Our Deepest Need

By Pastor Rey Diaz

I’m sure your daily prayers go something like mine – “Dear God, thank you for everything.  Please help me.  Please protect my family.  Please help us financially.  Please continue to bless us… in Jesus’ name amen.”  We might even throw in a prayer request for a sick person or a person in need. 

You see we all have these urgent needs that come up everyday.  Every single one of you could send me a current list of pressing needs to pray for.  There is nothing wrong with that.  However, there is something vital missing: forgiveness.

Our deepest need is for forgiveness and that might make you uncomfortable.  There is a story found in Mark 2 where a group of four friends take a paralytic see Jesus.  The felt need is obvious to everyone.  The guy is laying on a mat.  Unable to walk.  Unable to move himself.  Everyday he prays for healing.  His urgent, most important, and most pressing need is clear – healing.  So what happens when he meets Jesus? Jesus said to the paralyzed man, “My child, your sins are forgiven.” 

You can just hear the guy and crowd saying, “Well, thank you but I was hoping for something else.”  But Jesus is revealing an uncomfortable truth to all of us – our deepest need is forgiveness.  Forgiveness gives me eternal security in God.  Forgiveness gives me access to my heavenly Father.  These other needs are temporary.  But forgiveness is eternal.

We all need forgiveness.  Jesus died on the cross to offer us forgiveness.  After the first message ever preached in the church, Peter tells us, “Each of you must repent of your sins and turn to God, and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. Then you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.”

So where are you at?  Have you repented inwardly?  Have you been baptized yet?  Have you received the gift of the Holy Spirit?