I
read a book once... called the Bible. I saw where there was a woman
who was caught in the very act of being a sinner...I read where there
were Pharisees of the day just doing what they were used to
doing....what they were commanded to do...before they had truly met
JESUS personally....but that day....HE opened all of their
eyes....sinner woman...and white washed saint.....Jesus got eye level
with the sinner and wrote something.... and so powerful was the
moment.....then He said to all of them....sinner woman...and
Pharisee...."Let him who is without sin...Cast the first
stone"....Their reaction? ....They dropped their stones to the
ground at the realization that for all their keeping of the
LAW....for all their trying...sin remained in their lives ....The
woman? She received the message of forgiveness along with a mandate
from the only one who was without sin...Who DID cast the first
stone...so that all mankind could be free from all condemnation of
sin...and yet with the mandate....which was the same as when he first
spoke it to the woman....."Go, and sin no more!" For all
the years I, like this woman, have lived as a forgiven sinner, there
have been many who have fallen short of the glory of God and have
worn the cloak of the Pharisee well...but truly inside was the
scarlet robe of the harlot written in their fleshly hearts. I am a
Christian not because there is any good thing in my flesh, but only
because my sins have been washed away supernaturally by the blood of
the Perfect Son of God....who said ..."Follow Me.... The trouble
with us forgiven sinners? We often follow the desire in our fleshly
hearts rather than the example to love as Jesus does. I am realizing
the more I literally take an honest look in my own heart...I still
see a stone...JESUS...THE ROCK of AGES...cleft for me....He still
daily covers a multitude of sins by HIS LOVE. Bob Carlisle wrote a
song a few years ago that said, "We fall down, we get up...and
the saints become the sinners; who fall down...and get up."
License to sin? NO!....but truth....that on our best day as forgiven
sinners, saints, Christ-followers...or Christians...who try
everything humanly to "do right"....we fall short. BUT
Jesus never fails! I look to him who is the Author and Finisher of my
faith. Change my focus to HIM...he shines His truth on my sin....I
choose to repent; get up out of the dirt and Follow Him...doing the
best I can not to sin that sin anymore..and try to make
reconciliation and restitution to others when I realize I have sinned
against them...Trusting NOT in my own ability to save myself....but
in HIS FINISHED work on Calvary for me. I read a book once.....I met
a man once...Jesus!
