i’m not sure what is going on today, but every time i turned around God is using a person, a blog, a song…to tell me that i am set free from sin. this is not a new concept at all, but it has been a great encouragement to me today. it all started out with reading pastor terry’s blog this morning and then with a short promo on wbcl as i drove to work. so i started looking up “freedom from sin” on the web and it lead me to romans 6:1-11 for my study time today. so i’ll share what that passage says and continue with my day…
1 Well then, should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more of his wonderful grace? 2 Of course not! Since we have died to sin, how can we continue to live in it? 3 Or have you forgotten that when we were joined with Christ Jesus in baptism, we joined him in his death? 4 For we died and were buried with Christ by baptism. And just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glorious power of the Father, now we also may live new lives. 5 Since we have been united with him in his death, we will also be raised to life as he was. 6 We know that our old sinful selves were crucified with Christ so that sin might lose its power in our lives. We are no longer slaves to sin. 7 For when we died with Christ we were set free from the power of sin. 8 And since we died with Christ, we know we will also live with him. 9 We are sure of this because Christ was raised from the dead, and he will never die again. Death no longer has any power over him. 10 When he died, he died once to break the power of sin. But now that he lives, he lives for the glory of God. 11 So you also should consider yourselves to be dead to the power of sin and alive to God through Christ Jesus. (NLT)
there were several things that stuck out to me…we are no longer slaves to sin…sin no longer has power over us…and my favorite…we should consider ourselves ALIVE to God through Christ Jesus. these are the things that i need to focus on when satan tries to tell me that God can’t use me because of some weakness or sin from my past. nope, not true. i’m free and i’m ALIVE.
to end my day i got a phone call asking me to lead a few songs in the saturday night venue service and sing a “special”. the song i’m singing is “amazing grace (my chains are gone)” which was done by chris tomlin not too long ago for the movie soundtrack to “amazing grace”. here’s the chorus…
“my chains are gone, i’ve been set free
my God my Savior, has ransomed me
and like a flood, His mercy reigns
unending love, amazing grace”
i think God was trying to tell me something today? what do you think?
