Born into sin

I was recently reading over one of my old posts and saw where I questioned the definition of nothing.

What…truly…is nothing?

Does it even exist?

In that post I mentioned that if you hold nothing in your hands…you hold air and light in them. I discussed the thought with my sister and daughter. My sister took the idea a bit further…is there nothing in our hands, or are we in nothing?

But…my mind still struggles with the very concept of nothing. For sure nothing doesn’t truly exist. Everywhere…there is air. In an empty bowl, there is air. In an empty envelope, there is air. My daughter added in that there are also dust particles even if we can’t see them. And so…truly…nothing does not exist.

The word nothing exists. We use it to differentiate between a cup or bowl that holds something and one that holds…nothing. Or is empty. Except…it truly isn’t empty because it still holds all the things we cannot see.

The day after I had that conversation with my sister and daughter I was looking through a book at a large book store and saw where a reformed preacher of old had an entire sermon on the topic of nothing.

Our minds truly cannot grasp the concept. We stagger under the stress of trying to define nothing. We struggle to explain what nothing really is and if it exists or not.

When someone asks you what you’re doing and you answer nothing…your heart is beating, your digestive track is working, you are standing/sitting/ lying, you are breathing, your mind is thinking. You are doing something even as you think you are doing nothing.

And so…does nothing exist?

People today are fascinated by origins. There are great debates about just how life came to be. Evolutionists come up with great theories to support their ideas that life came from…nothing. Christians understand that all of life came from the Lord, that it didn’t just happen, that it was created. And yet we must still go back to how the Lord created everything from nothing.

I recently had a conversation with two grade school children on that very topic. One of them said to me,‘it’s hard to understand that God was just always there when nothing else was.’

How simply this child captured what our human minds struggle with.

It’s hard to understand that the Lord was there…when there was nothing. We can’t understand the true concept of nothing because we have never seen nothing. Not once. There has always been something even when we think there is nothing.

Genesis chapter 1 tells us that God made everything. Prior to Him making everything…the beginnings…the origins…what was there? Nothing. The answer is…there was God and there was nothing. And then the Lord created a perfect universe…a perfect world…perfect heavens and earth.

Until He created them…there was true nothing.

But once created there was perfection. God called it good. He called it very good.

We no longer live in that perfect world. We no longer live in a very good world. Genesis chapter 3 tells us how sin entered the world. We are told not only of how one man and one woman sinned…we are told of how the birth of sin in every man was born…how it began.

Genesis chapter 3 gives us a very important part of the history of the world. It gives us a turning point in the world and in all of mankind. We are given the story…the history…for the reason why our world is the way it is and why men are the way they are.

It was the beginning of the world as we know it.

It was the end of the world as Adam and Eve knew it.

It was the day…the moment…when sin entered the world.

That thought is nearly as hard to grasp as the idea of complete nothingness. Can you imagine a sinless world?

Without sin there is no evil. Without sin there is no danger from men. Without sin there are no lies. Without sin there is no disobedience…no covetousness…no idolatry…no…anything but perfection.

In that day…in that moment…with one bite of fruit…Adam sinned and tainted forever the world that the Lord had called good. He stained the world. He ruined what it had been and made it something completely different. He changed it for all time.

It was a change decreed by the Lord but it was a change nonetheless. What God had called good…Adam changed. No longer was there perfection. There was now this…thing…this evilness…that would permeate all of the world throughout all time.

What’s worse…it wouldn’t live only in the world…it would live forever in the hearts of every person ever born…except for Christ.

Sin was unleashed on the world by a single action by one man.

And it created…forever more…a sickness that would live in the hearts and minds of mankind. From birth. Those perfectly innocent newborn babies…contain within them the evilness of sin.

Sin is a disease of the flesh that feeds and preys on us from the moment of conception.

That is another one of those nearly impossible to grasp thoughts. How can we even consider that a baby that has yet to see the earth can hold within their hearts the evilness of sin? How can we consider that a minutes old baby is sinful? Yet…Scripture says they are.

Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men…Romans 5:12

Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men… For as by the one’s man’s disobedience the many were made sinners…Romans 5:18-19

The many were made sinners by one man’s disobedience. Because Adam sinned he brought sin into the entire world…into all people for all time.

Because Adam sinned…all men are diseased in the heart from the moment of conception. Because Adam sinned all newborn babies take their first breaths as sinners.

As a mother…as someone that see’s newborns as being oh-so-innocent…I have a very hard time imagining that the tiny baby I hold in my arms, snuggle against my chest, could be sinful in any way. My human mind sees those babies as innocent but Scripture says they hold sin within them.

Because sin isn’t something we do…it’s something we inherit by being born. We have no choice in the matter, we simply get born into sin. Unborn babies grow inside their mothers until the moment that they are born into this world. The baby doesn’t chose to go from their watery world into our world, it is forced into the world through circumstances not of its choosing and is born into a big, wide, world where it will spend the rest of its life.

