Opportunities

Opportunity To Restore

Verse 1-Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted. (NKJV)

Verse 1-Dear brothers and sisters, if another Christian is overcome by some sin, you who are godly should gently and humbly help that person back onto the right path. And be careful not to fall into the same temptation yourself. (NLT)

A sin that they are overtaken by, a sin that they are overcome by, we can all identify with a sin or sins that, like Hebrews 12 says….which so easily ensnares us.

This is taking about those habitual sins that people become enslaved in!

We are not to look down our noses at them, we are to remember, we all have sin in our lives and just like them, we all need help, we all need the prayers of others, the support of others, and if we think of that for moment, we will have the right frame of mind to restore our brother or sister to a right relationship with Christ!

We need to do what Jesus told us to do before helping others!

Matthew 7:3-5-And why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me remove the speck from your eye’; and look, a plank is in your own eye? Hypocrite! First remove the plank from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.

When you have had something in your eye, you are more sensitive to the pain a person is in, when you are trying to remove something from their eye.

When your dealing with someone who is entangled in a sin, you are more sensitive to what that person is dealing with, if you too have dealt with the sin or sins in your life!

Knowing that feeling of wanting to do right, and not doing it, knowing that guilty feeling of letting God down again, and that shameful feeling of not controlling that old sinful nature!

Opportunity To Accomplish

Verse 2-Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. (NKJV)

Verse 2-Share each other's troubles and problems, and in this way obey the law of Christ. (NLT)

How would do explain what is the law of Christ? Simply put it, is these two verses:

Matthew 22:34-39-But when the Pharisees heard that He had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. Then one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, and saying, “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?”Jesus said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”

Romans 13:8-10-Owe no one anything except to love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not bear false witness,” “You shall not covet,” and if there is any other commandment, are all summed up in this saying, namely, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no harm to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.

Opportunity To See Yourself

Verse 3-For if anyone thinks himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself. (NKJV)

Verse 3-If you think you are too important to help someone in need, you are only fooling yourself. You are really a nobody. (NLT)

When you hear statements like this from people…“I did this all on my on!” “I do what I want!” “I don’t have to answer to nobody!” Then you realizes why the world is in the shape it’s in!!

There are to many people in this world that have a high opinion of themselves and low opinion of others!!

Luke 18:9-14-Also He spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, ‘God, I thank You that I am not like other men—extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess.’ And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner!’

I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”