Too Far Gone?
“How can I ask God to do anything for me, when I made the wrong choice? I just don’t feel like I can ask Him for His help when I’ve already gone too far.”
As I read the text on my phone, my heart ached for the person who’d sent the message. The text exchange continued and was riddled with self-loathing and negative self-talk from my friend, who had fallen to the temptations in their life.
A couple of emotions arose in me as we texted: hurt, that they would speak about my friend (themselves) like this. And anger, that the enemy had deceived them into thinking they were too stained and filthy with sin to be able to reach out to the Lord for help. They were desperate to be clean and pure of their sin again, but didn’t believe they could reach out to the one who could cleanse them.
STOP BELIEVING THAT LIE, I wanted to scream. I typed it instead. 🙂
I wonder, have you ever believed that lie of the enemy? That you can’t go to God because you’ve sinned too much?
I have.
It’s a vicious cycle really. We sin, which separates us from God. We allow that separation to cause us to believe the lie (we can’t go to God, we’re too dirty), which causes us to sink deeper into our sin because we think we’re too far gone anyway and the sin helps us ‘feel good’, if only for a time.
John 10:10 says “The thief comes to steal, kill, and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.”.
This verse brings a whole new perspective to that vicious cycle. The enemy first steals our freedom from the bonds of sin by making our temptations way too tantalizing to overcome. In turn that steals our relationship with Jesus by making us feel like we are too dirty to go to Him. Our sin is killing us because “for the wages of sin is death…” (Romans 6:23). We ultimately do the destroying without the enemy having to do too much work. He just gets to sit back and take a front row seat to the destruction – all based on a LIE!
I think we should find some truths to replace that lie with.
First, we are all sinners!
Romans 3:23 says “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;”
1 John 1:8 takes that a step further with, “If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.”
I repeat, we are all sinners. All in need of a Savior.
Second, we are all making choices every day when faced with temptations, to sin or not to sin.
James 1:14-15 says – “but each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed. Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and sin, when it is full grown, gives birth to death.”
We were all born into sin, with a sin nature, an ‘evil streak’ if you will. When we live our lives only in the flesh for too long, never connecting with the Spirit – that evil streak begins to peek out from around the edges of our heart, seeping slowly into the fibers of our being – it’s those moments we are spiritually weak and unable to fight the flesh, so our temptations overtake us.
Which leads me to truth number three, we must spend more time in the Spirit than in the flesh to remain strong enough to resist our temptations. Galatians 5:16 tell us “But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.”
In my last article, I told you that I begged God to just let me sin. I thought if I could just clear my head, I’d be in a better spot to deal with the consequences. Through this interaction with my friend, I realized how wrong that thinking was.
You see, my friend had fallen to the temptations that had plagued their mind. Only to find that the shame and self-loathing crashed down in angry torrents, threatening to drown them. Their mind was more than overwhelmed in new thoughts filled with hate for themselves.
I believe we should hate the sin, but not the human (including ourselves). Jesus is Love, speaks love, and shares love. There is no hate found in Him, thus to be more like Him we must learn to love – ourselves. When we love ourselves, we begin to rebuke anything that will defile us. “I love myself too much for that”, is what we will begin to tell ourselves when faced with choices of sin.
Does that mean we will make the right choice every time? Absolutely not! You know who knew that? The Lord. You know what He did about that? Gave us His Son, Jesus. You know what we should do? Go and repent! That requires us to GO to God the Father through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Which means we CAN go to Him when we fall.
Does this ability to return to the Savior give us a license to sin?
Again, absolutely not!
When we repent, we are literally turning and walking in the opposite direction of our sin. We should never look back. Walking in the Spirit will help us to continue walking away, never looking back.
The best move we can make when we’ve fallen is the one toward God.
“Surely the arm of the Lord is not too short to save, nor His ear too dull to hear.” Isaiah 59:1.
Just as I told my friend, I imagine God sitting on the edge of His throne in Heaven in anticipation for each one of us to return to Him. When that time comes for each of us, He is so excited because He has missed us!
Father God,
Thank you so very much that Your arm is not too short to reach us and save us, nor Your ear too dull to hear when we cry out to You. May we always cry out to the only One who can save us. We praise You for Your everlasting mercy.
In Jesus Name, Amen!
Until next time, God bless you all.
Joanie
