because it’s Friday and because I got to eat Chipotle today, have a power smoothie from Ruby Juice, enjoy my smoothie as I drove to Bob Marley, and because it was warm and sunny with a warm breeze today and I found $110 trail running shoes for $17 at the Sierra Trading Post Outlet, and because Jesus is so incredible in His love and grace, I decided I would share a verse that’s impacted my life hugely. I figured those were enough reasons.
there’s this verse that every time I hear it or read it, I’m instantly taken back to the first moment this verse radically changed my life. I remember at that moment, I swore that was the first time I’d ever heard that verse in my life – though I’m sure I’d read it or heard it many times before.
I’m not going to tell you what verse it is.
HA!!!! I’m freakin’ hilarious. you know you’re laughing, too. at least giggling? at least smirking a little with a hint of amusement showing in your eyebrow? (…”a hint of amusement showing in your eyebrow”??? what in the world? who’s coming up with this nonsense?? oh…shoot…it’s my blog…I can’t blame someone else…)
oops. back on track… (I swear 1 day a study is going to come out saying everyone has at least some level of ADD or ADHD in them)
“Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus…” – Romans 8:1
now let me tell you why this verse brought so much life and freedom to me.
when this verse hit me, it was probably in…2008 (I can’t remember the exact year). we had taken a group of high schoolers to Acquire the Fire (ATF) in Miami and at one point, they had a time for all the leaders to get together and hear this one dude talk. side note: God’s real sly like that. I think He slips into stealth mode at these youth things. you know, you take these students to these youth events, praying all the while that God will meet them where they’re at and that He’ll capture their hearts. but most, if not all of the time, He teaches the leaders just as much and captures (or…recaptures) our hearts as well. He’s good. He’s reeeeeal good. :)
anyway, I have no clue what this dude talked about now, but I will never forget the moment he read that verse and he passionately encouraged us that any mistakes, any sins, any failures we were holding against ourselves – in Christ, we are forgiven! He does not hold any of that against us. And neither should we hold it against ourselves.
I was rocked.
by that point in my life, I had had plenty of instances of feeling like I failed God, and others. I had allowed those feelings of failure to take root in me and I just never felt like God was going to want to use me ever again because I had failed Him so many times.
so I hear this verse at ATF and it rocks me but I didn’t have time to process it at the time because we quickly had to get back to our group and make sure nobody killed each other (totally kidding – we had a great group of teens). as soon as we got home, I remember sitting in my friend Lisa’s living room (staring out across the back yard to the beautiful ocean and palm trees, I have to mention…oh my heart…how I miss the islands!). I’m sitting there on her couch and I asked what verse that was that the guy read, the one about “there’s no condemnation”. I asked, “is that really in the Bible??” and she laughed and had that expression on her face that said, “…are you for real?” she showed me where it was in Romans and the beauty and freedom of that verse continued to become more and more real to me.
if we are followers of Jesus, we are cleansed by His blood, the Ultimate Sacrifice that was required to restore us to God. we are completely forgiven and God does not condemn us anymore! it doesn’t matter what we have done, how we think we’ve failed Him, or how many times we’ve messed up. He loves us unconditionally. the blood of Jesus is grace that runs deeper than any of our sins, any of our failures.
“Therefore, there is now NO CONDEMNATION for those who are in Christ Jesus…”
let those words soak.
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