Then
He said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.”
…Then
He said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you.
Go
in peace.”
Luke
7:48,50
“I
have swept away your transgressions like a cloud.
I
have scattered your sins like the morning mist.
Oh,
return to Me, for I have paid the price to set you free.”
Sing,
O heavens, for the LORD has done this wondrous thing.
Shout
for joy, O depths of the earth!
Break
into song, O mountains and forests and every tree!
Isaiah
44:22-3
I
hear the Savior say,
Thy
strength indeed is small;
Child
of weakness, watch and pray,
Find
in Me thine all in all.
Jesus
paid it all,
All
to Him I owe;
Sin
had left a crimson stain,
He
washed it white as snow.
For
nothing good have I
Whereby
Thy grace to claim,
I’ll
wash my garments white
In
the blood of Calv’ry’s Lamb.
And
now complete in Him
My
robe His righteousness,
Close
sheltered ’neath His side,
I
am divinely blest.
Elvina
Hall~1865
God
is not against you but for you, in all the struggles of life; He wants you to
get through safe; wants you to succeed; wants you to conquer; and He will hear
your cry out of the deep and help you. And therefore when you find yourselves
wrong, utterly wrong, do not cry to this man or that man, “Do you help me; do you set me a little more
right before God comes….” Cry to God Himself, to Christ Himself; ask Him to
lift you up; ask Him to set you right. Do not be like St. Peter before his
conversion, and cry, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord; wait a
little till I have risen up, and washed off my stains, and made myself somewhat
fit to be seen.”-- No. Cry, “Come quickly, O Lord -- at once -- just because
I am a sinful man; just because I am sore let and hindered in running my race
by my own sins and wickedness; because I am lazy and stupid; because I am
perverse and vicious, therefore raise
up Thy power, and come to me, Thy miserable creature, Thy lost child, and with
Thy great might succour me. Lift me up, because I have fallen very low; deliver
me, for I have plunged out of Thy sound and safe highway into deep mire where
no ground is. Help myself I cannot, and if Thou help me not, I am undone.”
Do
so. Pray so. Let your sins and wickedness be to you not a reason for hiding
from Christ, who stands by; but a reason, the reason of all reasons, for crying
to Christ, who stands by. And then, whether He delivers you by gentle means or
by sharp ones, deliver you He will, and set your feet on firm ground, and order
your goings, that you may run with patience the race which is set before you
along the road of life and the pathway of God’s commandments wherein there is
no death.
CHARLES KINGSLEY
Out
of the Deep
“The
fact is, that the same moment which brings the consciousness of sin ought to
bring also the confession and the consciousness of forgiveness...”
HANNAH WHITALL SMITH
