I am not sure why, I am not sure about Gods reasoning; but tonight I want to talk about what God has said to me over the course of today. God told me that as we struggle to know God our struggle in sin grows, even as our efforts and conviction to know and do what’s best for ourselves grows stronger. You may notice that something is missing, where is God’s effort, God’s conviction? That’s the problem, at some point and in some aspect of our lives we have traded Gods knowledge and conviction for what our own. We have turned to our own ideas and designs of desire and strength.
Our greatest sin of desire has been stated in the bible as lust or adultery; this is true beyond all comparisons I can possibly make. The bible says this “the body is for the lord and the lord is for the body…” (1 Corinthians Ch. 6) I don’t really know how others might interpret this but I have to say this verse is to be paired with the fact that we are made in God’s image. Though this is a pairing that none of us would normally come up with on our own because we focus too much on our own will; I even admit that without the pastor of my church this connection never would have occurred. Our will and desire to have pleasure and to be in love. When this desire is paired with God there is no problem; but when we take these desires with ourselves in mind we fall prey to our own demons as Satan proceeds to worsen our situation. Our bodies are for the lord and without the lord we are doomed to sin and corrupt the temple that are bodies are made to be for the lord our God.
Our greatest sin of strength is greed; and greed’s worst form is deception. Who has seen that one person on the street corner who is trying to imitate a homeless person and just doesn’t look the part; that one person who just has no clue what he is doing but is too lazy to take the opportunities that he could have if he simply worked and lived an honest life. Satan is always looking for weaknesses in our hearts hoping to create sin. Greed is a one of the greatest weaknesses and one of the easiest for Satan to exploit. In this weakness we forget God and his desire for us to know and do what is right. In the end we sometimes use deceit to gain what we want. To consider however that this is a constant happening in every person’s life cannot be said but it is true to say that at some point or another every person who has ever lived and does live has and will deceive and have greed in their hearts.
But despite all of our selfishness and shortcomings God has given us a second chance through Jesus. All Christians know that Jesus died on the cross for our sins but this is just the gift basket it’s what is inside which matters most, eternal life; the opportunity to stand in God’s presence, a god who is willing to help his children overcome their inability to live outside of sin. God loves us but we blind ourselves to that love with desire and thoughts of how to gain our own strength.
