Passing the test

Have you ever experienced one of those moments where you inadvertently passed a test of your character? It was one of those moments where you did what was right simply because it was the right thing to do? I just had one of those moments. I didn't do anything grand, all I did was point out that some of the hours I was paid for during the last month were vacation hours and not regular work hours. Yet this moment of honesty gives me ecstacy, knowing that in some unassuming way I still care about righteousness, that in my heart of hearts I still love God.

I'll tell you a secret. It is in these little tests that our relationship with God stands or falls. Ultimately little sins quickly amount to real distance between us and God. Usually we think that great sins are what lead to a person's downfall, but sometimes great sins are followed by great repentance- which leads to reconciliation. Little sins tend to mount, over time, and create a corrosive and distructive effect upon our relationship with God. We tend to trivialize them, not realizing the gravity of our own decisions. The truth is people who have sinned the worst have often been vulnerable to transformation- a glance at scripture will reveal to obvious cases of this, the king Manasseh, who was perhaps the worst king in Judah's entire history and yet repented and is with our Lord now, and Paul- who was leading the crusade against Christians everywhere as a murderer, who turned around and became a great servant of Christ. Even a cursory glance at Saul and David- a real argument could be made that David's sins of adultery and murder were worse than Saul's sins of disobedience, but clearly David lived in relationship with God, and Saul lived on his own. It is this "living on our own" that is the most dangerous to our hearts, for as the little sins mount they kill us by leading us away from the master. If only a sin would occur that would be great enough to wake us up to the whole game- then we might repent, and rebuild our relationship with God. As long as nothing wakes us up to our true position we might ever walk farther and farther away from God, all the while smugly believing that the true sinners are those who fornicate or murder or whatever. We may even still be attending church, for the church itself acts as a barrier to recognition of our true condition. My prayer is that if you see yourself slowly tolerating sin, slowly walking away from God, take this moment to beg God for forgiveness. Perhaps it isn't too late if you see yourself being snared...

Your companion in Christ,
Sean