Love so Amazing

Today is Good Friday.

"The self-sins are self-righteousness, self-pity, self-confidence, self-sufficiency, self-admiration, self-love and a host of others like them. They are not something we do, they are something we are" A.W. Tozer--The Pursuit of God

Because of my sin, because of who I am, I need a Savior. And I have One who willingly gave His life for me. Today, we remembered the Cross, and His Love so amazing.

Tonight at church as we moved through several stations, we had the opportunity to identify our life with the life of Christ, to evaluate our sinfulness and pain from God's perspective, and to die to ourselves just as Christ died for the sins of the world.

1. Focus on Jesus.

What are you feeling right now? Lay everything that you are thinking and feeling at His feet. "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me" Matthew 16:24

2. What do you need to die to?

"Unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed, But if it dies, it produces many seeds." John 12:24

What areas of your life need to be addressed? Invite Christ to have his way in your life.

3. Enduring the pain.

Where is there pain in your life that you need to face and allow yourself to feel? How have your sins brought you pain? How have you caused others pain?

"Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross." Hebrews 12:2

4. Abandoned by God.

"My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" Matthew 27:46

Focus on the fact that Jesus felt alone, forgotten, and abandoned during his most desperate place of need. When have you felt this way?

5. Jesus walks with us.

Jesus Immanuel, our God-with-us, helps us in our weakness. he walks this road with us, carrying us through our pain and helping us to let go of our sinful, selfish behaviors. Walking through the difficult stuff of life with him leads to a deeper intimacy and fuller relationship.

"I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings." Philippians 3:10

6. The peace of death.

Invite Christ to crucify your sinful nature. Invite him to take everything that is not pleasing to him and to replace it with himself.

"I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live but Christ lives in me." Galatians 2:20

7. New life.

"If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has gone, the new has come." 2 Cor 5 :17

Invite Christ to bring his new life into your life.

How will you live differently now?

"If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies" Romans 8:11

Remembering the precious gift that we have been given, because of His amazing love!

(Taken from Andy Stumbo's booklet from tonight)