JESUS IS A CHAIN BREAKER
Psalms 106:7 When our fathers were in Egypt, they gave not thought to your miracles; they did not remember your many kindnesses, and they rebelled by the sea, the Red Sea.
Sin does crazy thing to a person. One of those things is that it so draws us away from God that we seldom even think of him until we have something drastic in our life happen. Sin is like a whirlpool that begins to draw us in slowly, and then the next thing we know we are out of control. Sin is disobedience to God. It is doing what God said not to do, or not doing what he said to do. We respond to temptation that draws us into sin by many different ways. And if there are not enough already, we can come up with a few excuses on our own. Everybody does it, I can’t help myself, if God didn’t want me doing it he would keep me from it, Satan and the powers of darkness make me do it. The list can go on and on. The thing is it all starts at one point in everyone's life and this is our carnal nature or that aspect about us that says, “No, I want my will to be done God.” It is there at birth in us. It has been passed down from generation to generation. It is not part of our DNA that God made to decide who we are to be, but it is part of the inherited characteristics regarding our will or spirit. We even see it in the animal realm. From the same litter of puppies we can see some that are more dominate and bully the others. And we can see what some call the runt or submissive pup. It is not only smaller, but often more of a loner. Then there are the puppies that are in between the two. They all look like dogs but their character or temperament are all different. Even our two twin grandsons can at times be so different.
What draws us all together besides the carnal nature is how we go about handling it. Certainly a lot depends on our surroundings. We tend to become like our parents. Because of our love for our parents, we assume that what they do and the way they are should be the model for our life. This is why the sins of the parents are most often passed down to their children. It is not genetic, but rather influenced sin. This is why so often when we read of Israel’s history one king that worshiped idols would have another follow and so on. And the sad thing is that just like with our parents, those we associate with will also influence so much us that not only does our sin seem natural, but we never even think about the righteousness of God and his desire for us to be like him. We see the goodness in others and hear of the miracles of God, and it all goes over us like water off a duck's back.
The world doesn’t spend time praising the Lord for all the many blessing that he gives us. They are so caught up in the things of the world, and the acceptance of their sin that to do otherwise goes against their character. Before I became a Christian I would swear so much that I would do it and not even realize it. It would come out of my mouth without me even thinking. The reason was because what was coming out of my mouth was what was in my heart.
My heart transplant came about the day I asked Jesus to be my Lord and Savior. I not only asked him to forgive me of my sins, but to come into my heart and change me to become more like him. Just as Jesus forgave me of my sins, he changed what was in my heart. My wife was the first to bring it to my attention. When she told me that I hadn’t been causing so much, I was kind of taken by it. First I didn’t think I had been doing it so much, and I hadn’t noticed I had stopped doing it. You see the Lord had done a work of cleansing me of years of stuff that I carried in my heart. I had truly become born again. I was new in Jesus, and becoming daily more and more like him. And it was coming about as natural as a breath being taken. Even my thought life changed. I began to think about the Lord and how good he is, all the wonderful things he has done and his promises for blessings for me and not curses. The pendulum in my life was going 180 degrees in the opposite direction of what it had for 25 years. God was transforming me heart, soul and mind.
Today I am 69 years old and while I am still being perfected into Christ-likeness, I am so much better than when I first begun. My only regret is that at the moment of my first breath that I could have been passionately in love with Jesus as I am today, and that I could have been enjoying him daily in the life I lived. But I do have all eternity before me. The gates of hell have swung wide open for me and all how would like to follow Jesus. I don’t have to be as I once was. I am free to become all I can be in Jesus, for Jesus.
If you are still caught up sin and it seems like there is no way out for you, remember that the gates of hell are wide open for anyone to come out. There is still chance for you! All you have to do is call out to Jesus, and like the prodigal son’s father Jesus will come running to you. The decision is yours. He will respect your free will. Won’t you choose Jesus today?
Prayer: Thank you Jesus that we are not so locked into sin that there is no hope for us. We thank you that you have broken the chains that once bound us in sin. Please help us to always live a life that will only glorify you and bless your heart. We ask this in Jesus’ name.
