Hosanna Restoration Church

Wow! I love think on heaven and the goodness of God. I can get excited about the power of God and the whole world sharing in His glory when Christ is revealed. That is going be so awesome. And when I focus on God and His power and His love for me it truly smoothes life out. In fact I get just plain peaceful even beginning to write about it.

So why did God have to follow all that wonderful peace by telling us to put sinful things lurking within us to death. It would be a lot more comforting to warn us to keep sin out, but He has to point out that these things lurk within us. We would like to think they don’t, but they most certainly do. We would also like to think that if God wants them out bad enough He should just take them away. I have actually heard people say things like that. Somehow they believe that if they still have the desire then God must not want them to give up that sin yet. I think we all know better but it is just one way of rationalizing. And unfortunately I believe all have to admit that we tend to enjoy rationalizing more than putting the thing to death.

Usually big ugly public sins cease in our lives, or at least they go private rather than public. However, if the root is allowed to lurk about it will find a way to do damage when opportunity arises. This is why the Holy Spirit brings them to our attention. He wants us to put them death. We need to get over the idea that it is God’s responsibility to clean those things up and kill them off ourselves. Jesus loved righteousness and He hated unrighteousness.

We all prefer to look at the unrighteousness around us and hate it. We can see the things in others that are wrong, but we prefer to ignore the things that surface in our lives. Oh, we may acknowledge them privately, but we will never truly be able to live in the freedom that God intends until we hate those things enough to put them to death. It is much better if it is a sudden attack on our part rather that stringing it out. Once we are fortunate enough to see it for what it is we would be wise to execute it before it files for an appeal.

Most will agree with God when it comes to sexual sins, until He clarifies with impurity, lust and sinful desires. Remember there is a difference between temptation and desire. The devil may tempt us, but if it turns to desire, that is our doing. And what does God have against us having good things? One camp might say “Amen to that, we were meant to be poor Christians.” Another camp might wonder why we can’t have anything good. One who lives wisely will know that God gives good gifts and intends for us to be blessed, He just does not want us consumed with greed. We can be generous and still greedy. We can have much and live with a poverty mentality. Think about how allowing God to enlighten us in these areas can help us in our quest of wise living.