pastorjohnb

Thoughts and musings on faith and our mighty God!

Tag Archives: unfailing


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Restoring a Sinner

Reading: Psalm 85

The psalmist expresses a cycle that is common to us all.  The people of Israel sinned and found God’s forgiveness.  Time passed and they sinned again.  The writer expresses the need for God to forgive the people once again.  The psalmist calls for God’s unfailing love to once again yield mercy and grace.  The writer reminds themselves and God that God promises peace to His people.  The the writer again requests salvation from God.

It is a cycle we often repeat as well.  Earlier in one’s Christian walk, the cycle is repeated more often but throughout life we cycle through the sin-repentance-forgiveness pattern over and over.  Being human, frail and weak as we are, we will fall into sin.  Yet God, being unfailing love and unending grace, responds over and over again with forgiveness and an invitation back into right relationship with Him.

As we look back over our journey of faith we can identify times when we came to realize that we had been sinning.  It was not obvious to us before we reached a certain maturity level in our faith.  As we continue to grow in our relationship with Jesus Christ we come to junctures where we realize that what we were doing was really gossip or being jealous or lust or …  What was before simply part of who we are is one day seen as sin.  So we repent and think ‘not again’ as we are now aware that a certain behavior was sinful.  But like most sins, this one will return again.  Satan knows our weak spots and will continue to hammer away at them for a while.

As we mature in our faith and our relationship with Christ grows stronger, the time between recurrences of a sin will lengthen out.  And being fully human, we know that we may fall back into that sin once in a while.  But as we do mature, we recognize it sooner and come to a place where we stop at the temptation to gossip or whatever.  And then we begin to wrestle with other sins in our lives!

Into our constant battle with sin, into our human weakness, steps God’s love and grace.  God’s love and grace are far greater than our sin will ever be.  It is so great that nothing in all of creation is able to separate us from the love of God.  May we ever be thankful for God’s unfailing love and unending grace that always restores a sinner like me back to the true and loving relationship that is life itself.


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Rooted

Reading: Psalm 52

David is in the midst of a trial in Psalm 52.  King Saul has become crazed with jealousy and paranoia and is pursuing David to kill him.  David is on the run for his life.  He knows in his heart that he is in the ‘right’ and that God is with him, yet he faces this trial.  Despite being physically on the move, David states that he is like “an olive tree flourishing in the house of God”.  In the midst of this crazy pursuit by Saul, David remains rooted in his faith in the God he loves.

In the song “Always”, artist Kristian Stanfill sings, “My foes are many, they rise against me, I will hold my ground”.  In our life we can often relate to David’s trial and to the thoughts expressed in this song.  At times we can feel beset on all sides.  In these moments it can be easy or tempting to pull up the roots we have in God and to turn to other means to deal with the fear or pain or doubt or whatever else we are facing.

David wrote, “I will trust in God’s unfailing love for ever and ever”.  The songs says, “I will not fear, His promise is true, my God will come through always, always”.  In both we find the blessed assurance that God will always live us and will always be there for us.  For our part, we must stay rooted in God.

It can be hard to do this.  The song goes on to day, “Trouble surrounds me, chaos abounding, I will test in You”.  It is a faith deeply rooted in God that can rest in Him in the midst of a trial.  To be deeply rooted requires daily watering and fertilizing.  This day may we water our faith in the Word of God and allow it to permeate our faith, to fertilize it as its message sinks deep down into our soul and strengthens our faith.  May we do this day by day do that when the winds and rain of life come, our faith will be deeply rooted on the true foundation, Jesus Christ.


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Extend His Love

God offers a covenant to David that is not contingent upon what David or his descendants do.  God promises His faithfulness and love to David and his descendants no matter what they do.  This is an extravagant promise.  God acknowledges that if the sons sin, there will be consequences.  In doing so God recognizes that the human side of the relationship or covenant will at times fail.  But God will remain steadfast.

Human relationships are dynamic and often fluid.  People we were once friends with are no longer close to us.  Others will come to occupy our time and interest for a season.  Some friendships last a lifetime.  Even in marriage, where forever is our intent starting out, some of these relationships come to an end.  Human relationships are affected by so many things; change is often the norm.  And as we are humans, at times we fail.  This can be fatal to some of our relationships.

Through Jesus we are connected into the covenant God made with David and his descendants.  As sons and daughters of Jesus Christ, we too are heirs to this steadfast and unchanging love that God offers.  Our claim to the love of God begins the covenant relationship between God and each of us.  At some point we recognize that love and choose to enter into a relationship with God the creator.

Even though at times we too will fail in this relationship, His love will never fail.  God’s love never fails.  As we come to know this unfailing love more and more, we too begin to share this love with others.  We extend His love.  This is our grateful response to God’s love.  Love generously today.

Scripture reference: Psalm 89: 20-37