“Three years ago I was bedridden. I had a half-dozen things wrong with my body. I just lay in my room, disgusted with God that He should allow such misery to come to one who had served Him as I had. My only consolation was the radio. One day your counseling program came on. You spoke about the importance of forgiving those who had wronged us. You quoted Matthew 6:15, ‘But if you forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.’ ‘Of course,’ I said to myself, ‘he’s no doubt young and healthy and has everything going for him. Nothing ever happened to him like it has to me. It’s easy for him to forgive.’ The following week, I was determined not to listen to you, but I did. You said that unforgiveness can cause misery for the one who refuses to forgive. You quoted from James 3:14 and 16, ‘But if you have bitter envying and strife in your hearts, glory not … for where envying and strife is there is confusion and every evil work.’ I yelled at my wife to turn that radio off. In the silence that followed, those words continued to resound in my soul. I have never experienced such anguish. When it came time for your program the next week, somehow I couldn’t keep the radio off. That time your Scripture was Isaiah 32:17, ‘And the work of righteousness will be peace; and the effect of righteousness will be quietness and assurance forever.’ I was a wretched man, but a thoughtful one, when you finished speaking that day. ‘What he says is from the Lord,’ I told myself. ‘The strife and confusion that he spoke about certainly describes me – and I have no peace or quietness, so where is my righteousness?’

I have a son and daughter, both married. Their two families entered business together, but by dishonest means one family wrestled the business from the other. Bitterness flared in my heart toward the guilty pair. I said I could never forgive the evil deeds that brought so much turmoil to my home. But there on my sickbed after the third broadcast, I began to see that by refusing to forgive, I was hurting only myself. I cried out to God to forgive me. In my heart, I forgave my children. I committed the whole matter to God. Eventually, the wrong was made right, but it wasn’t this happy development that brought me health again. My crippling ailments disappeared when my bitterness was taken away. That is what forgiveness did in my life.”

The names and certain details in this true case history have been changed to protect each person’s identity and privacy.

Carole had asked her mother if she might go roller skating with the church youth group, and Mom had replied, “No. You were at Bible Study last night and you studied late the night before.”

Just then Dad had come in and urged, “Let her go. She’s young only once.”

“But Carole needs her rest,” Mom insisted. Then the seesaw argument began, and both her mother and father were soon angry.

“Forget the whole thing,” Carole cried as she left them. There had been a family quarrel every day that week.

Carole was caught in the vortex of two swirling forces: her controlling mother and her strong-willed father. They bickered and squabbled over trifles and over real problems until Carole’s head and heart spun with confusion and revolt. The troubled parents finally brought her to me to discover “her” trouble.

“Talk of a mixed-up kid!” Carole wailed as she told her story. “Mom and I go shopping and I always wind up getting the clothes she picks out. I’m ungrateful if I disagree.”

When her mother suggests they whip up a cake together, Carole shudders. Either she selects the wrong pan or doesn’t mix the batter right. She may tense up and drop something; Mom gets disgusted and finishes the job, and both pout for the rest of the day. When Dad comes home, he interrogates them, and then gives them a lecture.

Carole’s father makes a good salary, and she has a generous allowance. Active at church, the parents are considered models. But Carole says they’re hypocrites. The moment they get in the car for home, Mom tells Dad how to drive or that he slept during the sermon, and he responds with a hot retort.

Like a number of church “pillars” Carole’s parents were suffering from spiritual termites that were destroying their inner being.

Carole was plainly up against a situation she could not change. She couldn’t possibly be obedient to her parents when they gave opposite directions. And she couldn’t escape their constant bickering. But, I suggested, she could do some things.

When working with her mother, she could try harder to do it Mom’s way. She could accept her mother’s choices. She could realize that her parents’ quarrels were not her problem.

And there was something else. We turned to 2 Corinthians 1:2-5, and as we read we underlined these words: grace, peace, mercies, comfort, and consolation. These, Carole saw, were the blessings God was ready to give “in all our tribulation.” She tried it, and it worked.

Sometimes she forgets and pities herself. But as she repeatedly yields herself to God, she is learning to live with something she cannot change.

