Living in confidence

“For whenever our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and he knows everything. Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God.”

1 John 3:20-21 (ESV)

It seems that John is saying that there are times when our hearts falsely condemn us, but God is greater than our hearts. We were meant to live in a confident relationship with God, through Jesus.  He knows our hearts and we know His love for us, so there are no secrets. We can walk in confidence, knowing that He loves us and gave Himself for us.

Life is a series of memories and moments which mold and make us who we are today. Days, weeks, months and years are condensed into key moments, that form our self image and how we develop our faith and trust in God over time.

We remember moments throughout our life spent with family and friends, as well as the sad times of saying our last goodbyes to our loved ones and friends. Not all memories are profound ones, yet some stay with us, and subtly form a part of our faith journey. 

I recall one, when I was very sick with a stomach virus, and too weak to care for my four month old twins. At the time, my husband was on strike and had an obligation to his union, to go to the picket line that day. With no one else available to help, I managed to dress the babies, pack a diaper bag with bottles, and gave it to my husband, sending the babies with him to the picket line. 

A newspaper reporter who was covering the workers’ strike that day,  came by and took a picture of the twins in their stroller, with their father, and the neighborhood newspaper headline read, “Striker does double duty on picket line.” It was an amusing, memorable moment for our family, but I was also grateful that God helped me rest and recover, providing a way for the babies to be cared for that day.

I like to listen to peoples’ stories, and I have learned that everyone has key moments, or turning points that influenced their faith and trust in God. Some moments helped them grow in confidence of their faith, while others left them feeling self condemnation. John’s words reminds us that feeling condemned in our hearts, is not from God, since God is greater than our hearts. Paul also said that there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. (Romans 8:1)

The collection of moments stored in our memories, were meant to lead us to a deeper, more confident journey of faith and friendship with Jesus.

People who had near death experiences, who died for a number of seconds, but brought back to life, all reported similar stories. During those few seconds of death, they all saw their lifeless body where it laid, as their spirit or soul was drawn upward from it. They all experienced going through a tunnel, toward a bright light, and they all saw some sort of a life review, like a brief video reflecting their key moments, both joyful and sad ones. Though they died for only seconds, they felt like they were in that state of being for hours. 

That life review is derived from the key moments of our lives, which all connect to form our journey of faith. We have all had moments when we were moved deeper in our level of faith, and moments when our faith was tested by unexpected sorrows and losses. There were moments when we missed what the Holy Spirit was trying to tell us, and others, when we heard Him and responded, in a way that positively changed someone’s life for good.

If we watched a video of all the key moments of our lives, some would make us laugh and some would make us cry, some would give us a sense of satisfaction and others a sense of shame, but there is a prevailing theme that runs through all the moments of our lives, and that is, the boundless “grace of God.”

As we lean on the everlasting arms, clinging to Jesus, whether our faith waxes or wanes, He stays with us through every storm. When we feel downhearted, He lifts our head up and we keep moving forward. God’s grace and strength is perfected through our weakest moments. When our heart condemns us, we remember John’s words that God is greater than our heart.

In those redemptive moments, our confidence in Christ’ love is secured within us. If we lack confidence in God’s love, it’s a false sense of self condemnation, and we have His word as our truth. We all need to be reminded;

“By grace, we are saved through faith, and not of ourselves, it is the gift of God, not by works, so that no one can boast.” (Ephesians 2:8-9)

The tiniest seed of faith, planted in Jesus, opens up a boundless fountain of mercy and grace which He generously pours out upon us. I know from experience that when we anchor our hope in His love, we receive many fresh starts, and He forgives our failures and mistakes. We do not let our heart condemn us, because God is greater than our heart. The divine love of God offers us an abundance of grace and mercy, which we could never earn, because it is His gift to us.

We were made to live forever, and this present life is the brief time we are given to make key moments out of difficult circumstances. When we live in confidence, we use our time left, to build up one another and we discover the good in others that we at first, missed. We are creating key moments that will last forever, in that final reel, called Our life.

Lord, thank you for your gift of grace, and your love which gives us confidence to make many fresh starts, so that we keep doing better, creating key moments in our lives that will bring honor and glory to you. Amen

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