Once we repent of our sins, believe in Jesus’ saving work on the cross, and start to follow the complete peace of His Spirit in our spirit, we can no longer live in habitual sin because we are an authentic part of God’s family (1 John 3:7-10). We realize that sin devastates the heart of our Father God, and we run from it.
God’s Spirit is quick to convict a true Believer’s spirit when we refuse to surrender to Him our fondness towards a particular mode of sin. If we do not respond to His conviction, and we continue in this particular sin, it shows us that there is some unholy soul-tie between us and this practice.
Waiting on God in our quiet place allows Him to show us how to get free from the strangle hold this inclination has on us. There is a reason our soul clings to this behavior and causes us to willfully disappoint our Heavenly Father. If we completely surrender this mystery to God, His Spirit will reveal the cause to us and help us to walk away from it into true freedom (John 5:18-21).
As we imitate the example Jesus gives us by His life on earth, we can live a life of love and repentance. We add praise and thanksgiving for our Lord Jesus Christ to our core values and daily practices. We discern the deception of satanic forces which attempt to draw us away from full devotion to God and cause us to stand the chance of experiencing God’s wrath over our sin (Ephesians 5:1-7).
If we keep our sinful practices, thinking that God will keep showing us His grace and forgiveness, we break His heart and lose out on His blessings for us. We have no reason to fall to temptation because Jesus broke the power of sin over us when we prayed for Him to forgive us. God always gives us a way of escape from temptation (Romans 6:1-4).
Repentance means that we turn away from iniquity and to walk toward an intimate relationship with our God and Savior. Once we are convicted, if we deliberately follow the desires of our body or soul, this proves that we were never converted, and our spirit is still dead in sin. Fully surrendering to Jesus is our only hope of true freedom. (Ephesians 2:1-5; Romans 8:9-11; Hebrews 10:26-31).
Prayer:
Father God, thank You for giving the whole world throughout every generation that ever lives the chance to come to You as an adopted child of Your Kingdom. We want to walk away from iniquity and adopt Your principles to guide our life instead. Remind us that if we are still a slave to sin and addiction, we are not truly born again by Your Spirit. Search our heart and examine our habits and deliver us if there is any tendency in us toward sin (Psalm 139:23-24).
We do not want to reap the eternal destruction, which is the consequence of not believing in Jesus and following Your ways (John 3:18). We do not want to continue to trample on Jesus by our unholy habits and treating His shed blood as though it were ineffective and nothing special. This insults and angers Your Spirit who wants to shower us with Your mercy. This disobedience causes us the experience of falling under Your discipline (Hebrews 10:.29-31). We love You and want to please You in every thought, word, and action in our life.
Thoughts for the Day:
Every attitude, desire, and inclination to sin that we refuse to allow God to prune from our life is controlling our life. If we give His Spirit full reign to sanctify us with the mind and character of Jesus, He breaks the unholy soul-ties that once kept us in bondage to that practice. If we quit submitting to Satan’s will for us, and we fully embrace and surrender to God’s will for us instead, we will live a fulfilled life complete with all the blessings God has in store for us (1 Corinthians 2:9-10).