The names and certain details in this true case history have been changed to protect each person’s identity and privacy.

That statement caught my attention. What kind of memories? Isn’t it good to have happy memories? Is it possible that there are unhappy memories that crowd out the happy ones? I encouraged her to recall some unhappy memories toward the people who caused the accident that killed her husband.

She took me by surprise. Yes, there were unhappy memories. They centered around that motorcycle. She did not want him to buy it. In the first place, it was a strain on the budget. They could not afford a powerful motorcycle and a decent car–so they drove a ten-year-old car. They would go for long motorcycle rides in the evenings. He was a bit reckless, cutting in and out, going too fast. She hated those rides. He loved them. He insisted on riding the motorcycle to church. She despised showing up at church with her helmet and messed-up hair.

One night he proposed that they go for a ride. It was an ideal evening. She did not want to go. The discussion became heated, but she stood her ground. He went for a ride alone. A car went through a stop sign and hit him broadside. He died on the pavement.

How does she feel when she talks about this? It makes her mad. He left her with an old car, house payments, and even motorcycle payments. He was underinsured, which left her to pay off some debts. She hates writing those checks. If only he had listened to her, it would not have happened. Her thoughts are usually disapproval of his choices. She resents the position he left her in. Over and over, she reviews her grudge against him.

I could see another problem. But when to speak and when to wait is often difficult to discern. The Bible says, “Speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ” (Ephesians 4:15).

My heart went out to her. Was she ready for my opinion? What does she think I will say? She thinks I will tell her to quit resenting her husband. But she tells herself that she is entitled to resent him. I agree. Her husband left her in a mess. She can nurse her grudge against her husband as long as she wishes. But she must realize that she is punishing herself. As long as she holds her grudge, her life is anchored in the past. Over and over again she relives the agony of that day and nurses her resentment. She can be released from this bondage only if she is ready to let it go.

Jesus instructs us to forgive men their trespasses (Matthew 6:14) and to love one another (John 13:34), so I finally said, “One option you have is to forgive your husband, repent of your resentment, let the Lord forgive you, and then ask him to fill your heart with love.”

She was ready for that opportunity. I observed a miracle as she released her grudge, asked for forgiveness, and received the love of God in her heart. Immediately she was released from her burden, and now she is free.

Amy’s experience illustrates what happens when two problems coexist. One can overshadow the other. It seems reasonable that the tragic death of her husband would explain her misery. In this case however, it was the resentment that held the sting.

[This story is taken from Dr. Brandt’s book, The Word for the Wise. The names and certain details in this true case history have been changed to protect each person’s identity and privacy.]

[Go to Discover Inner Peace]

“… present yourselves to God …”

Sometimes it seems as though a long-lasting marriage is determined by chance or circumstances or just plain old luck. However, there are some steps that will enable you to establish your marriage on a solid foundation that will help you stay in it for the long haul. Taking this series of steps will bring your life into continuous subjection to the will of God. If you do not know Jesus Christ as your Savior, consider seeking someone out today who can show you how to know Him personally. Then follow these steps (and repeat as necessary!):

1. Evaluate your behavior

2. Accept your condition

3. Receive forgiveness from God

4. Surrender to the power of God

Evaluate Your Behavior

Before you can solve a problem, you must first find out what the problem is. We live in an orderly world. It operates according to definite, dependable laws. For example, we take care to make allowance for the law of gravity. A dear, elderly gentleman put up a ladder to do some work on his roof, but he placed it so that it was crooked. When he climbed up the ladder, it began to slide. He fell and broke his hip. Here was a man, a devout Christian, who was careless about observing the law of gravity. He fell just as the worst criminal would have fallen if he had gone up the ladder.

People take the laws of friction into account. A student took a curve in the road too fast on an icy day. His car went end over end, and he came out of the wreckage with a battered head. He had ignored the laws of friction. He did not do this intentionally. He was not deliberately reckless. Yet the same thing happened to him as would have happened to the most reckless of drivers.

All of us know the importance of abiding by the laws of gravity and friction. These laws have been gathered and catalogued in books. As we study them, we learn what to expect if we abide by them and what to expect if we violate them.

