?☕ BIBLE BREAKFAST (#346) 03/05/20 (English)
“Wicked things – part 3 (hatred)…”
? Psalm 101:3 “I will set nothing wicked before my eyes; I hate the work of those who fall away; It shall not cling to me.”
▪️One time, a person called me, if not every day, then every other day. I had never met him before; he was from a different state. He called me, and every time, with the same request: “pray with me over the phone, I have sinned again”…
▪️This continued on long and happened so often that honestly, I got tired of these phone calls. I understood how the ministers from his church felt who, in his words, refused to listen and pray with him anymore.
▪️The sin that tortured him truly did cling to him like David wrote; or how the author of Hebrews wrote, “the sin which so easily ensnares us…” (Hebrews 12:1); or what I call “chronic sin” (if God allows, we will talk more about this in this Sunday’s sermon).
▪️I stopped praying with him. However, understanding his main problem in why he was returning to this sin over and over again, I began telling him about this. As a result, the phone calls stopped (I don’t know if he had listened to me and the sin left him or if he just didn’t like my advice).
▪️What was his problem? Why did he come back to that sin over and over, even though he prayed and asked God for forgiveness?
▪️There were things in his life that were the source of his temptations and I told him that he must break all ties and leave these things. But he could not decide to leave and destroy these things like David said: “I will set nothing wicked before my eyes”.
▪️He wanted to have freedom from sin and for God to free him and forgive him, but at the same time, he didn’t want to leave behind that which drew him into sin every time.
▪️Every time he sinned, he felt guilty for the committed sin. Unfortunately, however, he did not have true hatred or disgust towards this sin, like David wrote: “I hate the work of those who fall away“. But this is important.
▪️Hatred – this is not just “I don’t like this but I can be patient”. Hatred- is when you don’t like something so much that you use every effort to make the decision to depart from that which you don’t like.
▪️For this, God has given us a specific weapon for offense and protection (Ephesians 6:10-18). (I will talk more about this in Sunday’s sermon).
▪️Yes, it was not pleasant for him and his conscience was judging him. But because this sin brought certain pleasure or enjoyment (the devil always holds sin in beautiful wrapping), when the guilt faded or was dulled down, the body, wanting to sin, was victorious in doing so because the weapon that would have defeated it was not being used.
▪️Everything decisive, unconditional, ruthless, even that which was paid for, the destruction of all “wicked things”, that which entices you, pulls you, reminds you, and tempts you to sin- is “hatred of wicked actions”, victorious defeat over all sinful temptations!
▪️If you do not have this feeling of hatred towards sin and do not have decisive actions, there will be no victory. Jesus forgives all sin and gives us the opportunity to defeat it so that it does not control us. The only question is, do we apply this in our lives?
? Have a good day and a victorious mood with victory upon all sin! (With prayer, Valeriy Bayko).
? P.S. If needed, share this with others. Thank you for the re-post.