And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins. Ephesians 2:1
The Lord was teaching me about real love and trespasses or things that irritate others. When the Lord Yeshua gave us the “model prayer” he said to forgive those who trespass against us as we hope the Father forgives us. The Lord also said clearly if we do not, then the Father will not forgive us of ours.
Also note the above verse, Paul writes both words trespasses and sin, they are not one in the same words. Most people believe when the Lord spoke of trespasses he meant sinful behavior, and it can be. However it also can be something someone did which you did not like and it is not sinful.
Last night we went to a small party, a get together for a wedding coming up next month to celebrate it mostly. And most of us there have at least a form of Godliness, we all know he exists and we all know we need to hear him and obey. Although many work this out in different ways. But the point is we were discussing love and what it takes to remain strong together, because no matter how much you believe you are not subject to trials in your marriage, we are. The devil wants nothing more than to end every marriage and bring in serious dysfunction.
One of the ladies there made the point that we take small little issues and they get blown up into big ones, which is true and kind of the message today. But it is a little deeper than this.
We see love as an emotional thing, and when you have the emotional part also, it can be extra special. Real love is in the acceptance of a person who does not think like you, accepting their differences and just rolling with the punches. It is a decision to love like God loves. This does not mean accepting sin and serious dysfunction into your life, it is the opposite. Sin is sin, and trespasses can be non sinful.
Another quick subject and then to tie it up. There is an old saying that opposites attract, and I believe it is the way of God. If we hook up with people like us we never grow. And the interesting thing is that person will probably drive us crazy. This morning when talking with a neighbor she made this comment, about how one of her daughters is almost exactly like her and she is the one who she has the most problems with. My wife has the hardest time with our oldest daughter, who is exactly like her. If you look at your life and how you live and then at the ones who drive you nuts the most, they are like you. Yeshua said “you will be judged as you judge”, this is what he meant.
One time my mom said “I do not know how her husband puts up with her.” When speaking of a neighbor of mine. To which I told mom, well she is the same as you. My mom got upset and said, so you are saying dad should leave me?
This is a great illustration of how many people are. They judge someone like mom did, and it is pointing fingers back at you and God judges us on it. And then if anyone, especially your son. Say anything about it to make the point that it is wrong, they get mad at you and change the story around to make it about something different. Because I never said anything nor thought anything about my dad leaving my mom. That was not the point, the point was you are the same so do not judge her like that. Seems this point is made?
So to tie it into the bigger picture here. The Lord has shown me many times over that real love is a decision. It is a decision that when someone offends you or trespasses against you in a non sinful and or destructive way. We forgive them and move on, not holding a grudge. Because no matter how hard you try it is not possible to not offend someone. True love lets the issue roll off them, understanding we all have different issues and ideas of how things should be.
To make a point, it drives me nuts my wife and kids do not pick up after themselves and lose things. When I go to leave and cannot find the keys for the car because my wife did not put them away, it drives me nuts. But in the scope of things is it really a big deal? Back to what the lady said last night about some small little issue being blown up into something major.
Now some people take this all the way to the other side and because they associate sin and trespasses as being the same thing, they accept and forgive serious sin in their life. I have seen, especially in Mexico. What they call macho men who work during the week, make some money, give what they have to for the wife and then go out and blow the rest on women and drinking, and maybe drugs. And maybe beating and molesting the kids as well. And the women allow it to continue to happen maybe because of necessity in needing the man to feed them. But in many cases it is because of religious ideology that they must forgive those who trespass against them.
Forgiving and accepting the sin and dysfunction in your life ongoing are two different things. The Lord died to set us free from sin, and in him you can be set free. But when you choose to stay in a relationship which is seriously unhealthy because of what you see as love or because your religion says divorce is a sin (which it is). And so you stay in a worse sin to avoid a lesser sin which if you make that choice and obey the Lord, it would set you free. Religion gets in the way in many things, I see it over and over. It is one thing to get divorced because you do not like your wife not putting the keys away, amongst other silly little things, and another if it is because your husband or wife is abusing you and the kids.
But in the end it is about the Lord, hear him and obey him. Because even if there is sin in the relationship, he may have a purpose in you being there. Keep in mind we all have sinned in our life, most remain in the sin and never come to understand what is being written here because they do not know the Lord who will teach them truth which then sets them free. In my relationship with my wife, we are together for a reason. And I see the Lord working in my life with her and her life with mine, bring us deeper into the wisdom of God and his perfection. I never accept the sin with my wife, nor does she accept any with me. And for a long time in our relationship she did not forgive my trespasses and expected me to forgive hers. But after 15 years together, I see that changing, and our love growing deeper. And the difference is only because of listening to the wisdom of the Lord and then implementing it in our lives. And forgiving the little things not of sin in each other.
Which brings up one last point about perfection. Because the perfection of God is different than the perfection of man. You can never be perfect in the eyes of men, they will always find fault. For example my wife is much more into social etiquette than me. And always pointing out how I should act according to Mexican traditions. I am far from perfect in those areas, so in her eyes I am not perfect. But if you look at Yeshua, he was very blunt, he put people in their place all the time. His disciples even came to him and said “Lord you offended them.” He never once was apologetic for it. He offended them because he had to speak the truth which the truth does offend. Many atheists try to make the Lord imperfect a hypocrite, and it is easy to do. Yahweh said in the ten commandments to not kill. Yet he killed nations, he killed many of the Jews and Hebrews. He told men to kill other men, like David and Goliath, or Samuel and the King.
This is another example of how love is supposed to be according to God. Because Yeshua forgave the prostitute they wanted to stone to death and said “he who is without sin cast the first stone.” But he also was crude in his speech with the Pharisees, calling them murders and liars. And he also told the prostitute “now go and sin no more.” He did not allow the sin to continue. But the opposite, do not do those things no more.
We do not know what happened to this prostitute if she did stop or not? But if she did not stop, she paid the price eventually. My assumption is she did stop, because when you meet the Lord face to face like she did and I have. You know his authority and you know you must obey and change when you have done things so wrong like that.
Because we all have sinned, we all need to repent and need guidance in the repentance as well as doing our part to overcome. I still listen to certain guys about health to learn more. I know a lot about health and how the system is killing us intentionally. But there are still many things to learn and perfect in me on that subject. God does not expect us to know it all from day one and live our life perfectly. But he does expect us to learn and repent as we find out things we need to change. Especially when it comes to sin, he can and will set you free from sin, but will you listen to him and repent and do your working out part to get set free? Or will you love your life as it is more and remain in your sin, ignoring the light of God?
We are to be “perfect as your heavenly Father is Perfect.” In the eyes of God, not according to the eyes of men. And definitely not according to the current teaching that God looks down from heaven and does not see your sin anymore even though you still sin. That is a LIE, do not listen to it, but instead repent and keep repenting of everything the Lord shows you to repent of until he runs out of the sin and dysfunction in your life to repent of.