In a similar fashion that brand new baby is forced into a world of sin, sin that lives within them, even when they are too young to choose to sin. And they live and grow in sin because sin is the human nature.

We tend to think of so many things as being ‘only human’. So many, many things are ‘only human’ but so much of those ‘only human’ things are what we call human nature. And the nature of humans is sin.

We cannot help the longings in our hearts for things that take us far from Christ. As children we, in our human nature, want more toys, we want those popular shoes, or the in style clothes. Teenagers grow into sin almost as if it were some sort of epidemic disease. It is rampant and it breeds rapidly.

It takes the child its parents have known and loved for years and almost overnight turns that teenaged child into someone different. That teenaged child longs for the things of the world. They get caught up in idolatry, sexual immorality; stealing, coveting… the list goes on and on.

There is no way to treat the ‘disease’ that grows in children and spreads rapidly in the teen years. There is no cure for it. Because it is human nature and it is a sinful nature. It is the sin that they were born into growing into fruition and taking hold of their lives just as they begin to become truly responsible for themselves.

It is the sin that they were born into that is their…and our…human nature and it gains ground rapidly. Whatever they may become, whatever they are, sin rules them.

It ruled them in childhood too but it was…in most cases…restrained by their parents. To some extent anyway. But as they leave childhood behind and enter a time in their lives when their own thoughts and opinions and wants take over for the job that their parents once did…there is no stopping the roller coaster of sin that will bombard them. And that they will follow.

Because it is human nature.

Because human nature is a sin nature.

We are born into it. We grow up in it. We become adults in it. Even the regenerate live in it. There is no escaping it. No getting away from it.

Because of Adam we inherited sin much the way we inherit our parent’s eye color or blood type. It is passed to us through birth and fills us throughout life whether we want it or not.

Because we were born into sin.

Gone is the perfect world the Lord created and in its place is a sin filled world with sin filled people. The human mind generally has a hard time seeing themselves as bad, evil even, but the truth is…according to Scripture…we are all evil. We are all so filled with sin that we in no way deserve the Lord’s mercy or grace.

We live in sin because we are born into sin. You need never do anything considered evil by the human mind because the very fact that you cannot ever love God above all else makes you evil beyond comprehension. I fail every single day to love the Lord above everything…and everyone…else. And that makes me the worst kind of evil in the Lord’s eyes.

I don’t want to put anything before the Lord but it happens. It’s human nature. And that human nature is sin in the extreme. It is a sin nature that lives in me because I was born with it. I fail every single day to live up to the teachings of my holy God and therefore I sin every single day.

It is like a fault that is in me that I can never repair.

Because I was born into sin.

 

Happy to be a servant

Paul said he was a servant of Christ…a slave of Christ. He not only claimed to be a servant of Christ, He said he was a servant by the will of God.

In just those few words He showed that he belonged to Someone higher than he was. He clearly said he belonged to another and that it wasn’t by his will but by the will of God.

Our society balks at the very thought of belonging to anyone but ourselves. I heard a preacher say that women today want nothing to do with marriage because feminists say it is prostitution. Can you imagine…being a wife is equated with being a prostitute? That’s how far we’ve come. It’s how depraved our society and the sin filled minds of people have come. We now take a holy state…a God ordained state…a state that was, in fact, the very first human relationship created…and equate it with the sin of sexual immorality.

If women in our society can’t even stand the thought of belonging to their husbands…how can they stand the thought of belonging to God?

I have a relative that has said many times that she isn’t impressed with marriage, that she has no desire to get married, that after seeing marriage up close she doesn’t want to become her husband’s slave. This was said in a conversation about my marriage. Has in fact come up in several conversations about my marriage. I have never felt in any way as if I’m a slave to my husband. He in no way treats me as if I’m inferior to him or as if I’m here to do his bidding. I do things for and with him out of my love for him and my enjoyment of doing those things for him, not because he requires me to do anything.

Being his wife is actually…an honor. So much so that I can’t even put into words what a special honor it is to be my husband’s wife.

Where this relative got the idea that I’m a slave to my husband I have no idea but it’s an idea that she is holding strongly to.

For her, marriage seems to somehow represent a loss of freedom and of self and the gaining of nothing. I can think of so many things that we become slaves to that most people don’t think of as our being a slave. Sin tops the list. Then the government and the taxes we must pay…even on our food. Anyone that works becomes a slave to their employer. They must show up at a certain time, do what they’re told, stay until they’re released to go home. Some aren’t even allowed to take sick days. Others are required to go to the doctor if they miss a single day of work. They may bring home a paycheck but that sure sounds like an institution of slavery to me.

