Can Someone Else Cause Us To Sin?

In the Bible we are reminded of the account of the confrontation of Moses with the Pharo.  God said that each time the Pharo was faced with Moses appeals to let his people go, the Pharo would refuse to do so.  God said that Pharo hardened his own heart in anger against Moses and his God.  And later we see that God said He hardened Pharo’s heart.  Which was true?  Both were true.  God did challenge Pharos knowing with each new plague, Pharo would harden his heart more, so God sent what He knew would cause Pharo to do this.  

When we are confronted with our sin and we explode in anger, refusing to consider our actions,  take it to God in prayer and repent, then we are hardening our hearts a little further.  When others point out our shortcomings, it does not matter their delivery, or their attitude, God is using them to shake us up and expose what is really in our hearts.  If there is an explosion of anger when we are confronted with our sin, then the person who chastised us is not at fault for causing our anger, we have merely let come out of our inner being, that which was already there.  It shows us our inner heart problem of pride and self exhaultation.  

Instead of blaming the person who rebuked us, we need to be taking their message to the Lord in prayer that we might discover our own sinful attitudes, that we might repent and be cleansed from that sin.  If we do not listen to those who would rebuke and correct us, then God will discipline us His way, and very often it is much harsher than the words that our friends and family would say to us.  They can not take our health, our homes, our chidlren, or our security, but God can do all that in His effort to reach our soul.  He can do far more in His discipline of us than any human can do, He can also use evil humans to carry out His will.  We should never take lightly the exhortations, rebukes and corrections of others because they are sent of God to administer training, even if they are not aware of how they are being used.  

It is never wise to take lightly or defend ourselves when confronted with sin.  We ultimately will lose in the long run and perhaps enormously with life long consequences.  It is in our own best interest to repent quickly and sincerly before a Holy and Righteous God, that He may withhold His wrath and discipline from us.  

Lastly, if we are believers, it should be paramount that our Chrsitian witness take presidence over any discomfort we may experience in a rebuke.   Our personal pride and satisfaction is irrelevant in the vast scheme of God's purposes.  We must always seek the greater good for eternity in our evaluation of cercumstances.  

Do we live to please ourselves or do we live to please God?  This is the ultimate question that needs to be asked in every life experience.  If we find ourselves protecting ourselves by avoiding self-confrontation, then we are still walking in pride. If our own desires take presidence over God's greater good, then we are nurturing pride and resisting God.  

Let's seek Him with all our being and then we will see the arrogance and self will begin to take a back seat to His will and purpose.   

Relationships Are Not Scheduled, They Are Established.

Relationships take time and energy.  They take commitment and determination to succeed and grow.  When our relationships are established on superficial smiles and quaint clichés of happy trivialities, they are lacking in the depth that is necessary to sustain them.  We can enjoy these sorts of friendships for a time, but these are the connections that do not last and over time dissipate at the slightest testing.  Perhaps these are not relatinonships at all, but familiarities sterile of weightiness. 

There is a process called distillation, which in the course of heating a mixture in order to condense it into a more pure form of the substance desired, in this process there is a higher quality resulting.   This is the case in quality and lasting relationships.  It is the trials of life that show us what we are made of and what motivates us.  If when the difficulties come, we face them with fortitude and do not shrink away in fear and run from them, we show our enduring love for our friend.

When we face the trials head on, determined to know our friend, and discover our own heart, then we are walking in love.  Christ’s love seeks not it’s own, as He has told us, but it seeks the best for our friend.  Our friendship, if we walk with the Lord, will be evaluated on the basis of God’s Word and His Will.  Do we want our friend to walk with the Lord in holiness, or are we more concerned about enjoying one another in happiness.  God wants us to be distilled, pressed down and shaken together, that we might become strong and spiritually pure. 

Pleasure in our friendship can never be the motivating factor in our walk together, but God’s full purpose must drive us in all that we hope for in our friendship.  Pleasure very often is a byproduct of our Christ like walk with our companion, but not the stimulant.

Those individuals who yearn for penetrating kinship with friends, will walk through life seeking the denseness of fine fabric tightly woven together building a strength that is not easily torn or frayed.  Our desires will always be for the Lord’s best in one another. 

The trials of life only strengthen these sturdy fellowships and the joys are doubled when shared with a friend of quality, one who seeks the Lord in all occasions for His design.  That one stays with us when we are not perfect, and has no expectation that we sustain perfection in order to remain our friends.  But will correct us when we fail and lift us up when we get back on the path again.  That friend will raise his spiritual voice to us when we are feeble and disobedient to Christ and mercifully soften it again when we repent.

