The Bible tells us there will be a time when mankind calls good, evil and evil, good. In America, that time is now. The constant media programming (according to recent surveys, the average person watchs 44 hours of television per week) has convinced people that alternative life styles are perfectly acceptable, that premarital sex is normal, and if it feels good do it. Anything goes.
The church has not escaped unscathed. God's call to the church to "be ye separate" is today falling on deaf ears. It has been my observation, that Chrisitans have become unclear about what is sin and what is not sin. The media's constant message that anything goes has had an impact. Many Christians think that they can play with sin and get away with it by just simply asking forgiveness -- not experiencing sorrow and remorse for their willfull transgression against the known will of god. If you are sincere in your confession, God will forgive you, but that does not mean there will be no consequences. God takes willful sin seriously. Let's examine three stories from the Bible.
The first story is about King David, chosen by God as a young boy to rule Israel. David was a warrior, successfully carrying out one exploit after another against the enemies of God. We are probably are all familiar with his victory over Goliath, the giant Philistine. David was a great man, used mightily by God. But there is one more thing you need to know about David. David, one of the Old Testament heroes of the Bible and friend of God, was a sinner.
In 2Samuel, Chapter 11, we find the story of David & Bathsheba. It was in the spring, at the time when kings go off to war, David sent Joab out with the king's men and the whole Israelite army. They destroyed the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. But David remained in Jerusalem. One evening David got up from his bed and walked around on the roof of the palace. From the roof he saw a woman bathing. The woman was very beautiful, and David sent someone to find out about her. The man said, "Isn't this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam and the wife of Uriah the Hittite?" Then David sent messengers to get her. She came to him, and he slept with her. Then she went back home. The woman con- ceived and sent word to David, saying, "I am pregnant." So David wrote a letter to Uriah's commander to "Put Uriah in the front line where the fighting is fiercest. Then withdraw from him so he will be struck down and die." and Uriah was killed. When Uriah's wife heard that her husband was dead, she mourned for him. And After the time of mourning was over, David had her brought to his house, and she became his wife and bore him a son. But the thing David had done displeased the LORD.
And so we find that David had not only committed adultery, but was guilty of murder as well. David repented of his sin and was forgiven by God, and yet there was a price to pay for his sin.
And the Lord spoke to David through the prophet Nathan:
'I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you from the hand of Saul. I gave your master's house to you, and your master's wives into your arms. I gave you the house of Israel and Judah. And if all this had been too little, I would have given you even more. Why did you despise the word of the LORD by doing what is evil in his eyes? You struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword and took his wife to be your own. You killed him with the sword of the Ammonites. Now, therefore, the sword will never depart from your house, because you despised me and took the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your own.'
"This is what the LORD says: 'Out of your own household I am going to bring calamity upon you. Before your very eyes I will take your wives and give them to one who is close to you, and he will lie with your wives in broad daylight. You did it in secret, but I will do this thing in broad daylight before all Israel.'"
Then David said to Nathan, "I have sinned against the LORD."
Nathan replied, "The LORD has taken away your sin. You are not going to die. But because by doing this you have made the enemies of the LORD show utter contempt, the son born to you will die." How sad. You see sin always has a price. Sin always exacts a payment. David was forgiven, but his son was forfeit.
The second story is also about David. It is found in 1 Chronicles 21, we find where David, tempted by Satan into taking a census of His fighting men against the will of God. After the census was taken, the scripture tells us that David was conscience-stricken after he had counted the fighting men, and he said to the LORD, "I have sinned greatly in what I have done. Now, O LORD, I beg you, take away the guilt of your servant. I have done a very foolish thing." Before David got up the next morning, the word of the LORD had come to Gad the prophet, David's seer: "Go and tell David, 'This is what the LORD says: I am giving you three options. Choose one of them for me to carry out against you.'" So Gad went to David and said to him, "Shall there come upon you three years of famine in your land? Or three months of fleeing from your enemies while they pursue you? Or three days of plague in your land? Now then, think it over and decide how I should answer the one who sent me." David said to Gad, "I am in deep distress. Let us fall into the hands of the LORD, for his mercy is great; but do not let me fall into the hands of men." So the LORD sent a plague on Israel from that morning until the end of the time designated, and seventy thousand of the people from Dan to Beersheba died.