So many people in our society see that as normal but balk at the idea of belonging completely to the Lord. Paul had no such problems. His very identity was that of a servant of Christ. It was how he introduced himself, how he defined himself. He started his letters with…I am a servant of Christ.

How much more profound could he have been?

What else could he have said that would have told who he was and Who he belonged to?

I belong to Christ because…I am His. It’s that simple and that complex. He created me and therefore what is created can’t help but belong to the one that did the creating. But I’m His…because my very soul longs for Him. It is within the depths of me that I feel Christ.

I once told someone that I can feel the Lord ‘in here’ with my hand lying on my chest. That person said simply…I can’t. I knew that even as I told them I could. Deep within me lives the Lord and because He lives there, He is everything that I am. Or I am everything that He makes me to be.

I am happy to be a servant to Christ. I am happy to belong to Him.

What would we see?

Can you imagine what would happen if you could somehow take someone from say…the late 1700’s and transport them into today? My sister and I used to imagine just such a thing. We would imagine bringing someone forward from their time to ours. We would then imagine what their reaction would be to certain things.

How would someone that has never experienced electricity react to being able to flip a switch and create light?

What would they think with their first glimpse of a vehicle?

How would they react to indoor plumbing?

What about a microwave? Coffee pot? Cell phone? How about T.V.? A radio? Modern day clothes? A washing machine?

There are so many things that we can imagine would baffle someone coming from the past to our modern times. And we can easily imagine what those things would be.

But I have to wonder what would baffle them more, the very modern inventions…things they couldn’t begin to imagine in their time…or the moral and religious state of people today. As much as we may think they would marvel over our ‘modern conveniences’, it could very well be something very different that would confound them.

So much of what we see as ordinary…even if we don’t like it…would be dumbfounding to people from a different time. How many babies are born to single mothers every day? They say the number is somewhere around one out of every two. To a person that lived in a time when pretty close to 100% of all children were born to married parents…how astounding would they be with the way our country sees unwed parenthood?

Several years ago I had someone tell me that the majority of the people in jail in Saudi Arabia are unwed mothers and that the reason they’re in jail is because they are unwed mothers. What must people from countries with laws like those think of the numbers of unwed mothers in our country? And how much worse would someone to whom unwed parenthood was nearly unheard of think?

How would they respond not to the movies that are so easily attainable in our country but to the content of those movies? What would they think of the sin and moral depravity depicted in those movies? How would they respond at the ease in which the Lord’s name is taken in vain time and time again in those movies? How would they respond to the same thing happening in the people they pass in town?

What would they think of a country that kills its own unborn babies? How would they respond to meeting a woman that had had an abortion?

What would they think upon sitting in one of our country’s Sunday services in any of our ‘church’ buildings? Being taken straight from their time to ours…what would they see in those services? Would they hear Truth in the sermon being delivered or would they be able to easily pick out all the twisting and changing the preacher does? Would they feel ‘moved’ and ‘led to worship’ by the music or would they stand in shock at the concert being put on before them?

If we could see our world through the eyes of someone coming into it from a more moral time, a time when Truth may have been a little more prevalent…what would we see?

They won't disappear

Not all that long ago I had someone ask me what happened to the reformed belief before Calvin turned it into what is known as Calvinists. This person told me it didn’t exist before Calvin shared his ideas and gained followers.

Recently I received a book in the mail that talks about the true church. I vaguely remember ordering it some time back but had long since forgotten what the author’s beliefs were by the time the book arrived. I took the time to look the author up and discovered that I don’t share his beliefs but by the time I did so I had already read a very small bit of the first couple of pages in the book.

Regardless of the fact that I don’t agree with the author’s beliefs I did find something in the book that I very much agree with. In the first paragraph of the introduction the author talks about how the true church, as he calls it, will never be extinguished. He speaks of how it is foretold to always exist.

I don’t share the author’s beliefs but I do know that he is right in that. Christ’s church is the true Church, it is the church spoken of in Scripture and it will always exist. In fact that Church is the very reason for all of existence.

The purpose for mankind and all of creation…from before the Lord created the earth until long past Christ’s return…the purpose is the salvation of God’s chosen people.

This author, in the first pages of that book, went on to speak of how Christ’s church hasn’t always been visible, how sometimes it has been but a very few people. Scripture tells us that there are few.

As I read those few paragraphs in that book…written by someone whose beliefs I don’t hold…I couldn’t help but think of the person that asked me where the reformed people were in history.

Historically speaking there have been many times when the world wasn’t a safe place for God’s people. Going all the way back to the Old Testament we can see in men like Daniel that believing in God hasn’t always been safe. How many people throughout time have tried to keep themselves from being detected because their faith would cost them their freedom…or their life.

