When I reached a certain age, my waistline started
expanding. And even though I lost 25 pounds last year, there didn’t seem to be
a corresponding decrease in my waistline!
I’m told that’s natural for men of my age!
Analogously, it is also natural for our spiritual ‘lines’ to
expand. Jesus compared us to new wineskins that
could stretch with maturation. A. W. Tozer said, “The widest thing in the
universe is not space, but the potential capacity of the human spirit—unlimited
expansion.”
Some of you must be thinking you have too many
hindrances to hope for such boundless progress. But
as we begin this New Year, let's not look back at what-might-have-seemed an unlucky '13. Instead, let us “forget what lies behind and reach
forward (expanding) to what lies ahead, throwing off everything
that hinders us so we can run with endurance the race marked out for us” (Phil. 3:14; Heb. 12:1, edited). In '14, expect expansion.
Email regret occurs when you click "send" but wish you hadn't. In an angry impulse you fire off a hot email to your boss, colleague, friend, mother-in-law…well, you get the picture! And you can't un-send your message—it’s the 21st century version of “you can’t un-ring a bell.”
While it’s true there are no do-over’s in this life, it is not hopeless. Every one of your mistakes (sometimes referred to as sin) activates the ‘send’ button of God’s grace. “Where sin abounded, grace abounded all the more” (Ro. 5:20)—as though an oceanic measure of God’s grace was being stored up so you will have “…grace to help in time of need.” (Heb. 4:16)
And how exactly does God’s grace effect your regretful un-do-over’s? Well, it doesn’t ‘un-ring the bell’ or ‘turn back the clock.’ But God’s grace effectively overwrites our mistakes: re-sending them to accomplish His purposes (Ro. 8:28). And this overwriting grace is so effective that you might think it was better that you made the mistake (even though it isn't!) There is no logical explanation for this phenomenon. It is simply grace. However, I must add one thing to the mix. The certainty of God’s grace is inexplicably connected to your responsible participation (sometimes referred to as repentance.)
