Our God is Greater
This is how we know that we are of the truth and how we will set our hearts at rest in his presence: If our hearts condemn us, God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything. Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God. (1 John 3:19–21)
When Jesus said to go and bear fruit, he knew that there would be times when we would bear bad fruit. We are sinful people who live in a sinful world. We don’t always show the love that we are supposed to show. We become angry or upset with our neighbor. We hesitate to help those who are need. We speak ill of one another. We don’t always honor those in authority. And when we realize this, we can become overwhelmed with guilt, or question why we didn’t feel bad when we were doing those things.
John gives us an answer for that today. He tells us that when we feel overwhelmed with guilt, that God knows everything. He knows that we feel guilty. He knows the sins that we committed. And he also knows his Son. He knows Jesus, whose blood cleanses us of our sins. He knows his Spirit who has worked faith in us. He knows that our names are written in the book of life, because he know everything. And he is greater than our hearts. He is the last say, not our hearts. So when we don’t feel guilty for our sin, we don’t have to doubt God’s love for us. Instead, we can stand before God with confidence, knowing that our sins have been forgiven. We can be confident that we are still God’s child and we still have eternal life. Amen.
The song for today is “Greater Than Our Hearts” by Matthew Smith