I recently wrote a post titled persecution. In it I spoke of some of the people that have experienced persecution for their faith. The time in which the person questioned me about people that hold the reformed belief was a time of great persecution for the ‘true’ Church. It was a time when people were killed for believing in the true Christ. It was a time when people were told by rulers who they could and could not worship.

In times of great persecution the ‘true’ church would have had to hide from their persecutors. There are places, even today, where those that have faith in Christ must keep their faith mostly to themselves. They may share it quietly but in those places they can’t share it in a way that would make the news, or be recorded in the history books. They are there but not seen. They believe and worship but must disappear in the eyes of their country. They must be like the Jews when Hitler reigned…hiding their very existence. Some may go about their daily lives appearing to be what they are not.

The ‘true’ church as that author put it has never disappeared. It will never disappear. The Lord has His people here for a purpose and He has a plan that He works out through and for them.

But they may not always be within sight of the world.

As I think of that, I think of America and how there are many professing ‘Christians’ but few Christians that uphold the Truth of the Bible.

Right here, right now, in America it’s hard to find the Church that is spoken of in Scripture. A child of Christ knows that that church is the body of believers…the elect. They also know that the church consists of even one such believer. But try and find those believers in any city.

It’s not that easy.

And today we have all of the internet at our fingertips. We can search for groups or ‘churches’ of people that hold the reformed belief. We can look for others that share our faith. But finding them, even with all our technology, is much like finding the needle in a haystack.

How much harder might it be to find them in a given time period in history?

As fascinating as the history of God’s people is…I don’t need to know where they were at every time in history to know they were there. Scripture shows me that the Lord’s people will always be there, that they won’t disappear.

They may not always be visible but that doesn’t mean that they aren’t there.

Why should we be treated as equal?

I stumbled across something today that made me pause. It could be old news or it could have been fresh news this morning…I do not know. And to me…for me…it makes no difference if it’s new news or old news. It’s the very fact that the thought exists that gained my attention.

You see, the news I saw this morning, which was really a link at the end of an article I was reading, was about a female draft in America. When I clicked on the link I was taken to a page that had a video but no article. I had no interest in watching the video so I skipped down to the nearly 600 comments. And what I found there was more than enlightening.

Among all those comments, once I skimmed through the many, many, insults aimed at other commenters, were two trains of thought…those that supported the draft and those that didn’t. The amazing thing was that very few people supported it. Among those that didn’t support it there seemed to be several thought processes, those that didn’t want a draft at all-whether for males or females, those that didn’t believe women should be in the military because they didn’t believe the women could physically do the jobs a man could, and those that didn’t want women in the military because they believed women should be protected from the dangers and horrors of war.

But the amazing thing was that among those that supported a female draft most of them supported it because of the women…feminists…that have demanded equality. And among those supporting the female draft there was almost a 100% distinction between the women that they thought should be drafted and the ones they didn’t think should be.

The commenters, from what I could gather, were mostly men, regardless of which side of the draft discussion they fell on. And those that were for the draft were almost all for it as it pertained to the feminist women. They suggested not only drafting the feminists but in many cases putting them on the front lines of war. But the same people suggesting that were also, in many cases, saying that the non-feminist women should not be drafted at all.

I have several female relatives that would probably fall somewhere in the feminist spectrum, although as far as I know none of them claim to be a feminist. And as far as I know none of them would support or want a female draft. But then I’m not sure I know very many men that support or want a male draft.

But what I found truly amazing as I read through that long list…a list I didn’t reach the bottom of…of comments was the near total distinction between the women being discussed. Regardless of which side of the debate a commenter stood on, it was almost as if they were discussing two different…breeds. Dogs verses cats or men verses women. Feminist women verses non-feminist women.

They did not, in most cases, lump all women into the same category, although there were a few that did. I can well remember many times in my life when I have thought back to the many things the feminist women have done and wondered why those handful of women had to go and ruin things for the rest of us. Just because some women wanted to be treated as men why do we all have to suffer for it?

The draft spoken of in the comments I read, is only one example of many cases were the feminists and those seeking equality have managed to ruin things for everyone.

Men and women were not created equal. We were never designed to be equal. We were not intended to be equal.

Why should we be treated as equal?

And why would we want to be?

Preparing for the future

Turn on your TV or any device with internet and you’re pretty much guaranteed to see some sort of horror. I’m not talking about movies or books. I’m not talking about words you’d rather not see or pictures that offend you with just a glance. I’m talking about some kind of disaster. Train wrecks, riots, racism, beheadings…you name it, it hits the news.

Recently I was reading an online news article about something that, to me, has the possibility of affected our entire nation in a bad way. It has the potential to draw people to something that stands against Christianity by any definition. And so I read the article. But it wasn’t that article that wound up having such an effect on me. It was the link at the bottom of the article, one that warned of something to come. Out of curiosity, and thinking it was weather related, I clicked on it. I wound up watching a video that was actually very good and, from what little I know of the topic being discussed, factual.

