I've been thinking about repentance today and that has naturally meant I've been thinking about sin too. It's a funny thing sin (well it's not funny in the slightest but I think you know what I mean), we can try and try and try not to do it and then sit back and wonder how it managed to happen anyway depsite all our positive thoughts and defence mechanisms against it. We truly are Romans 7 people (well I am anyway).
It got me thinking about the incredible nature of God's grace (this is always good to think about) but today it hit me for some reason in a new way. I was thinking about the fact that God knows about and has forgiven us for that sin we are about to do, the one we did yesterday, repented of and yet still managed to fall into again today. That purity problem, the lying issue, the lack of anger management, the pride, confidence in ourselves, reliance on our skill and human effort. It's hardly new to me that God knows every sin and forgives each and every one (this being the amazing gospel after all) but today, sitting thinking about repentance, I'm awed by the fact God has forgiven us for the sins we are about to do...before they have even taken place they're dealt with, nailed to a rough wooden cross on a hill outside Jerusalem 1974 years ago in the person of God's Son.
I'll sin and I'll repent, today I've been seeking God for an end to repeat sin, an end to the things that have plagued me despite my continually giving them to Him for years and years of my life. He wants us to be free, He has made us free, we need to rely on Him to walk in the power of the Spirit to defeat this sin nature. It's not easy, but then He never said it would be did He?
Praise the Lord that I can come to Him and repent and know His mercy, yes, even for that thing that I just did for the 496th time in the last 25 years. God is so good.
