1. Obsessed with
Entertainment
2. Frozen in Sin
3. Unheeded Warnings
4. Little Sins
5. Lord Byron's Life
6. Backslidden
7. Water Logged
8. Sexually Transmitted Disease
9. Sins Restrictions Demand Surgery
10. Death fo the Permanent Record
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Phillip Myers, in Rome, Its
Rise and Fall, made this observation on the Romans: "Almost from the beginning,
the Roman stage was gross, and immorality was one of the main agencies
to which must be attributed the undermining of the originally sound moral
life of Roman society. So absorbed did the people become in the indecent
representations of the stage that they lost all thought and care of the
affairs of real life."
--Top
The story is told of an eagle perched on a block of ice
just above Niagra Falls. The swift current carried the ice and its majestic
passenger closer to the edge of the great precipice. The cries of other
birds and animals warning the eagle of danger that lay ahead were to no
avail. "I have great and powerful wings," he boasted. "I can fly from my
perch at any time. I can handle it." Suddenly the edge of the falls was
only a few feet away. The torrent of water rushed the block of ice over
the great falls. The eagle spread his powerful wings to mount up over the
impending doom only to discover too late that his claws had become frozen
to the cake of ice. Do I have to say more? None of us is immune to the
consequences of sin.
--Top
One of the stories that we enjoyed reading
to our young children is about a young farm girl named Mabel in the book
called Grandma's Attic. The first winter they had a new hand pump outside,
Mabel was warned by her uncle not to put her tongue on the pump handle
and discovered instantly what a mistake she had made. Any one of us can
imagine the pain she went through. It seemed like such a silly warning,
but the instant that she did it, she knew there was a problem.
There are many warnings in life about things that will
cause cancer or heart problems, or even moral problems in life. But unlike
putting your tongue on the pump handle, it isn't obvious right away that
it is a mistake and the wrong thing to do. And yet, later, often when it
is too late, the problems are very obvious. So the Bible says don't cheat,
don't lie, stay away from adultery, treat your wife or your husband with
love and respect. He's eager to help us minimize the freezing horrors of
life.
-- Pastor John Teevan, Personal Illustration.
--Top
There is an old saying that goes like this:
"It isn't the mountain ahead that wears you out, it's the grain of sand
in your shoe." Many a man, worried for fear he would not be able
to cross a mountain, has had to stop some miles before he crossed the foothills
because he had not taken time to clean out his shoes.
That has been the source of failure in many Christian
lives. Eager to avoid the big sins, your life may outwardly be one
of extreme piety, but if there are hidden imperfections - little pebbles
in your shoe - these will cause failure in your Christian life.
--Top
The Consequences of Lord Byrons Life
Lord Byron, a brilliant poet, spent his life in a mad search for pleasure. Moderns would say, "He tried to live it up." Then in despair he wrote:
The thorns I have reaped are of the tree I planted.
They have torn me and I bleed.
I should have known what fruit would spring from such a tree.
--Top
What a painful reminder of the consequences of sin: "You cannot backslide without suffering."
-- D. Martyn Lloyd Jones, Romans, Vol. 2, p. 29.
--Top
Like a piece of wood in a pond, a Christian can "float"
on the surface of sin and not get too wet. But, just as wood that
is in the water for too long gets waterlogged and sinks to the bottom,
so also does the Christian who spends too much time in sin.
--Top
Today, perhaps more than any other time, there is widespread
fear of contracting a sexually transmitted disease. In the next 24 hours,
more than 35,000 Americans will get a sexually transmitted disease -- that's
13 million people in the next year! A few years ago, there were just five
of these diseases -- today there are more than 34. And with the advent
of the killer AIDS virus, medical doctors are becoming prophets of doom.
Surgeon General C. Everett Koop and others predict that
unless cures are found or lifestyles are changed by the year 2000, our
plague-stricken generation could be sterile or give birth to more infected
or deformed children.
God wants to protect us from the nightmare of being infected
with diseases and provide us with peace of mind. God certainly had our
children's best interests at heart when he said we should abstain from
sexual immorality (1 Thess. 4:3).
--Top
Sins Restrictions demands Surgery
Recently a young man underwent surgery to remove
the pericardium, a paper-thin lining around his heart, because his had
enlarged to about three-fourths of an inch thick, restricting the function
of his heart muscle. The doctors said that when they slit the pericardium,
the heart immediately began to function about twice as fast as it had been
working.
As with an enlarged pericardium, sin cuts down on our
spiritual functioning, thus making us spiritually ill. We need to let the
Lord remove the sin that restricts us from functioning on a 100 percent
basis for our Lord.
--Top
Columnist Bob Green of the Chicago Tribune
has a theory about what's wrong with the world. He blames it on what he
calls the "Death of The Permanent Record." He recalls that grade-school
children once lived in fear of having their bad behavior noted on The Permanent
Record. Because of this, people learned in their youth to stop before they
did something deceitful or unethical. They didn't stop because they were
so good but for fear of having their actions written down.
Today, according to Bob Green, people have
come to the conclusion that there is no such thing as a permanent record.
In fact, they believe no one has a right to keep track. Green says that
with today's emphasis on our rights to privacy, if a school child were
ever threatened with something going on his permanent record, he would
probably file suit under the Freedom of Information Act and gain possession
of his files before recess.
--Top
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