The laws of human behavior are likewise gathered together in a Book–the Bible. To understand why people behave as they do and to understand why you behave as you do, you must understand the laws contained in the Bible. Paul wrote in 1 Timothy 3:16-17, “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.”

The cause of inner unrest, conflict between people, and separation from God is because people live in violation of the laws found in the Bible. Isaiah 59:1-2 says, “Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; nor His ear heavy, that it cannot hear. But your iniquities have separated you from your God; and your sins have hidden His face from you, so that He will not hear.” Deliberately or in ignorance, we reap the results of violating God’s laws, just as we reap the results of friction or gravity.

To understand the cause of inner unrest, conflict with people, and separation from God is to understand the effect of sin. To understand God’s solution is to understand the preventatives that keep us from sinning.

Paul wrote in the New Testament, “Indeed, I do not understand what I do, for I do not practice what I want to do, but I am always doing what I hate. But if I am always doing what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is right. Now really it is not I that am doing these things; but it is sin which has its home within me. For I know that nothing good has its home in me; that is, in my lower self; I have the will but not the power to do what is right. Indeed, I do not do the good things that I want to do. But if I do the things that I do not want to do, it is really not I that am doing these things, but it is sin which has its home within me. So I find this law: When I want to do right, the wrong is always in my way. For in accordance with my better inner nature I approve God’s law, but I see another power operating my lower nature in conflict with the power operated by my reason, which makes me a prisoner to the power of sin which is operating in my lower nature.” (Romans 7:15-23)

To illustrate, a student tells of his experience. Night after night, before he retired, he determined that he would go through the next day with a wholesome, positive reaction toward circumstances and people. One morning, he was particularly determined to have a good day. He left his room, raced for the elevator, and just as he got there the door closed. He was forced to wait a few minutes. When he did get on the elevator, another passenger accidentally stepped on his foot. He walked away very aware that he was annoyed at both incidents in spite of his determination to react in a wholesome, kindly way toward all such happenings.

A mother of two preschool children tells of her struggle with her attitude toward her children. Two specific tasks that faced her daily caused her much annoyance. She hated herself for it, but no amount of determination, willpower, or good intentions could give her control over her annoyance at feeding picky children or dealing with their fusses. Granted, these are trying tasks, but the point here is that this woman was unable to achieve the desired attitude toward these tasks.

All of us, sooner or later, find ourselves doing, saying, feeling, or thinking in a way that is distasteful to us. And all of us, sooner or later, find ourselves not doing, saying, feeling, or thinking as we would like. All of these behaviors–or lack of them–are sin. And often these behaviors come from within us and feel as though they are beyond our control. To recognize and accept this fact is the first step toward a solution to the problem.

Most often we are angry when we are responding to the actions or attitudes of others. Anger, bitterness, wrath, pride, and hate are reactions to circumstances. These reactions may be invisible and can often be concealed to those around us, but not to God. We tend to overemphasize the value and importance of outward behavior and to minimize–or fail to realize–the importance given in the Bible to inward behavior.

In Galatians, Paul tells us, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.”

Again, these are inward, invisible qualities. You can act this way in your own strength, at least part of the time; but you can’t genuinely be this way without the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit. If you doubt it, just pay attention to your inner responses to people or circumstances for one week.

Accept Your Condition

It is easy and common to find a reason outside of yourself that keeps you from loving your neighbor as yourself. It seems reasonable that missing an elevator, getting a toe stepped on, feeding picky children and dealing with their fusses, associating with people who have undesirable habits, or living with an uncooperative wife or husband are justifiable reasons for being unhappy. Under such circumstances anger, wrath, malice, bitterness, and resentment seem normal.

This reasoning seems to be sound. However, the Bible calls such reactions sinful. In other words, these circumstances are not putting these reactions into you; they are bringing these reactions out of you.

Jesus said, “Are you also still without understanding? Do you not yet understand that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and is eliminated? But those things which proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and they defile a man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies.” (Matthew 15:16-19)

Many people find this to be a shocking idea. It seems clear that the circumstances or the other person is the cause of their distress. It is hard to accept that their distress is a response to the circumstance or person.

