Friday, November 16, 2007
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Our friend Joy has become a bit of an expert on moving. Her husband is a career Air Force officer, and that means seeing a lot of different places, having a lot of different addresses, and seeing a lot of moving vans in your life. We were talking the other day about their last move and what she considered one of the greatest gifts she's ever been given. It didn't have beautiful wrapping paper or bows on it. In fact, it was a dumpster! That might not sound all that exciting to you, but it was to her! She and her family had so much stuff to move, and everything they could get rid of, they didn't have to move. Someone said to her, "I've got this dumpster I'd like to loan to you for your move." Joy said she was overjoyed! She said there was something so exciting about the first thud of the first thing they threw into that dumpster. Then it was all about lots of thuds as they threw away mountains of stuff. They couldn't wait to go get more.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Getting Rid of What You've Hung Onto So Long."
When I asked our friend what was so exciting about having that dumpster, she said, "It was so great getting rid of so much stuff that we'd been hanging onto so long." That's the very feeling that so many people over so many years have experienced when they surrendered their lives to Jesus Christ. They came to the dumpster of God and unloaded so much stuff that they'd been hanging onto so long. It's an experience God wants you to have - even today.
It's an experience vividly described in our word for today from the Word of God in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11. It begins with bad news about some of the dirty and useless stuff we hang onto. It says, "Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters (that's anyone who lets anything be more important than God in their life) nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers (that's anyone who speaks destructively about another person) nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God." Now that is bad news. Our sin leaves us with no human chance of heaven.
OK, fasten your seat belt. Here comes the dumpster of God. "And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified (that means you were made special), you were justified (that means you were made right with God) in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God." Because of what Jesus did when He died on the cross, you don't have to be dirty inside for one more day. You can be clean from now on. You don't have to be away from God. You can belong to God if you'll bring all your sin, all your selfishness, all the junk of a life that you've run to the dumpster of God - which is the cross of Jesus Christ! That's where every wrong thing you've ever done was paid for in full by the shed blood of Jesus Christ.
It's stuff you've hung onto so long - including the guilt of it all, the shame, the regrets of what you wish you had done differently. But Jesus took all that on Himself when He died on the cross, and He's waiting to take it from you at the moment you put your total trust in Him to be your personal Savior from your personal sin. It happens the moment you give yourself to Him, turning from that sin and placing your life in His hands. How does it feel? Our friend described the feeling of getting rid of all that junk with one word. She said, "It was so cleansing." That's it. You can be cleansed today!
If that's what you want, please let me send you the little booklet I wrote about beginning this life-saving relationship with Jesus Christ. It's called Yours For Life. I'll send it to you if you'll just let me know you want it. You can go to our website at yoursforlife.net or you can call us toll free at 877-741-1200.
This can be the day that Jesus Christ enters your life; the day that you experience the wonderful relief of getting rid of so much that you've been hanging onto for so long.