Again David repented and was forgiven, but again there was a price to pay - the death of 70,000 men. Sin always exacts payment from the sinner.
The third story is probably one we are all familiar with. It is the story of Adam and Eve. God made man from the dust of the earth and breathed the breath of life into him. Eve was created from the rib of man as His help mate and companion. And after they had been created God put them into the garden of Eden. And the LORD God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die."
But Satan in the form of a serpent appeared to Adam and Eve and told them a different story. The serpent said to the Eve, "Did God really say, 'You must not eat from any tree in the garden'?" "You will not surely die," the serpent said to the woman. "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." And So Adam & Eve disobeyed God and eat the forbidden fruit. And there sin exacted payment fro Adam and Eve. The Lord God said to the woman, "What is this you have done?" The woman said, "The serpent deceived me, and I ate." So the LORD God said to the serpent, "Because you have done this, "Cursed are you above all the livestock and all the wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel."
To the woman he said, "I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you."
To Adam he said, "Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, 'You must not eat of it,' "Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life.
It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return."
Then the LORD God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them. And the LORD God said, "The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever." So the LORD God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.
There several points I would like to make about this portion of scripture.
1) Notice that in the midst of the Garden were found two trees: The Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.
And God counseled Adam that he might eat freely of everything in the garden, but not of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil; ``for God said that in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shall surely die''. This was the only requirement imposed on Adam and Eve and it was obviously for their own good as God warned them that: "in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shall surely die''.
They lived a perfect existence in fellowship with God, until the day that Satan, in the form of a serpent, lied to them and they chose to obey Satan, rather than to obey God. They had a choice to make. To obey God, or to obey Satan the Devil. They choose to obey Satan and were exiled from God's presence and became mortal.
Notice that God had not denied Adam access to the Tree of Life; it was only after he sinned by disobeying God that he lost free access to the Tree of Life. As a result of their sin they would no longer live forever, but they would now be mortal as God said "from dust you came and to dust you shall return."
They ate, in disobedience to God, from the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil. In effect decided to be like God, determining for themselves what is right and what is wrong, what is good and what is evil. Determining what is good and what is evil is reserved for God alone, it is not up to man to decide what is right and what is wrong. God is the creator of the heaven and the earth. He determines what is right and wrong, it is not up to us. What is right is what God says is right. What is wrong is what God says is wrong.
The same sin of Adam & Eve of trying to play God in determining for themselves what is right and what is wrong committed by Adam and Eve is being committed today as we hear on television time and time again...if it feels good do it. Anything Goes. For example, The media says Homosexuality is not wrong...it is an alternative lifestyle...but God says it is wrong and like all sin, there is a price to pay for those who engage in this sin. It says in Romans Chapter 1 that:
For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles. Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator--who is forever praised. Amen. Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, AND RECEIVED IN THEMSELVES THE DUE PENALTY FOR THEIR PERVERSION (emphasis added)." God says Homosexuality is wrong and He means it. Jesus died for all men and woman, to make it possible for everyone to go to Heaven and have eternal life, but this is only possible if we forsake sin, follow God's plan of salvation through Jesus Christ, and strive to live a life that is pleasing and acceptable to God.
The philosophy that there is no right or wrong is what Satanists teach today. They teach that every person shall be a god. Alexander Crowley, the famous Satanist, summed it up as follows: ``Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law''. In other words, anything goes; you decide what is good and what is evil. Well this is just not true.
Adam and Eve chose this path and faced God's judgment. They were exiled from His presence, denied access to the Tree of Life, and became slaves to Satan. Romans 6:16 clearly indicates that to whom you yield yourselves, his servants or slaves you become. Adam and Eve had become slaves to Satan and, as slaves, forfeited the right to rule the planet. Their intimate fellowship with God was broken through disobedience (sin) to God and they and all mankind becomes slaves to sin and the devil.
