Day 2617 of the 7 day Bible verse challenge.

1 Peter 1:14 NIV

Humans are creatures of habit. We find a nice little pattern that works for us and we stick to it. We may branch out here and there or look for little things that we can bring into our routine, but for the most part, we just prefer to live our lives on repeat doing what we've always done. And even when we do find the audacity to try something new or different, we do everything we can to make it fit where and how we want it to fit into those patterns that we're so comfortable living in.

I think that's a huge reason why we see all this progressive religion. They're not trying to progress how they share the Gospel, not trying to do a better job of sharing the Gospel, not even trying to reach more people with the Gospel. All this modern religion is doing is trying to come up with a version of the Gospel that fits what people want their lives to look like according to what they've always done. We can't surrender. We can't let go of the patterns we're used to. We can't accept the truth that we need to change because we've grown to see change as this horror that must be avoided at all costs.

So that's why there are some creating a falsified version of “truth” to cater to the wants and wishes of their followers. They don't preach repentance. They don't preach sin. They don't speak on the requirement to live different lives now that we know the cost of our mistakes. They simply cater to this human desire to remain the same, live the same lives, and keep doing as we've always done. Not good enough folks. Christ didn't go through everything He endured for us to turn away from the vision of the cross and walk right back into the lives we'd always known up until that moment.

He died to bury our sins and iniquities in the grave. Don’t crawl back in there just to find the filth that you’ve become comfortable living with.

We have to stop trying to bend the truth of God's word to fit what we want it to mean. We have to stop making ourselves and our desires the basis that everything else revolves around. We are not called to live for ourselves or to continue catering to our desires. It's those desires, those habits, those comforts that formed those nails that held our Savior to that cross. How can we learn the facts of the Gospel and return to the very lives that caused that suffering? How can we understand what our mistakes cost and just keep running up the tab?

What we have to remember is what Hebrews 10:26 reminds us, "If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left." Jesus did what He did to open our eyes to the very real and very dangerous price of living our lives the way that we had been living them, consumed with sin and wickedness. Are we seriously going to ask Him to do it again? Could we really look Christ in the eyes knowing everything He endured for us because of our old ways of living and keep doing it?

We have to realize that we're called to obedience. I know, not something that is highly regarded in our world of freedom and carelessness and selfish desires. But we have to understand that it's one or the other. We have to choose. We can't keep living according to the ways of the world and simply create a religion that allows us to do so without feeling guilty. We can't fall back into those sinful patterns and wicked habits and expect God to just be okay with it because that's how we want it. He doesn't barter. He doesn't negotiate. And we're fooling ourselves if we live like He will.

Friends, at one time we were ignorant of the truth of God's word. At one time we didn't know the law, the cost, the danger of living apart from Him and shirking His desire to live according to His will rather than our own. We can't say that now. We know. We are no longer unaware of what's sinful and what those sins will cost us if we don't rid our lives of them. That's the thing about knowledge, it comes with responsibility. Unfortunately, everyone in our world wants to look and live like they know it all, they just don't want the responsibility that actually comes with knowing something.

Now that we know the truth and have heard the Gospel, we're responsible for that knowledge. If we keep doing as we've always done, then we will bear the weight of that choice. No getting out of it. No excuse that we can possibly come up with. Our blood is on our own heads. Thankfully, because of the truth of the Gospel, we don't have to face that suffering. We don't have to fear God's wrath. We don't have to live our lives constantly looking over our shoulder waiting for His truth to catch us unprepared.

Do not fall for a message that allows your old way of life to seem okay. Do not accept some sermon that meets you where you are and leaves you there. Do not buy this new-world, progressive, updated, and human-centered version of things that makes room for worldliness, selfishness, or that plays down the reality of what God has said is sinful. Habits may be hard to break. Changing may be hard to do. Letting go of who we've been and the lives we've lived and learning to make better choices that don't revolve around our desires may be hard to do. But it's a matter of life or death.

And when we finally manage to understand that God's not playing around and that we really have earned a first-class ticket to an eternity of misery, well, that realization makes it a whole lot easier to see the reason and the dire necessity to change our ways and stop living like God's going to conform to us. He won't. So we better get busy surrendering to His will, because friends, His will will win.

#LeaveNoSoulUntold