Sunday, November 5, 2017

The One Thing You Need to Know to Become Free of the Burden of Guilt

Oh, how it gets me.   I was waiting this week to turn behind this other car.    But when the traffic cleared, the car just sat there.   I tried to be nice about it.   I thought.  Maybe this driver was distracted for a moment. It happens.  But then the traffic cleared again, and guess what did not happen?   No turn again!   That’s when I lost it.   I started yelling “Turn, just turn!!”   Eventually the driver did turn of course, but that sort of thing drives me nuts!

Now that may not bother you, but you probably have something that does?  Do you have something that pushes your buttons; an annoying habit; a certain noise that sends you around the bend.     It could be anything.    And when it happens, oh how it can irritate.

Still, life goes on.   On the scale of problems, these things, they’re irritating, but they don’t really mess up your life.   But in your life, you have something else, something that pushes your buttons in a different way that will mess you up, that could even destroy you.  

When it comes to doing wrong things in life, let’s be honest.  Some of the wrong you and I do, it doesn’t bother us that much.   Maybe it should, but it doesn’t.   You don’t feel that much guilt or regret about it.  Heck, you may not feel any.  But not every mistake you make is like that.  In your life, you probably have one that really pushes your buttons.    When you mess up here, that failing stays with you.  The guilt follows you, the regrets.   You find it so hard to let it go. 

Normally, with my son, Patrick, I’m the more patient parent.   But a few times, I’ve lost it.   I can’t even tell you why I lost it, but I remember that I did.  It wasn’t pretty. Afterwards, I went to Patrick and apologized. And he, like 3 year olds do, let it go and moved on.   But I carried it.  I carried it for way too long.  

Now that particular screw-up may not push your buttons, like it pushes mine.  But do you have something that does?  Do you carry regret over a mistake, maybe one from years ago?    Do you have a failing that you hope no one finds out about ever?   That stuff weighs you down.  It holds you back.   It can even eat you alive.  Some have found such stuff so hard to live with, they kill themselves.   They’d rather die than carry it another day.   But here’s the truth.   If you’re carrying that, you’re not supposed to.  You can let it go.  You can be free of it.   In these words, God shows the way.  Let’s listen and hear what God has to say.


You can carry regrets, guilt about things for years and years even.   You can even think you’re supposed to, like it’s a virtue or something.  It’s not.   But even if you know that, it’s hard to let it go.   So, how do you?   How do you leave it behind?   How do you get free of it, really free?   God tells you here.   God says.  I am greater than your heart.

And it’s that, your heart, that is holding you back.  When John talks about your heart here, he doesn’t mean that big red muscle beating in your chest right now.  John means what you mean, when you say; That guy was really speaking from the heart.  John means what Selena Gomez means when she sings, The Heart Wants What It Wants.  

John is talking about the forces that drive you, for good or for bad.   For sometimes your heart will not only lead you to do something stupid.   It won’t let you forget it.   It will torture you with it, condemn you for it, burden you with it.   And you can think that all this bad feeling even comes from God.   But if that’s true, why does John say when our hearts condemn us, God is greater than that.  God not only doesn’t condemn you, John says, instead he reassures you. 

Now, that doesn’t mean that God doesn’t care when you do something wrong.   But God doesn’t condemn you for it.   Now, God may convict you.   You may hear God saying to your heart.  What you did there wasn’t right.   That thought you’re carrying it leads nowhere good.    But do you see the difference?  When conviction comes, it wakes you up to something wrong.  Then it encourages you to go a different way.   It is saying something like: You are better than this.   It gives you hope.

But condemnation offers you no hope.  Condemnation just locks you up and throws away the key.   So when condemnation comes, it never comes from God, even if you hear it in a church.   God doesn’t condemn.  Evil condemns.  That’s why the Bible calls the Devil, the Accuser.  That’s part of the evil of evil.  It gets you coming and going.  It tempts you to do wrong. And then it condemns you for what it tempted you to do in the first place. 

So how do you get free? You realize. Your heart is lying to you.  It is telling you something isn’t true.  God is bigger than your mistakes.  God is greater than your failings, no matter how bad.   Instead, God has taken all that for you.   He carried your guilt so you can be free of it.  God paid the ultimate price to set you free from your lying and condemning heart.   And the more you believe that, the greater your freedom becomes. 

The preacher Tim Keller tells a story about one of the old Czars in Russia.  One of the Czar’s nobleman was dying.   So, he asked the Czar to adopt his little son, as his mother had died also.  The Czar adopted the boy into his household, gave him everything.   The boy grew up and took a commission in the army.  But he had some issues, a big gambling problem.  And he began to embezzle from his division, as he was the bookkeeper.  Eventually it got so bad, he couldn’t hide the stealing any longer.  It was going to come out.    So, one night he looked at the books and saw the mess he created.  Then, he drank as much as he could, trying to find the nerve to kill himself.  But he drank so much, he passed out.   Now, the Czar had a practice of dressing up as a soldier to see what was really going on.  And that night, he was doing just that.  He went to look in on his adopted son.  And he saw the revolver, the open books, the passed-out man. He realized everything.  So, the Czar wrote a note, and sealed it with the Czar’s seal.  Then he left.   When the young man woke up, he saw the note.  It read, “I, the Czar will make good all the debts in this book.”   And he realized, the Czar had come and seen everything.  But the Czar hadn’t condemned him.  No, the Czar out of love had taken all the debt on himself. 


In Jesus God came as one of us.  And God saw everything, all the messes you and had made.  But God did more than write a note.  In Jesus, God offered up everything, even God’s own life, so that you might be free forever.    Let Jesus free you from your lying and condemning heart.  Receive the liberation from guilt God has given to you.  What do you need to do?  All you need to do is believe that it’s true, that God's love is greater than your heart.       

No comments:

Post a Comment