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An
Outreach Publication of the Church of Christ at
Creekwood |
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Engraved
In Stone A story is told of two friends who were traveling together through the desert. During some point of the journey they had an argument, and one friend slapped the other one in the face. The one who got slapped was hurt, but without saying anything, wrote in the SAND: TODAY MY BEST FRIEND SLAPPED ME IN THE FACE. They
kept on walking until they found an oasis, where they
decided to take a bath. The friend who had slapped and saved his best friend asked him, "When I hurt you, you wrote in the SAND and now, you write on a STONE, why?" The other friend replied, "When someone hurts us we should write it down in SAND where winds of forgiveness can erase it away. But, when someone does something good for us, we must engrave it in STONE where no wind can ever erase it." The
moral of the story is: Learn to write your
hurts in the SAND and to carve your blessings in
STONE. Consider
another application of the story… By committing sin, WE are just like the ones who tortured and mocked the Son of God when "they spat in His face and beat Him; and others struck Him with the palms of their hands” (Matthew 26:67). Yet, because of His great love for us, Jesus is willing to "write these offenses in the sand" and forgive us. In fact, He was hung on a cross for that very reason. He "bore OUR sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness; by whose stripes YOU were healed" (1 Peter 2:24). "In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace" (Ephesians 1:7). His forgiveness is available to those who: will accept through an obedient faith: placing their trust in Christ (Acts 16:31), repenting of sin (2 Corinthians 7:9-10), confessing Christ (Romans 10:9-10), and being baptized (immersed) in the name of Christ for the forgiveness of sins (Acts 2:38). Christ continues to forgive those who continue to follow Him (1 John 1:7). Even when we didn’t deserve it, Christ died on the cross so that we might have forgiveness for our sins (cf. Romans 5:6-8). THAT'S a blessing we need to accept and "engrave it in stone!" God bless you!
David A. Sargent,
Minister To Subscribe to "Living Water" send a blank e-mail to:
HTML version: subscribe-livingwater@lyris.dundee.net Follow this link to locate the church of Christ nearest you: www.churchsearch.org Archived issues of "Living Water" can be accessed from our website at: www.creekwoodcc.org
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