Listening To The Flesh

 Sin has been your downfall! (Hosea 14:1).  Sin wants to destroy you, but you must not let it! (Gen. 4:7). We all dread committing the sin unto death (1 John 5:16) or letting some sin domineer or dominate and rule over us (Rom. 6:14; Psalm 14:13).  We all have some sin to keep us humble as a thorn in the flesh (2 Cor. 12:9) and easily besets us (Heb. 12:1-2).  Some of us even fear some unforgiveable sin (Matt. 12:32) or doing some egregious or heinous sin that we cannot forgive ourselves for. All sin is avoidable if we are filled with the Spirit and is a violation of our own conscience as well as God's perfect Law and plumb line of the Word of God and even falls short of the conduct of Jesus, our Exemplar. If we refuse to repent, "Beware you sin will find you out!" Numbers 32:23. 

I know sin is a killjoy word and is avoided in the pulpit; it's a thankless job to call people to repentance especially when you do not know of what. Nevertheless, we must call a spade a spade and not invent pretty names for it. For instance, if you take the label of the essence of peppermint and apply it to cyanide, you do not avoid a possible poisoning.  People do this by calling sin a mistake, error, flaw, weakness, shortcoming, or peccadillo.  Sin must be seen as our birthright and the virus inherited from Adam as we are born in solidarity with him and we sin because we are born sinners as Adam's legacy.  Sin is our Declaration of Independence from God!   So, the question on the pulpit:  Whatever became of sin?  

Many will admit no one is perfect or to err is human but deny they are sinners!  Sin is defined  many ways: whatever Jesus would not do; anything irresponsible, autonomous, rebellious, unbelieving, unloving, or disobedient to God, either in commission or omission.  The Book of Common Prayer says sin is any want of conformity to or transgression of the Law of God.  Any thought, word, act, feeling, desire, or reaction contrary to what God would or would not do.  In hamartiology, we say that sin is by definition, "missing the mark." It has been called "the refusal of the love of God."   

We fall short of God's glorious ideals and standards of conduct.  Confession means saying the same thing as and agreeing with God about what we did with no attempt at coverup or blaming others, but taking full responsibility for our sins. We then renounce and denounce our sins and ask for forgiveness because of the blood of Christ and Jesus making intercession for us. 

It is the Law that convicts and shows us we cannot keep it and brings us to repentance: "Indeed it is the straightedge of the Law that shows us what sinners we are." Romans 3:20  By the Law is the knowledge of sin; the Law was not given to save us but to measure us!  We must realize that "out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks."  And as a man thinks in his heart, so is he. Prov. 23:7.  

Jesus changed the concept of sin by internalizing it; i.e., making sins of the heart (as Jesus condemned in Mark 7; Matt 15) just as serious and sometimes more so than just doing the action. Ovid said, "I know the better things and I approve them, but I follow the worst." Pierre in War and Peace by Tolstoy said, "Why is it that I know what is right and do what is wrong?" Even Paul in Romans 7 admitted he struggled still with sin. 

There are degrees of sin and of punishment for them. There are no mortal sins that remove us from our state of grace in salvation, and there are no venial sins in the sense that they are not serious or harmless. All sins can condemn a person; if you break one part of the Law, you are guilty of breaking all of it. Actually, we should not limit grace because where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more. (Romans 5:20).  We are all sinners and should not compare ourselves; God doesn't grade on a curve!  

Sin is universal and no one can claim to be sin-free or have reached some point of maturity without any sin (Prov. 20:9; 1 John 1:8,10).  But we all have feet of clay with flaws not readily apparent and we should pray for a lively sense of sin because that leads to less sin!  The more mature we are, the more  we see our sin and we must see how bad we are to be saved! and we don't know how bad we are till we try to be good! What a catch-22!  Soli Deo Gloria! 

Prone To Wander

"Return, Israel, to the LORD your God, Your sins have been your downfall! ... 'I will heal their waywardness [backsliding] and love them freely, for my anger has turned away from them" (Hosea 14:1,4, NIV). 
"Backsliders get what they deserve..." (Prov. 14:14, NLT).  
"Truly you are a God who has been hiding himself..." (Isa. 45:15, NIV).  
"But no one says, 'Where is God my Maker, who gives songs in the night...[?]'" (Job 35:10, NIV).
"... God left him to test him and discover what was in his heart" (2 Chron. 32:31, ESV).  

Robert Robinson wrote the famous hymn  "Come Thou Fount" to show his struggle with the faith and how God got him through the hard times. Everyone is subject to backsliding, depression, and wandering from the faith because this is the natural inclination of our sin nature.  Robinson was indeed a man of struggles and hardship and suffered melancholy, known today as depression.  In fact, in his later years, he would've given anything to feel like he did at twenty-two writing that hymn.  It would seem it was a self-fulfilling prophecy.  The feelings come and go like a yo-yo and a weather-vane in a storm, but our faith must endure.  We must learn Reality 101 that we also must not depend upon feelings as a measure of our faith, but obedience.  Sooner or later, we must face the reality of the test of our faith.

