We aim to please God, not to get something from Him, but because we have already received something, His love. We try to imitate Him because it is the right thing to do, because it glorifies God, because we love Him, and because we want to, or at least we want to want to...but even when we fail, we look to Him with faith and realize the reason we can or want to do any of this anyway is because He has already done it for us, and it is His righteousness, His glory, His love, His "want to", and His perfect life that counts for us.
Now people can say amen all day long to that, and I am glad when they do, and they should because it is the good news of the gospel. However, lots of people think they have been saved but all they have done is desired to get their ticket to heaven punched without actually being born again. True believers are born again. If you truly believe then you won’t do those bad things as much, and you will care about wanting to change, if you truly understand what forgiveness is, and why we need it.
It is not just because we broke the law, or the rules, or did things that hurt other people, it is because we have rebelled against God, we have committed treason against Him, we have not believed in Him, we have spit at Him in the face. We have sinned against God (David-Psalm 51:4), that is what the problem really is, and that is why we do those other things, because we don’t believe God. And so therefore, if the reason we do all these other bad things is because we don’t believe in God, then if we do believe in God, we won’t do the other things.
People who know that their sin is actually against God are not so casual about their sin. |