The "Don'ts"

I was amused by my son when his mother told him that the item he was chewing on “doesn’t go in your mouth.” His reply was “does it go in my ear?” I don’t know if he is old enough to have developed a smart mouth or if he was just curious, but it got me to thinking about how often we are told what not to do but not what to do. I see this often times in lessons designed for young people. They tend to focus on the big “Don’t”s of adolescent. As important as these are, this focus can leave kids with the impression that Christianity is a faith based on what you don’t do rather than a faith of action. The truth is a person can never do any of the “Don’t”s but still be lost. True Christian living is as much about the thing good works and action we do as it is about what we avoid. A faith that has no action is dead.