Strength for human weakness

“Come now, let us reason together,” says the LORD. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.” – Isaiah 1:18

Desperation at times causes a kind of amnesia of the soul, which often causes a person to forget that with decisions there are consequences. Desperation also brings a kind of moral dysfunction that refuses to focus on the ultimate outcome of something that may be appealing but wrong. It focuses on you – how you have been mistreated, how lonely you are and how you deserve better than what you are getting. Should you find yourselves in the ranks of those labeled “desperate,” remember the following:

First, you need to know that God knows your loneliness and your pain and is not indifferent to it. Jesus Christ was no stranger to loneliness. In fact, He specializes in treating the disorder.

The second thing you need to know is that God can give you strength for your weakness. It’s better to be lonely and have fellowship with a loving God than to turn your back on Him for someone who cares more about your physical embrace than your loneliness.

Also be assured that God specializes in washing away those stains on your dirty laundry. “Neither do I condemn you,” Jesus told a woman who had been caught in the arms of a man to whom she was not married, adding, “Go and sin no more.”

Isaiah wrote that our sins which are as scarlet can be white as wool (Isaiah 1:18). Do you recall the words of that old hymn, “What can wash away my sins? Nothing but the blood of Jesus?” With God’s forgiveness comes the enabling of the Holy Spirit to resist human desperation.

Forgiven, cleansed and made whole brings the friendship of one who said, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you... The Lord is my helper, I will not be afraid. What can mere mortals do to me?” (Hebrews 13:5-6).

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Used with permission from Guidelines International Ministries. To learn more about Guidelines and the ministry, send an e-mail to [email protected]. You may also visit www.guidelines.org.