The Record is Canceled
Where is the record of your sins?
Verse of the Day
‘He canceled the record of the charges against us and took it away by nailing it to the cross. In this way, he disarmed the spiritual rulers and authorities. He shamed them publicly by his victory over them on the cross.’
Today’s Devotional
Imagine that you sit down to look at your finances and your debt is out of control. Based on how much you owe, versus how much you have left over after your bills are paid each month, it will take you 8,673 years to break even – only if you never increase your debt by even one more penny.
Or, in an even scarier scenario, there is a magic printer that is constantly printing out a list of your sins. Every time you are selfish, or tell a white lie, or covet anything that belongs to someone else, another line prints out on a never ending document. Every single sin you have ever committed is listed here in black ink on white paper.
Then Jesus, in His desire to be with you, takes every bill you owe, every credit card statement, every loan, every I.O.U, your mortgage and car payments, insurance and property taxes – He takes ALL of them and says, “I’ll cover that.”
And He takes this print out of your sins, even as it is still constantly printing more pages, and He says, “I’ll take the punishment for all of it.”
He takes your debt and your sins and makes them disappear by taking them with Him to be nailed to the cross. It’s remarkable and hard to comprehend.
So how does this beautiful sacrifice shame the spiritual rulers? Well, they wanted Him out of the way. They wanted to prove that He was not God. But their act of sentencing Him to death achieved that exact opposite result. If they had known what would happen on the cross, they would never have had us humans crucify Him. They were defeating themselves and they didn’t even know it.
So now, what “power” do the evil forces have? The Bible says they are disarmed. The only weapons they now have are their ability to deceive and to create fear. Now, they only have the power that we grant them. In truth and faith, the weapons are in our hands, not theirs. All because of Jesus.
Journal Prompts
Answer only the questions that seem relevant to you today.
How can you praise and worship Jesus for the sacrifice He made for you to erase all of your sins?
In what ways or areas are you allowing evil forces to have any kind of power over you?
How can you take back your power in the name of Jesus?