| Whatsoever
Things Are True
by Dan Coburn Pastor, Emmanuel Baptist Church pastordan@mtida.net Helpful Guilt. What? The right kind of guilt is a Gift Of God. That which is generated by the Holy Spirit. John 16: 8 in the NIV says “When He comes, He will convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness and judgment. Or will expose the guilt of the world”. Guilt is to the soul, what pain is to the body. Would it be good if our body no longer felt any pain? Guilt says to a sinful dying world, that Something is desperately wrong. But because we live in a society that sees all guilt as Bad, and all that matters is your self esteem, we must do away with all guilt. Harmful guilt from Satan. Not all guilt is good, and not all the same. Harmful guilt is guilt over sin that God has already forgiven. When Satan talks about Sin, and the Savior, he lies. But when he talks about my sin, he tells the truth. He is the accuser and I have to say “I did it”. But he shuts out, Gods grace, His mercy, His forgiveness, His Redemptive work, and instead gets us to focus on our sin, our self, our problem. Us instead of God. C S Lewis' The Screwtape Letters is the story of Demons talking about Satan's strategy to preoccupy us with our failures, and thus render us useless to God. Spiritual growth stops dead in its tracks when we have this satanic guilt banding us. If, John 8: 32, the truth sets us free, than what are we free from exactly? Could "it" be pleural? How do I know? It’s absolutely essential that you know how to discern between the two Because, one drives you away from God, and the other draws you nearer. Here are three words to describe the conviction or guilt that the Holy Spirit brings in the life of a believer. And if the guilt is not in line with these three truths, than it is not of God, and I will guarantee you that it is from the enemy. We’ll see how to deal with it in a minute. 1st. The Holy spirit convicts us Legitimately. Listen to me, He will never convict us of something that God has already forgiven. Our text was written primarily to Christians, see 1st John 1:7. Pre- Salvation, Post Salvation sins, whatever; they have been dealt with Gods’ way. 2nd. The Holy Spirit will convict Specifically. When the enemy accuses us it is always Vague. “I’m just no good–I’m never going to be any different, I’m never gonna change–how could God ever use Me–look what I’ve done, How can God hear my prayers? God must be so angry-and disgusted with me”. 3rd. The Holy Spirit convicts Redemptively. He will always lead us to deal with barriers in order to draw us closer to God. False, bad, satanic guilt creates a sense of isolation and estrangement from God. But the Holy Spirits' purpose is always to bring us to God. With the bad, there is a sense of hopelessness and often a feeling of having to pay God back. That’s always false guilt cause you can’t pay back grace. How do I Conquer guilt? Our goal is not to never face guilt again. Our goal is 1st John 2:1—we want to experience guilt. How do we allow guilt to do its intended work in us? How do we conquer the harmful guilt from the enemy? Utilize Confession. For Salvation/restoration. Confession=Agreeing with God. Never been saved=confession of your need; and Jesus as Lord-Romans 10: 9. For a believer, confession is the agreement with God about a specific sin, for the purpose of dealing with it, unto reconciliation. 1st John 1:9—. Restoration. Once we agree, repent, refuse to rationalize, blame, deal with it, then LISTEN, the Holy Spirit will never bring it up again. There will be consequences, and Confession does not earn forgiveness, but God "is faithful and just to forgive us our sin and cleanse us from all unrighteousness". How do I conquer the harmful guilt? Again, 1:7–all sin. Didn’t just cover sin, but cleansed us. That word cleanses, is in the present or lineal tense, it is an ongoing process. He is at the Right hand of the Father Interceding on our behalf. Every person is capable of sin. But if you are a child of God, you have forgiveness available. |
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