We are all wretched.

We are all unclean in the eyes of God. All OUR righteousnesses are as filthy rags.  Yet we try to imagine we are clean, and we are righteous. What a dangerous thing we do when we strive for righteousness in our self. When we tally up our day and see our failures, when we go further and look back upon our lives and try our best to number our good deeds hoping they will outweigh the bad, we are counting upon our own righteousness.  No, we are not to be evil and lay claim to Christ's righteousness. We must count any good thing that springs from us as being of Christ and glorify HIS name, not our own.

We are truly wretched. Paul, an apostle of Christ's called himself wretched and if one who is called by Christ Himself and is given all power through the Holy Spirit to perform miracles, to proclaim the gospel far and wide and lead many to salvation through Christ, if he is wretched how much more wretched are we?

We go about our day to day lives scarcely recognized as Christ followers because we blend in so well with those who aren't. We proclaim Christ in our own ways, yet we need to proclaim Him in His way. We fear to offend, we fear to appear a fool, we utilize our Christianity in such a way that it becomes tailormade to suit us, rather than wear God's armor as He intended.

Can Christ truly walk everywhere you walk each day? Can Christ truly be beside you in every conversation?

Paul was a wretched man. We are wretched as well. And as we strive- as Paul did- to do God's will we do so by laying claim to CHRIST'S righteousness first and foremost. We ask God to look to Christ for righteousness because we have none of our own. We will continue to fight and fail, and never, by the grace of God will we give up our fighting, always seeking Christ as being our ONLY Victory!

We can never afford to forget where our Hope lies, never!

Let us not hope in ourselves, let us discard all hope we have in ourselves and put all our hope in Christ.

Please, Lord, we know we are wretched, that we are filthy, that we are prone to evil in all its many forms- blatant and not so blatant. Please, Lord, we would have you be our Hope, our Righteousness, our Goodness, keep us from any evil and all evil that would keep us from You! Save us from ourselves, our wretched, wretched selves.

All through Jesus Christ our Savior, our Lord, our King, our Advocate with the Father now and forever!

Isa 64:6  But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rag

Rom 7:18  For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not. 

Rom 7:24  O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? 

Eph 2:1  And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins; 

Eph 2:2  Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience

Tit 3:3  For we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating one another. 

Php 3:9  And be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith