Returns: One Happy, Many Tragic

It has been too long! To my readers, my friends, I bid each of you a fond hello. The last 15 months have been very exciting. Every day has been a new adventure! It has been for me a time of great growth, but not without often greater struggle. Perhaps it has been the same for you. Conversations for another day, I suppose.

Tonight I return to my writer's desk for just a few brief minutes. As I was reading this morning, I was struck by what may be, in my humble opinion, one of the saddest verses in Scripture. Take a look at Psalm 106:43:

"Many times He delivered them, but they were bent on rebellion and they wasted away in their sin."

This text is a theological reflection on the journey of God's people, beginning its chronology during their time in Egypt. While recounting history, the author hits on a recurring theme: people really don't change that much. As their fathers had, they continued to run to sin.

I dare not speak for anyone else, but I feel as though this is probably true for us today. We all run to our own sins. May God help us to chase after Him instead.

I hope that it will not be another 15 months before we meet again. Times are busy, but it is in these times we most need to encourage each other. All the best to you, friends!

Bibliography

NIV Archaeological Study Bible. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2005. Print.

Contemplating Sin and Our Relationship with God

Lately I have been thinking much about my relationship with God. In seeking Him, I have been challenged to think much about another issue: sin.

I realize that in our postmodern society, clearcut right and wrong can be hard to find. When we choose to submit ourselves to Christ, however, this becomes a well defined issue with which we must reckon.

King David offers the following prayer in Psalm 51:1-5.

"Have mercy on me, O God, according to Your steadfast love; according to Your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against You, You alone, have I sinned, and done what is evil in Your sight, so that You are justified in Your sentence and blameless when You pass judgment. Indeed, I was born guilty, a sinner when my mother conceived me."

David, who is elsewhere in Scripture acknowledged by God as "a man after My own heart" (1 Samuel 13:14 and Acts 13:22), recognized the reality of this issue of sin. He himself wrestled with it, and was honest about his struggles. When David sinned against God, he sought restored relationship with God through repentance.

After quite some time contemplating this issue, I found myself at this thought: we wrestle with sin in direct proportion to our relationship with God. When I do not care to pursue God as a disciple of Jesus Christ, sin is not so bothersome. In fact, it's mostly enjoyable. But when I am drawing near to God under the leadership of the Holy Spirit, sin becomes a major problem. Instead of feeling nothing, I am able to acknowledge that a part of myself is dying in darkness because of sin. And I can only know this because of the light of truth which Jesus Christ provides.

"For once you were in darkness, but now in the Lord you are light. Live as children of light- for the fruit of the light is found in all that is good and right and true. Try to find out what is pleasing to the Lord. Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. For it is shameful even to mention what such people do secretly; but everything exposed by the light becomes visible, for everything that becomes visible is light. Therefore it says, 'Sleeper, awake! Rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.'" (Ephesians 5:8-14)

Bibliography

The Holy Bible: Containing the Old and New Testaments with the Apocryphal/Deuterocanonical Books: New Revised Standard Version. New York: Oxford UP, 1989. Print.

Running and Crawling

by Joshua Bland

From time to time, I feel inspired to write poetry. It is an exercise which challenges the linguist, the disciple, the teacher, the artist, and the human in me. I find that it helps me to reflect on what God is doing in the world, as well as on how I see Him working in my heart and mind.

Poetry has a beauty to it. However, this beauty does not always mean happiness; it often takes a much more realistic view on the struggles and consequences of humanity.

Peccatum curro ad Rapuit meam vim Me ferus haurisit Cultero pungente Dentibus seratis Sed in mea desperatione Dominus servat me Vitam meam mutat Animadvertite: Peccato curro ab Repo ad Te

I run toward sin It seized my soul The savage devoured me by the piercing knife by sharp teeth But in my desperation the Lord saves me He changes my life Observe: I run from sin I crawl to You

Here's the honest truth: I, like everyone else, struggle with temptation and sin; this is a fact which we recognize to varying degrees. For the disciple of Jesus Christ, this becomes a more accentuated part of life. Listen to how the apostle Paul describes it in Romans 7:14-25:

"For we know that the Law is spiritual; but I am of flesh, sold into bondage to sin. For that which I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate. But if I do the very thing I do not wish to do, I agree with the Law, confessing that it is good. So now, no longer am I the one doing it, but sin which indwells me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; for the wishing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not. For the good that I wish, I do not do; but I practice the very evil that I do not wish. But if I am doing the very thing I do not wish, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me. I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wishes to do good. For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man, but I see a different law in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind, and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin."

Jesus Christ died as the atonement for our sins. In other words, He paid our debt: yours and mine. For the disciple of Christ, there is redemption. He did not, however, remove us entirely from sin. Notice Paul's final words in the preceding section: he strove to serve the law of God with his mind, but his flesh was constantly wrestling with the law of sin. This is true for us all. We still find ourselves running to sin.

How then do we wrestle this natural inclination within us? How do we find victory over the sin which ensnares us? John Owen, reflecting on the biblical ideas of the law of God, writes the following: 

"Afterward God renews this law, and writes it in tables of stone [the Ten Commandments, representative of the Old Covenant]. But what is the efficacy of this law? Will it now, as it is external and proposed unto men, enable them to perform the things that it exacts and requires? Not at all. God knew it would not, unless it were turned to an internal law again; that is, until, of a moral outward rule, it be turned into an inward real principle."

In other words, we can not seek simply to follow rules. We, especially as Americans, are socially conditioned to be independent. We will follow rules when we must, but there is a tendency in us to want to cross that line, pushing the limits placed upon us. If we use Scripture or personal philosophy to try and establish boundaries for our actions, counting on these boundaries to keep us from sin, we will fail.

Instead, we need to be changed inwardly. External motivators, while effective for a time, will not have the lasting impact of internal convictions. Thus we hear another challenge from the apostle Paul: "I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect" (Romans 12:1-2, emphasis mine).

What we need, my friends, is not a new set of rules, but a complete change of heart.

Bibliography

New American Standard Bible. La Habra, CA: Lockman Foundation, 1977. Kindle.

Owen, John. Indwelling Sin in Believers. Louisville, KY: GLH, n.d. Vintage Puritan Ser. Kindle.

Peccatum curro ad by Joshua Bland is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.