Christianity Oasis Forum

[cimi]

January 23
Friday


WHEN OTHERS
WON'T
FORGIVE

READ:
Philippians 3:12-16
___________________________________________________________________________________________
Forgetting those things
which are behind...I
press toward the goal.
++Philippians 3:13-14
__________________________________________________________________________________________

I was having lunch with two men who had opened their lives to Christ while they were in prison. The younger man had been discouraged by the fact that the family from whom he had stolen would not forgive him.

"My crime was violent," the older man said. "It continues to haunt and affect the family to this day. They have not forgiven me,...the pain is just too great. At first, I found myself paralyzed by this longing for their forgiveness." He continued his story: "Then one day I realized I was adding selfishness to my brokenness. It's a lot to expect that the family forgive me. I was focused on what I felt I needed to heal from my past. It took some time to realize that their forgiveness of me was a matter between them and God."

"How can you stand it?" the younger man asked.

The older man explained that God did for him what he didn't deserve and what others simply can't do: He died for our sins, and He keeps His promise to move our sins "as far as the east is from the west" (Ps. 103:12) and "will not remember [our] sins" (Isa. 43:25).

In the face of such great love, we honor Him by accepting His forgiveness as sufficient. We must forget what lies behind and keep pressing forward (Phil. 3:13-14). __Randy Kilgore

`````````````````````Thank You, Father, for the work of Christ on the``````````````````````
`````````````````````cross. Help me to understand and accept what``````````````````````
`````````````````````it means for me, and to be a messenger of that``````````````````````
````````````````````````forgiveness to those I meet along the way.````````````````````````
___________________________________________________________________________________________________
The work of Christ is sufficient for every sin.

**************************Today's Bible Reading __ Philippians 3:12-16**********************

12 Not that I have already
attained, or am already
perfected; but I press on,
that I may lay hold of that
for which Christ Jesus has
also laid hold of me.

13 Brethren, I do not
count myself to have
apprehended; but one thing
I do, forgetting those
things which are behind
and reaching forward to
those things which are
ahead, 14 I press toward the
goal for the prize of the
upward call of God in
Christ Jesus.

15 Therefore let us, as
many as are mature, have
this mind; and if in
anything you think
otherwise, God will reveal
even this to you.

16 Nevertheless, to the
degree that we have
already attained, let us
walk by the same rule, let
us be of the same mind.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>INSIGHT<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

Paul often uses the metaphor of an athlete running a race to depict
the Christian life (1 Cor. 9:24-27; Phil. 2:16; 2 Tim. 4:7). In today's
passage, he compares himself to someone running a long-distance
race. Paul had probably been a Christian for about 30 years when
he wrote this letter; he was known as the apostle to the Gentiles
(Eph. 3:8; Gal. 2:8) and a teacher of the Scriptures. He could
have been content with his own spiritual maturity, but he did not
consider himself as having "already reached perfection" (v.12 NLT).
Instead, Paul persisted in pursuing Christlikeness (v.10) with the
determination and vigor of a runner whose single goal is to be the
first to cross the finish line.