I actually found myself interested in what I was watching and even considered sharing it with my husband, who wasn’t there when I was watching it, but what started out being pretty good and informative wound up being a rather long sales pitch trying to get me to buy a set of books. I exited the video before it ended. But I was left with the thoughts that watching it created.

You see this video spoke about terrorist attacks on America, it spoke of things that sounded completely plausible to me. And I knew just enough on the subject to know that most of what they were saying did indeed seem to be true.

But now, after having watched all of it I intend to, I’m thinking on things they said. You see the person that made the video is what they call a ‘prepper’ or a ‘survivalist’. Scripture tells us not to worry about tomorrow. It tells us that the Lord will take care of us. But I must admit to seeing some merit in being at least a little prepared for certain circumstances. I’m not talking about survival type end of the world scenarios. Nor am I advocating storing up five, or even one, year of food and supplies…have you ever thought of how much space you’d need to do that?

I’m talking about basic preparations. Most people put gas in their cars long before the gauge reaches the E. In doing so they are preparing for their future in the sense that they will have the gas needed to drive the next time they get behind the wheel. People on medications prepare by making sure to get their medication before they run out of their current supply. Most of us prepare for daily life by buying a week or more’s worth of groceries at a time.

I remember once, years ago, when I lived within two blocks of two major grocery stores. I had a refrigerator that was trying to go out on me and would keep food cold but not quite cold enough and the freezer wouldn’t freeze. I had no back up refrigerator, no deep freeze. So I shopped for groceries daily. I kept shelf stable foods like cereal and bread on hand but bought only what I would need for that day if it needed any kind of refrigeration.

That system worked well for us for months. There were days I didn’t want to go to the store and on those days we did have just enough in the refrigerator to make it until the next day. We also had enough shelf stable foods to make it a few days if need be. And so we did fine basically eating only what I bought that day.

But then trouble came. One day an unexpected ice storm hit. A storm that was supposed to bring rain brought ice and left us iced in for over a week. A tree broke in half and blocked my driveway, power lines snapped. And we were stuck at home without enough groceries to see us through. Somehow we stretched what little was in the refrigerator and the contents of the pantry out until I could get out to go to the store. We didn’t go hungry but we didn’t eat all that well either. And I had plenty of time to worry as I watched our already meager supply of food dwindle.

From that I learned to never let my food supply get that low again. What worked fine when everything was normal didn’t work so well when something out of the ordinary happened.

I have seen time and again since that storm that when the weather forecast predicts snow or ice people run to the store to buy groceries, batteries, flashlights… Some of them go to buy extra supplies just in case, some go because they don’t have enough to make it for a week or more if they can’t get to the store.

And as a result they prepare for what is to come. Not because they fear the disaster that could happen but because they want to be able to make it for a few days if something does happen.

I live in tornado alley. We are encouraged to keep a disaster kit just in case a tornado should strike our area. I’ve seen what happens after a tornado goes through our area. I’ve seen the devastation that can be cause by even small tornados. I understand the wisdom in having something in place should we get hit by a tornado…do I admit now that I didn’t follow the advice?

But that wasn’t the sort of preparation the man in the video I watched was talking about. He was suggesting that we be prepared before an ice storm, before a tornado, or even before the family reunion converges on your home. What he was suggesting we prepare for was a large scale terrorist attack or other disaster that could essentially end life as we know it. And the method this man suggested it could happen wasn’t some farfetched thing but something that very easily could happen.

But now that I’m no longer watching the video waiting for him to divulge the answer to this possible scenario I sit here thinking of it and how he essentially told people to prepare for the end.

And I’m reminded of a verse my husband likes to use often…

And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. Matthew 10:28

There are lots of people that are what they call ‘preppers’ or ‘survivalists’ out there. There are people that stockpile weapons, food, machines, books, skills, and who knows what all else. I used to find that sort of thing fascinating. I never had the money or the space to do any of the things they suggested beyond putting together a bad to have on hand in a disaster. That did come in handy during the many tornado warnings we spent sitting in the hall for safety. We never needed them because we were impacted by the storm to the point of needing a survival bag but I did put the snacks, coloring books and crayons, flashlights and other items to use. It was nice having everything together when we were placed under a tornado warning. As the children ran for the hall I grabbed the bag that I knew would keep them entertained while we sat there.

But as useful as I found the items I had packed in the backpack, and I doubt a serious survivalist would have had any interest in the bag I had prepared. There’s a good chance it would have been little more than something to make them laugh. Really…who needs coloring books when your house is in splinters? But it worked for us as we needed it at the time. All that aside though…what good are any earthly preparations when our souls are in danger?

How many people that fill their basements, put in hidden floors in their homes, build indestructible shelters, and whatever else they do, prepare their souls with as much diligence as they prepare for the end of the world?

