“When the cool evening breezes were blowing, the man and his wife heard the LORD God walking about in the garden. So they hid from the LORD God among the trees. Then the LORD God called to the man, ‘Where are you?’ He replied, ‘I heard you walking in the garden, so I hid. I was afraid because I was naked.’” Genesis 3:8-10 NLT
Guilt from sin has a way of creating a desire to run away and hide. Of course for most of us that is not possible, but the feeling is there. Will I be exposed? Will this shame go away? What if ‘so and so’ found out? I will just lay low for a while until time passes you say to yourself. You do not want to be around anyone. You cannot hide so you live with the guilt feelings. Your sin may never be exposed but you cannot get over the guilt.
Just as we cannot hide physically from others without a legitimate reason for our disappearance, we cannot hide from God. We may think by sheltering ourselves from others that also includes God. It does not. In fact, God knows why we are trying to hide ourselves while others do not. The Lord is aware of every sin we have committed. It is in His sight of vision. We cannot hide it or hide from Him. Laying low for a period of time will not keep the Lord from finding out..
Adam and Eve found this to be true after they ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They knew they had sinned before God and instantly felt shame. Their first reaction was to run and hide, of course, after they tried to cover themselves. That didn’t work either. Adam and Eve could not hide from God and neither can we. Our shame may be unbearable but hiding from God will only prolong the situation. Perhaps the Lord is calling you in the midst of your garden of shame, answer Him with full confession, no excuses, and have God restore you to full fellowship with Him and quit hiding from God.
“At that moment their eyes were opened, and they suddenly felt shame at their nakedness. So they sewed fig leaves together to cover themselves.” Genesis 3:7 NLT
Having eyes wide open is usually a good thing. Operating a motor vehicle requires having both eyes on the road. Keeping your eye on the ball in any sport is crucial if you want to have success. A surgeon must have keen vision while performing a delicate operation. There are countless other examples of needing both eyes open in our daily lives, but sometimes what is not seen is just as beneficial.
Adam and Eve were living in a perfect environment. Last Friday we referred to it as ‘paradise.’ They were also perfect in every way. Adam and Eve had perfect 20/20 vision and had their eyes wide open. They saw the beauty of God’s creation, the garden He had placed them in, and the attractiveness of each other. Everything was perfect and holy. The Lord was their constant companion in the world He had just created. All was good.
The story of Adam and Eve eating the forbidden fruit is well-known to most people either through sermons, Bible stories, or references made to it in a jest manner. The truth is when they ate the fruit something changed forever. Their eyes were opened, wide opened. Their perception of things had changed. They saw the same things, but something was wrong, it did not feel right. They saw sin for the first time in the way they felt, naked and ashamed in front of holy God. When we sin that feeling comes over us, or at least it should. Our eyes are wide open to whom we are in front of, a holy God. May we make it a habit to keep our eyes pure and wide open on the road of life in God’s blessings and not have them wide open in revealing our sin before God.
“I have wandered away like a lost sheep; come and find me, for I have not forgotten your commands.” Psalm 119:176 NLT
“Oh, to grace how great a debtor, Daily I’m constrained to be, Let that goodness like a fetter Bind my wandering heart to Thee, Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, Prone to leave the God I love Here’s my heart, oh, take and seal it, Seal it for Thy courts above” Robert Robinson
‘Come Thou Fount’ is an old hymn found in many church hymnals and even sung occasionally in churches today. Written in 1757 by Robert Robinson, a Methodist minister at the time, it was reflection of his life in the past and would prove true again in his future years. Robinson was uncontrollable as a child and teenager after his father died when he was only eight years old. That all changed when he and his friends attended a George Whitefield meeting to heckled him, but the Lord had other plans and he was converted through Whitefield’s preaching. Writing the hymn just two years after his conversion his past wanderings were fresh in his mind. In his later years he wandered between several denominations in his pastorate and was known to be unhappy and prone to wander.