The answer is that you can find peace and contentment without changing your circumstances or the people in your life. To do so involves recognizing that the situation you are in is not causing your distress. You must accept or acknowledge personal responsibility for your distress, for your sin.

You need a power outside yourself if you are to respond differently the next time you find yourself in a trying circumstance. You must accept personal responsibility without reservation. Dependence and faith in willpower, resolutions, insight, and/or determination are not the answer. A lingering thought that another person must be at least a little bit to blame is not the answer.

Many people prefer to find a reason for justifying anger, wrath, malice, envy, and similar emotions rather than finding freedom from them. They seek to change the circumstance or the person rather than to search for a source of peace, joy and comfort in the circumstance or with the person.

For example, consider a young man who had habits that his mother believed were bad. The mother kept insisting that her misery was caused by her son’s behavior. Accordingly, this mother felt quite clear in her own mind that the solution to her problem was to see a change in her son. Further, this woman believed that, being a Christian, she should not be agreeable toward her son lest she seem to be giving her blessing on his unacceptable habits. She was being a good Christian, she thought, by being angry and impatient with her son. The son, in turn, felt quite justified in being bitter, rebellious, hostile, and stubborn. He would not give in if it killed him. If there was a source of strength that would enable him to have a spirit of love, tenderness, gentleness, and compassion toward his mother, he would turn away from it. He insisted that his mother was the cause of these reactions.

The woman who had the task of teaching two small children how to eat right and how to stop fussing preferred to be annoyed. According to her, you should be annoyed at such a job. There is nothing wrong with being impatient with such a task. It is quite normal to be disgusted, tense, and dissatisfied at the end of the day. The children are the cause of these reactions. In her opinion, being a Christian has no bearing on the matter.

Many Christians find comfort in speaking of nerves, tension, anxiety, or stress–any term but sin. Many Christians feel that they have long ago settled the matter of living in sin. They are saved. They are sanctified.

But remember our definition of sin! “Whoever commits sin also commits lawlessness” (1 John 3:4).

If it applies, then it applies. It matters not who you are, how much responsibility you have, what your status is, or who your family is. You may have been trained to believe that to grin and bear it, even though you are seething inside, is evidence of piety; to speak in a well-modulated voice, even though you feel like screaming, is a mark of culture; to perform the task assigned, even though you rebel inwardly, is evidence of determination. Such behavior is surely to be expected from a social standpoint. However, from a personal standpoint, you benefit nothing. Your inward reaction is evidence of sinfulness.

You have seen that acceptance of your condition implies accepting personal responsibility without reservation. If you feel that you can and will conquer your circumstances, then you are not yet ready to accept the tendency to sin. It is best for you to try yourself. Expose yourself to your circumstances and pay attention to your inner reactions and your outward actions. Acceptance means that you are convinced beyond the shadow of a doubt that you are subject to your tendency to sin and that this causes you to react the way you do not want to react–and prevents you from reacting in a way that you would like to react. This applies to thoughts, feelings, desires, actions, or speech. These must be identified in detail and dealt with separately. Acceptance or acknowledgment of the presence of sin in your life opens the way for you to avail yourself of a better way of life as defined by Paul: “For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death” (Romans 8:2).

Receive Forgiveness from God

Christ died to make forgiveness available to us: “In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace” (Ephesians 1:7).

You may have noticed that acceptance of your tendency to sin is often a difficult step to take. Seeking forgiveness is an even more difficult step to take. To ask for forgiveness implies repentance and a willingness to forsake sins. Isaiah 55:7 teaches, “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; Let him return to the LORD, And He will have mercy on him; And to our God, For He will abundantly pardon.”

Many people insist that a period of depression, self-condemnation, sadness, remorse, or weeping is evidence of repentance. In Quebec, one can see people climb five hundred cathedral steps on their knees in evidence of repentance. In India, a man may be lying on a bed of spikes. It is true that conviction of sin causes some people to react emotionally or to show evidence of repentance. However, true repentance is not found in the emotion or the action. It is, rather, being truly sorry enough for sin to hate and forsake it. Repentance involves following God’s plan and believing His Word.

