Romans 6:14  For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.
 
We hear the phrase, "possession is nine tenths of the law."  We are not under the law, but under grace.  The law no longer can condemn us because our kinsman redeemer has paid our debt.  We are declared free.
    
So many of us are caught up in the 'need' for things.  We want the bigger house, bigger car, bigger diamond ring.  We end up with the bigger debt.
     
When we achieve all the 'things' that are advertised to make our lives better and happier and more prosperous, we discover that we are not happier or more content or more satisfied.  We seek more 'things'  and still are not happy.  All of our possessions have made us work more, worry more and give us less time for our true treasure.

Matthew 6:19-21 "Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal.  But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.  For where your treasure is,
there your heart will be also."

    Matthew 6:33 tells us to seek first the kingdom of God.  We will receive all the blessings of God when we put Him first.  We must put our priorities in order.  He will bless us with His great abundance.  It will not necessarily be the 'things' that the world is telling us we need but it will be the
things that lead us into eternal life.  His blessings will help us to be a better, more effective witness to the world.

1Peter 1:3,4  Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ!  In His great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade- kept in heaven for you,....

We will receive our inheritance at the last trumpet.  When we stand before the Lord of the harvest, we will stand sinless and forgiven.  We will be received with great rejoicing into the eternal city.  We will walk on streets of gold.  If the streets
are gold, we can only imagine what the city will look like. 
   
The 'things' we have now will pale in comparison to our heavenly inheritance.  We won't have to dust, clean or repair anything.  We will look back and wonder why our 'things' were so important!

Joel 2:12-14
"Even now", declares the Lord, "return to me
with all your heart, with fasting and weeping and
mourning."  Rend your heart and not your garments.
Return to the Lord your God, for He is gracious and
compassionate.  Who knows?  He may turn and have
pity and leave behind a blessing....
 
We, God's people, have begun to take sin lightly.  We don't recognize that God will allow our sins only for so long before He allows us to reap the harvest.  We don't think a loving God will let the consequences of our choices hurt us.  We choose to see Him as a benevolent, soft hearted person who can be fooled by our false or half hearted repentance.

Joel 2:1  Blow the trumpet in Zion; sound the alarm on
My holy hill.  Let all who live in the land tremble, for the
day of the Lord is coming.  It is close at hand--
 
God sent many prophets to Israel and Judah. He sent warnings over and over to the people to lead them to repentance and healing.  His people chose to ignore the storm warnings and continued their journey to destruction.  God's people can't say they were not warned. 
 
Many times God sent disasters and enemies and disease to try to turn His people back to Him and His ways.  Each time, they ignored Him until calamity struck.  Then they would come running back, crying, "Why would you allow this, God?"  God's heart breaks when His people don't understand or choose to not understand.  He will put up with our foolish ways for a limited time.  He will not withhold from us the results of our bad choices if what we learn from our mistakes brings us back to Him.
 
We, God's people, must choose to repent, turn our broken hearts back to Him and worship Him.  We must confess even to ourselves the sins we are committing and accept His discipline.  He loves us enough to allow us to learn the hard way that our way leads to trouble, His way leads to joy and blessings.
 
Pray to our great Redeemer that He will open our eyes to our sins.  Pray that He will, with loving kindness, show us where we are failing and what sins need to be dealt with.  His word tells us that He is willing to forgive our sins but He wants us
to grow and learn and lead others to repentance.  He knows our sins and is waiting for us to come to Him seeking forgiveness and healing.  He wants us to come to Him with true, heartbroken repentance.
 
He loves us and is waiting for us to run to Him.  He will receive us with open arms.  He will scoop us up in His arms and rejoice with us.  He will sing over us with great joy.  He will comfort those who honestly mourn their sinful ways and will pour out His blessings on them.

Titus 3:4-7
But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, He saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of His mercy.  He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, so
that, having been justified by His grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life.

Micah 7:7-9
But as for me, I watch in hope for the Lord, I wait for God my Savior; my God will hear me.   Do not gloat over me, my enemy!  Though I have fallen, I will rise.  Though I sit in darkness, the Lord will be my light.  Because I have sinned against Him, I will bear the Lord's wrath, until He pleads my case and establishes my right.  He will bring me out into the light; I will see His righteousness.

2Corinthians 5:21
God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us,
so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.

    
God sent His Son to restore us to communion with Him.  He gave His Son as a perfect sacrifice without blemish to take our place.  His word tells us over and over that there is nothing we can offer that can pay the debt we owe.  Adam, in his foolishness, gifted us with eternal death because he chose to abdicate his role and responsibilities.  God in His unlimited love paid the price for us.
     
We, in our infinite wisdom, try to pay the debt by giving tithes, joining a church, working on committees.  We think we can bypass the need to confess our sins.  We want to buy our way into heaven.  We don't want to admit that we are not able, in our sinfulness, to pay the price.  We don't  want anyone to take the credit for getting us to heaven.  We,
in our arrogance, think we can do it all.
    
But when we, God's people, confess our sins, He our Lord and Savior, restores to us His righteousness.  He welcomes us into the throne room and rejoices with us that we will spend eternity with Him.  We will see the Son of God face to face.  We will have no more tears.  We will not see
death or sorrow. 
     
God, in His righteousness, bought for us eternal life.  He poured out boundless grace so that we can becomes heirs of eternal life in Him.  Now is the time to pour out for Him, boundless praise and worship.  Now is the time to offer up to Him the sacrifice of thanksgiving for the grace we have been given.  His grace restored to us His righteousness.  Our worship of Him is what He desires.  We can not repay our debt but we can rejoice in His love and grace.

1Peter 1:13  Therefore, prepare your  minds
for action; be self-controlled; set your hope fully on the
grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed.

1Peter 1:9  For you are receiving the goal of
your faith, the salvation of your souls.

Christ Jesus rejoices in giving us good gifts. His greatest gift, our salvation, is wrapped in the sweet promise of grace.  God's grace is sufficient to cover the worst, most painful sins.  He, our Lord, showed us the way of grace.  He showed us how to offer grace to others by the way he lived.  He offered grace and forgiveness to the woman at the well, the woman caught in adultery.  He gave grace to Paul after he persecuted
His, God's, people. 
   
He lifted up before the religious leaders an example of what they should be giving.  Instead, they chose to give books of laws and rules and restrictions.  Jesus showed us a better way by fulfilling the laws and asking us to follow Him because of love, not because of threats and demands.  
  
Jesus promised us grace because He knew us from before we were formed in our mother's womb.  He knew we would be weak and need His strength.  He knew we would slip and fall and fail.  But He and the Father knew that the debt we would incur would be paid.  Our Lord had set in place grace for any and all who would choose it.
   
Jesus will not force on us the promise of His grace.  He offers it freely.  We can choose to accept the promise of His grace or we can go our own way.  We can choose to take our chances.  Most who don't know the Lord, don't believe we will stand before Him one day to account for our choices and actions. 
  
 I, for one, choose grace as my promise from Him.  I will stand on the promise that, once forgiven, my sins are banished forever.  I will wait for His praise on my life as He says, "Well done, good and faithful servant".