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Dear friends, this is now my second letter to you. I have written both of them as reminders to stimulate you to wholesome thinking. 2 Peter 3:1 (NIV).
This puts me in good company: Peter’s reason for writing his letters is the same as mine: to stimulate you to wholesome thinking. You could do me no greater compliment than to look in your Bible to learn more about today’s verse. No greater honor could be paid than for you to be encouraged in your faith, strengthened in your relationship with the Lord Jesus, who saves us all. When that happens, give all the credit to God because He’s the one who made it happen.
THAT was the wholesome thinking Peter urged; that’s why I write here. It is for God to use these words to help you somehow in your walk today. Let’s face it: we all need that help. We can’t do this faith-journey alone; we can’t journey through life without others. And others are here to channel the Lord’s love to help us as well.
That becomes important, even critical, every day when we’re faced with idolatry. You know you will be; you know that something today will occupy your interest so much that you’ll put aside thoughts of God, thoughts of yourself even. Hard work and focus are good things, inherent in our human independence. But they can facilitate our idolatry if we let them. We can make work, sex, leisure, money, anything an idol, and the evil one will happily use that to drive a wedge into our relationship with God. If you think about it, every sin we do is a combination of at least two sins, one of which is idolatry. We choose something other than Jesus and, like Elvis sang, that’s when your heartaches begin.
The good news is that Jesus forgives all sins. All of them. Recognize idolatrous immorality then flee from it so you can confess genuine sorrow, real remorse, true repentance. He will forgive you. That doesn’t make him a wish-machine: it simply shows His divine character. You know when you feel that genuine sorrow: it’s when you feel it deep inside, when you’re ashamed of what you’ve done, when you want to ‘take it back’ but accept that you can’t undo what you did. Go to God with that on your heart and you’ll find He’s been waiting for you.
When you do that, you’ll understand how every believer needs to go to Christ every single day because every day we mess things up. Every one of the apostles and church heroes of old had to do the same thing. And so will you every day of your life. Feel the relief of Jesus’ forgiveness and know you’re in good company. That’s when the best life begins.
For further reading: 1 Corinthians 10:14, 2 Peter 3:2
Lord Jesus, let my heart genuinely confess my sins to You, and let me rest peacefully in Your forgiveness.
Practical Proverbs 