1 John 1:9 says “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

The simplicity of receiving forgiveness is hard to accept. Nothing is required of you apart from acceptance of your sinfulness and of God’s forgiveness on His terms, not yours. This must be done from the heart. There is no other way. You must be completely sincere. You will not find forgiveness until you are convinced that you need it.

Yes, acceptance of your tendency to sin, confession of specific sins, and seeking forgiveness are contrary to our normal way of doing things. But the next step–surrender to the power of God–is the hardest of all to accept.

Surrender To the Power of God

At first glance, it would seem that to submit to the strength and power of God is something that everyone would gladly do. However, many people find this the hardest step of all to take. As Paul expresses it, “Our sufficiency is from God” (2 Corinthians 3:5).

Our human nature tends to rebel against accepting any kind of weakness or insufficiency. Even if you acknowledge the failures of your past, you may be unwilling to acknowledge your inability to please God in the future. We all tend to feel that since we understand the reason for our past failures, we can now do better. We tend to seek the answer to our sinfulness in two ways: to repent for past sins and to retain confidence in ourselves not to repeat past sins. We tend to retain our faith in our own self-discipline, willpower, training, and self-sacrifice.

To surrender to God means we must commit ourselves to a lifetime study of His will for every detail of our lives. It means recognizing our inability to do His will apart from His power and our need to submit to Him daily for His power.

Colossians 1:10-11 teaches us, “…that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, for all patience and longsuffering with joy.”

To surrender to God involves a clear, definite yielding of one’s self completely to God, followed by day-by-day experience of that surrender. Note Paul’s words: “And do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God as being alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God” (Romans 6:13).

This is a matter of the will. Ephesians 5:18 instructs us to “Be filled with the Spirit.” Here is the secret of God’s power–the Holy Spirit expressing Himself through us! He works in us only as we let Him.

A young woman was married to a man who refused to give her spending money. This disturbed her to the extent that she was always feeling sorry for herself and was angry with her husband. She went to an older woman in the church who was known to be a calm, peaceful soul. The older woman said to the younger one: “Let me tell you my story. My husband keeps all the money. He seldom pays any attention to my opinion. Now that the children are married, he gives most of his time to them and has no room for me in his life. This has gone on for thirty years. It will probably go on as long as I live. All these years I have prayed daily for patience and every day God answers my prayer.”

This man’s behavior is totally selfish and another whole topic of discussion. But the point here is that his wife surrendered her unhappiness and frustration to God and found daily grace and strength to continue to love him. To surrender to God is to bring each circumstance of life to Him and receive from Him the strength to face it by His Spirit. It is one thing to make a broad, thoughtless statement that you will submit to God and another thing to surrender each detail of life to Him.

When you are impatient, you lack patience; when you are unhappy, you lack joy; when you are tense and anxious, you lack peace. You must continuously go to the source of supply. Comfort, mercy, grace, peace, joy, patience, and longsuffering with joyfulness will be yours only when you recognize that you lack them and when you let God give them to you.

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Do you believe that? No, thanks to the law of gravity, I came down so hard the impact broke one of my teeth.

Wouldn’t it be difficult if gravity worked only part of the time? Imagine walking in your neighborhood and never knowing for sure whether you would fly up or come down. Fortunately we can depend on the law of gravity. And though you can’t touch it or see it, if you jump out of a window, you will feel it.

You would not say, “I don’t believe germs exist,” just because you can’t see them. When you are sick, you experience the effects of germs. Even though you can’t see them, you do not deny that they exist.

These invisible powers are explained through science according to predictable laws. There are also biblical laws that affect our interactions.

I want to do what is right, but I can’t. I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway. But if I do what I don’t want to do, I am not really the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it. I have discovered this principle of life—that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong. I love God’s law with all my heart. But there is another power within me that is at war with my mind. This power makes me a slave to the sin that is still within me. Oh, what a miserable person I am! Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death? Thank God! The answer is in Jesus Christ our Lord. So you see how it is: In my mind I really want to obey God’s law, but because of my sinful nature I am a slave to sin. (Romans 7:18-25)

There is a tiny word tucked into these verses that you seldom hear these days. The word is … “sin.” These verses define the term “sin” to mean the breaking of God’s law. An equally important concept to understand is the “law of sin.” It is one of the most important of all laws to understand because it will determine your future conduct.

