How hard is it for you to forgive yourself? Are you carrying around the guilt and shame of something you did years ago, and it still eats away at you? Here’s what God asked me to say to you today: “My girl, I forgave you the moment you asked for forgiveness. Your feelings of unforgiveness toward yourself do not come from me. Those are not holy thoughts. My Son set you free from all of that, now I desire for you to walk in freedom.”
Guilt and shame bring us to God. However, continued guilt and shame make us hide from God. That’s why the enemy works overtime in reminding you of your shortcomings, because those reminders make you feel unworthy of God’s goodness in your life. We are NOT to accept the enemy’s reminders and allow our minds to be flooded with our past mistakes. See that for what it is … that’s Hell’s attempts to lessen the power of God’s complete forgiveness in your life. The next time Satan tries to bring up something you’ve already sought forgiveness for, you tell him with the authority given to you in Jesus, “NO, I’M FULLY FORGIVEN AND THIS HAS ALREADY BEEN TAKEN FROM ME. YOU DON’T GET TO BRING IT BACK!”
Psalm 103:12, “He has removed our sins as far from us as the east is from the west.” Do you understand the distance between the East and the West? It’s not thousands of miles. It’s not even light years. It’s infinite. The east never meets the west and the west never meets the east. And this is the picture of how far God has removed your sins from you. They’re gone. All the way gone. Infinitely gone. Eternally gone. And you have absolutely no right to go digging for them again.
Girl, stop bringing it up.
I used to bring up the same old sin to God over and over again. 20 years later I was still allowing guilt and shame to eat at me. I would continually come back and ask God for forgiveness over the same thing and assume that any bad thing happening in my life was some sort of punishment for my old sin. One day, I was in the shower, rehashing my failure and disqualifying myself from future opportunities, and it was so clear … God said to me, “I don’t even know what you’re talking about. I have no record of this. Please stop.”
Oh … God really DOESN’T WANT YOU TO WALLOW IN REGRET FROM PAST SIN. He removed it from you so you wouldn’t carry it into your future. So, we have to let it go! He’s already removed it. It’s already been erased from your record. You’ve already been washed clean. You’ve already been deemed “not guilty”. Stop brewing in the court room of condemnation, convinced you weren’t supposed to be forgiven.
Romans 8:1-2, “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because Jesus has set you free!” Condemnation is guilt with coming punishment. And God says because of Jesus, we are not guilty. Because of Jesus, we are not subject to punishment. Because of Jesus, we are forgiven. Now, we must forgive ourselves! Ephesians 4:32, “Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.” Guess who is included in the list of people you should be kind and compassionate towards? YOU! Guess who needs you to forgive them as well? YOU! Why? Because Jesus already did!
Romans 8:31, “If God is for us, who can be against us?” God is standing with you. Get that mental image. He is standing with you because he is 100% for you. There’s not an ounce of God that is against you, and nothing that could convince him to be.
But wait … there’s more! You not only have God standing with you, you have Jesus continually praying for your triumph. What? For real? YES!!!! Verse 34: “Christ Jesus is at the right hand of God and intercedes for us.” Jesus intercedes for us … This means he pleads for us. He prays for us. Woah, now that changes everything. JESUS PRAYS FOR ME!
Girl, JESUS IS PRAYING FOR YOU! There are some serious prayer warriors that I love to have praying over me, but there is none greater than Jesus himself. And God’s word tells us Jesus is sitting at the right hand of God, praying for us!
My mind is blown. Why hasn’t anyone ever told me that Jesus is praying for me? Somebody needs to paint that image … show me what that looks like. Me on the mind of Jesus, Jesus kneeling before God pleading on my behalf. Now that’s a game changer!!!!!
I was once asked what would I do if I knew I couldn’t fail. That’s a powerful question. Now, let me ask you an even deeper question. What would you do if you knew Jesus was praying for you?
Revelations 12:10 tells us that Satan is continually accusing us night and day before God, and we often feel that attack. But now we know, Jesus is continually praying for us at the right hand of God, blocking those attacks, tearing down those arguments, and holding us up in redemption! The enemy has no dirt on you, Jesus has covered it all! There’s not only no condemnation for you, there’s no guilt or shame for you to pick up at the foot of the cross. It’s all been redeemed. Exchanged. Taken from you and replaced with approval, acceptance and purpose.
You are not only a forgiven girl, but you are a fully redeemed girl with heaven on her side! Move forward, Sis. Step boldly into the fullness of life Jesus came to give you, and never allow the enemy to bombard you with reminders of the past again.
Satan is always trying to separate you from God’s forgiveness. He’s always trying to disqualify you from God’s love. He’s always trying to distract you from God’s truth. BUT HE WILL NOT WIN! Here’s why:
Romans 8:37 tells me we already have victory over everything! Yes, everything! And how could we not when Jesus himself is praying for us?!!!!
God’s love overcomes death, it overcomes life’s troubles, it defeats every demon and force of evil. And this unstoppable love is ours and we could NEVER be separated from it. Romans 8:38-39, “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,[a] neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
This means not even the worst sin could separate us from Jesus’ love. Nothing you’ve ever done or ever could do takes away his love from you. With Jesus on your side, nothing has ever, or will ever, make God stand in opposition of you. There is nothing that can distance you from God’s passionate love. He is relentless in his pursuit of you and unwavering in his forgiveness.
If you’ve been carrying around guilt and shame, let today be the day you lay it down for the very last time. And God says, “Finally, she’s letting go of what I already took away!”
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