Your guilt trips don’t glorify God
Trusting in Christ’s forgiveness does.
In Acts 13:38, Paul concludes his sermon before the synagogue in Antioch with these words:
Be it known unto you therefore, men [and] brethren, that through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins: and by him all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses.
Paul had spent the previous minutes using history and the Old Testament to show how Christ was the promised Saviour. “Therefore, men and brethren” there is forgiveness of sins, and forgiveness much better than any sense of justice that can be achieved on our own.
Too often, when we’ve sinned, we try to appease God’s wrath by putting ourselves on a guilt-trip. Discouraged, dismayed and self-condoning, we sulk through the day, repeatedly bringing to mind our own unworthiness. A spiritual form of crying-over-spilt-milk. “This way, God will see how seriously I take my failures and let me off the hook.”
This is works-salvation and it’s wrong. As Christians, we serve a God who doesn’t need to be appeased. Instead, He seeks to be glorified. And God is most glorified when we cling to Christ for our every need.
Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in him. John 13.31
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Excelente!
Enjoyed it!!
Very good!