Rejecting the Lie That “I Missed It" - Purity 1315

To see today's photo, go to mt4christ.org or follow me, M.t. Clark, on Facebook or Twitter. Good morning. Today's photo of lilacs and other flowers in the foreground as the sun sets in the distance over a mountain range that I suspect to be the Catskill Mountains comes to us from an unknown Facebook friend who shared this scene on social media on or around May 7th, 2021. If this photo is yours and you'd like to be recognized for it, give me a heads up and I'll update the blog to give you the photo credit after the fact. Well, it's Tuesday and I am sharing today's photo to continue my campaign of cleaning out my closet of unused photos borrowed from social media and to highlight the fact that it is indeed actually springtime. My personal electronics assistant, who will remain nameless, uh, confirmed to me that the first day of spring In 2024 was March 19th, 2 weeks ago. And even though we have had some snow that may have caused us to doubt what season we are in, the meteorological circumstances and our feelings don't change the fact that it is spring. That's the truth. As an advocate for a lifestyle of Christian discipleship that is grounded in experiencing our freedom in Christ through repentance and affirming the truth of who we are in Christ, I often encourage Christians to honestly look at the beliefs they're holding on to that cause them to stay stuck in sin or negative mind states such as anger, anxiety, or depression. When you ask people who are earnestly seeking freedom or a breakthrough to review their family and personal history, if you listen carefully to what they are saying, they will reveal things they believe about themselves, God, or life in general that may be supported by the circumstances of their life experience, but contradict what the Word of God says. If you give people a space in which they can safely tell their story, they will tell you the lies they believe. One of the lies that I have heard from a few different people over the years has to do with regrets from the past, where they believe that they missed their calling or purpose in life, or their opportunity to be used by God, or their chance at happiness. In recovery circles, these narratives are described as the only ifs or if onlys, as in, if I had only asked blank to marry me instead of blank, or if I only had never done something, or if I had done X, Y, and Z, or if they only— they had done this or didn't do that. Um, regrets cause us to second-guess our life's path and contribute to the false belief that we, quote unquote, missed it— our chance at happiness or purpose or fulfillment. And while we can look at our lives and think of several points where things could have been different, it is a lie to believe that we missed it when it comes to God's plan for our lives or for our personal happiness. The Freedom in Christ course defines happiness as wanting what you have, as being content. And no missed opportunities in the past can stop us from being content with what we have today. But dwelling on the thoughts of regrets from the past certainly can. While we can't fix the past, through prayer and repentance we can resolve and move beyond the conflicts of the past that affect our present. And get in the way of looking toward the future with hope. The Serenity Prayer touches on how we do this when we pray to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Living one day at a time, enjoying one moment at a time, accepting hardship as a pathway to peace, taking as Jesus did this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it, Trusting you will make all things right if I surrender to your will, so that I will be reasonably happy in this life and supremely happy with you forever in the next. Amen. So reject the lie that you missed it, and instead accept the things that happened in the past. Forgive those who have hurt you and seek the forgiveness of those you have hurt. When doing so will not harm them or others, to move past any bitterness or guilt you have been holding on to. Forgive yourself, meaning you accept God's forgiveness and let it stick. There is no condemnation. And move forward in the peace that the Lord wants you to live in. As for the missed opportunities and broken relationships, accept that they are in the past and gone, and endeavor to start living today to be right with God to be the person he created you to be, and to step out in faith and hope to see what God wants to do with the rest of your life. All that stuff in the past has prepared you for today, and we can either learn from it and move on wiser from it, or we can dwell on things we cannot change and be consumed by feelings of shame, guilt, and regret, and stay stuck in our negative feelings and listlessness. God has forgiven us and calls us to a new life, but we have to accept it and move forward with him to experience the freedom and abundant life he has given us. If we know Jesus, we didn't miss it, but we have to follow him into the life he wants us to live, to be free. So seek the Lord and the truth of who you are in Christ. Live from the identity that God gives you when you put when you put your faith in Jesus and learn to walk in his ways. Walking in the Spirit leads to peace, love, joy, and other good things. So step out in faith and follow the Lord into the life he has for you, and take the opportunities that come your way to give thanks to God and to share the good news of the life and peace that only comes through Jesus. Today's Bible verses— or verse— comes to us from the Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling by John G. Cruis, this morning's meditation verse comes from the section on contentment, coveting, and priorities. And today's verse is 2 Corinthians 4:18 from the New Living Translation. The word of God says, so we don't look at the troubles we can see now. Rather, we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen, for the things we see now will soon be gone, but the things we cannot see will last forever. Today's verse falls under the 25th point of our Counseling Reference Guide's resource section on Contentment, Coveting, and Priorities. And that 25th point is: What is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal. Today's verse encourages us to look beyond current troubles and to focus on the unseen things that can give us hope and inspire us to endure and persevere through trials. Christians are assured that God is moving all things together for our good. And regardless of what we may suffer in the here and now, uh, we have the promise of eternal life to keep us buoyed by hope. We know God will never leave us or forsake us, even if we die. And when we can hold on to that unseen truth, we can handle anything this world has to dish out. Christ rose from the dead and ascended to heaven, literally. That's a fact. And that fact and the testimony of scripture tells us of the spiritual realm that exists beyond this mortal coil and the hope that God's kingdom