"Where Love Reigns!"
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From Pastor Sheli's Weekly 'Prayer & Praise' email
Weekly Announcements
6/28- Mens Event 'RC Open'
7/6- Healing Servcie
7/13,,, RC's 13th Anniversary Celebration
7/19...Women's Breakfast
Backpack (school spplies) Blessing COMPLETE! Thank You RC!
July/Aug Giving Opprtunity- F.I.N. (Families In Need) Christmas
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Good Afternoon Church Family! God is able and faithful! I was reminded lately of how grateful I am for Jesus and all that He did for us. Reading through Leviticus this past week made it so clear to me again that Jesus paid the price for our sins to be forgiven, forgotten and forever gone! Before He paid the price, you could only have your sins covered by the shedding of blood. The image that comes to mind would be like sin being an object. Before Jesus, it was covered but you can still see it. You are reminded of it every time you see it and it constantly reminds you of what you have done. BUT, because of Jesus, He comes in and takes the object of sin and it is completely gone! Never to be seen again. I love how the Bible says it is gone... as far as the East is from the West! When you read through Leviticus it reminds us too of all the weight and obligations of sin that Jesus also took on Himself. Lynsi and I were talking about how often you would have to be in the temple offering a sacrifice for sin. We all make mistakes and fall short of the glory of God and we can now just go to Jesus and ask forgiveness. Before Jesus, there were specific sacrifices that had to be made in specific ways for a certain sin and you had to make sure you did it right and even with all of this it didn't take away the sin... it just covered it. When we ask for forgiveness, we are forgiven. That is the promise that we have in the Bible! When we confess our sins He is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and cleanse us - Hallelujah! Cleans us from ALL unrighteousness! Not just one... ALL of them! Not only did He bring forgiveness but cleansing! This is such a vital piece for us to grab hold of. We are cleansed from the results of sin.
Most Christians understand that they are forgiven but the idea of being cleansed (made clean) seems harder to accept. It's almost like they view the results of sin in their lives as battle scars that they look at to remember what they did. Or their way to do penance for what they have done. The problem with both of these ideas is they aren't Scriptural. We are to confess our sins and turn from them but it is only Jesus that forgives us and makes us clean. The very definition of penance is 'voluntary self-punishment inflicted as an outward expression of repentance for having done wrong'. Self... can you see the problem with this? We can never do enough self-punishment to make up for what we have done. It can only be because of what HE did! We need to not only receive forgiveness but also His cleansing! When you get a stain from something on your shirt, you put a product on it to remove it. Once it is completely removed, you can't find where that stain used to be. The same with your computer. When you erase or delete something... it's gone. These are just earthly examples of 'cleansing' and they can't begin to compare to the cleansing that God does! When God cleanses you from sin, you are clean! In Isaiah 1:18, He says, "Come now, and let us reason together,” Says the Lord. “Though your sins are like scarlet, They shall be as white as snow; Though they are red like crimson, They shall be like wool." This is the truth about what cleansing really means. Because of sin, you were red as scarlet or crimson BUT because of JESUS you are white as snow or wool! These are two very distinct, very different colors and you may be able to make something that was white turn red (we've all done this in the wash at one time or another!) but turning something that was deep red to the whitest of whites??? Impossible... without God!
You may be asking why I am going on and on about this. It is because once you grab hold of this truth it will truly set you free! When you sin, make a mistake, fall short, stumble, whatever you want to call it, you have a Savior who paid the price IN FULL to make what is as crimson or scarlet to be the purest of whites! If He did that for us, why would we feel we have to live with the battle scars of our sin? Or why would we feel we have to punish ourselves after we've been forgiven and cleansed? The answer is we don't and we shouldn't. We need to accept the forgiveness we have been given and stop looking for the scars and the stains of our past sin. The Lord has already told us, they aren't there anymore. You aren't scarlet anymore... you are the purest of whites because of Jesus. The enemy is very crafty about how he comes against us. If he hit us with a head on battle we'd be ready and take him down but he knows he doesn't have to do that. He can just plant slight untruths in our minds and we will destroy ourselves. Think about it for a second, the idea of repentance is Biblical. We need to repent and turn, right? But what does the devil do? He takes a Biblical idea and slightly turns it... you need to repent yes, but you should also do penance to prove to yourself and others that you truly are forgiven. For example, you sinned and to make up for it you need to give money to the church or you need to suffer because you made someone else suffer and so on and so on. The lies he weaves into minds look so religious that we as a Church on a whole believe them. When you carry the weight of uncleanness, it is really hard to be used by the Lord to reach others because you don't feel qualified. It is really hard to see God as a loving Father because you feel unworthy of His love. Can you see, Church Family, why it is so important that we not only receive our forgiveness but also the truth that we ARE clean not working on our cleansing? I am sure that each of us have things in our past the enemy likes to bring to the forefront of our thinking. He likes to try to get us to look at the stains and scars of sin to keep us from being able to move forward in our lives. However, we need to stop ourselves in that moment and remember all that Jesus did! We need to look at the stains and scars through the Blood of Jesus and realize that there are no stains and there are no scars. There is just pure white snow and the whitest of wool. When we can recognize how truly forgiven and free we are, we are going to be able to help others to find their forgiveness and freedom in Jesus too. Let's stop looking for stains and scars that don't exist anymore and let's praise Jesus for what He's done and tell someone else how they can be free as well! Have a blessed rest of your week, Church Family and remember... Jesus already paid the price for you to be forgiven and cleansed! Blessings, Pastors Sheli and Steve
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