Thought for Saturday, April 20th

April 16, 2013

Secret Faults

Who can understand his errors? cleanse thou me from secret faults.  Keep back thy servant also from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me: then shall I be upright, and I shall be innocent from the great transgression.  Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my strength, and my redeemer.

Psalms 19:12-14

“The greatest of faults, I should say, is to be conscious of none.”

-          Thomas Carlyle

Almost every one of us knows that we have faults: though there might be one or two among us that would struggle with that acknowledgement: however how many of us are willing to admit to having faults we don’t even recognize or realize we have: probably very few.

Being good Christian folk; we realize that there are none of us perfect, except for Jesus; but very few of us are really willing to face just how imperfect we really are.

There are those big faults that we often identify and often expend much time and energy trying to improve on and overcome: yet the Psalmist recognized that beyond those big things that can be rather obvious; there is a potential plethora of unacknowledged, maybe even unnoticed faults or failings that never get our attention.

This is why we need to rely so heavily on the Holy Spirit and allow Him to work within us to reveal to us and to help us overcome those little foibles that sometimes if gone unchecked could develop into bigger faults or failures that then require even more time and attention.

The bottom line is this; most, if not all of us, are less perfect than we realize or maybe are even willing to admit: but that does not decrease, diminish or change in any way God’s love for us and His desire for us to be over comers and more than conquerors of not just our big faults but those little ones as well.

And with His help all things are possible, if we will only believe.  Even over coming faults and failures we may not even realize we have: but He does.

Prayer:

Father, with all the faults I know I have it is a rather sobering to think there are even more faults that I don’t even recognize, yet I know there are: so help me to overcome not just those things I am aware of but all the other things that you are aware of that I haven’t even noticed yet.