don’t worry, that is not going to happen to you in heaven. There is no big screen with front-row and circle seats for everyone to sit and watch your past sins. There is no video recorder in heaven recording your sins right now. Because your lifetime of sins has already been punished in the body of Jesus, God declares to you, “Your sins and lawless deeds, I will by no means ever remember!”

This is true even for the Old Testament heroes of faith such as Abraham, Moses and David. If you read Hebrews 11, which was written after the cross of Jesus, you will notice that there is no record of their sins or failures. Yet, their life stories tell us that they were far from perfect.

Abraham lied twice about his wife Sarah. He told Pharaoh, and later, King Abimelech, that she was his sister to protect his own life. Moses killed an Egyptian who was beating a Hebrew, and hid the body in the sand. David committed adultery with Bathsheba and later arranged for her husband to be killed in battle. Yet, their sins were not recorded in Hebrews 11, only their deeds done in faith!

God is showing you that He does not record your sins or failures today. Instead, He records your faith confessions and deeds done in response to what His Son has done for you. Every time you sin, every time you waver in your faith, God does not record it. But every time you believe Him and respond in faith, He records it! That should not make you want to sin more. It should free you to love God more!

So don’t be conscious of your failures. If God Himself does not remember them, who are you to remember them? Be conscious instead of your righteousness in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:21), and you will reign in life! (Romans 5:17)

AMEN! There are some believers who just cannot accept such a wonderful grace, and instead focus on their sin, and the sins of others. Our Father does NOT want us to focus on our mistakes! He wants us to focus on what HE has done to render our sins powerless! 1 John 1:9, contrary to most teaching on it, is NOT a call to make a list and recount all of our sins and mistakes! The word "confess" is the Greek word "homologeo", which means: to acknowledge, to agree with, to concede, to agree with. It simply means that WE agree with God and His Word. If God says something is sin, then we agree with Him that it is! We recognize and acknowledge when we DO sin, and then accept and receive His forgiveness for it! It is NOT a dwelling on, getting emotional over, or making a big deal about it. That type of behaviours gives power to the sin. Acknowledging, receiving forgiveness for and then thanking HIM for that forgiveness AND the cleansing from ALL unrighteousness, takes all of the power out of the schemes and strategies of the enemy to try and trip us up! Rejoice, instead, in the grace and mercy of God and His overwhelming love for us and the desire to sin will be replaced by the desire to please Him! AMEN! Here is Hillsong with "Grace To Grace":

Shalom in Him!