There is not a Christian alive today who has never wandered. Not you. Not me. We are all prone to wander away from the Lord. Some of us are neglecting prayer and Bible reading. Some are absent in the gathering of the saints for worship. Some of us are indifferent to the needs of others. There are some of us who are caught up in some sin, and others who turned a blind eye in not helping such a one only to repeat the matter. These may be harsh words, but the Bible says, “All of us, like sheep, have strayed away. We have left God’s paths to follow our own.” (Is.53:6 nlt)
Although we wander, we have a Savior who has His eye on us, going after us and bringing us back into the fold. In Jesus’ parable of the lost sheep, Jesus says, “If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them wanders away, what will he do? Won’t he leave the ninety-nine others on the hills and go out to search for the one that is lost?” (Mt.18:12 nlt) Our Lord will not leave you abandoned in your season of wandering.
If you have wandered from the Lord and think there is no way back you are wrong. He is searching for you. Those nudges you are sensing are from the Lord. The uncomfortable feelings you are having as well as those well-timed words from a friend are also from the Lord. Pray with the psalmist in Psalm 119, “I have wandered away like a lost sheep; come and find me, for I have not forgotten your commands.” And then sing, “Here’s my heart, oh, take and seal it, Seal it for Thy courts above.”
“Meanwhile, the fire on the altar must be kept burning; it must never go out. Each morning the priest will add fresh wood to the fire and arrange the burnt offering on it. He will then burn the fat of the peace offerings on it. Remember, the fire must be kept burning on the altar at all times. It must never go out.” Leviticus 6:12-13 NLT
The Old Testament book of Leviticus describes the sacrifices that had to be made to forgive and cover sins that were committed. The sacrifices didn’t take away the sin, only covered it. Someone had to pay for that sin committed. A blameless animal’s blood was shed on the alter with the perpetual fire of God under it. The fire was never to go out signifying God’s willingness and readiness to receive confession and offer forgiveness. The people of Israel needed continual atonement for their sin and the Lord would always accept their sacrifice on the altar. The fire was always burning.
Today we do not need to offer daily sacrifices to cover our sin. There was a perfect sacrifice made for us once and for all in the God-man Christ Jesus. “Christ suffered for our sins once for all time. He never sinned, but he died for sinners to bring you safely home to God.” (1Pt.3:18 nlt) Not only are our sins forgiven but we gain entrance into the kingdom to God as we accept Christ as our savior. Our sin that kept alienated from God has been forgiven and taken away. We have now been reconciled to God for the sin that kept us apart. It has been taken away by the blood of Christ, something that the blood of bulls and goats could never do.
But, we still have a problem. Although assured of forgiveness and eternal life with Christ we still sin in this life. So what do we do? The symbolism of God’s perpetual fire still applies for us today. Fire destroys but it also purifies. God is ready to forgive us our sins and restore us to fellowship with Him as we confess them to Him. The fire still burns. Ask Him daily to purify you as you confess your sins to Him.
Finding comfort through mourning sounds like an oxymoron. They fit perfectly together as Jesus spoke in the second beatitude, “Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.” How can mourning bring me comfort, you ask? It all depends on your relationship with Jesus Christ.
The late John R. W. Stott, theologian and evangelical Anglican preacher had written; “The truth is that there are such things as Christian tears, and too few of us ever weep them.” Weeping tears over the sins and conditions of the world, including our own before a Holy God brings about true mourning. It also brings about the reality of who God is and who we are before Him. It brings about true repentance as we see ourselves before God. Confessing our sins, turning away from them, and living a life pleasing to Him result in immense joy and comfort.
The question becomes how often have you been comforted by our Lord through mourning? I need to ask myself the same the question. Do we truly mourn and weep as the Old Testament prophets, the apostle Paul and even Jesus did over the sins of people? Do we shed tears over our own sins? Do we come clean before God, admitting our sin before Him through mourning? Confessing our sins by shedding tears will open the door to true comfort of forgiveness, grace, and mercy. Jesus said, “Blessed are they that mourn (those who shed Christian Tears) for they shall be comforted.”