will come and restore this broken— this world broken by sin when Jesus returns. These are all unseen, but they are promised and true. And they can cause us to live lives free from fear and full of joy. As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org, where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk. Today we continue sharing from According to Your Word: Morning and Evening Through the New Testament by Stephen F. Alford. And in Alford's devotional, he prompts us to read a chapter of scripture And today's chapter is John 7, and from John 7, he shares a portion of John 7:37, which says, "If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink." And Stephen Alford writes, there are three steps in this verse. Each one is as important as the other, and all lead to true satisfaction in Christ. Rapacity, a greedy desire or craving for the living water. If anyone thirsts, there must be this earnest desire if the soul is to be satisfied. For the Lord says, blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled. Request: Let him come to me. This is request, for it includes the two parties— he who thirsts coming to the one who satisfies. That coming is the request of the soul. Reception: Drink. Here is the personal, deliberate reception of the gift of satisfying water. To drink implies the receiving into oneself. And Offord concludes his sharing with the prayer: Satisfy my soul now, O Lord, until I overflow with your blessing. Amen, amen, amen. And rapacity, whoa. Um, yeah, you can look that one up on the, on the blog and then look for the definition, but that's apparently a greedy desire or craving for the living water. So we need to want it. If anyone thirsts, let them come to me and drink. So we need to have that desire. We want peace, we want freedom, and then we have to do what? We have to request, we have to ask for it, and You know, Lord, come help me. Let him come to me. We have to go to God to have that greedy desire or craving for the living water to be satisfied. And then we have to drink it. Oh yeah, drink it deep. You have to accept your forgiveness in Christ and the new life he's given to you. You know, we can, we can say we have it, but if we don't drink it and live it, you know, we're not going to experience the living water in our life. And that's maybe where we stop in the drinking, the reception of the life we have in Christ. You know, we come, we have a desire to be, be at peace and to have, have, have peace with God. We have a desire to do that. We know where to go, that's God. But then are we receiving it? Are we, are we agreeing with it? Are we just agreeing with it in general? Are we actually drinking and living the life that God's called us to live? That's on you. And we have to— we have to jump in and repent and pray and believe and accept the new life that God has for us. And guess what? It's a holy life. So we have sin in our life, we have to look at that and go, this doesn't really belong in this picture. And God will give you the strength if you ask. You know, if you have a greedy desire to be set free and you ask Him to help you and then follow Him, He will bless your efforts at repentance. He'll give you repentance through the Holy Spirit, and that resolves the issues of the past. You know, we forgive and move on. We, we let go the things we cannot change. And we look for the things we can change and the wisdom to know the difference. We move forward with Christ. That takes care of the past. And then the present— so yeah, maybe your troubles are right now. Those troubles need to be taken, you know, we have to look beyond them. You know, God is with us and he'll move us beyond it. This too shall pass, and someday we'll be with the Lord. So There you go. So whatever you're suffering through, make wise decisions to try to get out of it. Endure whatever you have to do. Trust in the Lord. Walk with the Lord. He'll strengthen you. He'll help you. Um, it might not be the help you expect, but he'll never leave you. Um, so stay with him and walk with him to find the peace that you need to get through the hard times. Believe me, been there, done that. You know, you could say I'm in it right now in some circumstances, but do I focus on the bad all the time? If something bad's happening now, if I can't fix it myself, um, I'm gonna have to accept it and, and pray to the Lord to change things and then wait and keep living and move forward. You know, that's, that's what we do, and we can't Unfortunately, you know, we have a lot of people in our lives that we can't, we can't change. Um, I don't know if we should be allowed to change people, so that's probably why we can't change people. Only God can do that. We can encourage people to change, we can point people to Jesus, but we can't believe for them and we can't repent for them. And, um, you know, it's their decision. We're all personally responsible. We're personally responsible for the life we have with God. You know, if we seek him, we'll find him. And if we follow him, you know, I can't tell you we'll have a life that's free from suffering, but I can tell you that the unseen ahead is a good ending. And the key there is it doesn't end. It goes on forever. And we live in God's presence as his people. So this is good news. This is the news for the new life in Christ. And I'll continue to share this good news until the Lord calls me home. That's my purpose. Because guess what? I lived in the past consumed by worries and regrets and sin, and the Lord saved me and he showed me there was a new way. And he showed me that the impossible things, some things I thought were impossible, were just me holding on to the belief that I couldn't overcome, that I wasn't good enough, or, you know, didn't have the talents or abilities to be free, to live a good and righteous life. And I'm still a work in progress on that, but There's been great work done, and it's been done by the Lord and through the Lord. So we thank him and we pray to him today. Lord God, Heavenly Father, thank you for another day in your kingdom. Lord, we thank you for using a fool like me to encourage people to find you. And Lord, we just pray for anyone who's listening or reading today's message that they come alongside you and that you'd come alongside them. Bless them and their prayer requests and lead them in the way they should go. And Lord, we pray for you to do that for us too. Every day we need your help. Every day we need to be reminded of who we are in Christ. And Lord, I'm going to keep talking, walking and talking with you, uh, so you can, you can, you can let me know. Um, I pray for you to go before me today, open my eyes to the things you want me to see, and lead me in the way I should go. Convict my heart to do what's right and to Um, you know, take the opportunities to thank you and, and love you and, and to do the same for others. Lord, we thank you, we praise you, we love you, and we pray all these things in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.