Bless The Lord - God's Benefit Package - Part 3

Psalms 103:1-5

Part 3 of a Series

TEXT: Psalms 103:1-5 NKJV Bless the Lord, O my soul; And all that is within me, bless His holy name! 2 Bless the Lord, O my soul, And forget not all His benefits: 3 Who forgives all your iniquities, Who heals all your diseases, 4 Who redeems your life from destruction, Who crowns you with lovingkindness and tender mercies, 5 Who satisfies your mouth with good things, So that your youth is renewed like the eagle's.

In his book. Lee: The Last Years, Charles Bracelen Flood reports that after the Civil War, Robert E. Lee visited a Kentucky lady who took him to the remains of a grand old tree in front of her house. There she bitterly cried that its limbs and trunk had been destroyed by Federal artillery fire. She looked to Lee for a word condemning the North or at least sympathizing with her loss. After a brief silence, Lee said, "Cut it down, my dear Madam, and forget it." It is better to forgive the injustices of the past than to allow them to remain, let bitterness take root and poison the rest of our life.

Many Christians are living defeated lives, because they are hanging onto their pasts. They see their sins more than they see the solution to their sins, which is the blood of Jesus! They spend more of their time dwelling on their sins, then dwelling on what Jesus has done for them!

Repentance - the key to being forgiven

Proverbs 28:13, "He that covereth his sins shall not prosper: but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy."

If you can confess it, you can be forgiven of it!

It doesn't matter what you've done, if you turn to God and confess your sins, He will forgive ALL of your unrighteousness... that includes anything you've done, that you are willing to bring before Him!

1 John 1:9, "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from ALL unrighteousness."

There is no sin too great for God to forgive: Titus 2:14, "Who gave Himself for us to redeem us from EVERY lawless deed, and to purify for Himself a people for His own possession, zealous for good deeds." (NASB)

Isaiah 1:18, "Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool."

The only sin God can't forgive, is the one you won't take to Him!!

Did you know that it's the goodness of God; when we realize His great love for us, which is supposed to draw or lead you to repent and turn to Him?

Romans 2:3-4 The Message - You didn't think, did you, that just by pointing your finger at others you would distract God from seeing all your misdoings and from coming down on you hard? 4 Or did you think that because he's such a nice God, he'd let you off the hook? Better think this one through from the beginning. God is kind, but he's not soft. In kindness he takes us firmly by the hand and leads us into a radical life-change.

Also look at Jeremiah 31:3, "...Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee."

Do you know that Christ's death on the cross was a symbol of God's great and deep love for you? That's right! Romans 5:8, "But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners." (NLT)

My friend, our minds cannot comprehend the deep love that God has for us!!! Ephesians 3:19, "And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fullness of God." If you want to be filled with the fullness of God, you need to understand this great love that God has for you!!

The nature of God's forgiveness

To demonstrate how our heavenly Father wants to love, accept and forgive us when we turn to Him, Jesus told a parable of the son who took half his dad's money and ran away, then returned home and when his father saw his son the ded was moved with compassion.

But in Luke 15:11-25 it tells us how the father received his son; took his son back.

Luke 15:11-24 The Message, “Then he said, "There was once a man who had two sons. 12 The younger said to his father, 'Father, I want right now what's coming to me.'

"So the father divided the property between them. 13 It wasn't long before the younger son packed his bags and left for a distant country. There, undisciplined and dissipated, he wasted everything he had. 14 After he had gone through all his money, there was a bad famine all through that country and he began to hurt. 15 He signed on with a citizen there who assigned him to his fields to slop the pigs. 16 He was so hungry he would have eaten the corncobs in the pig slop, but no one would give him any.