Justified

Have you ever been in a situation where you felt you needed to justify your actions to someone else?  When I was a stay-at-home mom, my husband would come home from work and ask about my day.  He was being kind and interested, but I heard “What have you been doing with your time?”   I would come up with a list of things I had “accomplished”—or would recite a list of all the things that had prevented me from accomplishing what I believed was expected.  Either way I felt compelled to give evidence that I had done enough, or at least tried to.

Am I good enough?

This was a tolerable enough existence until I got serious about the Bible.  God soon became the most important person to please, but He was mysterious and powerful and perfect.  It was the sins of omission that haunted me – the good things out there that I wasn’t doing.  I was imagining God the same way I heard my husband.  Instead of enjoying being loved, I felt the need to earn my way into His grace and to justify myself.    

So what happened?  God put teachers and friends and my wonderful husband in my life to demonstrate love that wasn't tied to my performance.  I have been extraordinarily blessed in this way - perhaps because I had such a long way to come.  John 8:32 quotes Jesus telling those who believed him, "Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."  The Bible brought out my fears of God's judgement, but it was leading me beyond them into freedom through the truth.

pursuing the Truth...

Listen to these amazing words from Romans 4: 4-5 (with my emphasis added):  “Now when a man works, his wages are not credited to him as a gift, but as an obligation.  However, to the man who does not work but trusts God who justifies the wicked, his faith is credited as righteousness.”

In other words, faith that God, Himself, justifies me is the beginning.  Why does God justify me?  Because He loves me and that is His very nature!  It’s that simple.  I recently heard a wonderful saying: "Why does the sun shine on the lake?  Because the lake is there."  It took a moment for the import of that to sink in, but I can't think of a better explanation of why God loves us.

Because God is love the promised day came when Jesus “…was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification” (Romans 4:25)   Now each of us gets to choose whether or not we will have faith in the way God has provided to be justified before Him. 

Once this truth became clear to me (and it was hardly overnight), I realized that my attitude toward other people was based on believing that they somehow held my worth in their hands.  I thought that their opinion, or judgement, could determine the legitimacy of my life.  What a lie that is!   I was uniquely designed and created by God (as each and every one of us are).  I was redeemed from being lost to Him by my decision to accept what Jesus did for me.  I am forever justified before Him. Now I am free to have relationships with people who I'm sure have many different of opinions of me.  They can base their judgments on their own beliefs, or on my performance, but they cannot touch my true worth which has been established by God.  That is free indeed!