SECOND CHANCES

I'd like to be known for second chances.

 

As I type and think even now, my kids are working diligently for what I assume they're praying will be a second chance.

The truth is they disappointed me tonight (nothing major)...BUT...as I consider their hearts to repent and ask for forgiveness,

as I watch them turn a corner, I can't help but feel compassion.

I'm offering forgiveness such as I've been shown, inclined to a second chance.

 

"If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

1 John 1:9

 

I'd like my children to remember me as a mom who gave second chances.

 

In the other room, a little voice sings, "left and left and left, right, left" with a snap in her fingers and a song in her heart.

The tap in her toes helps me remember...they're still learning. And, we're all still learning.

 

Second chances.

 

God gives us second chances and Veggie Tales Jonah rings loudly in my ears, "Our God is a God of second chances...!!!"

 

He is.

 

And if I'm here imitating Him, and if He has shown compassion to me, then how could I withhold that which I've received?

 

Grace. Mercy. Second chances.

 

"But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast."

Ephesians 2:4-9

 

"Therefore be imitators of God."
Ephesians 5:1

 

So, I'm in. A second chance is coming their way. They may not "deserve" this grace, but do I?

 

"For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing;

it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast."

Ephesians 2:8-9

 

"Do you suppose, O man—

you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—

that you will escape the judgment of God? 

Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience,

not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?"

Romans 2:3-4

 

It's His kindness which leads me to repentance. Oh, that I might teach my children through similar means as I hold back retribution, model undeserved grace, express love in unlovable circumstances, and offer second chances.

 

 "Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the belly of the fish, saying,

"I called out to the Lord, out of my distress,
    and he answered me;
out of the belly of Sheol I cried,
    and you heard my voice.
For you cast me into the deep,
    into the heart of the seas,
    and the flood surrounded me;
all your waves and your billows
    passed over me.
Then I said, ‘I am driven away
    from your sight;
yet I shall again look
    upon your holy temple.’
The waters closed in over me to take my life;
    the deep surrounded me;
weeds were wrapped about my head
at the roots of the mountains.
I went down to the land
    whose bars closed upon me forever;
yet you brought up my life from the pit,
    O Lord my God.
When my life was fainting away,
    I remembered the Lord,
and my prayer came to you,
    into your holy temple.
Those who pay regard to vain idols
    forsake their hope of steadfast love.

But I with the voice of thanksgiving
    will sacrifice to you;
what I have vowed I will pay.
    Salvation belongs to the Lord!'

And the Lord spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah out upon the dry land."

Jonah 2:1-10