Tag Archives: guilt

Max Lucado – An Advocate

Max Lucado

Not all guilt is bad.  God uses appropriate doses of guilt to awaken us to sin! God’s guilt brings enough regret to change us! Satan’s guilt, on the other hand, brings enough regret to enslave us.  Don’t let Satan lock his shackles on you!

Colossians 3:3 reminds us, “your life is hidden with Christ in God.”  When God looks at you, he sees Jesus first.  In the Chinese language the word for “righteousness” is a combination of two characters, the figure of a lamb and a person.  The lamb is on top, covering the person.  Whenever God looks down at you, this is what he sees:  The perfect Lamb of God covering you.

So, do you trust your Advocate, Jesus, or do you trust your Accuser—Satan?  Give no heed to Satan’s voice!  You have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous! (I John 2:1).

From GRACE

Charles Stanley – Understanding Guilty Feelings

Charles Stanley

James 2:10

Think about how you feel when doing something you know you shouldn’t. Most likely a stinging conscience makes you realize that you feel guilty.

What is guilt? Perhaps you think of it as a nagging sense that the Lord is out to get you. Or you might feel isolated from God or others because of some dark cloud of regret. Obviously, there are different ways to interpret guilt; identifying exactly what it is will allow us to move ahead on the road to spiritual maturity.

When our behavior is in conflict with guidance from the Spirit of God residing in us, we will experience an emotional response. That’s all guilt is: emotional pain caused by something we have done. Put another way, guilt describes our taking responsibility for doing wrong, whether it be a thought, action, careless word, or something else.

While it is good to have this inner alarm, we have to guard against the inclination to wallow in shame. At times we behave so badly that we’re completely overcome with remorse, and we refuse to let the waves of regret pass by. We might punish ourselves by wading in those troubled waters for a while.

When these times come, we must remember that Jesus Christ has paid the debt for all our sin. This means that He has already paid the price of our wrongdoing, and we have been found “not guilty.” As our sin lies dead at the cross, so does our guilt. While we must always take responsibility for our actions, we have the freedom in Christ to do so without the burden of unhealthy regret.