December 23, 2024

Condemnation or Confidence?

Matthew 18:35 -Condemnation

32 “Then the master called the servant in. ‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. 33 Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ 34 In anger his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed.35 “This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.”

There is only liberty in one being, and He is Jesus Christ, the one who forgives sin. This parable is a description of His standard of forgiveness. We must either yoke ourselves to Christ on this standard or be in jeopardy of suffering daily with a spirit of wicked unforgiveness.

Matthew 6:14-15

14 For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.          15 But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.

Ephesians 3:10-12Confidence

10 His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms, 11 according to his eternal purpose that he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord. 12 In him and through faith in him we may approach God with freedom and confidence.

2 Corinthians 5:16-21

16 So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. 17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! 18 All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: 19 that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation.20 We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. 21 God made him who had no sin to be sinfor us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

We either live with the liberty of the dominance of Jesus Christ or we remain in our own world.  In liberty we draw others to Christ. In our own world we insist others believe what we believe.  In Christ there is power and life, in our world there is weakness and manipulation.

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