If we looked at statistics alone…what are the odds that any one person will experience a disaster of any kind that is so debilitating they can’t get some kind of help within a few days? National response teams say you need to prepare to survive on your own for three days, the average length of time it takes help to reach you in a major disaster. Three days. That’s the average time anyone would need to survive without help after a disaster. And how many people are effected to that extent in their lifetime? Thousands? Millions? We’re talking three days where you can’t get to any kind of outside help, store, business, phone…anything. How many?

What percentage of people in America must survive on their own in disaster type, life threatening situations? With no help or contact with anyone?

I don’t know the answer to those questions. I know there are many that are affected in disaster type situations in any given year but how many of them are completely cut off from the rest of the world so that they must rely only on themselves for survival for even the three days recommended? Whatever the number I’m absolutely positive that 100% of the population of America, of the world, will be effected by death. Not just by death but by their own death.

You might experience a disaster situation that puts your life in danger. You might find yourself in a situation where you are completely cut off from all outside help. You may wind up needing to use only what you have on your person, in your vehicle, or in your home to stay alive for hours, days, weeks, or less likely months or years as the survivalists fear. But I guarantee that you will be affected by your own death.

Survivalists prepare for what they call ‘the end of the world as we know it’. They prepare themselves to depend on no one but themselves for years (in some cases). They look ahead to what might happen, to what could happen, and they prepare for what they imagine might affect them in their lifetime.

Preparing for a disaster that could happen might come in handy someday if that disaster ever does happen. It might give you useful skills that can be utilized in your everyday life now. It probably will give you supplies that you can rotate through and use on a daily basis…unless you have a 5 or 10 year supply of what they call meals ready to eat or MRE’s, then you may not want to eat them if your life depends on it.

But what has all that preparing done to get them ready for the absolute, guaranteed experience that they will have with their own death and the judgment they will face as a result?

I know that the Lord has His chosen people. I know that He has determined who will spend eternity in heaven and who will spend it in hell. I know that. But I also know that Scripture speaks of faith comes from hearing the Word of God. I know that Scripture speaks of the Lord giving up the unbelievers because of their unbelief.

If any of the people that spend even a small part of their lives prepping for a disaster that may never come put the same amount of time into Christ…what would happen with their life? What kind of fruit might their preparation bear?

What kind of future should we prepare for?

Eternity?

Or a disaster that could happen?

What are you preparing for?

 

I've wasted it

Years ago I read somewhere that the two saddest words in the English language are the words ‘if only.’ And truly…if we stop and think of those words…we can see that they are two very sad words.

Those two little words sum up the entirety of our regrets. If only I had done this. If only I hadn’t done that. If only…

The two saddest words in the English language.

Today I read something that may well be sadder. ‘I’ve wasted it.’ Those three words were written in a book (don’t waste your life) by John Piper. Along with those words he tells the story of an old man that upon what appears to be his conversion he says ‘I’ve wasted it.’

He had wasted his chance to live for Christ. That seems to be the point that the author is getting to although he begins to stray from that man’s story not long after those profound words. If the words ‘if only’ are the two saddest words in the English language…I’ve wasted it must be the three saddest words in the Christian language.

Right now I have trials in my life that have left me drowning in deep water, struggling to gain my footing… more than once I’ve found myself asking the question I least want to ask. I have asked…why.

As I struggle through these trials I have asked not only myself but also my Lord…why.

And I don’t like that. It grieves me to ask my Lord why. Because I know that in His plan there is a purpose for everything that makes me ask why. And I know that I am but the creature. Who am I ‘O man’ to question God?

And so it grieves me when I find myself questioning Him. But I am a fallen person. I am flesh. I am weak. I hurt. I fear. And I question even when I don’t want to.

How easy I could make a list of ‘if onlys’ at this time in my life. If only this had happened. Or if only that hadn’t happened. But that would serve no purpose and it would negate the will of God in my life.

And so I skip the ‘if onlys’.

Instead I struggle through the days. I face the trials that come. And I think of how much worse it would be to face any day of your life and to think ‘I’ve wasted it.’

Sometimes my flesh wants to think back over my life and think ‘if only’ but then my spirit reminds me that there are no ‘if onlys’ because the Lord was in charge of my life…even in those times I’d like to change. And He had a plan for me during each second of my life.

How much better to look back over my life and to see that there is a before Christ and an after Christ. That there were days when I ‘knew not what I did’ and that there came the day when I was enlightened and that for me ‘to live is Christ.’

The ‘if onlys’ were erased.

And I will never have to say…’I’ve wasted it.’

Sin

Sometimes I have a hard time figuring out if the internet is a good thing or a bad thing. I remember back when the media meant television news, newspapers, and magazines. I remember when things like school shootings happened and people would say that if the media wouldn’t sensationalize it there’d be less people trying to harm others for the attention it brings them. Let’s face it…such an act forever immortalizes the offenders name.

