{"id":70029,"date":"2020-02-11T13:11:56","date_gmt":"2020-02-11T11:11:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=70029"},"modified":"2023-09-07T16:09:53","modified_gmt":"2023-09-07T13:09:53","slug":"how-not-to-be-trapped-by-our-past-and-our-sins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/how-not-to-be-trapped-by-our-past-and-our-sins\/","title":{"rendered":"How Not To Be Trapped By Our Past And Our Sins"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[376,717,571,400],"acf":{"old_id":"70029","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":33992,"related_cahpter":"414","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"Reaching above ourselves and our limits","content":"

One of the bifurcations that modern people face is the choice between earning one\u2019s status by being consistently excellent (where is the place where everyone is \u2018merely\u2019 above average?) and feeling worthless. We occupy a culture that stimulates new levels of productivity and achievement by scorning the advances of yesterday, by aiming always toward greater efficiency, greater output, higher standards.<\/span><\/p>\n

Yet we can\u2019t always do better. It is the nature of reality that there are some limits, and that we operate within those limits. In America, recent data suggests that this is the first generation whose standard of living may not rise to that of their parents. Does that mean that today\u2019s young people are inferior?<\/span><\/p>\n

The great power of religion is to acknowledge our failures, our errors, our \u2013 old fashioned word here \u2013 sin. By acknowledging that we are creatures who sin, we clear out room to say that our worth comes not from our perfection. Only God is perfect. Our worth comes out of our striving to do better than we did before, which starts by acknowledging the depths of our wrongdoing.<\/span><\/p>\n

If our sins testify against us, Lord, act for Your Name\u2019s sake; for our rebelliousness is great. We have sinned to You. O Hope of Israel, its Redeemer in time of trouble, why should You be like a stranger in the land?<\/span><\/p>\n

We begin in stark honesty. We admit that our sins testify against us. But the point is that we don\u2019t feel trapped by those sins. Instead we ask God to act on us, work through us, not for the sake of our track record, but for the sake of God\u2019s essence, which is hope and love.<\/span><\/p>\n

We know there is some perversity in human nature that makes us return to our errors, to make bad choices, to disappoint and to hurt. Yet we ask God to be our hope. By latching on to a perfection beyond our own capacity, we acquire a way of being lifted beyond any internal possibility. We rise up to a God-generated possibility.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Sinners, yes? Defined by those sins? Not if we reach to the One who is always holding out a hand.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

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