“For Herod had arrested and imprisoned John as a favor to his wife Herodias (the former wife of Herod’s brother Philip). John had been telling Herod, ‘It is against God’s law for you to marry her.’” Matthew 14:3-4 NLT
“I mind my own business and I do not judge others, after all who am I to judge? Didn’t even Jesus say, ‘Judge not, that you be not judged?’ I am a sinner just as the rest of the world; therefore I am in no position to point out the sins of others. Also there’s an old saying that goes something like this, ‘Be careful when you point your finger at someone for you have three fingers pointed back at you.’”
Do the above quotes sound familiar to you? Have you used them yourself, living your life in line with them? Is your attitude towards others ‘live and let live’ not concerning yourself with what is right or wrong in God’s eyes? Do you accept the sinful things of the world due to the fact that you do not have the courage to call sin what it is? After all you do not want to hear, ‘who are you to tell me how I should live!” You are not alone in this, I am in this with you, but we have an example of one who was not afraid to call sin a sin and to call it out in high places, John the Baptist.
We should not be surprised that a man who lived in the wilderness clothed in camels hair and whose diet consisted of locusts and wild honey would have the nerve to call out the king for his sin. But John the Baptist was much more than what his image portrayed. He was Jesus’s forerunner preparing his Jewish brethren for the coming Messiah. John the Baptist was called of God for this ministry before his birth and carried it out flawlessly which included calling out the Pharisees and Sadducees naming them ‘brood of vipers!’ The Baptizer was one called of God to conduct God’s plan for his life, a forerunner who baptized and called out sin.
Every Christian is also called of God to conduct His plan for us. Part of that plan is to call sin what it is. We may not be baptizers, pastors, teachers, or elders, but every Christian is responsible to recognize sin wherever it is and call it out. The first place to start is with our own lives. We need to deal with our sin before the Lord confessing and repenting. There is no joy in standing before a holy God and confessing what He already sees in us, but may we see that sin for what it is. May we thank the Lord for those who call out our sin to us, and may we be able to call sin what it is in the lives of others, even ‘rebuking sin in high places.’
“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.” Psalm 23:4 ESV
Life is not easy. Sometimes it is downright hard and difficult to manage. Have you ever thought why it is this way? So many of us cannot except the fact that bad things happen to good people, and it is true that bad things do happen to ‘good’ people. But how do we define ‘good’? Let’s see how God defines good. It says in Psalm 14, “The LORD looks down from heaven on the children of man, to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God. They have all turned aside; together they have become corrupt; there is none who does good, not even one.” (Ps.14:2-3 esv) It looks like the word ‘good’ does not define any of us.
The reason ‘good’ does not define us is that we all have a sin nature. Like it or not we have inherited this nature from our first parents, Adam and Eve. There is no changing it. The punishment for our sin is death, physical death separation from the body and spiritual death separation from God for all eternity. There is no comfort that can be found in the punishment for our sin.
When David the shepherd, later a warrior, and then king wrote the 23rd Psalm he wrote of the Lord’s (David’s shepherd) comfort all through life. David knew life was hard. He was aware of his sin many times as several of his psalms reflect. When David wrote, ‘even thought I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,’ it was not only his death he was referring to, but of the trials and tribulations that come upon all of us in this life. The rod and staff of his shepherd provided him with protection and safety.
David knew that physical death was the result of his sin as we should also realize. But more importantly is to know the results of our sin concerning the second death if not dealt with in this life. Jesus came to protect us from that second death and bring us to safety in eternal life Him and God the Father. It is not just physical death, or the struggles of this life in which we need a comforter, it is to save us from eternal separation from God and Jesus Christ in eternity. That is why we need a comforter.
