Love It Or List It

"But with you there is forgiveness so that you can be feared."

“O LORD, who would be able to stand if you kept a record of sins? But with you there is forgiveness so that you can be feared.” (Psalm 130:3-4 GW)

“O Israel, put your hope in the LORD, because with the LORD there is mercy and with him there is unlimited forgiveness. He will rescue Israel from all its sins.” (Psalm 130:7-8 GW)

HE IS forgiveness. It is that He forgives which causes our reverence. A holy God, without sin or error, chooses to forgive our sins.

He is forgiveness for Israel. They know this. We don’t. But there it is, one verse of many, which tells them they are forgiven. We need to seal this Truth in our thinking and stop making Jesus, the King of Israel, Hashem who they make King every year at Rosh Hashanah, their condemning. Today begins Rosh Hashanah. I wish all Jews abundance in forgiveness this year.

I heard of a list put out by an unknown numbskull that listed their OPINION of “ungodly” churches. Dear unknown numbskull, God is forgiveness, and He, alone, knows the heart (Hebrews 4:12). We don’t. We form our opinions from false information – ALWAYS. What we don’t know, what we decide we know that we actually don’t know, becomes people’s condemning. This is solved forever by Jesus’ commandment, which, when He spoke it, He applied it to the Jewish covenant, as well as what would become instruction to the church. LOVE ONE ANOTHER, He said. Matthew 22:37-40. This means everyone, whether you disagree with them or not.

“Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.” (Romans 13:10)

We take Jesus’ words to the religious leaders of His day, that He called them “hypocrites” as our allowance to do the same. But (a) Jesus did not sin (Hebrews 4:15; 1 Peter 2:22), and (b) He died for them (John 3:16). We cannot say the same. We are hypocrites by attending church services, saying we worship Him, then making that stupid, crass list. There is no God in it. None. And now, we ask, What should we do instead? We should let go of what offends us. Argument always leads to strife and strife to division. God is unity. Of Gentiles with Gentiles, of Gentiles with Jews (Ephesians 2:14). He is peace to all and unity of everything, and that is His promise in John’s Revelation. He will make peace.

“Give none offence, neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the church of God:” (1 Corinthians 10:32)

“For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us;” (Ephesians 2:14)

Our need to fight is ungodly. I see this everywhere – in songs, in sermons. Even our fighting devils is wrong. Jesus destroyed them. 1 John 3:8. We are to stand IN HIM. Not in authority. I say this because the idea of authority leads us back to fighting. We’ve taken hold of His Words about authority and made ourself huge. Instead, it is that we are dependent upon Him. THERE ISN’T A WAR. Not between people and devils, or the devil, who isn’t in control of himself, much less a faux-kingdom. He is IN darkness because he isn’t IN the Light.

WE ARE TO BE FORGIVING OF PEOPLE. To refuse to speak outside of love because it is the love of God that covers sin. And this is God’s CHARACTER. It’s who He is, and we ought to fear Him for it.


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Suzanne D. Williams, Author
www.suzannedwilliams.com
www.feelgoodromance.com