Plastic money. Yep, a credit card - great convenience. But it could also be a great trap, right? I mean, just ask any of the millions of Americans who have credit card bills that are chasing them every month. Now, some people decide to take radical action to bring this spending part of their lives under control. They've actually cut up their credit cards! And for many people, that has represented a genuine turning point in their personal finances. They've finally declared their independence from this slave master called Credit. Yes, they've changed, but unfortunately, there's still one problem.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Bills Keep Coming."
It's great to move beyond the years of deeper and deeper debt. The good news is, you've changed and it's not going to be the same again. The bad news is, you still have to deal with the bills that accumulated before you changed.
That's something a lot of people don't calculate about the sinful choices we make. It's the sobering truth of our word for today from the Word of God in Galatians 6:7, and a familiar principle. It says, "Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; but the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life." You know, it's one of those laws of the universe - the law of sowing and reaping. Sometimes the harvest continues even after you've stopped sowing the seed.
You could be on one of two sides of this issue. Maybe you're still sowing sinful seed or maybe you've repented, you've accepted Christ's forgiveness, and you're trying to live new. Well, if you're in the Sin Zone right now, you may be counting on what I call "grace abuse." Grace abuse sounds like this: "Well, I know what I'm doing is wrong, but hey, God will always forgive me, right?" And you've gone for that forgiveness a lot of times, knowing in the back of your mind that you'd probably go back and sin again, knowing you could always come back for some more forgiveness, right?
Here's what you might be forgetting. You can get forgiven, but the consequences of your sin will keep scarring your life long after you've been forgiven by God. The credit cards of sin may be gone, but the bills just keep coming. Whether it's a pattern of lying, sexual sins, pornography, maybe it's angry outbursts, or selfishness, backstabbing. Sin will always take you farther than you ever planned to go, it will keep you longer than you ever planned to stay, and it will cost you more than you ever dreamed you'd pay. Sin pursues you with ongoing consequences, reputation consequences, health consequences, legal consequences, or the long battle to rebuild your reputation, or the long battle to rebuild broken trust.
But you may have been to the cross of Jesus with all that sin, and you really are becoming what the Bible describes as "a new creation in Christ" (2 Corinthians 5:17). But you're still paying some of those "bills" from the old you. And Satan is trying to use those to discourage you and divert you. Don't fall for his lies. God's promise to you is in indelible ink, "I will remember their sins no more" (Hebrews 8:12). Your sins are forever forgiven; forever gone!
If you're still experiencing some of the consequences of sin that's gone, don't fall for Satan's discouragement trap. You're a new person and the old bills don't change that. Let those consequences strengthen your commitment to never go back there again and to keep everyone else possible from ever going there.
The bill that really matters, the eternal death penalty for the sins of your past, that bill was ripped up by Jesus the moment you met Him at the foot of His cross. Maybe you still have that death penalty hanging over you because your sins have never been erased from God's book by the man who died for them. Let this be the day you say, "Jesus, would you erase all my sins from God's book? I'm prepared to change the leadership of my life to You. I am yours."
You want to begin this relationship with Jesus today? Well, then, it's a day to be clean once and for all. I think we can help with that. Go to our website. It's ANewStory.com. Please go there today.
If you've never had your sins forgiven by Him at that cross, take care of that today and let the new story of your life begin.