Saturday, July 9, 2011

Acceptance

How do we accept those who are different from us? Accepting others may require us to look at people from a different perspective.

Matthew 9:11-12 - And when the Pharisees saw it, they said unto his disciples, Why eateth your Master with publicans and sinners? But when Jesus heard that, he said unto them, They that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick.

What if a person has committed a terrible sin? Do we still accept him or her? Nothing we do can separate us from God's love. In the same way, we should always love others. This does not mean we accept or condone their sinful actions, but we love and accept them as unique and special creations of God.

Romans 8:38-39 - For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Are there times we should not be accepting? We must not accept or tolerate sin in our own lives. Sin is our enemy, seeking to destroy us. If we are willing to allow any specific sin to dwell in our heart unattended, it will begin to spread like a malignant tumor, affecting all we think and do.

2 Chronicles 34:3-7 - For in the eighth year of his reign, while he was yet young, he began to seek after the God of David his father: and in the twelfth year he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem from the high places, and the groves, and the carved images, and the molten images. And they brake down the altars of Baalim in his presence; and the images, that were on high above them, he cut down; and the groves, and the carved images, and the molten images, he brake in pieces, and made dust of them, and strowed it upon the graves of them that had sacrificed unto them. And he burnt the bones of the priests upon their altars, and cleansed Judah and Jerusalem. And so did he in the cities of Manasseh, and Ephraim, and Simeon, even unto Naphtali, with their mattocks round about. And when he had broken down the altars and the groves, and had beaten the graven images into powder, and cut down all the idols throughout all the land of Israel, he returned to Jerusalem.

Promise from God:
Romans 15:7 - Wherefore receive ye one another, as Christ also received us to the glory of God.

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