But today it’s not just the news media that sensationalize everything. Now it’s them plus social media. The people that used sit in coffee shops, living rooms, and businesses discussing things they’d heard in the news now plaster it all over the internet. By the time something hits the news so many people have commented on it and posted it that it’s nearly impossible to miss.

That’s a good thing when pictures of missing children and the like are being shown. It’s okay when it’s being used to share stories and further truths. It’s bad when it’s being used to support and encourage sin. Even the reports that start out as informative seem to quickly dissolve into a free-for-all where everyone has a comment on what happened.

People today seem to think they have the right to tear people’s lives apart simply because they have an opinion on what happened. When a person has to stand face to face with someone to discuss something the conversation at least stays in the realm of understanding that you are talking to another person. When it goes online it becomes a screen that you’re speaking to. It’s easy to forget that there’s another person on the other side of that screen.

Like everything in life the internet can be used for good and bad. We live in the information age. Information is available to us like it’s never been available at any other time in history. This is great when we need information on health issues, weather forecasts, and accessing Christian articles that might otherwise have been available to only a few. But it’s bad when it’s used to further sin.

Idolatry comes in many forms. The internet is but one of them. Used as a tool it can be very effective and helpful. Used to hurt others it can be a way to break one of the top commandments. Used to further sin…it’s just more sin in a fallen world.

And we are living in a fallen world. If a person pays any attention to any form of media today it’s impossible to avoid all the sin. Sin before us, sin surrounding us. It’s so prevalent that it seems if we wake up in the morning it’s delivered to us.

I’ve seen t-shirts that say something to the effect of …I want to be the kind of person that when my feet hit the floor in the morning the devil says oh no she’s up. Maybe we need a t-shirt that says….Sin wants to be so prevalent that when their eyes open in the morning there’s no way we can avoid it.

Every year from about August until sometime in the first couple of weeks in November Halloween rolls around. Without fail, every year, seemingly earlier and earlier out pop all the evil decorations. Going to the grocery store becomes a challenge. There’s no way to drive through town, to walk through a store, without seeing some sort of climbed-from-the-grave horror guaranteed to offend sensitive souls. It’s sin run rampant.

And it’s celebrated.

It’s honored.

It’s revered.

It’s seen as nothing wrong with this, it’s just innocent fun. Well, there is something wrong with it. It’s not just innocent fun. It’s promoting that which the Lord hates. It’s looking upon sin without seeing it as such.

That’s one holiday. One brief time during the year. Bad as it is…it does have an end. Not so the sin we encounter daily. What of all the sin being promoted through the media, being forced on us whether we want it or not? What of the sin that overflows from Hollywood and into our children? What of the sin that is seen in our own homes if we own a television or computer? What of the sin that arrives on our phones through text messages from people we don’t even know?

It’s paraded before us as something to be encouraged and celebrated. It’s there…wherever there happens to be.

My husband and I were looking at a Christian news site today and even there sin was so rampant that I told my husband looking at the news is just depressing. What good is there in news articles? I’m not asking what the good of knowing the news is, I’m asking where the good articles are. Where are the stories that promote the things Christ stands for? Where are the articles that applaud someone for standing up for what is right?

It’s not in the news.

The only thing that seems to be there is sin.

 

Romans 12

I read an article recently that referenced Romans 12. That article left me kind of wondering how the author came to the conclusions they did but it also left me thinking about Romans 12.

In that article the author asked some questions along the lines of…

If the world treasures things…do we?

If the world see’s something as okay…do we?

If the world loves it…do we?

It leaves me thinking…do we? There are so many things, so many places where something is accepted or seen as normal simply because it’s what is accepted. When I first became a parent I did a lot of things without thinking, things that I’d always done in my life so I just continued those things with my children. It wasn’t until I’d been a parent for quite a few years that I started questioning whether or not some of those things were something I really wanted to teach my children.

As a Christian my life is so different from what most people see as normal that my sister has said I make things harder than they have to be because there’s so much I want no part of. What she doesn’t understand is that my life isn’t hard. Not for me. Giving up all those sinful things was the easy way. It was much easier than continuing to allow them in my life because sin hurts my heart, hurts my soul. Staying away from those things brings peace, contentment, and joy. It’s not hard, it’s easy.

But it isn’t that way for so many ‘Christians’ today. Christianity can’t even agree on how to be ‘Christians’ so how can any ‘Christian’ figure out what is acceptable and what isn’t. I’ve read that divorce is higher among ‘Christians’ than it is among those that aren’t ‘Christian’. ‘Christians’ are homosexuals. ‘Christians’ have abortions.

And because those ‘Christians’ accept so much of what the world sees as being good there are some that are left asking ‘if the world is okay with it…are we?’