“You have heard that our ancestors were told, ‘You must not murder. If you commit murder, you are subject to judgment. But I say, if you are even angry with someone, you are subject to judgment! If you call someone an idiot, you are in danger of being brought before the court. And if you curse someone, you are in danger of the fires of hell.’” Matthew 5:21-22 NLT
Our judicial system in the United States measures the punishment for a crime by determining what is appropriate according to the severity and circumstances of the crime. Obviously, a murder conviction would bring on a much stiffer penalty than an assault charge or shoplifting. More recently in the 21st century the law now includes “hate crimes.” According to the United States Department of Justice a “hate crime” is “a crime plus the motivation for committing the crime based on bias equals a hate crime. In the simplest terms, a hate crime must include both “hate” and a “crime.” (1) The FBI’s definition is “A hate crime is a traditional offense like murder, arson, or vandalism with an added element of bias………Hate itself is not a crime—and the FBI is mindful of protecting freedom of speech and other civil liberties.” (2)
Our Lord Jesus also had something to say about hate crimes 2,000 years ago. The scribes and the Pharisees in Jesus’s day had an external view of the law. The outward deeds that were seen and committed such as murder would never have be done by these religious leaders. They reasoned they had never broken the sixth commandment, “You shall not murder.” Jesus corrects their misguided thinking, “But I say, if you are even angry with someone, you are subject to judgment! If you call someone an idiot, you are in danger of being brought before the court. And if you curse someone, you are in danger of the fires of hell.” The real issue is the heart.
Anger, hate, and verbal abuse are the internal seeds of destruction that lead to murder. Jesus was pointing out the guilt of murder and inward sinful seeds resulting in abusive behavior are the same. Hate crimes are not only a product of our current society, but a product of a sinful heart since the fall of man in need of a Savior.
Beginning next week the world will celebrate another ‘Pride Month,’ the recognition of the LGBTQIA+ community. While ‘pride flags’ and colors of this revolution will be hard to miss in public venues as sporting events, concerts, playground activities, retail establishments, restaurants, libraries, and sadly many churches, a much larger community must witness and absorb what they consider offensive and immoral. They are not alone because God Himself is offended and He has a few things to say about pride and ‘Pride Month.’
“The fear of the LORD is to hate evil; Pride and arrogance and the evil way And the perverted mouth, I hate.” (Pr.8:13 nasb)
“There they cry out, but He does not answer Because of the pride of evil men.” (Job35:12 nasb)
“In pride the wicked hotly pursue the afflicted; Let them be caught in the plots which they have devised.” (Ps.10:2 nasb)
“On account of the sin of their mouth and the words of their lips, Let them even be caught in their pride, And on account of curses and lies which they utter.” (Ps.59:12 nasb)
“When pride comes, then comes dishonor.” (Pr.11:2 nasb)
‘“Proud,’ ‘Haughty,’ ‘Scoffer,’ are his names, Who acts with insolent pride.’” (Pr.21:24 nasb)
“ For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened……Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them…….For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error.” (Ro.1:21, 24, 26-26 nasb)
“Abraham introduced his wife, Sarah, by saying, ‘She is my sister.’ So King Abimelech of Gerar sent for Sarah and had her brought to him at his palace.” Genesis 20:2 NLT
FreeBibleimages.org
Abraham, the man of faith, the one known as a friend of God, becomes Abraham a deceiver once again. The story of Abraham should bring us all comfort to see one of the great icons of faith in the Bible had their failures too. Abraham was human and being human had a sin nature and having a sin nature would fall into sin on occasion. Today’s story is such an occasion.
