Something That Should Not Be There

Li Fuyan had been having the same headache on and on for the past four years. He’d tried every treatment imaginable to ease his throbbing headaches but nothing made much of a dent. It had all started after a failed robbery where he was attacked with a knife. The blade gave him lacerations on the right side of his jaw but he was able to escape with his life. Doctors finally decided to do an X-ray of his skull to see if there were any issues. Turns out the blade hadn’t just nicked his face. A rusty four-inch knife blade had been lodged in his skull the whole time. Once it was removed his headache went away.

This is similar to how sin treats us. Often, we struggle with a sinful temptation and maybe we feel like we escape the damage. However, if the desire finds a way in our hearts, it beings to corrupt. Some other struggles may seem unrelated but it’s really desire growing into lust.

But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death.

James 1:14-15

However, an X-Ray won’t see the problem, but a good look inside might. Often the pains we face have a root in sin we have not dealt with. That is why James later tells us in chapter five and verse 16 to “confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another so that you may be healed”. Don’t brush off Satan’s attacks. Make sure he hasn’t left something behind in our head that might bring us pain and misery.

Comments

Until Midnight

In Acts 20, there is the tragicomic event surrounding a young man by the name of Eutychus. He did what a lot of folks before and after him did, he fell asleep during a sermon. Unfortunately, he was setting in in the third story window at the time. So instead of nodding off and hitting the pew in front of him, he fell to his death. The good news was the apostle Paul was delivering the sermon and had the ability to bring him back. I don’t know, however, if we can judge Eutychus too harshly. The sermon had gone on till midnight. Paul wouldn’t finish it up till daybreak. That’s a long lesson. I know some folks that might want to jump out of a window if I had a lesson that long, yet these Christians wanted to be there to hear Paul. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not pushing for all night sermons but I think we might need to adopt these folks' dedication. They knew that Paul was only in town for a limited time only and they were determined to ...

The Gift You Give Yourself

I always hated buying gifts for my Mom. If I got her something like a new set of pans, it was like saying “Here’s something you can use to go make me something to eat”. A gift for her was seemingly a gift for me. There are however gifts you give that benefit you more than the receiver. For example, forgiveness. When you give it, you are giving it to yourself as much as you are giving it to them. Jesus said that when we forgive others it means God is forgiving us our wrongs (Matthew 6:14-15). I once read: “ Heaven is where everyone's forgiven. Hell is where nobody's forgiven. So, when we forgive we pull heaven down into our lives. When we withhold forgiveness, we pull hell up into our lives ” Give yourself something nice today, Forgive.

Why Does A Lion Tamer Use a Chair?

Ok, I know you have seen the image. A lion tamer enters in the cage of the beast and forces it to obey his commands using a whip, a gun and a chair. Now you can see how the whip and gun could come in handy but you might be wondering why a chair would intimidate an animal as powerful as a lion? Clyde Beatty taming a lion with a chair It's not that the lion is afraid of the chair -- it's that the lion is confused by the chair. Cats are single-minded, and the points of the chair's four legs bobbing around confuse the lion enough that it loses its train of thought. Casually put, the chair distracts the lion from wanting to claw the lion tamer's face off. The powerful creature could destroy the chair in moment’s notice but instead it is distracted into submission. It’s not too much different than how Satan controls us today. By the power of God we could overcome anything that he would use to subdue us. We can overcome the evil one (1 st John 2:13-14). ...

Ecclesiastes 12:10

Search This Blog