During the first night of bible study the question was posed, "what hinders you from praying and believing God to answer?". Many of the ladies stated that they believe God to answer prayers for others (when they themselves pray for others) but they have a hard time believing that God will answer them because of things they have done in the past. Our past is our own greatest challenge when it come to believing God. 1 John 1:9 states: "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." It is the enemies job to try and keep you bound. Your past is just what it is.....your past. If we have confessed our sins and repented, God is faithful and just and He will forgive every sin. When we come to Christ and surrender our lives to Him, He forgives us and no longer imputes the debt of sin to us.
When we accept the fact that we have been forgiven it will become easier for us to believe that when we pray, God hears us and He will answer.
Question for discussion: Why is it so difficult to move beyond my past, when I have been forgiven?
I believe that as a believer it is hard to accept that God had forgiven us of our past because the enemy can so well remind us everyday of the things we once were and used to be. And the enemy will paint the picture constantly in our mind when things go wrong that this is simply a punishment and what you deserve to deal with simply because of things that you have done in your past. However, when we can accept the fact that once we confess our sins and accept Jesus into our lives we become NEW creatures. And the Bible says that old things are passed away and behold all things become new. So the main challenge is after we confess and God forgives us, can we forgive ourselves? Can we say to ourselves and the enemy that speaks to our mind, my past is my past and it is now under the blood of Jesus. I am a new creature. It is truly a daily battle to remind our own selves that God has forgiven us for every sin, no matter how big, small, wrong, and filthy. He is just enough and loves us so much that He forgave us and gave us the chance to walk in our full Godly potential. And the best thing about God is that he will allow us to make mistakes in order to prepare us for our destiny in Him. So remember that we are New creatures and we are called and ordained by God. Everything that we were in our past, is not simply that..our past. Be blessed.
ReplyDeleteIt's difficult to move beyond my past because I feel I am unworthy because of the wrong I did. I feel ashamed of my sins. I feel filthy and I question God asking, "Why ME?". I don't want to feel this way. I want and desire to move past it, but living a life for years feeling like I'm not worth anything keeps me in that mind frame.
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