As I read that article I found it sad and encouraged at the same time. Christians shouldn’t need to ask those kinds of questions. And yet they do. Even true regenerate Christians are presented with so much in our world that sometimes we have to really use discernment to know whether or not it’s acceptable in the Lord’s eyes.

I picked up a book not that long ago because the title caught my attention. It was about the doctrine of election. As I lifted it off the shelf I thought I might have found a book that I would and could enjoy. Only it wound up presenting four different views on the doctrine of election. It wasn’t just scripturally based as I had hoped. I had to use discernment as I looked through it to figure out if it was a book that I should read. I put it back.

Movies come out that claim to be Christian and yet so much discernment is needed to see if it’s truly okay. I don’t ask myself ‘if the world loves it…do we?’ but the need to discern things is there. The need to be careful not to let influences that don’t need to be in our lives is there.

I wasn’t sure I saw the connection that the author of the article I was reading made to Romans 12. In fact the author really didn’t make any connection beyond stating a reference to Romans 12. But when looking at Romans 12 I could see the connection that the author of that article failed to make.

I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.

In the first verse alone there is plenty of option to ask…Does the world? Do we? Paul is speaking to ‘brothers’, to the elect, to the regenerate. The message, the question, is being given to true born again Christians.

 ² Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

The next verse gives us more to go on. As true Christians we should be able to discern most things without asking ourselves if they’re okay but when in doubt here’s yet another verse to help us. Is something we are holding, looking at, or thinking about what would be considered conformed to this world? Does it hold with the world’s standards? Does it renew our minds to the Lord’s standards? If we test it can we discern the will of God? Is it good in his eyes? Acceptable? Perfect?

³ For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.

Does something in our life…in our culture…promote the idea of thinking of others more highly than it does the thinking of ourselves or does it encourage us to think of our own desires and needs before those of others? What do we see if we truly look at something soberly, through our faith, and not through the eyes of the flesh?

 ⁴ For as in one body we have many members,^[e] and the members do not all have the same function, ⁵ so we, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another.

I will admit to failing to see a connection between this part and looking at things of the world except maybe in the way we look at each other, rather in the way we look at other believers.

⁶ Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them: if prophecy, in proportion to our faith; ⁷ if service, in our serving; the one who teaches, in his teaching; ⁸ the one who exhorts, in his exhortation; the one who contributes, in generosity; the one who leads,^[f] with zeal; the one who does acts of mercy, with cheerfulness.

Do our actions show the depth of our faith? When we do something do we do it in faith? When serving others do we do so with all we have to give them? If we teach do we do it in faith that the Lord is leading what we teach? Do we lean on Him as we instruct others? When we give do we do so generously?

⁹ Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good.

Is our love true love? Do we love out of the abundance of our hearts or do we love because it’s expected of us? Do those we encounter, those in our daily lives, feel our love? Do we hate what is evil? Does that hate show? When our children encounter sin do they know that it is something we hate? Do we embrace only the good? Do our children see that in our lives? Do others?

¹⁰ Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor.

Does the world see this love? Do we feel it or are we simply going through the motions?

¹¹ Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit,^[g] serve the Lord.

Do we serve the Lord in all that we do? Does it show? Do those around us know of our beliefs? How would they describe us if asked to do so?

¹² Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer.

Do we have hope even when it looks like all hope is lost? Do we become easily angered when things get rough? Do we pray always?

¹³ Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.

These are things that are seen rarely in our society….are they seen in us?

¹⁴ Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them.

Ohh…that’s a hard one. Do we do it? Do we react differently to persecution in any form than the world does?

¹⁵ Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.

Are we happy for others simply because they are happy? Do we hurt for those who hurt?

¹⁶ Live in harmony with one another. Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly.^[h] Never be wise in your own sight.

The further I go the harder this gets. Do we think we’re better than others or do we see even the most disreputable person as better than we are? I will admit now to having a hard time with this one. Do we see ourselves as wise? Do we see others and ourselves as the world leads us to think of ourselves and those around us or do we see them as instructed in Scripture?

¹⁷ Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all.

Do we live…and act…honorably in the sight of everyone? Do we treat someone as they have treated us or do we respond out of the love Christ has put in us? Do we react as the world tells us we should or do we react out of our faith?

¹⁸ If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.

This is another one that gets hard. Peace is often hard found with many people. Do we try to find it even in the hard times?

¹⁹ Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it^[i] to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.”

Do we leave anger and vengeance to the Lord even when we are wronged? Do we leave it to the Lord when our children are wronged?

²⁰ To the contrary, “if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals on his head.”

Could we feed someone that had harmed us or our children? Do we? How do we respond to those that do or say things that hurt us or those closest to us?

 ²¹ Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

When we are surrounded with evil…an everyday occurrence in our society…do we hold onto the good and ward off the evil that tries time and again to get the better of us?