The question often plagues those who follow Christ. We have heard the gospel, we spend time reading our Bible, but are more aware of our failures than of God’s grace. I (Mike) have been reading Tullian Tchividjian’s Jesus + Nothing = Everything and was helped by this quote:
One of the reasons we experience so much failure in the Christian life is that we think more about obligations than we do gospel declarations. We focus on the imperatives (what we must do), but we pass over the indicatives (what God has done). We fail in our doing because we fail to grasp first what Christ has already done. This leaves us powerless–running on our own steam. Only when you realize that the gospel has nothing to do with your obedience but with Christ’s obedience for you, will you start to obey. The only Christians who end up getting better are those who realize that if they don’t get better, God will love them anyway.
That is a truth I need to remember today.