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My soul is sorrowful, even unto death.

Matthew 26:38

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Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.

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When the mouth doesn't know exactly what to say, God sees your tears and how you pray.

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Can I still be forgiven? Am I even worthy of forgiveness anymore?

Something that has been on my mind a lot lately is the power of sin. To sin continuously and to struggle with sin day to day. Can I still be forgiven, or am I even worthy of God's forgiveness still? In Scripture, it states, "As a dog returns to its vomit, so fools repeat their folly" (NIV, Proverbs 26:11). So, as I return to my sin and keep asking the Lord to forgive me for the same thing, I feel like it is similar to asking myself to be clean after I covered myself with filth. Once I am freshly clean again, I return to the same muck which I just removed from myself. With this pattern repeated over and over to sin and ask for forgiveness every day I start to feel like, do my words to the Lord have any meaning anymore? When I ask forgiveness, does He see it as a weak plea? Does He scoff when I ask for forgiveness? Have I asked so many times, or am I too stained to even be worthy enough anymore? Scripture says, "For I am about to fall, and my pain is ever with me. I confess my iniquity; I am troubled by my sin" (NIV, Psalm 38:17-18).

I will be honest with you when I say no human is perfect. We all struggle with insecurities, fears, and anxieties. We all have things that keep us up at night or shout at us as giant errors when we look at ourselves within. So the thing is, we are troubled by sin. I am troubled by it, you are troubled by it, everyone faces the battle of sin. None of us are ever going to be sinless. We are all "dirty" for lack of better words and can never be truly 100% pure. The only one I tell you that is sinless and pure is our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Jesus suffered the most painful death imaginable for all of humanity and died for our sins. To say our sin and our past have done so much damage we cannot come back from it would be to say Jesus didn’t die for us, which is completely untrue. He gave His life for us so we can be saved and experience God's grace.

Scripture tells us in Ephesians 2:8-9 (NIV): "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God not by works, so that no one can boast." Grace cannot be determined by people but only by God because it's His to give. Which is why it's His gift to us, not something we can grant ourselves whether we are deserving of it. When we start to doubt the power of God's mercy and love and His forgiveness toward us, we start to go down a dangerous slope. At that point, we are starting to decide what sin and actions are worthy of God's forgiveness, His grace. We have no place for that, but only the Lord can determine that. In Scripture, it reminds us of this in Isaiah 1:18 (NIV): "Come now, let us settle the matter," says the Lord. "Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool."

You see, we should always try to fight sin, and this is not an excuse to sin, but this is a reminder to know that to sin is to go against God. That sinning is not a good action to do. So, we must try to fight against it as best as we can. Because when we sin, we must ask for forgiveness, and with God's love for us, when we confess our sins and repent, we are forgiven. Scripture says in 1 John 1:9 (NIV), "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness."

God will know your heart. He knows your pain, and He knows you better than anyone can. When you sin and ask for forgiveness, from recent sins or ones that still bother you from the past, just remind yourself the Lord knows your heart and loves you so much. He knows if you truly wish to be forgiven. The Bible states in Acts 15:8 (NIV): "God, who knows the heart, showed that He accepted them by giving the Holy Spirit to them, just as He did to us."

Please remind yourself that God loves you and truly cares about you. He loves us all so much that He gave His only Son for you so you could experience His greatness. John 3:16 (NIV): "For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life."

Yes, it may feel difficult, but with God, anything is possible.

Thank you for reading, and may God bless you.

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Rest on the Flight into Egypt by Hermann von Kaulbach

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Pieta by Michelangelo - Aluminum Foil Sculpture