Why Are We… ?

by Susan Sampson

So why are we doing this study?  Why are we going through the process of asking God to search our hearts?  Because of the Gospel.  It is the Gospel that enables us to do this.  We can’t see apart from the Gospel.  This study is not about getting it right.  We are not trying to fix our sin. It’s not like math class where 2 + 2 = 4.  It is about leaving self and our old ways and holding fast to Christ and following Him.

Our culture is devoted to the idolatry of self.  Do you agree?  I know this is true of my heart.  We must be willing to die to self.  I must confess my unwillingness to die, how much I actually like my life and my sin.  We must cry out to the Lord because only God can change a human heart.  The power is in the Gospel.  Not in self.  Not in our flesh.  There is no victory apart from God.

May the Lord enable us by his grace to actually live the truths of the Scriptures that we are memorizing from Colossians 3 and put to death what is earthly in us and put on the new self, created by God.  I pray that we would be like Mary and sit at the feet of Jesus everyday, not relying on our own strength like Martha or blaming others (husbands and children or friends).  It is so easy for me to see others’ sin and yet I am so blind to my own.

Lord, we can’t hear; please help us hear.  Lord, we can’t see; please help us see.  Lord, we want to follow and don’t know how; please help us follow you and not self.

Remember when you are asking the Lord to reveal your sin to you that He talks to us with a kind, loving, and gentle voice.  That is His nature.  A gentle Shepherd.  Any condemning thoughts are not from the Lord.  There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus (Rom. 8:1). Jesus took all our sin upon Himself, bore the wrath of God in our place, thereby paying the penalty we owed.  There is no greater love.  May the truth of the Gospel penetrate our blind, hard hearts!