Friday 26th June - God Transforms

DAILY BYTE

In the BBC program, ‘How clean is your house,’ two ladies go into the very worst and messiest British homes to clean them up. These are the types of homes that for years and years have not been tidied, and every owner of these homes has a number of things in common. They are ashamed of the complete mess of their homes to the extent that they don’t entertain anymore (but apparently not ashamed enough to have them viewed on T.V.). They are also sick and tired of living in such a mess, but their homes are in such a state of total disorder that they don’t know where to even begin. The mess is beyond them and they need a team of experts to sort it out.

When I told you yesterday that: ‘God loves us as we are,’ I did not finish the sentence. The complete sentence reads: ‘God loves us as we are but God loves us too much to leave as we are.’ We need to know that not only does God’s love accept us and cover over even the very worst of our sins, but also that God loves us too much to leave us all broken and hurting. We may be incapable of cleaning up our mess but God is both loving and powerful enough to cleanse and make us whole.

Today’s scripture reading reminds us that we don’t have power enough to sort out our own inner worlds. No external practices of religion, by themselves, are enough to take care of our inner brokenness. Instead, God sent Jesus who would bring to us God’s message of forgiveness and grace, and also open us up to God’s transforming power.

We need to trust not only in the love of God as we discussed yesterday, but also to trust in the power of God to transform and heal us. God can change us and make us better people. God can change our characters so that we become more like Jesus in our hearts and actions.

When we begin to face up to our brokenness, we need to know that we can do so with a sense of rising joy and anticipation. For the Good News is that God can take that brokenness and make us whole!

For God loves us as we are, but loves us too much to leave us as we are.

PRAY AS YOU GO

Almighty and Powerful God, it is with a sense of rising joy that we continue to face up to our inner brokenness. For we remember that we do not have to do so with a sense of despair or futility. We remember that we can trust not only in your love to accept us, but also in your power to totally transform us and make us new. For this we give thanks. Amen.

FOCUS READING

Romans 7:21-8:2 (NIV)

So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God's law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God's law, but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin.

Romans 8

Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death.

This week’s devotions have been written by Gareth Killeen, a minister at Manning Road Methodist Church in Durban. E-mail any comments & feedback to bdc@mrmc.co.za