Very often our human relationship dynamics reflect our relationship with the Lord.  If we stay focused on the superficial with our friends, chances are good that we are doing the same with our Lord.  Our prayers become shallow and selfish as we use the Lord like we would dance a puppet on a string, requiring Him to fulfill our every desire and ease of life. 

When we seek the Lord with all our heart we see a very different bent in our walk.  We see a heart that regards the commands of God above all else.  That person sees all circumstances as from Him and worthy of praise, whether they be happy or sad. They are all lessons to be learned and attitudes to be altered. 

Let us remember that relationships are established on the basis of much time spent and not on short periods of scheduled time.

Let us also not forget, that if we are careless and flimsy with our friends, we are probably acting the same way toward our Lord.   

Resisting The Lord?

http://thefinalwordradio.com/media/episodes/2011/05/TFW_11-093_Wed_May_11.mp3

Let's Obey God Rather Than Man

http://www.biblicalresearchreports.com/divorceandremarriage.php#actorstate

The best explanation of divorce and remarriage that I have seen is contained in the above link.  

When THE LORD, "makes one" no man can undo what He has done.   This is a picture of THE LORDs’ Work and salvation of the believers.  HE makes us a new creation when we repent and trust Christ; this can not be undone any more than the marriage covenant can be undone.  They are both a work of God.  Man can never change what God has done, we can only disobey Him, but we can never nullify His work.  Can we change God's plan for the ages, His plan of salvation, His end times design, His judgments’ or wrath or His perfect will, never!!!!   We have been tainted with our humanness and our culture as we seek to find excuses and loop holes around His will.  We want to be free to do as we please without guilt, so we change what He said and pretend it is real.  

Can we not see the devastation in the lives of the people in our culture from the twisting and distorting of God's Word? Divorce has ended families as we used to know them.  Once children knew a father and a mother living together in one home in stability.  Now we see children shuffled from a father or mother who no longer live with them.  They go from home to home every other week.  They do not have two homes they have no home at all.  The children have multiple mothers and fathers and grandparents, but feel no sense that any of it is permanent.  The non-biological parent lacks the loyalty to his step children that a bio-parent would have.  There is continual dis-harmony in the so called "blended" families.  They are not blended at all, but are a source of devastating insecurity and loneliness.  As the child watches a step parent walk off from them, hand in hand with their "real" child, while the step child feels a sense of abandonment and lovelessness.  The real parent has children by their second marriage leaving the children from the first marriage feeling left out and empty and deserted, even jealous of the child who gets to live with his real parent.  These lonely children become angry, seeking love where ever they can find it, no matter what destruction it may cause to others or themselves.  There is a sense of desperation in their souls.

I have not experienced divorce and remarriage myself, but have watched the carnage in other people who have lived this nightmare.  They have difficulty bonding to anyone or trusting anyone.  They live a life of insecurity that is nearly impossible to undo their entire lives.  It is only through Christ that they can overcome the desolation that has occurred because of selfish, lazy and irresponsible parents.   God does not expect families to be perfect, we all have our problems because we are human, but if we stay together working through the difficulties with Christ as our focus, we have a much better stage for secure children who learn how to turn to Christ in difficulties.  Children, who see conflict and a working to resolve it, are children who can learn commitment to those people and things that matter to God.  

Difficulties are not to be avoided, but to be challenged head on in prayer and commitment to the Lord first and then those we love.  When we realize love is a choice and an obligation we can take our duties more seriously and meet them with resolve.  We can begin obeying God in this way by first ignoring our feelings, they lie to us, then searching God's Word for His way and thirdly obeying what we find there.   Knowing what is right is not enough; we must obey it for it to count.  

God says:  "Therefore the Lord said, 'In as much as these people draw near to Me with their mouths, and honor Me with their lips, but have removed their hearts far from Me, and their fear toward Me is taught by the commandments of men.'"  Isaiah 29:13

He also says: "and in vain they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men."  Matthew 15:9

God said: "For laying aside the commandments of God, you hold the traditions of men --the washing of pitchers and cups, and many other such things you do' and He said to them, "All too well you reject the commandments of God that you may keep your tradition."   Mark 7:8-9

Our teachings about divorce and remarriage in today’s modern church is nothing less than heresy.  It denies Gods perfect will and work and introduces false doctrine that has destroyed the family.  We must stop listening to men and begin praying for God to reveal the truth as we search His word for the answers.  

There will be no hope for our country, as long as we seek men rather than God for human solutions to spiritual problems. 

"But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you."  Matthew 6:33

Let's make this our goal and resolve.

God's Marvelous Creation: Praise His Name!!!

http://www.andiesisle.com/creation/magnificent.html