A knowledge of sin and what to do about it is the most important information in the world, and the Bible is the source of that information. Almost all the people who talk to me about themselves have little or no knowledge about the Bible. It follows that they also have little or no knowledge about sin.

I have heard hundreds of stories from people who begin by saying, “I have everything I always wanted and I’m doing everything right!” But the same gnawing emptiness and repetitive questions remain: Why am I restless? Why am I disturbed? Why am I worried? Why am I nervous? Why am I tense? Why am I unhappy? Why do I hurt? Why am I under stress? Why am I uncomfortable?

I am convinced that all of us sincerely want to overlook other people’s faults and be easygoing, loving, generous, cooperative, and sacrificial individuals. But something holds us back. Could it be this law of sin? Paul seems to say yes:  “I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway. But if I do what I don’t want to do, I am not really the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it” (Romans 7:19-20).

It is usually the unexpected circumstances that give you an unexpected glimpse of yourself. Joe considered himself to be an easygoing, friendly person. He liked his work and got along well with his associates. Then his boss got transferred. The new boss rearranged Joe’s workplace, changed his secretary, and gave him some new duties that he didn’t like. Joe changed from being a cheerful, cooperative person to a disgruntled, rebellious employee. He hated the new boss. His inner response to the new superior resulted in behavior that missed his own personal standard of conduct.

This is the law of sin at work. It suggests a conflict between the desire to do good and the inability to do it. The Bible sums up this condition very simply: “Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin” (James 4:17).

Perhaps you have been present with someone who has eaten too much and is confronted by a luscious dessert. With fork in hand he declares, “I shouldn’t eat this.” Then he deliberately proceeds to do what he just declared he shouldn’t do—eat the dessert.

Another Bible verse describes this type of struggle: “For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish” (Galatians 5:17).

The Bible pinpointed the trouble long ago:  “We have turned, every one, to his own way” (Isaiah 53:6).

Each person likes his own ideas, plans, aspirations, and longings. Thus when you encounter resistance to your wishes, or face demands that are not to your liking, the tendency is to rebel, attack, run, or defend yourself. The natural reaction is to be resentful, bitter, stubborn or full of fight. It is easy for you to think that your desires are the reasonable ones. A person will find a way to make a selfish drive seem selfless, deceiving even himself.

Furthermore, it is natural to shrink away from an honest glimpse of yourself. To back off from reproof is as human as shielding the eyes from a burst of light in a dark room. The Bible’s assessment that the heart is deceitful above all things (Jeremiah 17:9) and that men love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil (John 3:19) is as up-to-date as the literature on psychology that describes the mental mechanisms for evading the truth.

The patterns of deceit and self-defense are so systematized that their names are common dictionary words: rationalization, regression, suppression, repression, extroversion, introversion, compartmental thinking, and projection. To peer further into the darkness, such avenues can lead to psychoses requiring hospitalization—or to broken homes, crime, vice, or even murder or suicide.

But as already mentioned, there is hope! Since we are looking to the Bible as our guide, we can turn to it not only for a description of man as he naturally is, but for the path to peace from our disturbances, neuroses, and psychoses. Psalm 119:165 says, “Great peace have those who love Your law, And nothing causes them to stumble.”

Many people turn to a counselor for help because they are in circumstances that offend them or have caused them to stumble. They are dissatisfied, irritated and unhappy. Either they flee from the vexing situation or attack it. One would think that people would rush to buy a book that pointed out the path to peace and the way from offense to freedom. People do buy it—millions of copies every year. The Bible continues to be the all-time bestseller. But it is a book that most people quickly lay aside because it reproves and corrects. Man simply does not like the truth that he discovers about himself in the Bible.

The “law” of sin exposes our inability to do right. As we study the Bible we can be assured that God will help us to confess our sin, will forgive us of it, and will help us to live a new life of freedom in Him.