Day 2639 of the 7 day Bible verse challenge.

Romans 3:23 NIV

Okay, so yesterday we nailed down the how in regard to laying down the ways of living and thinking that we've been used to up until now. Walking away from the desires that have consumed our thoughts for so long isn't easy, but just because it's hard doesn't mean that we can avoid it. It's something we absolutely have to address because having anything in our lives that takes focus away from God simply isn't alright.

But now that we've discussed the assistance that we have in the Holy Spirit who helps guide us away from everything that doesn't matter so that we can better focus on the things that do matter, we're left with yet another question. Why? Why do we have to learn to stop chasing and prioritizing worldly things? Why is it so dangerous if it doesn't really seem to harm anyone? Why is our desire to want earthly possessions and comfort such a problem when for the most part it's all about things that bring us joy?

Well, because our joy should be found in God alone. That's where the whole issue with idols comes into play. When we look to other things to bring us joy or happiness or pride or comfort or anything else, then we're putting whatever that 'thing' may be on equal footing with God. We're giving that 'thing' as much importance and value and gravity in our hearts as we do God. We're saying that while God offers us the most perfect forms of peace and happiness in His will, we still think that we can find something at least somewhat close enough in our minds, and that we can therefore find peace and happiness and whatever else in something other than God and without God's help or guidance.

That's why this is a problem. It isn't a victim-less crime. It isn't a harmless sin. Because there's no such thing. Sin is harmless, no matter how innocent and light-hearted it may seem to us. Sin is the choice to choose something or someone else before God. Putting ourselves first before humbling ourselves to His leading is sin. Allowing worldly things to consume our time and focus is sin. And while so much of what's sinful has been made to seem absolutely harmless in our society, the truth is that there is simply nothing harmless about sin because sin pulls us away from God, and that my friends, has a cost.

I think one of the biggest signs that we've got a serious problem is found in the fact that we can't always see when we're doing wrong. We've been dumbed down into thinking that so many things are okay because they don't seem to hurt anyone. But let's say we break a law in which nobody gets hurt, nothing gets damaged, and nobody ever even knows about it. Is that harmless? Is that okay? Absolutely not because we've harmed ourselves in choosing to do something that we knew wasn't okay. We are the victims of our poor choices. And while we have been well-conditioned to ignore that fact, ignoring it doesn't change it.

There is no harmless sin. There is no less dangerous poor choice. There is no way to do what's wrong without it being a serious problem because in order to do wrong, that means we also had the ability and the choice to have done something right. But we chose wrong. We chose self. We chose desire. We chose passion. We chose anger. We chose to give in to the path of personal gain and least resistance in order to fulfill what we wanted while ignoring the desires of our Heavenly Father. And any time that we fall short of the glory of God and the example that He gave us in Christ Jesus, then we have sinned and forsaken His calling to do better than that.

So that's why we must tackle this issue of worldly idols head-on. Because it's sinful. Because it's allowing other things to take up room in our hearts that God alone paid an unimaginable price to redeem. Because choosing anything worldly or selfish is also choosing to ignore God. Because it pulls us down from the perfect will of God and allows us to settle for the lesser desires that we've learned to prioritize based upon the world's priorities. And because it lures us into thinking that we can find something good without God in it, and that's a kind of lie that is perfectly designed to put ourselves and our desires first all while ignoring God.

Make no mistake, there is nothing harmless about sin. Even if it doesn't hurt anyone else, it hurts us. And even when we can't feel the damage that sin does in our hearts, it hurts God. And we have to learn to understand that our choices, every single one of them, has a cost and when those choices pull us away from focusing on God and putting Him first in our lives, then that cost is death. So while it may all seem like fun and games chasing all these worldly things, ignoring God in order to do so is deadly. So we must, we absolutely must fix this all too common issue that infects every single human heart.

Friends, we've all sinned in countless ways. And while many of them seemed so harmless at the time that we didn't even realize we'd done wrong, wrong was still done and every wrong still has a cost. We can't keep running up that tab. We have to learn from our mistakes and fight to stop making so many of them! Because if we don't, then sin still has too much power and too much control in our lives and there is absolutely nothing about that that will ever be okay, or harmless, or safe. Sin is sin, and sin is death, and it doesn't matter how badly we may want to believe that there are less dangerous sins that give us some way around that. That's just not how this works.

And since God is the only One who gets to decide how this works, trying to work it around in our favor instead is about as foolish and sinful and therefore as deadly as it gets.

#LeaveNoSoulUntold