2nd. July. 2022.Daily Devotions.
31 Jesus answered them, ‘It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but those who are ill. 32 I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. Luke 5:31-32
We have a strange illusion that mere time cancels sin. I have heard others, and I have heard myself, recounting cruelties and falsehoods committed in boyhood as if they were no concern of the present speaker’s, and even with laughter. But mere time does nothing either to the fact or to the guilt of a sin.
The guilt is washed out not by time but by repentance and the blood of Christ: if we have repented these early sins, we should remember the price of our forgiveness and be humble. As for the fact of a sin, is it probable that anything cancels it? All times are eternally present to God. Is it not at least possible that along some one line of His multi-dimensional eternity He sees you forever in the nursery pulling the wings off a fly, forever toadying, lying, and lusting as a schoolboy, forever in that moment of cowardice or insolence as a subaltern?
It may be that salvation consists not in the cancelling of these eternal moments but in the perfected humanity that bears the shame forever, rejoicing in the occasion which it furnished to God’s compassion and glad that it should be common knowledge to the universe. Perhaps in that eternal moment St Peter—he will forgive me if I am wrong—forever denies his Master. If so, it would indeed be true that the joys of Heaven are for most of us, in our present condition, ‘an acquired taste’—and certain ways of life may render the taste impossible of acquisition. Perhaps the lost are those who dare not go to such a public place.
Of course, I do not know that this is true; but I think the possibility is worth keeping in mind. ~ From The Problem of Pain by C. S. Lewis.
Lord God, let me never discount my past acts, but rather always give thanks for your grace and be assured of your forgiveness. Amen.
Prayer for the Day
Mighty Father God, I thank You for today — that it even exists, and especially, that I can live in it, that I can know it through the senses you have given me and breathe the air you have made. Your bounty and goodness to me is beyond understanding. I worship and praise you above all things because you are above all things. Your hand has made them, and your love has forgiven me and blessed me.
Keep me and those I love from danger, sickness, accident this day, I pray. Help me to turn my back on evil in all its many forms, to turn aside from the temptation that comes to me from within myself and from my reaction to the world outside. Broaden my mind and give me the gift of hearing truth even when I do not want to hear it, when a false thought is embedded in my mind and the truth disagrees with my preconceptions.
Fill me with gratitude. Give me courage to change the things that are contrary to your Word, even when they are ingrained, and it is painful for me to give them up. Let me realize my sin and give me the grace to repent it and seek your forgiveness. In the name of Jesus Christ, my Lord and Saviour, Amen.
God of wholeness, God of Grace, to you we bring our thanks and praise.
To a world that searches you are a lamp that shines, to a world that is hungry
you are food that sustains, to a world that suffers you are hope of release, to a world that’s broken you are one who restores, to a world full of hate you are love that forgives, to a world that denies you are truth that endures. To you we bring our thanks and praise, God of wholeness, God of Grace. Amen. John Birch.