And falling to his knees he cried out with a loud voice, "Lord, do not hold this sin against them.
" And when he had said this, he fell asleep-Acts:7:60 Just try to imagine this scene, if you can.
You are being STONED for your faith.
Rocks are being thrown at you.
No one is showing you any kind of mercy, grace, love, none of that.
They are out to kill you.
No hope whatsoever in living to tell about it...
You are telling the truth but it doesn't matter to them.
They don't see it as so and you are making them angrier by he minute.
Then, in the midst of pain and suffering, literally breathing your very last breaths on earth...
you ask God to FORGIVE THEM...
Huh? Could you do it? Could you even have the kind of love, grace and mercy that wasn't extended to you? Could you spend the very last moments of your life not being angry at the very people who are taking your life, but instead saying "God please extend forgiveness to them"? I'll be the first one to admit it, I couldn't do it.
I'm not even sure those kind of thoughts would even enter my mind.
It almost seemed like an easy thing for Stephen to do.
If you take the time to read through Acts 7 you won't see a moment of anger from Stephen.
You'll see a man who is bold for his LORD and won't back down on telling the truth, even if it meant dying for it.
He died for it.
If you look at verse 56, you will see what was waiting for him after the pain and suffering.
Forgiveness.
Don't you just hate that word sometimes? Some people have done you and I WRONG.
Those who have done us wrong don't deserve our forgiveness, and we deserve better, don't we? We deserve better than to allow those kind of people back into our lives after all they have done to us.
It should be one and done, you mess up once and you are out for GOOD.
Hey wait a minute...
Didn't Jesus hang on a cross for 6 hours to forgive us of our sins? Yeah, we didn't exactly deserve it, did we? Maybe forgiveness isn't such a bad thing or a bad word after all.
Don't forget that HE loves you, and so do I, Shelley Olsen
" And when he had said this, he fell asleep-Acts:7:60 Just try to imagine this scene, if you can.
You are being STONED for your faith.
Rocks are being thrown at you.
No one is showing you any kind of mercy, grace, love, none of that.
They are out to kill you.
No hope whatsoever in living to tell about it...
You are telling the truth but it doesn't matter to them.
They don't see it as so and you are making them angrier by he minute.
Then, in the midst of pain and suffering, literally breathing your very last breaths on earth...
you ask God to FORGIVE THEM...
Huh? Could you do it? Could you even have the kind of love, grace and mercy that wasn't extended to you? Could you spend the very last moments of your life not being angry at the very people who are taking your life, but instead saying "God please extend forgiveness to them"? I'll be the first one to admit it, I couldn't do it.
I'm not even sure those kind of thoughts would even enter my mind.
It almost seemed like an easy thing for Stephen to do.
If you take the time to read through Acts 7 you won't see a moment of anger from Stephen.
You'll see a man who is bold for his LORD and won't back down on telling the truth, even if it meant dying for it.
He died for it.
If you look at verse 56, you will see what was waiting for him after the pain and suffering.
Forgiveness.
Don't you just hate that word sometimes? Some people have done you and I WRONG.
Those who have done us wrong don't deserve our forgiveness, and we deserve better, don't we? We deserve better than to allow those kind of people back into our lives after all they have done to us.
It should be one and done, you mess up once and you are out for GOOD.
Hey wait a minute...
Didn't Jesus hang on a cross for 6 hours to forgive us of our sins? Yeah, we didn't exactly deserve it, did we? Maybe forgiveness isn't such a bad thing or a bad word after all.
Don't forget that HE loves you, and so do I, Shelley Olsen
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