Hopelessness is the doorway to Hope.
You have to give
up on yourself before you will be excited about the hope that is yours in Christ. We can be so consumed with our righteous living that grace isn't a need we recognize.
The world has overshadowed the purpose of why we were created with so many self righteous intentions. We tend to give ourselves far too
much credit.... Attributing too much righteousness to ourselves and our actions, our involvement. Showing up for, or to participate in the righteous man made acts which are too many to list. We are so busy glorifying the positions that we have minimized the
purpose.
The problem with these tendencies ...
when you name yourself as righteous for your acts, when you attribute yourself with more maturity than you actually have, you don't see the grace that is your only hope.
Because we look at ourselves and conclude that we’re spiritually okay, we don't tend to have a deep esteem and appreciation for
the grace that is our only hope in life and in death. You see, only people who acknowledge how deep their need is and who admit that they have no ability whatsoever to meet that need on their own, get excited about the grace that meets every one of their spiritual
needs.
On the other hand, we do not like to
think of ourselves as needy, so we tend to minimize our sin. Sadly, many of us are far more concerned about the sin of others than our own. We pay far more attention to the spiritual needs of others than our own. Minimizing our own sins, seeing ourselves as
righteous, or even, 'okay', we don't cry out for and run after the rescuing and transforming grace that is ours as the children of God. As long as we have 'hope in us' ... that is, hope in our ability to be righteous on our own.... we won't run after the grace
that is offered to us in Christ.
When we give up on 'us'..... we give
in to Christ.
Are our comforts in this life keeping us in our hoplessness?
So yes... it is true.... in a world that
says 'you are enough'.... this is a thought today, it's not all in 'us'... it's in Him, and so much more in Him than in us!
The fact is that we all give daily evidence of our continuing need for grace. Simply put, we have no ability to make it on our own. We still stand in desperate need of divine help. Are you willing
to admit that and run to where grace can be found.
It
is hard to find grace when we are focused on how well we have it together. How involved we are. What a great giver we are. How well we attend to the 'place of worship'... we are just so righteous.... we forget how much grace we are in need of. And even more
importantly, the grace that others are in need of.