Forever Home in the Eternal Family of God

A Daily Devotional by Kenton Cheek

11 May 2024

Reading From Psalm 65-67, 69-70

“When we were overwhelmed by sins,
    you forgave our transgressions.
Blessed are those you choose
    and bring near to live in your courts!
We are filled with the good things of your house,
    of your holy temple.”

–Psalm 65:3-4

“Come and hear, all you who fear God;
    let me tell you what he has done for me.
I cried out to him with my mouth;
    his praise was on my tongue.
If I had cherished sin in my heart,
    the Lord would not have listened;
but God has surely listened
    and has heard my prayer.
Praise be to God,
    who has not rejected my prayer
    or withheld his love from me!”

–Psalm 66:16-20

     Yahweh invites every human being who has ever lived to forsake sin and draw near to Him while they live within the limitations of the time and space of their lives on Earth.  He loves everyone and longs to bring them from death to life and from darkness to light.  The beautiful act and process of redemption is not something that God will force upon anyone.  It matters not what kind of sin, how vast the sin seems to be, or how hopeless the situation appears.  God is bigger than any transgression and there is nothing too great for Him to forgive.

     Praise the Lord that He has the ability through the shedding of His own blood, to wash our sins away completely even when we were overwhelmed by our failures and shortcomings!  I love the words of the hymn, “Love Lifted Me” by James Rowe,

I was sinking deep in sin far from a peaceful shore
Very deeply stained within sinking to rise no more;
But the Master of the sea heard my despairing cry
From the waters lifted me now safe am I
Love lifted me! Love lifted me!
When nothing else could help
Love lifted me

No matter how bad whatever you thought, said or did is, God can remove your sin as far as the east is from the west and buries its memory in the sea of His forgetfulness.  He not only brings forgiveness, but healing, restoration and provision.  As He removes the bad, He fills us with the good.  In the place of wicked desires, He fills us with more and more of His promised Holy Spirit. 

     In order for us to experience the fulness of the goodness of God, we must come to a place in our lives where we are done with sin.  When we’ve had our fill of the cancerous, malevolent burden that is enmity with God, we call upon the Name of the Lord and He is faithful and just to forgive us of sin and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.  But if we haven’t come to that point of genuine repentance and we are still cherishing sin, forgiveness is withheld. 

     Quite often we try the same sin a hundred different ways hoping that somehow this time it will work.  If I just indulge one more time, it will bring me satisfaction.  But it never does.  Someone with a whole lot of wisdom once told me that “Sin takes you further than you want to go, keeps you there longer than you want to stay, and costs more than you ever wanted to pay.”  That temporary, fleshly satisfaction from sin does the opposite of what we want it to.  Instead of fulfillment, it is corrosive to our hearts.  Sin leaves us empty, but when we reject it in order to find help in the arms of God, we find redemption, power, healing and hope.

“God, thank You for Your redeeming and healing power that is so readily available to anyone and everyone who call upon Your Name in faith and trust.  I pray that Your children will experience a new level of freedom and joy in Your Holy Spirit as we continue to reject the old habits of our former way of life.  You are the Way, the Truth and the Life and no one comes to the Father except through You, Jesus.  Give us strength, peace, and joy for our journey.  I pray these things in the wonderful and matchless Name of Jesus Christ.  Amen.”

For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives, so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and giving joyful thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light. For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves,in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

–Colossians 1:9-14