I admit, I did venture out in my car to try the streets and go the bank--which is conveniently in walmart. Never again. There are idiots on the roads who think that driving on 2 inches of ice with pressed snow on top is a free ticket to drive--upwards of 30. FALSE. After I had my ice wreck two years ago I was nervous enough. I was going so slow I'm pretty sure the trucks behind me were doing sign language--and not the "I love you" kind. I should have stayed inside and blogged. I wouldn't have been shaking as much. By the time I got to walmart, parked, and went inside, it was about 20 minutes before the bank closed. So I did my business and walked around the store trying to get up the nerve to go back outside. I think I had Kyle worried because I told him I was there.....and was there for a long time before he called to ask if I was ok. Yeah--just being a wimp. After fish tailing a few times and calling the people passing me "idiot" and "dummy" I made it home and swore that I would never need body wash that badly again.
I apologize if you were driving on Judge Ely yesterday and passed a Nissan Murano with a young woman clutching the wheel for dear life and going upwards of 10 miles per hour. She might have been me....and you might have been called an idiot if you passed me.
BUT on to much more amazing things....
How often do we get sick and go to the doctor for meds? I've gone quite a bit in the last year. When I go, I normally don't really care about what's causing my sickness. I just want to feel better! The doctor gives me antibiotics that treat the symptoms, and as soon as I start feeling better I usually stop taking them. Sadly, sometimes I stop taking them too quickly so the actual illness isn't cured--just the symptoms. In some cases, the sickness comes back full force and I have built up a resistance to the medications because I didn't let them completely kill the root of the problem.
How often do we do that as Christians? How often do we do that in our own lives? I know I have done it so many times. We see areas that concern us and we try to treat the sin. We want to fix the rebellious attitude--we want to immediately change a course of action, without knowing why the action was being taken in the first place. I know, I sound like a psychologist here, but follow this through with me.
If a person doesn't know Jesus, then obviously we are going to take every sin back to their fallen state and believe that if they accept Him, then the root of the sin is taken care of.
HA.
Ok, that's the fix for the moment. .... but when was the last time you sinned? Assuming you are a believer, have you been perfect from the time you accepted Jesus?
If you have, then I'm a goner.
So what is the root of our sin problems after we accept Christ? Obviously we have a root of something that is battling the Christ in us.
For me, the root of certain sins in my life is the sad truth that I often take my eyes off Him. When I do that, I see in me a sin nature so sick that it frustrates and shocks me. I can stray just as far away from His side as I like-----because I no longer see His holiness leading me.
At other times, I see selfishness as the root of my sin. Getting ready for marriage is an awesome time to realize all the areas of sin that need fixing before your beloved husband has to deal with them. An area that I see is selfishness. No, I don't mean I am selfish in "do it all for me"....that's not my attitude. But in the way I have a mood when Kyle's hurt my feelings--rather than going to him and telling him I'm hurt and we need to talk it through--I usually clam up, get moody, and feel sorry for myself, hoping he'll notice and come asking what's wrong.
After typing that confession...I feel like a heel. Because that's the selfish nature to which I'm referring. It's an attitude of "I want HIM to come seek out the problem" so I don't have to face confrontation on my own accord. Therein lies a root of some sin problems I've been encountering lately.
So it's not the action of moodiness I should be "treating"...it's the attitude of selfishness that is the problem.
In our Christian communities we want to help organizations battle abortion, gay marriages, political policies, and so many other areas. We can do a great job and give a lot of money toward something that attempts to fix the statistics and balm the pain of the problem. But those hurting people caught in their sin don't need a topical medicine to treat the pain. They need the root of the sin taken care of. What does that require? Time. Time and discipleship that can't be gained in a quick "ABC prayer and a pamphlet." We can treat a lot of illness, but God has come in an seeks to fix the root of sin in your life everyday. So why not seek to help them solve the root of theirs?
Stop trying to fix the mini skirt....and fix the seductive heart wanting the attention of others because she isn't secure in her God enough to walk alone.
Maybe I'm off my rocker--if so, tell me. But I just wonder what would happen if I sought to help find a root of sin in a person's life--and through prayer and giving of my time they were able to find not only the balm for the problem, but find the ugly, God-denying, deep-digging, life-damaging root--and let God dig it out of them.
Just a thought......
Maybe it could make an everlasting change for a few more lives.
Because HE lives,
Sarah
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