“For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just
one point is guilty of breaking all of it” – James 2:10
I was sitting here, asking the Lord to show me what I should
write this morning. When He brought James 2:10 to mind, I thought, “Lord, that
is not going to be easy. I will be stepping on someone’s toes.” That is about when
my toes started to hurt. There are some
things in my life that are not right – not acceptable in the sight of God – and
yet, for some things – persistent things, it would seem I have no real
compulsion to do anything about them. Oh – they are not what we would classify
as BIG sins – but then God does not regard sins on a scale, say 1 to 100. But they are things that have their root in
the Garden, part of my old nature, and try as I might – they seem to keep
popping up in the garden that is my life.
We recently bought a house in Texas – that is where the Lord
has us serving currently. There is a particular
weed that is growing in the back yard.
It has root-ball somewhere in the yard, but has sent out runners all
over the yard. The fragile looking plant is connected to some very large roots.
Have you ever wonder why weeds grow so easily while plants you want to grow,
don’t? For the time being we are just mowing them down when we cut the
grass. We don’t see them for a few days,
but they are still there. The simple
solution is to tolerate them – to manage the problem. To not let it get any worse. The right and
more challenging solution is to eliminate them.
That is the way it is with sin. There are things about each of us that
we know must be rooted out. We don’t
yield them to the Lord but try to eliminate them through our own determination. In failing that, we resolve to just put up
with them – like the weeds. Cut them down when they pop up. We try to manage the unmanageable. Believing
that the plant is the problem, when it is the root that produces the plant that
is the problem. The Apostle Paul had the same problem.
“We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual,
sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I
do not do, but what I hate I do. ……. So I find this law at work: Although I
want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight
in God’s law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law
of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. What a
wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? Thanks
be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!” – Romans 7:14-15,
21-25
We act as though we think that we are the only ones in the
struggle with sin. The truth is that all of us are to some degree. That struggle won’t stop until we see Jesus
face to face. But – in the meantime, we don’t have to be content with the
invasive nature of sin in our lives. The
answer is Jesus, the master gardener. I
have a good friend who volunteered with us some years back. As we worked together in a house I would come
across a problem and ask, “What do you think George?” He would look at me and
with a smile would say, “Jesus saves!” And so ….
“since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of
witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily
entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing
our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith.” – Hebrews 12:1-2
Our sin problem is a faith problem. The truth is that Jesus
is the answer and that will do …. don’t you think?
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