When God Convicts: Learning to Trust the Correction of God

Conviction is tough. Sometimes it is hard to accept when God is convicting you of sin, no matter how big or small that sin may be.
As Christians, we always want to please God, and when He tells us Himself that there is something we need to change or remove from our lives completely, it can feel like we have failed.

God has been convicting me this week. He has been not-so-gently pushing me to get my eyes back on the goals that both He and I have set for myself. And He has been urging me to get back to cultivating our relationship at all times.
Used to, any time God convicted me of absolutely anything I would feel like it was the end of the world and think, "Why should I even try to be a Christian when I'm never going to measure up to the standard that has been set? I'm always going to fail and fall." 
But that was before I understood both the difference between conviction and condemnation.

Priscilla Shirer covered this topic in her book, "Discerning the Voice of God: How to Recognize when God speaks" and it has changed my life since I read it a few years ago.
She said that people and satan condemn and only God can convict. And the way to tell the difference is that condemnation says, "Here is what you're doing wrong and there is no way out." But conviction says, "Here is what you're doing wrong and I am showing you the way out because I Am the way out."
Where people and the enemy point out our sins to hurt, isolate, and destroy us, the Father points out our sins to save us from destruction and bring us back into His presence.

I hope this can be a life changer for you as much as it has been for me.
This week, as I have felt the conviction of God, I have clung to this truth.

God doesn't convict in order to point out our flaws and tear us down, God convicts to show us that we are flawed people in need of our graceful God and He is always the way out of sin and into freedom. We will never deserve or earn His rescue and He will never stop giving it to us freely.

I used to always think that conviction was some kind of punishment from God. Like He was just waiting for me to mess up, which was and is frequent so that He could storm down from Heaven and tell me what a disappointment I am. But that could not be further from the Truth.
The writer of Hebrews says it best in verses 5 and 6 of chapter 12: "My son, do not take the Lord’s discipline lightly or faint when you are reproved by Him, for the Lord disciplines the one He loves and punishes every son He receives."

Conviction is not a result of God's disappointment in you, conviction is a result of God's indescribable Love for you.

If God is correcting you, it is because He views you as His beloved child. He wants and knows what is best for you and He wants to help you find the best of life. He isn't convicting you to embarrass or discourage you, He is convicting you to guide you forward and bring you closer to Him.
God not only wants to see you survive, He wants to see you thrive, and He knows that His path is the best option that there is.
Don't be discouraged if God is convicting you, swallow your pride and allow the Love of God to change you from the inside out.