In His Time

Yesterday I started recording the songs the Lord has given me once again. Please pray for me that I will not procrastinate in doing this. It is one sin (the sin of omission - not doing what I'm called to do) that I have a hard time overcoming. But, He who is within us is stronger than he who is in the world.(1Jn 4:4). And one day I will stop omitting anything I need to be doing.

It has taken over 60 years before I came to the place 21 days ago where the grace of the Lord became stronger in me than the urge to pmo. I do not say that God neglected to give me the grace necessary to overcome pmo before. We never have to sin, even though sometimes it seems like it takes a super human effort to remain faithful. I realized a number of years ago that I would not die if I didn't pmo. It was proof enough for me that if I stood fast, determined to do God's will, I would not give in to pmo. The Lord gave me this realization and that it was not He who was to blame for my continued disobedience. The enemy took hold of this and continued in his agitated voice with his accusations that God can't forgive you, If you know you don't have to do it and still do it you're a tremendously bad sinner. You know that God is very disappointed in you. It's been many decades since you began this horrible practice. How much longer will you put yourself through your ridiculous attempts to stop it? Give in to the truth that you will never conquer this sin and go ahead and at least get some pleasure from it.

The calm voice of Holy Spirit has always countered those accusations saying there is nothing I can do bad that is bigger than God is good. No sin will ever make Him quit on me. "...if we are faithless, he remains faithful—for he cannot deny himself." (2Tim 2:13) And what is it about Himself that He cannot deny? He is never anything but Love and mercy. To be sure He is just, but His mercy outweighs His justice that is why "...God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us." (Rom 5:8) He didn't just come down from heaven exasperated that He had to die in order for us to obedient once again. For "...though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself..." He continues to empty himself for eternity because "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever." (Heb 13:8) His mercy will always outweigh his justice. He calls out to us in the midst of our sins "Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls." (Matt 11:28-29)

Just what is His yoke? His yoke is Love and mercy. If we love others as He has loved us and are merciful to others as He is to us (cf. Jn 13:34) then we are obeying a much bigger command than the one to not lust. We will be judged not by whether or not we lusted in this life. We will be judged by what we did or did not do to others. (cf. Matt 25:31-45) When we lust and give in to the urge to pmo we don't love others as He has loved us, we selfishly love ourselves. And so, Holy Spirit told me to love others as Jesus loves me, to have mercy on others as He has mercy on me and to trust that the difficulty in giving up pmo would be removed in His time. His time was 21 days ago and will continue until the end of my life.

I have trusted Him for decades and tried my best to have the same attitude as Jesus. (cf. Phil 2:5-7) I have listened to the voice of Holy Spirit not the voice of Satan. Whenever the devil told me my sin was too terrible, Holy Spirit told me to just love as Jesus loves and it will be taken care of. He didn't mean to keep on sinning. He means my sinning will quit in His time due to the grace that comes from loving as He loves. And so it has even though I have not finished growing in my love for others. All praise, honor and glory be to Father, Jesus and Holy Spirit!