Sorry not sorry-Levi Lusko

Last night I got a chance to listen to a really great message from fresh life church preached by Levi Lusko. I listened to the first message of the series and am hoping to listen to the second one today. He talks a lot about the art of the apology and just the words he spoke were really from God and from his heart. It was a really special message to me and impacted me in tremendous ways! First thing I am going to summarize from it is the 3 things that are required in an apology. They are responsibility, regret and remedy. He brings up genesis 3 the first time in history anybody needed to apologize. Adam and Eve sinned and they hid from God. They knew what they did was wrong and they were scared to be seen by Him and didn't want to have to tell them what they did. Of course God knows our sin the moment we do it but there is still confession that needs to take place. Instead of doing the easy thing and telling God they decided to hide as most humans do and not tell the truth. It makes it a whole lot worse when you do hide because then you also have to explain why you hid it and lied and why you sinned. When we sin we need to run to Jesus. If we do hide it we will constantly have dread and fear and wonder if people will find out. I have experienced this before and it is not fun at all. You are looking over your shoulder, hiding your phone, wondering if you accidentally sent the wrong text, and it is just endless. The lies just continue to build up and hurt people more and more. Not only do you then have to apologize for your sin but also for your lying. You just keep losing more and more trust. Levi says something that is really funny but true, he said that God is the worst person ever to play hide and seek with. This is so true! God should be the ambulance that we run to and seek help from. God knows our sin and we need His help! We need to turn to Him before we sin so that we don't have to battle the rest of the mess. The pile will just keep building with who your sin hurts. 

Proverbs 16 is really great to go along with this message and talk about plans and letting God ordain your steps. We need His righteousness. 

By our nature we will sin and we need to come clean about it. We can NOT live in the darkness and hide it. God will reveal the truth. Just as when Adam and Eve ate from the tree they were NOT supposed to, God found them and exposed their sin. They tried to cover it with fig leaves but God still knew. God asked them and Adam blamed it on the woman, He created and gave to her. It wasn't his fault and he didn't apologize. The woman blamed it on the serpent and why would God put a serpent in the garden? They never took responsibility for it themselves or said I won't do it again. They just kept going with their lives acting like they found the solution themselves with the fig leaves. Btw fig leaves are some the itchiest form of leaves. But they thought they had it under control and didn't need God to fix it. We do that so much where we think we can fix it on our own and don't need Gods help. We ALWAYS need His help. Another interesting point Levi made is that in Mark 11 Jesus cursed the only tree ever and that was a fig tree. 

With the fig leaves they tried to cover their sins and not actually come clean and repent. They just wanted to cover it up so they appeared okay. They weren't actually honest or repent. They just found a worldly solution. Levi made the analogy it is like a dishwasher only cleaning the outside of the cup and leaving the inside filthy. Well our inside is what is most important just as we drink out of the inside of the cup. God needs to clean us and we need to let Him! We need to be made new! 

The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them. (Genesis 3:21 NIV). This is the first sign of the Cross taking place. God killed sheep and made leather for them and this was the first sign of blood. He sacrificed something else so that they didn't have to die. They should've died right there on the spot but God protected them. This is His working to make us clean. He was constantly making plans to save His people. Not because we are perfect but because He cares about us. 

Finally when someone apologizes and they say "I am so sorry BUT you did this or I didn't have a choice or you provoked me" it's not really an apology. When you apologize and have the word but in there you only truly believe what comes after the but and not before. You aren't really sorry, you are going to keep sinning or it's that persons fault. When we apologize we need to take responsibility. Yes satan wants us to sin and fall but we are the one that makes the final choice to give into sin and not be strong enough in our faith. Not only do we need to take responsibility we need to be sorry for our sin and full of remorse. We should not be happy that we got to sin but instead be sad that we fell but rejoice that God will save us. We need to have Godly sorrow that we sinned and fell but be renewed in Christ. How do we fix this sin? We don't just cover it up but we clean it. We take a shovel and dig that sin out. It needs to be washed white as snow. When God is in our apologizes we are truly asking for forgiveness. 

I really enjoyed this message and it deeply impacted me. God gave this to me at the right time and will forever change my heart towards sin. I can't wait to listen to the rest of the series! Here is a link to the message! http://freshlifechurch.com/teachings/teaching_page.php?id=1747