We spent yesterday evening with some grieving friends. No, they didn't lose someone, not in the classic sense anyway. But someone near and dear to them -- a Christian -- steadily, surely is walking away from Christ -- moving step by step to immorality and will not listen to anyone's warning or admonition.
Then I opened my Bible this morning and read two passages: one, Ezra 8:21-9:15. That one is the account of Ezra's mourning, fasting and prayer over how his people so gladly welcomed God releasing them from the slavery of captivity, then so blatantly snubbed Him, ignoring His warning not to intermarry with the pagan people in the land around them. The second passage was 1 Corinthians 5:1-13. It's Paul record of how dumbfounded he was that the church in Corinth just "overlooked" (and even seemed glad about) the gross sin of one of their members. Both passages hold dire warnings that God -- as much as we think He will -- won't play our fool and overlook what we know is in essence a disregard of Him when we actively choose sin.
Then I was reading in "God: As He Longs for You to See Him" (Chip Ingram) in the chapter on "The Holiness of God." Writing about Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5) Chip says, "They chose to make a mockery of other believers, God's holiness and the privilege of giving. They treated God as someone they could fool. God, everyone discovered, will not be mocked....."
"If you are hard-headed like me, the experience can be tough because the vice often gets very tight before I even start paying attention. God often uses our finances, our circumstances and our relationships. He will do whatever it takes to get as much of our attention as he needs to say, 'Be holy, for I am holy.'"
3 comments:
Good to hear your heart. This is the blessing of blogging. :)
Good words. It is often hard to make choices that mark us as holy people and often easy to compromise.
Thanks to you both for reading and leaving something behind!
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