The classic stealing-candy-from-a-grocery-store story. I'm sure many of us have one. At that age I was oblivious. That gummy worm was calling out my name, and I was simply answering it. I didn't imagine that simply taking one worm was a crime that some call stealing-a crime that in larger cases can be punishable by jail. I didn't even know that what I was doing something "wrong," as they call it. And yet today I still struggle with that issue. No, I don't mean that I steal gummy worms anymore (although they do still call my name). But sometimes I feel like I do things and then later on find out that they were wrong. At one point this lead me to a great struggle-I was a sanctified Christian and therefore I wanted to prevent doing what was wrong and try to do what was right for God. I came to find the hardest part was not even the temptation with sins, but struggling to figure out what was right and what was wrong in this world! How can I figure out if I'm sinning or not if I don't even know if what I'm doing is right or wrong? I searched around a bit, and sure, God gives us some specifics in the Bible-he certainly gives us the 10 Commandments and some verses that say not to do specific things, but I feel at times he also certainly left a lot of gray areas. There certainly is no list of everything that is right and everything that is wrong, some things are left to our own judgment, how do you figure out all of those little things? And there are those seemingly big, obvious sins, but what about the rest? All those little things added up and I was left tormented, struggling with everything I did, questioning if it was "right" or "wrong." This continued and came to a point where I asked a friend about it. We were driving in the car and I just threw it out on the table pretty directly, somewhere along the lines of "I want to live as a sanctified Christian, but I don't know how to figure out what is right and wrong. How do you figure out what is right and wrong to do in your life?" I explained that the media certainly doesn't seem to have it right, others each have their own perspective of what is right and wrong, and I felt that God's Word, the ultimate authority, was missing a few details. When he responded at first it seemed like He was dodging my question. He said, "you don't need to figure out what is right and what is wrong, you just need to keep your focus on Christ." I was quick to reply, saying that my focus was on Christ and that I wanted to know what is right and wrong so I can be a better example and live for Him. He simply stated one of His favorite verses at that time, "throw off the sin that so easily entangles and fix your eyes on Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith" (Heb. 13). I was still frustrated that he didn't answer my question, and we returned to other amusing conversations. Later on as I again began to struggle again with this issue, I looked up that verse he told me and realized he was completely right. My focus had been on me and how I could become a "better Christian." My focus was on myself, and not on Christ. Only when our focus is on Christ can we reflect His light. And more importantly, only Christ is the perfector of faith. We cannot be. We will certainly never do everything right, and we may not ever figure out everything that is "right." We are sinners and we never can work our way back into God's favor even if we knew how. Although we can try to do our best for God, the truth is that we will always find ourselves failing. But that is where the beauty of Christ comes in; He is the perfector of our faith so we don't have to be. And soon I came across another verse in Romans 9 that answered my question dead on. It says that God's justice "does not, therefore, depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy." No matter how much we desire to do good and want to figure out what is right-it doesn't matter. And no matter how good we are or how much we want to do what is right-we will always fail. All that matters is that it is already fully completed through God's mercy, in Christ alone. We are already forgiven, we already have won salvation because of Christ's death and resurrection. There is nothing greater we can receive, and there is nothing more we can do! Written by: Abigail Gimbel Discuss this article here...
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