The Point of the Cross

At different times, I've had people come to me and talk about how depressed and hopeless they feel in their faith. Their inability to "get it right" sometimes saddens them. They feel unclean, unworthy, like they're letting God down. And the phrase I hear a lot is, "I don't even feel like a Christian anymore."
I'm not being judgmental. I've been there, I've felt that, and said all those same things. Most of my life was spent in misery because I was reaching for perfection, and failing daily.
But as I've been thinking about it more recently, those thoughts and feelings shouldn't come into the mind of the Christian.
A friend of mine was feeling this way, and I just had to tell her, "Look, we aren't under the Law anymore." Wow! I need to practice what I preach on that one. But how much truth there is in that statement.
We are not under the Law anymore. The Law was in effect so that people could strive to sanctify and purify themselves before God. And what does Scripture say? No one could keep it. And God knew that. That's why He sent Jesus. We can't keep the Law, but God wanted us with Him, so He sent His Son to bring us home.
Don't make Christianity just a different or updated set of rules and regulations from the Old Testament. We will never be able to save ourselves. Never. "With man it is impossible." Absolutely impossible. Will not ever happen.
If the New Testament is just The Law 2.0, and we still have to sanctify ourselves, let me ask you this then: what was the point of the cross? Did Jesus die in vain? No one would dare say that. We know that our salvation was fulfilled at Calvary. So live it. Believe it. Put your faith in it. We're under grace, not law. Mercy, not self-sufficiency.
Once we grasp how sweet it is that our forgiveness is taken care of despite our deeds (though we still must accept the gift of grace), then we can start living for God as a response, a thanksgiving. Amen!