We may wonder about the whereabouts of God as Job did ("If only I knew where to find him..." in Job 23:3, NIV) and if He is meeting His end of the deal and if we do really have faith after all.  The fact is, is that the same trials make some bitter, and some better.  We ought to rejoice in our sufferings (cf. Rom. 5:3) and that we are considered worthy to suffer for His name's sake.  There may be times when there seems no hope like Job experienced, or one may be at the end of one's rope and their hope has perished like Jeremiah's.  But we must learn to acknowledge Jesus as the Lord of the storm and if He got us to it, He'll get us through it!  We don't have to wonder where God is, but where our faith is!  God can calm all the storms of life and every stormy relationship or stressful event.  We hang in there like Job in Job 14:14, NIV:  "...All the days of my hard service I will wait for my renewal to come."

We must feel the pain to be able to relate and to and comfort others in their afflictions (cf. 2 Cor. 1:10)!  That's one reason Jesus felt our pains and was a "man of sorrows and acquainted with grief"--to identify with us.  Even believers may wonder periodically if God is really there, and if He is aware of our situation.  But no problem is too trivial or too big for our God to be able to take care of.  But note that God didn't explain Himself to Job and doesn't need to explain Himself to us--He's too profound!  We all have a cross to bear, a crucible that comes with the territory--no cross means no crown!  It is adversity that builds character and if we had no problems our faith could never be tested--and it's more precious than silver and gold.  So, when your storm comes, learn to seek God and His presence and the comfort of the indwelling Holy Spirit.

Jesus isn't asking anything of us He didn't go through Himself (He didn't exempt Himself from predicaments, adversities, and exigencies) but He was honest enough to warn us to count the cost.  No one gets through life trouble free or without any stress or trials; we need it to grow by them though.  We must not question where God is, but ask ourselves:  Where isn't God?  And we must celebrate the fact that the battle is the Lord's, and we are fighting from victory, not for victory.  This is where we find out if we have the right stuff to be disciples and what we are made of.  We cannot skate through life problem-free!  Let's echo Alfred, Lord Tennyson's words:  "I hope to see my Pilot face to face when I have crossed the bar."   In the meantime, we are to go over to the other side with Jesus at the helm and simply live a life following Him in obedience to prove our faith and love. 

Note that God is not playing cosmic hide-and-seek and He is not MIA or missing-in-action!  Next time, don't wonder about God, but where you are!  The late Francis Schaeffer said, "He is there and He is not silent."    St. Augustine of Hippo said, "You made us for yourself, and our hearts find no peace until they rest in you."  Pascal, in the same vein, talked of a "God-shaped blank" or vacuum only God can fill!   Soli Deo Gloria!

Staying Alive

There is no such thing as a worldly Christian, or some term it carnal Christian, as a class of believer. Christians can become carnal or worldly, but it doesn't last due, to divine pruning by God.  If we are without discipline we are not sons.  Christians who get soiled by this life are brought to repentance and do not enjoy being in a backslidden state.  Newsflash:  But God heals us of our backsliding (cf. Hos. 14:4).

Even Christians can have "spiritual dryness" which is temporary.  Any believer can experience Bible fatigue or writer's block.  We all can feel dispirited, uninspired, or unmotivated, but it doesn't last and we bounce out of it or rebound into the full privilege of fellowship.  We all must have trials or crises to determine what we are made of, and to give us the opportunity to become overcomers.  The Christian life is not about keeping up appearances, nor about being ideal, but being real--we all have vulnerabilities and we all fall short--no perfect people need apply to the church.  Our faith is more valuable than silver or gold and must be tested, because in the judgment, faith, not feelings, please God.

Christians are to walk worthy of the Lord and to practice holiness--for we are to share in the divine nature and to produce fruit--no fruit equals no faith!  We all worthy in Christ and there is no such thing as one Christian being holier than another--we are all in Christ and His holiness is imputed to us.  So much of our walk depends upon what we expose ourselves to because of the computer principle, GIGO (garbage in equals garbage out) applies!

When we walk in Christ and are in fellowship, we are alive, and it is possible to keep this relationship growing because that which is alive grows.  "When we walk in the light, even as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another..." (cf. 1 John 1:4).  That's why we have a living faith in a living God.  When encountering evil we face up to it and overcome it with good.  We need to keep our testimony from being jeopardized by our walk, and therefore must pursue holiness, as a way of life in our sanctification.

This means we walk in the light of eternity and not store up treasures on earth but look to our heavenly reward. We don't want our reward in this life (cf. Psalm 17:14).  We have nothing to fear in man and if we fear God we have nothing to fear.  Remember Noah:  "... Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generation [ways], Noah walked with God" (Gen. 6:9, ESV).  Soli Deo Gloria!

Is It Worldly And Carnal?

I have been told not to admire "mere mortals" like The Beatles. Doesn't the Bible say that we are all mere mortals and not divine? I believe in rendering credit where credit is due, respect to whom it is due, honor to whom it is due, fear to whom it is due (Fear God, honor the emperor), accolades to whom due, et cetera. All music is a gift of God and James 1:17 says that "every good gift" is "from above."

This kind of logic (to avoid secular music) is erroneous. Why? Isn't most classical music composed by unbelievers also? Yet these same Christians are not on the bandwagon to abolish classical music. Whitney Houston was a Christian (just listen to her sing "Jesus Loves Me") and she sang R & B. Now, take The Beatles, for instance: Most of their music is innocent love songs and fun to sing along with--what is wrong with that?  Elvis won his only two Emmys with gospel music!

We must show some discernment but to judge a whole genre of music is out of line and too critical. Music is not evil per se, but sometimes lyrics can be a bad influence. Believers are at different stages of growth and we cannot be intolerant of one another's taste in music--there is no one-size-fits-all genre.   Soli Deo Gloria!