Ocean of Grace (1): Ash Wednesday - Heal Me

 

Ocean of Grace (1): Ash Wednesday – Heal Me

 https://www.thegoodbook.co.uk/an-ocean-of-grace

Consider and confess your sins:

Sins of thought, word and deed.

Sins of commission and omission: things done and things left undone.

 

Confess to God that you not only sin but you are a sinner: your sinful actions come from your sinful heart.

 

How are you influenced by the world (the prevailing non-Christian culture), the flesh (your own sinful desires) and / or the devil (evil)?

 

Look afresh to Christ as your all-sufficient Saviour with repentance and faith. Turn from your sin and trust him.

 

How does Becon describe our need? Do you find any of these particularly striking?

 

In what ways is Jesus such a wonderful and appropriate Saviour?

Again, do you find any of these titles / descriptions of Christ especially striking?

(Are there others you would have added?)

 

Reflect on Christ’s sinless humanity and his powerful and infinitely valuable divinity. Can you not believe that he is good and mighty enough to save and forgive you?

 

Read the Parable of the Good Samaritan from Luke Chapter 10v25ff. In what ways does the Good Samaritan provide a picture of Jesus our Saviour? Can you see yourself in the robbed and wounded man in need of aid?

 

For more on Jesus as the Good Samaritan see: https://christthetruth.net/2008/09/29/he-saved-my-life-and-i-dont-even-know-his-name/

 

Have you ever thought of Christ as like a Father before? (Hebrews 2:13f might be relevant here)

 

Do you find it over the top to say that we find in ourselves “nothing but sin, death and damnation”?

Perhaps the point is not to deny that we are made in the image of God, though Fallen. Rather, every part of us is affected by sin. This is the doctrine of Total Depravity: not that we act as wickedly as we might but that there is no pure core in us. We cannot merit our own salvation and left to ourselves we would be spiritually dead and condemned.

We admit this about ourselves whenever we use the Prayer Book Confession of sin, saying that “there is no health in us”.

 

Our only hope is for Jesus to give us new spiritual life that we might be born again: regeneration (as the theologians call it), resurrection!