The Bible says that sin is at the door of each of our lives and its desire is to have us. Even Peter, the great disciple and apostle of God, when he sinned by resisting the will of God, came under the devil's authority and in Luke 22:31 Jesus says to Simon Peter: "Simon, Simon, Satan has asked (demanded his right) to sift you as wheat, but I Jesus have prayed for you Simon.
You see when you sin, you give Satan legal right to afflict your life. The Bible tells us that "when the hedge row is broken a serpent will bite". When we sin, Satan the accuser goes before the throne of God and demands his right to sift us like wheat.
Satan came to earth for three reasons. To kill, to maim and destroy, but Jesus came to give us life and life abundantly (John 10:10). In fact, in 1John 3.8 we find out that the reason Jesus appeared was to destroy all the works of the devil. In John 8:32 we find out Jesus came to set the captives free.
We are born into this world as slaves to sin. Sin always exacts a payment -- and the ultimate payment is spiritual death and eternal separation from God in Hell. The wages of Sin is death, but the good news is that Jesus came to set us free. In his great love for mankind, He provided a plan of redemption; a redeemer would come forth, the Messiah of Israel, Jesus the Christ, who would redeem mankind back to God. But God in his great love for us provided a plan of restoration that would enable us to come back into the family of God.
We catch our first glimpse of His plan, back in the Genesis account of Adam and Eve. Adam & Eve did not surprise God when they rebelled against God in sin. God is all-knowing. In fact, one of the first thing God did after they sinned was to make a covering for them of animal skins. Leviticus tells us that without the spilling of blood, there is no forgiveness from sin (Lev 17:11; Heb 9:22). In other words, the blood of an innocent animal was spilled so that their sin might be covered. The spilling of blood in order to cover sins, was the basis of the Jewish sacrificial system.
Throughout Jewish history hundreds of thousands upon hundreds of thousands of ``lambs bulls and goats without blemish'', were sacrificed for atonement for sin. And yet God says in Psalm 50:7-15 that He does not desire the blood of bulls and goats. Incredible. Then why was the sacrificial system instituted by God in the first place? Clearly, it was so the Jewish people could recognize their ``Kinsman-Redeemer'', their Messiah, their ``Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world''. This was Jesus who came to earth, lived a sinless life and in the fullness of time died the most excruciating death known to mankind.
Jesus spilled His precious blood to pay the price and to give us the right to be born into the family of God, redeemed from Satan's control. But this can only occur if we are adopted back into the family of God. God is spirit; therefore, to be adopted requires a spiritual rebirth. This is what Jesus was talking about when he told Nicodemus that he must be born again (born from above [John 3:3]). If we're not born into the family of God, Jesus can't redeem us. But if we'll just ask God to forgive our sins and ask Jesus to become Lord of our lives, then He will also become our Redeemer. We will be spiritually regenerated (reborn) into God's family. God will seal us with the Holy Spirit, the guarantee of our redemption when Jesus comes again.
But without Christ in our life, we can't stop sinning. Each one of us, because of the sin of Adam and Eve, are born into Satan's kingdom, we are by nature, the bible says, children of wrath. We are sinners not so much of what we do, but because of who we are. Sin is like a disease in each one of us and therefore we can't save ourselves -- we can't stop sinning. Romans 6:17 says we are slaves to sin. But God has not forsaken us, out of love and compassion for each one of us, God sent His only begotten son, Jesus, to this earth, who lived a sinless life, and then in the fullness of time, went to the cross to die for our sins. Jesus tasted of sin and death so we would have the opportunity to have eternal life.
