Accountability & Responsibility

Last week we shared the benefit of deep and difficult trials – they expose the secret and hidden parts of our flesh natures. Heat needs to be intensified to burn off the dross; the scum, the worthless and impure remnants of our old nature. Residual sin is often only uncovered through heightened difficulties.

Initially we may hate the circumstances that inevitably expose what we had become comfortable with – those forgotten things we hid so well. When we stop looking at the heat and examine our sinful thoughts and responses we are in a position to change and grow. Without examination we will not determine the truth of our situation – we are in the process of sanctification. We have been given the opportunity to repent and change.

As much as sanctification is personal – it is His work of grace specifically for us, to change and grow us – it does not end there. The work of change He wrought in us through changing our thoughts, provoking and agitating them to bring about transformation is for His glory. It is the testimony of His guiding and directing of our lives through providences. He makes good out of bad circumstances.

As much as we may feel abandoned and forgotten in the struggles – we are not. The heat should be a comfort – we are in His grip. Being held in His grip – is an assurance – we are being kept by His power. We are where we should be – the grip is nothing more and nothing less than being in the shelter of His wings. We are being protected from ourselves, and the condemnation of deeply hidden aspects of our flesh nature that needed to be exposed. It prepares us for greater usefulness to Him – for His purposes.

When we understand the difficult providences, and when we have learned His goodness in them we are accountable and responsible to glorify Him in them and through them. We need to encourage others knowing of His mercy, and the tenderness found in His grip.

• Praised (honored, blessed) be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ (the Messiah)! By His boundless mercy we have been born again to an ever-living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, [Born anew] into an inheritance which is beyond the reach of change and decay [imperishable], unsullied and unfading, reserved in heaven for you, Who are being guarded (garrisoned) by God’s power through [your] faith [till you fully inherit that [final] salvation that is ready to be revealed [for you] in the last time. [You should] be exceedingly glad on this account, though now for a little while you may be distressed by trials and suffer temptations, So that [the genuineness] of your faith may be tested, [your faith] which is infinitely more precious than the perishable gold which is tested and purified by fire. [This proving of your faith is intended] to redound to [your] praise and glory and honor when Jesus Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One) is revealed. Without having seen Him, you love Him; though you do not [even] now see Him, you believe in Him and exult and thrill with inexpressible and glorious (triumphant, heavenly) joy (1 Peter 1:3-8).

#accountability #responsibility