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"Accept the TRUTH that God does forgive you for ALL of your sins IF you repent and mean it with your heart."

This was the lesson for today. Let me tell you why I have problems with this.

It seems like all my life I've been told I wasn't good enough. Not good enough for anything, not even salvation. It seems like every Sunday I'm reminded that I don't deserve to be here, I don't deserve to be alive, I don't deserve anything from God except death and misery, especially since I am a sinner and will always be a sinner and will continue to fail God at each and every turn.

All this may very well be true. But why does it have to seem like there's no hope? I mean, if I'm never going to be good enough for God, why try? Why accept His wonderful gift of grace when all I'm going to do is stomp all over it the moment I open my eyes on another undeserved day of life?

I'm just very confused. When I pray for forgiveness, I am truly, honestly sorry for whatever wrong I've done. I mean come on, like I'm really going to try to "fool" God into believing a fake apology. I wouldn't ask for forgiveness if I didn't truly think I'd done something wrong, so when I go to God in prayer and ask for forgiveness, I am truly sorry.

But why does it feel like I continue to be punished? I expect to be punished for each and every sin I commit. As a loving Heavenly Father, I wouldn't expect God not to punish me for my sins. But why does it seem like the punishments never end? I don't know what I keep doing wrong to have to keep having so much hurt and turmoil in my life. When do the punishments end???? If only things could be so clear to me like they were for David. He knew what he did wrong, and he was told his child would die as a price for his sins (and it did), and after that he flourished and went on to live a great life. I just wish I could have a tiny sliver of that in my own life.

Pert,

I understand your conflict, and I want you to know it is not a new paradox. In ancient times members of the Gnostic religion believed that the human body was disgusting and incapable of doing good, so they did whatever they want. Even Sir Thomas Aquinas (who is a philosopher that wrote arguments for the existence of God) was subject to mental breakdown from pondering these questions. I have studied secular and Christian philosophy and this is what is known as the problem of evil. Basically if God is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent, then why do these bad things happen? It makes us wonder why God lets us sin and why these things exist. It makes us think of why we can never truly be all good and why we continue to suffer.

It might be a little loose to talk about this in reference to forgiveness, but I do not believe turmoil and suffering is because God does not forgive you. It is because we have evil in us and in the world. To be honest with you, I do not have an answer to this philosophical dilemma. Somehow this is part of God's divine plan which we can never understand. A quote I remember from sitting through sermons is, "God explaining his plan to us would be like teaching math to an ant." The point is we are incapable of understanding what his intentions are. He is with you and has forgiven you even though you will continue to sin. I do not think there is a timeline for tribulation to start and end, so hang in there because it will get better. For some reason God seemed to make life an up and down cycle of highs, lows, and transitions. We do not know why, but he has given us the tools to believe in him and told us what we are capable of understanding. We just have to trust in him for the rest. If we could understand why everything happened we would not need faith right? I hope this helps a little, or at the very least know that this type of conflicted thinking is a perfectly normal part of obtaining and maintaining faith.

Hello Pert (((hugs)))

God bless you this day.

There is HOPE, blessed HOPE in Christ Jesus. We are saved by hope -- Romans 8:24-25 For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doeth he yet hope for? (25) But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it.

I think you may be equating trials and tribulations of this life, with punishment. But, maybe I'm just not fully understanding what you are saying. Could you explain a little more, and maybe give a few examples?

Prayers are rising to our Lord in the name of Jesus, on your behalf. May God's blessed and perfect will be done.

God bless and keep you, Pert.
Love,
Mack

i felt God give me Psalm 39 for you. I'm praying for you too, i cannot describe the freedom from sin and how powerful the Lords love is. If you accept him he accepts us good and bad he loves us deeper than we'll ever know and gives us rebirth that we could never understand. Amen

Hebrews 12:7-9 ... If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not? But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons. Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live?


Proverbs 13:12 ... Hope deferred maketh the heart sick: but when the desire cometh, it is a tree of life.

We need only be as patient on God to bring forth that which we hope for, as He is with us.

Continue on the path with hope and understanding that our Lord does what He does in LOVE.

Thank you all for replying and helping me. I do want to say though, that I don't want to be hopeless!

It seems like other people are trying to force this message of a hopeless life on me and I'm resisting and resisting with everything in me, but I do get tired at times. I have occasional moments of weakness where I start to believe them, but I just can't. Something in me just won't let me believe that my life has no worth. Maybe it's the Holy Spirit, maybe it's just common sense... I don't know. But I can't accept it. I know enough intuitively to know that that's not TRUTH.

Pert wrote:Thank you all for replying and helping me. I do want to say though, that I don't want to be hopeless!

You don't have to be. It's your choice. Don't let others tell you what your life is or should be. They say I can't heal and I'll suffer all my life. THEY are WRONG cause I have HOPE in a loving God who CAN and WILL take care of all of this with in each of us. Cause HE is good like that.