God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten son that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. It doesn't matter how many sins you have committed or how bad they were, you can still be forgiven, given and gain everlasting life in heaven. God says to us through Isaiah: let us reason together, though your sins be as red as scarlet, they will be as white as snow. Forgiveness and eternal life are available though the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ paid the price for our sin. And when we receive accept His free gift of salvation, we become His child once again. He gives us the power to overcome sin. But even if we miss the mark and sin, the Bible tells us that then when we repent that Jesus will forgive your sin and cleanse you from all righteousness. Jesus, at the right hand of God, is constantly making intercession with the Father on our behalf.
Jesus in the 13th chapter of Matthew (verse 45-46) tells us that the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant seeking beautiful pearls, who when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that He had in order to buy it. The merchant was Jesus Christ, who sold and put aside all he had with the Father, to become a man, to live a sinless and perfect life and in the fullness of time to die the most excruciating death ever recorded, so He could buy that pearl of great. And that pearl of great price was you and I. You are not your own, you have been bought at a great price. In Hebrews 12:2 we find that Jesus counted it joy to endure the cross, despite the shame, so we could have a right to become once again children of God. Yes Jesus paid the price on the cross for all of our sins. He died, so we would not have to, but could live once again forever in heaven with Him.
We have a choice to make. We can do our own thing and remain slaves to sin and servants of Satan who wants to maim, destroy and kill you, or you can serve Jesus Christ who died so you could have life. Jesus himself said, that he did not come to judge the world, but to save it. The choice is yours, choose this day whom you will serve: Satan or God.
Jesus in Rev 3:3 says Behold I stand at the door of your life and knock, If you will open the door I will come in and fellowship with you. We can have fellowship with God once again as Adam and Eve had fellowship with God be fore the fall of Man, if, if, if you will open the door of your heart and let him into your life. The Bible says that if you ask forgiveness for your sins Jesus will forgive you and cleanse you from all unrighteousness. The Bible says that when you repent and ask forgiveness of your sins and ask Jesus to come into your heart, you will be spiritually reborn, born of the spirit, Jesus will come inside to live with you, to be your Lord and your Savior so you can once again have not only eternal life in heaven with the Father, but have life abundantly on the earth as well. The Bible says that when you are born again, you become a new person. The old is washed away, Behold I make all things new. You have a fresh start and the ability to serve God once again. God says He has a plan for each one of you, a plan to prosper you.
But you must receive the free gift of salvation, it is not automatic. As Adam and Eve willfully sinned and were separated from God, now each one of you individually, must decide to accept the free gift of salvation offered to you by Jesus Christ. But you have to reach out your hand and take it from him. You see it is not automatic. Jesus, through his sacrifice on your behalf, gave you the right to become children of God. You have to exercise your rights by asking God to forgive you, repenting of your sins (with God's help, stop sinning), and ask Him into your life as Lord and Savior.
Jesus says that if you acknowledge me before men, I will acknowledge you before my Father who is in Heaven. So I ask you now to acknowledge that you want to accept from Jesus the free gift of salvation by standing up now and saying out loud a prayer of salvation. You must say it out loud, don't just think it, because the bible says that it is when you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord of your life, and believe in you heart that God raised Him from the dead, that you will be saved.
If you once knew God, but have walked away from Him, the Bible says that if you return to God, God will return to you. So if you want to recommit your life to God and His ways or if if you haven't as let done what the God says you must do to be forgiven your sins and have eternal life, then please pray the following prayer.
Father I recognize I am a sinner. I have sinned against you. I am truly sorry for my sin. So right now, in Jesus name, I ask forgiveness for my sins. I turn from them and with your help I will not commit them any more. I open the door of my heart now Jesus and ask to come in to my life...to be my Lord and my Savior...to make me a new creation in Christ. I want to walk with God, to be a man or woman after God's own heart. In Jesus name I pray, Amen.
If you prayed that prayer, please send us an EMAIL and let us know. We will send you back some free information that will help you get started in your new walk with God.
"Watch and pray, therefore, that you would be counted worthy to escape the judgment that is coming upon the earth and be able to stand before the Son of Man" (Luke 21:36).
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