The good news is that it doesn’t need to since all we need to know is that Jesus paid the price, will be our attorney and clear the charges, enabling us to stand unashamed in front of the judge at that time. Then we get given eternal life in a place of where no sorry or unhappiness can exist, and where there are lots of cool interesting things to do! Better than sykdiving, skateboarding, ultimate challenges, tropical island paradises, etc.

"Trust" is an action word and "distrust" an inaction word.


Trust is a hidden gift from one person to another, it is the exposure of our lives into the domain of control of another. It demonstrates our vulnerability to that person in a personal way!

Crazy thought, but without religion there is no absolutes of right and wrong is there? There is only a slippery slope of opinions of others that influence me!

If the crowd says we are wrong, and it’s not good, then it must be right!
 
I don’t believe crowds get things right. Public opinion is a poor guide to morals! Remember the crowd voted Hitler into power in Germany.

It's known that some of the highest incomes in the television business come from pornography. If the crowd is able to state what is right and wrong, we will soon see people persecuted for not being "immoral" right? Maybe sex with minors will drop down to lower ages? The ratings of what is good for young people to view certainly has hasn’t it? How much do you agree with that? I certainly don't! History shows that man left to his own devises screws up! How much to agree with that statement? If so, how much are you willing to do to make sure we don't screw up?

That way we can improve not only our world, but our relationship with our Father God at the same time.

If they are successful as well they really become attractive don't they.

 I’m not talking "rich"="financial success", but rather accomplished and content with life while helping others with their lives.
 
Isn’t that the type of person we like to entrust with special things that have deep significance?

When we have a very important, deeply emotionally, personal truth in which we are excited and we want to reveal it to someone, we look for friends who have the qualities mentioned above don’t we?

It makes sense that we don’t spill our hearts out to someone who will perhaps misunderstand or abuse us for exposing our hearts, right?

Maybe that’s why God says he treats those who love and trust him differently and expects different things from them to those that reject him, or have not yet got to know him properly.

He says this in that book written to a people who lived in a city that was one of the porno sites in the old world. The city of Corinth!(Up on the hill above the city was a pagan temple where you could go and have sex with temple prostitutes). This was a wealthy city that had mixed types in it. Quite cosmopolitan for the day! Part of a major trade route. So business was the in thing in that town! In 1 Corinthians 4:1 Paul says

If we fail, we fail God!

If we judge those who are not Christians with Christian standards, and demand they stick to God’s values, we undermine God’s message which is one of love for the worse of selfish, ignorant and nasty people!
 
Think how Jesus forgave the woman of five husbands who finally came to him, and how he never accused her of anything other than having the husbands! He initiated that conversation asking for real help from a person who others considered doing evil and who he should not talk to, let alone show love to(see John 4)! He didn't criticise her, he offered her something special instead. It was her choice if she chose to look into the secrets or not, but they were presented in a package of love that encouraged her to discover if the motivation was true or false.

What would we do there? How would we have reacted? Like Jesus?
 
We need to allow those who don’t yet know our God to live their lives, even if they are disfunctional, but we must be attractive to them because our confidence in God’s values is seen by them (not "told" to them). We must be ready to help, but know that God's secrets are within our lives actions,  and not to be easily unveiled by our tongues!

We need to consider facts given to us by outsiders with depth of research and knowledge, not just reacting to our gut feelings impulsively with traditional inpulsive thoughts and words. 

The love we show to others should not suddenly be flipped into criticism due to a sin(selfish, ignorant or nasty things) the outsider or sinner has fallen into doing.

Jesus dealt with sinners who came to him, and did not go out and look for those who sinned to tell them what they did wrong! (Okay he did clear the temple with a whip, but that was due to abuse of God’s house and failing to treat poor and ill correctly [so if people abuse God’s house and treat the poor and ill badly maybe we can be proactive J ]).

To be viewed by outsiders as people who attract others, having God’s secrets in our lives, means we need to live that way.

So today I want to try and not pre-judge those outside the church with my own Godly values, because doing that is wrong!
 
I want to have confidence that comes from my close relationship with our loving God.
 
I want to address information others give me with respect and confidence.
 
I want to be a true friend to outsiders not based on what they will do, or not do, but based on the “agape” love of God that loves others despite others failures to themselves, others and me.

1. Tell important others in your life what is going on, but also make sure they know what is not to be repeated and what may be repeated. Don’t tell those who have failed with confidences in the past. People want to help. Christian people are obligated by our Lord to care and help if they can.
2. Ask for counselling from your local church. It helps to have experienced people who are not tied into the situation asking the right questions to move us on. Sometimes this is difficult but success isn’t always easy.
3. I do things for myself and help others. We are least likely to let our thoughts intrude when busy, and our pain is often made less by helping others who are sometimes in worse pain.
4. Be patient with myself. I fail often, and if I beat myself up I would be continually sore! Wisdom is to care about failure enough to move on and avoid the next failure, but not to care so much we persist in our painful thoughts.
5. Limit negative talk! Talking about negative things all the time pulls us down. Gently work out a simple answer to those that inquire that gives them facts, not emotional facts, and then moves off the subject. That way “pity parties” are avoided and we can move onto positive stuff.
6. Draw close to others that love us! Friends and family make a difference if they can distance themselves form the situation and connect with us. I have a friend who describes people as falling into two groups, the “energy suckers” and “energy renewers”.  The suckers leave us with less enegery and happiness when they leave, the renewers when they leave have imparted some joy of life and energy into our lives. We want the “renewer” types during tough times.
7. I listen to upbeat Christian music!
8. Every time I start to think about it I bless the person I have forgiven. That way it limits the times I think about it and helps spiritually at the same time.