By Ricky Chelette, Executive Director
“Rather, we have renounced secret and shameful ways; we do not use deception, nor do we distort the word of God. On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to everyone’s conscience in the sight of God” – 2 Corinthians 4:2
Previously in 2 Corinthians, we saw Paul admonishing the church to look to Jesus as the light; and when they saw Him as he is, they would be changed. But what does it look like to be a “seeing” person? How are we really any different?
Paul says that we have not only changed how we act, we have renounced our past for what it is. How often do we, as Jesus said, put our hand to the plow and look back? How often do we see the old self as something alluring instead of the shame that it is?
We aren’t alone in doing it. Exodus is full of accounts of the people of God coming to Moses and, through the lens of time, claiming that slavery would have been better than the hardship of the wilderness. In Christ, we have been made free!
If we look at our past with joy, let it be in an understanding of what grace has saved us out of and the hope it has saved us into.
Our Father spared us from his wrath through the blood of Christ, and has promised us an inheritance beyond what the mind can comprehend. In faith, we speak and act in light of that truth. We don’t fear accountability or reproof because we have nothing to hide. We have called our past what it is, seen it covered by Christ’s blood and then can live in the precious freedom he purchased for us.
“Father, let us be children of the light. May we be consistent in our confession of sin, and diligent about our holiness. Guard our mouths so that we may speak the truth, for your word is truth.”