Habit's

2.Cor 5:17 “Therefore if any person is engrafted  in Christ, he is a new creature (a new creature altogether); the old previous moral and spiritual condition has passed away. Behold the fresh and new has come”.

Are all of your old habits put away; even those things that you unknowingly received from your ancestors?  Are you annoyed that there are acts, words and more which do not become loose quickly or simply?  You pray: “Lord, take these habits, which entice me again and again away” - and nothing happens.  Perhaps you already have forgiven your parents and ancestors, brothers and sisters and friends with all seriousness – nevertheless something still remains and you become more annoyed about yourself each day.

1. Peter 1:18 “You must know, recognize that you were redeemed, ransomed from the useless, fruitless way of living inherited by tradition from your forefathers, not with corruptible things, such as silver and gold.”

Ezekiel 20:18 “But I said to their sons in the wilderness, you shall not walk in the statutes of your fathers, nor observe their ordinances, nor defile yourselves with their idols.”

Mt 12, 35 “The good man from his inner good treasure brings forth good things and the evil man out of his inner evil storehouse brings forth evil things”.

May I say this to you today:

There is a solution!

There are however some questions.  What does Jesus mean in this sentence?

Luke 6:37 Judge not, neither pronouncing judgment nor subjecting to censure and you will not be judged; do not condemn and pronounce guilty and you will not be condemned and pronounced guilty; acquit and forgive and release (give up resentment, let it drop) and you will be acquitted and forgiven and released.”

Have we released our ancestors?  Why is this necessary?   All of our ancestors - good and bad have committed sins. There is a continuation of sequential sins - in other words: we can live religiously on a heap of muck from the past. As long as we do not release this past, we can have, unknowingly, good or bad things, and/or characteristics from our ancestors. We can stand under their sin and influence.

Now perhaps you think: but I gave Jesus everything - He died for all my sins! –Yes, this is true, but perhaps the sins of your ancestors have not been repented for.

With the sentimental way of thinking, which by the way originates from the human (most dangerous anti-Christian way of thinking): I may not think and talk badly of my ancestors - we are sinning with their sin. We then open a door and a gate, for all their habits and ways of thinking.

Proverbs 22:24-25 “Make no friendship with a man given to anger, and with a wrathful man do not associate,  lest you learn his ways, and get yourself into a snare.”

Because this sentimental thinking is so strong in us, (also this was taught us by our ancestors) this has become normal for us. Therefore good and bad habits are in our lives.

A problem develops now, if we want to separate the allegedly good and bad habits.  Repeatedly there are the good habits, which can bring us in difficulties. i.e. the whole thing could be complicated at one time and very complex, so we come again to;

Luke 6:37 “……. release, and (give up resentment, let it drop) and you will be acquitted and forgiven and released.”

The way is simple as follows:

1. Forgive your ancestors, friends and relatives completely. Do not make the offenses smaller. If your parents or other authorities gave coinages and behaved consciously or unconsciously to you in ways that do not correspond to God’s ways, then they acted wrongly. With each sentimental way of thinking, how: "they could not have acted differently..." or: "they did well, that was their way...!"   We receive their wrongs and we walk in their paths. (Proverb 22:25) that is, speak truth, your parents, ancestors and other authorities are guiltily and then forgive them. Now the basis of releasing is activated. There are then two further steps:

2.  After we have faced the truth and the cause, then it is necessary to act.

An example - someone let us call him John, digs a hole in our garden and leaves a heap of dirt. We are annoyed because of it, but we forgive John, because we are the guilty ones for assigning him this work. Now, however the hole and the heap of dirt remain.

3. Thus this hole that John has left and a heap of dirt in our garden. Perhaps we have planted a few flowers around it to make it more beautiful. In doing this, we have separated from God’s ways.  He gave us Jesus to forgive us our sins for that we are very thankful.  However the complete freedom did not come.   This is called the Word of God from our view.  In this we continued to be in further idolatry because of our ancestors. (See above Ezekiel 20:18)

1 King 3:3 “Solomon loved the Lord, walking (at first) in the statutes and practices of David his father: only he sacrificed and burnt incense in the high places”.

     Here we need a genuine reversal. Our sin consists of two parts:

A:  we did not adhere to the word of Jesus, which says: Release!

B:  we do ourselves still consciously or unconsciously have idolatry from our ancestors.

Dan 9:5 “We have sinned, and dealt perversely and done wickedly, and have rebelled, turning aside from Your           commandments and ordinances.”

That is called penalty - turn around. If we the follow the three points and do them:

1. - forgive our ancestor their acts

2. - forgive our ancestors the consequences of these acts

3. - ask for forgiveness about our failure for remaining in old habits and doing nothing against   

      it. Repent and turn God’s way! And…the success for us is for sure!

With all the best,    Vreni + Peter Jordi