NORTH LIVERMORE — The congregation was welcomed in by Pastor Bonnie Higgins at 9:30 a.m. to begin the service. The Call to Worship was read and the Invocation/Lord’s Prayer was recited. The hymns that were sung were “At Calvary”, “If My People’s Hearts are Humbled” and “Cleanse Me”. The service concluded with “Go Now in Peace”. Linda Lyman is the organist each week. Janet Diaz is the pianist each week. Lew Lyman leads the music for the congregation each week.

The sermon, titled “Is All Sin Equal?” and reading the scripture from Psalm 51:1-6. Pastor Bonnie began commenting on how people have asked her, is a sin a sin, and if you have sin, have you done them all (10 commandments)? Also, she has heard, “it is better to ask for forgiveness than it is to ask for permission to sin” when someone wanted to sin. But, let’s face it, if you are going to sin, God will never say it is okay to sin.

Pastor Bonnie gave an explanation of what sin is. Sin is any action or thought, or spoken word that is against God’s Will. We know that God is perfect and anything that is not perfect in our lives means we fall short of what God wants from us. This is sin. Many times, sin is referred as missing the mark. We get this term from a simple sport of archery. If we want to stay in God’s Will, we must hit a bulls eye every time, but we miss the mark because we don’t stay on the path that God has for us. Life here on earth gets in our way and we some times take our eyes off God, which puts us away from God and more on our own where we get into trouble, or another word for it, is sin. Too many times, we only look at the big sins and not the smaller sins, such as that little white lie, or when we are silent about speaking up for Jesus, or even when we allow our feelings toward someone else overwhelm us from love to dislike. We miss the mark when we allow earthly feelings be stronger than what God has called us to be. God has called us to be like Jesus, if we aren’t, we are committing a sin. We are supposing to imitate Jesus in our lives and when we don’t, we sin.

Scripture tells us in Romans, that the wages of sin is death and that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. When we hear these, it is clear that sin brings death to a person. But for a Christian, we have Jesus, who died for all sins and resurrected for us to overcome death. Because Jesus did this for each of us, all we need to do is to repent of our sins and live our lives for Jesus. Scriptures tells us that the wages of sin is death, and if we die before we repent of our sins, people will not see Heaven’s gate but will see hell. We read in the Bible, that eternity is only two places, Heaven with God, or hell, separated from God. Sin separates us from God. To overcome sin, we must repent and accept Jesus as our personal Savior.

So, are all sins treated equally in God’s eyes? Some say that a little white lie isn’t as bad as doing one of the ten commandments. But all sin puts a wedge between you and God and must be forgiven no matter how small it is. A sin, separates us from God. Scriptures in John tells us that the only way to God the Father is through Jesus Christ. So, we need to go directly to Jesus for forgiveness of our sins. No one or thing can erase our sins, except Jesus. Is there any sin that God will never forgive? Yes, there is one. To all those who never accept Jesus as their personal Savior, or as the scriptures call it blasphemy (an act or speaking against God) against the Spirit, will not be forgiven. On Judgment Day, all those who rejected Jesus will be condemned to Hell, not because God wanted it to happen, but because the person had a choice and they did not choose Jesus.

There are seven deadly sins listed in the Bible. They are lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, wrath, envy, and pride. All these sins will be forgiven if someone asks forgiveness, but not the sin of rejecting Jesus. On a day real soon, will Jesus say “Welcome home” as we cross over to Heaven or will Jesus say “I never knew you, go away.” It is your choice.

Announcements listed in the bulletin were that the congregation will be collecting canned corn for the Food Pantry in the month of September. Bible Study is Tuesday at 1:00 p.m. Coming Events: September 18th – Church Barbeque. The AA meetings are held on Friday nights at the church.

For information, check out our website at northlivermorebaptistchurch.org. You can email the church at nlbcmaine@gmail.com. Pastor Bonnie’s office hours are Monday and Tuesday from 9:00 a.m. to noon.

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