Chris' Christian Blog

January 12, 2022

"Judges 10:6-16
6 And the children of Israel did evil again in the sight of the Lord, and served Baalim, and Ashtaroth, and the gods of Syria, and the gods of Zidon, and the gods of Moab, and the gods of the children of Ammon, and the gods of the Philistines, and forsook the Lord, and served not him.

7 And the anger of the Lord was hot against Israel, and he sold them into the hands of the Philistines, and into the hands of the children of Ammon.

8 And that year they vexed and oppressed the children of Israel: eighteen years, all the children of Israel that were on the other side Jordan in the land of the Amorites, which is in Gilead.

9 Moreover the children of Ammon passed over Jordan to fight also against Judah, and against Benjamin, and against the house of Ephraim; so that Israel was sore distressed.

10 And the children of Israel cried unto the Lord, saying, We have sinned against thee, both because we have forsaken our God, and also served Baalim.

11 And the Lord said unto the children of Israel, Did not I deliver you from the Egyptians, and from the Amorites, from the children of Ammon, and from the Philistines?

12 The Zidonians also, and the Amalekites, and the Maonites, did oppress you; and ye cried to me, and I delivered you out of their hand.

13 Yet ye have forsaken me, and served other gods: wherefore I will deliver you no more.

14 Go and cry unto the gods which ye have chosen; let them deliver you in the time of your tribulation.

15 And the children of Israel said unto the Lord, We have sinned: do thou unto us whatsoever seemeth good unto thee; deliver us only, we pray thee, this day.

16 And they put away the strange gods from among them, and served the Lord: and his soul was grieved for the misery of Israel.

prompt
In the above passage we see how God wants our first love and complete loyalty, not shameful crys from an

unrepentant heart. What is the difference between using God and crying out to him in true faith?"

I think a lot of people want to use God like a magic genie. They pull the lamp down when they are in trouble but only when they are in trouble. Then when the trouble subsides they forget about God.

I think another problem is human attitude about God. Many of us believe that Christians become saved, God wipes out our sin, and we never sin again. This however has not been my experience nor is this experience the human experience. Yes we are restored to a right standing with God when we are saved. Perfection is not part of the process though. Perfection only comes when we pass into eternity. While we remain on earth we remain in the flesh and the flesh is weak. There is sin in my life that I have prayed about and begged God to remove because I am weak and helpless against it. God seems in no hurry to remove it. Then it occurred to me that God is omnipresent and omniscient. He is everywhere and knows everything. He sees sin on a daily basis and it is always in His face. He died to eradicate it and His patience is so much better than ours. If He removed all sin from me He would still see sin in billions of others. My sin is hideous but I cannot fix sin on my own. God will fix it when He is ready to fix it. Perfection is a process. It is not an event.

Does this mean that I condone sin or that God is saying to go ahead and sin because we are going to anyway until He deals with it? No! It does not mean that. It means we should hate sin as much as God does. What we should not do is think we can overcome sin ion our own strength. We cannot overcome sin. God will remove sin in His time. During the meantime the gossip who cannot overcome the sin of gossiping should not sit in judgement of the adulterer who cannot overcome the sin of adultery. We are to love one another and allow God to remove our blemishes. He will do so in His time.


Prompt: "I have a meeting tomorrow morning so I am sending out the prompt before I forget.

I was cruising the multiverse with Spiderman today when his spider sense started tingling. We looked and there was a star we had not seen before. Alan Davies writes

STATIC

Capturing Mother's Colors  (E) Verdant Poetry Contest Entry #2003859 by Alan Davies

about a woman's frustrations in painting. Do you ever get frustrated writing and can't quite express it? Tell us about it."

My meeting today was cancelled because four of the key players are down with COVID-19. They will be okay. They are all symptomatic and ill, but on the road to recovery. We are going to try to hold the meeting next week.

I have felt like the lady the author speaks of many times. I was in an auto accident once that left me with a non-paralyzing compression fracture of the C-4 vertebra in my neck, a skull fracture, and a traumatic brain injury (TBI). As a result of the TBI I often have ideas in my head but translating those ideas to my hands or expressing them on paper is impossible. I can see it clearly in my head and fully understand. Expressing it though is not possible for me. It can be very frustrating.