Forgive Yourself

The walk of faith has challenges, twist, and turns to sharpen, teach, and grown the believer and who better to encourage than our Genesis Bible Fellowship Youth and Young Adults (Gen. B.FY) whose Christian walk is stirring up memories of our own Christian walk. Make sure to encourage our Gen. B.FYs-it’s not easy to be vulnerable.

Have you ever struggled with a sin and gotten discouraged when you fall back into it? I know I have. More times than I can count, I have fallen back into several sins I thought I was done with. When my relationship with God is strong and I can see my life benefitting from not indulging in the lusts of my flesh, I feel great. But when I fall back into those sins, I feel demoralized. I think I can speak for many of us when I say that Satan has a way of using our sins to discourage us. With that discouragement, we can feel too ashamed to go back to our Father even if we’ve already asked for forgiveness.

One of the things I love so much about God is His mercy. When I think of all the sins that I’ve committed in my life, I still cannot wrap my head around how God not only forgives me for them all but also sent His son Jesus to die for me so those sins could be forgiven. Forgiving myself always feels hard because I know what to do and what not to do. I know that God wants me to live a life pleasing to him and not pleasing to the world and yet still I fall. Similar to Paul in Romans 7, I understand and have identified the sin, but I still struggle.

God forgives. Jesus Christ saves. If those two statements are true, then who am I to say that I am not forgiven? Was that not what Christ’s sacrifice was for? The last few days I have been really hard on myself for falling into temptation and indulging in my sinful ways. Reading Psalms 103: 10-11 helped me to forgive myself. As Christians we know the standard we are to live by, but none of us are perfect. We all fall short of the glory of God. Despite that, our Father in Heaven is still merciful. So for those of you struggling with a particular sin that you can’t seem to shake or have done things that you’re ashamed of, remember that our God gives us grace and mercy that we don’t deserve. And if God can forgive us, we should forgive ourselves as well.

Prayer: Dear Heavenly Father, thank You for the mercy and grace You give us even though we don’t deserve it. Thank You for forgiving us of our sins even when we don’t forgive ourselves. I pray for each and every person that is reading this devotion. Lord God, help them to know that no matter the sin, no matter the temptation, no matter how hard we fall, You still reign supreme and are always there to save us. Help us to remember Your love when we are at our lowest moments. I pray comfort for those that are in those dark places right now. And I pray that You will shine Your light on them in their moments of darkness. Thank You, Lord for giving me this testimony and I pray it helps someone else who needs to forgive themselves right now as well. I pray all these things in Your wonderful and matchless name and in the name of Your son Jesus Christ and Your Holy Spirit, AMEN.
By Bro. Kendall Manns