After the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, Abraham knew his nephew Lot was spared and he decided to move towards the south and dwell between Gaza and the Mediterranean coast settling in the town of Gerar. Abraham did not learn his lesson from twenty-five years earlier repeating his same sin of deception. “While living there as a foreigner, Abraham introduced his wife, Sarah, by saying, ‘She is my sister.’ So King Abimelech of Gerar sent for Sarah and had her brought to him at his palace (Gen.20:1-2 nlt) We sometimes today find ourselves as time passes either forgetting or disregarding our past sins that got us into trouble. Abraham’s in good company, but of course it doesn’t excuse it.
Abraham’s main problem was his moment of faithlessness in God’s protection. He had just witnessed God answering his prayer in saving Lot but failed to recognize He could do the same for him. He was afraid as he was in Egypt that he would be killed for his wife. What Abraham told King Abimelech was partly true meaning it was also partly false. As in Genesis 12 Abraham told Pharoah the same half-truth. Abraham and Sarah were siblings who had the same father, but different mothers.
The expected did happen. Abraham did not die and Sarah was taken. But God intervened and came to King Abimelech in a dream telling him that Sarah is a married woman. God said that he would die along with all his people if Sarah was not return to her husband. Abimelech earnestly pleaded his innocence which the Lord was already aware of and He said, “Yes, I know you are innocent. That’s why I kept you from sinning against me, and why I did not let you touch her.” (Gen.20:6 nlt) God was the one who kept Sarah pure by His hand of grace keeping the king at bay. The promised child of the covenant that was to come through Abraham could have been compromised, a thought that should have come to Abraham’s mind when Abimelech took her.
Abimelech didn’t waste any time. “Abimelech got up early the next morning and quickly called all his servants together. When he told them what had happened, his men were terrified.” (Gen.20:8 nlt) The people of the Near East, although heathen, considered adultery a great sin. They wanted this problem rectified as soon as possible. King Abimelech acted with integrity, more so than Abraham, in this matter. He moved quickly and called for Abraham. ‘“What have you done to us?’ he demanded. ‘What crime have I committed that deserves treatment like this, making me and my kingdom guilty of this great sin? No one should ever do what you have done! Whatever possessed you to do such a thing?’” (Gen.12:9-10 nlt) It is an embarrassing situation when a heathen king rebukes a prophet of God. Equally embarrassing are the rebukes we Christians get today from our friends and family when we are on the wrong side of honesty.
Abraham offered his three flimsy excuses; the people of Gerar did not fear God, they would kill him for his wife, and Sarah was actually his half-sister. The Bible doesn’t record a spoken response from the king, but records Abimelech’s action to make things right. “Then Abimelech took some of his sheep and goats, cattle, and male and female servants, and he presented them to Abraham. He also returned his wife, Sarah, to him. Then Abimelech said, ‘Look over my land and choose any place where you would like to live.’” (Gen.20:14-15 nlt) It seems strange that despite Abraham’s sin of deception he is lavishly given gifts. Of course this is not a license to sin, but an example of the enormous riches and blessings God bestows on His children in spite of their sin. It seems that King Abimelech gave these gifts in a way to honor God.
Abimelech topped it off by giving Abraham 1,000 pieces of silver, the price of a slave in those days, to restore any honor Sarah may have lost before others. “This is to compensate you for any wrong I may have done to you. This will settle any claim against me, and your reputation is cleared.” (Gen.20:16 nlt) Abraham, the prophet, then prayed for Abimelech and the people for their afflictions to be gone, because God had prevented the women from becoming pregnant because of Sarah.
FreeBibleimages.org
Abraham repeated his sin of twenty-five years earlier in Egypt and the Lord delivered on His promise He made to Abraham twenty-five years earlier. “The LORD kept his word and did for Sarah exactly what he had promised. She became pregnant, and she gave birth to a son for Abraham in his old age. This happened at just the time God had said it would.” (Gen.21:1-2 nlt) The wait was over. God’s promised was fulfilled. Abraham named him Issac, meaning ‘laughter’ and circumcised him on the eighth day, according to the covenant.
God’s promised blessings continue throughout our lives. They will always be there in His timing despite our failures. Praise God for that!
