Intolerable

Sin is intolerable. Why are we so prone to make excuses and make no effort to admit that we are a sinner? People go to AA and the first thing they have to say is, “Hi my name is so and so and I am an alcoholic.” They have to admit their problem. Our problem is that we sin. And sin brings the wrath of God=death. Why don’t we understand that? Why don’t I understand that? Why do I find myself daily sinning and falling short of the glory of God?

These past few days the Lord has been relieving sin in my life. The mundane ones where I never really thought it was a big deal to the deep dirty ugly ones. I have spent night after night confessing them, mind you new ones, to my Savior, the only one that could rid me of those horrible things, and I cry, not because of shame but the love I feel from Jesus who wants to free me of those sins and lies that Satan has a hold on me. He embraces me with each confession and tells me that He will help me. And daily I feel freedom in Him and confident that He will guide me to a freer life.

“Unconfessed sin blocks our fellowship with God and with one another, reaping destructive consequences in these relationships. Confession, on the other hand, intentionally moves us out of darkness into light so that our sin is exposed, forgiven, and purified.” (Today in the Word) - John 3:19-21.

My unknown sins were blocking my relationship with God and I didn’t know it, but the Lord so graciously showed them to me. I thought I was doing well, but as it is written in 1 Corinthians 10:12, “If you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall.” I am so glad that the Lord caught me before I fell. I would have fell flat on my face thinking I was standing on firm ground. The thing is, we are never on strong ground. Yes when we give our lives to the Lord Jesus Christ, sin’s death grip on us is no more, but daily we are tempted. “To walk in the light does not mean we are sinless; we will sin, and the denial of this sin inhibits our fellowship with God.” (Today in the Word). So we have to have a strategy, what are we going to do when temptation is in our face? In my book, “every woman’s battle”, the author writes how sometimes we fall in a false guilt, when we think because we are tempted we have sin and commit sin because we think to ourselves well we thought it, oh well. Our sin occurs when we actually fall into the temptation and do what we are not supposed to do. The world is going to seduce us and when it does we need to run, especially when we are still struggling with the sin. There may come a point when it’s not even a temptation, but even then, do not think you are standing firm, for you may fall.

P and I would go through seasons of our life where we could clean out of DVD collection. We would go through it and toss out the rated R ones, the PG-13 ones with sex scenes in them, ones with a lot of swear words, tv series that had innuendos that were not godly… I remember doing that three times in our marriage, which equals to about once a year. But we did not want anything in our house that would make us fall. We knew our weakness. I had to give up Korean dramas, if you know me any better I was a Korean drama queen. I loved watching them… but it was not good for my heart as it lead me to comparisons that were not even comparable, plus it was an addiction taking away so much time. I’ve been free from it for like 2 years.

Yes we are to live of the world, but it doesn’t mean to tolerate sin. SIN IS INTOLERABLE. You know the famous D.A.R.E. quote, “just say no to drugs.” That’s what our motto should be, “just say no to sin.” It effects our relationship with our Father, but also with each other. 1 John 1: 8-10. So when we don’t have a good relationship with God, which comes from confession of sin and moving from darkness to light, our relationship with one another is also not going to be happy go lucky

I just started reading “The Knowledge of the Holy” by A.W. Tozer. I only read one chapter, can’t wait to get more into it, but I was struck by this statement: “Always the most revealing thing about the Church is her idea of God, just as her most significant message is what she says about Him or leaves unsaid, for her silence is often more eloquent than her speech. She can never escape the self-disclosure of her witness concerning God.” (p. 1) What are we saying and not saying about God? Yes God is loving, compassionate, our shield and defender, faithful, upright… but God is also a jealous God. He doesn’t tolerate sin and He once destroyed cities for being so sinful. I feel like, myself included, we like to only talk about the nice attributes of God, not wanting to scare off the new believer or non-believer. But in Proverbs it talks about how the beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord… it says that more than a few times. We are to fear the Lord. If He does not tolerate sin, why do we? If our God is holy, why do we not strive to be?

“The low view of God entertained almost universally among Christians is the cause of a hundred lesser evils everywhere among us. A whole new philosophy of the Christian life has resulted from this one basic error in our religious thinking. With our loss of the sense of majesty has come the further loss of religious awe and consciousness of the divine Presence. We have lost our spirit of worship and our ability to withdraw inwardly to meet God in adoring silence. Modern Christianity is simply not producing the kid of Christian who can appreciate or experience the life in the Spirit. The words, ‘Be still, and know that I am God,’ mean next to nothing to the self-confident, bustling worshiper in this middle period of the twentieth century.” (Preface of “The Knowledge of the Holy”)

If we had a sense of God’s majesty and were daily living in awe of Him… What would our lives be like? Today as I was studying the word when I realized my IPod was playing “I need thee every hour”. I listened to that song like three times in a row and have been listening to it when I get a chance all day. How I want that to be my prayer everyday that I may not fall into the hands of the enemy. I need Him every hour, every minute, every second. We have to be on guard, our hearts, minds, life, thoughts, we need to be on guard that we may not fall into sin. But when we do fall, for we are going to, we need to be quick to confess, to have a relationship with God… and with each other.

I appreciate so much that there are people are okay with me sharing my thoughts. I’m just really excited about the different ways the Lord is working in my life so intimately. Guiding me into books to read in the Bible, books to read to grow me… personally walking me through the different sins in my life, letting me say them out loud to him in the most elementary way and allowing me ask my questions on the way then in the most gentle way answering each of them… taking me on journeys where I could see His handprints all over the place… GOD IS GOOD.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not all lovey dovey with God all the time. I mean I just confessed that I sin… and not just little sins, big ones too. I still have my days where I go to the rudimentary questions of P’s death and get mad at Him. I still have my days where God is the last person I want to talk to, but then He makes it so that He is the only one I could talk to… for example, I’d be frustrated with God and want to call a friend, God will make that friend not answer the phone. Then I’ll call another friend… same thing, keeps going until I finally say, “alright fine I’ll talk to you… what do you want?” I tell A to fix her attitude when she starts talking to me like that. Ha ha… But God is so true and faithful even when I’m not… ever so being the gentle God that He is and speaking to every fiber of my being to let me know He loves me and cares. Why would I want to hinder that by sinning and then not confessing to break the relationship I have with my Lord and Savior?

I really understand now why people wore sackcloth and threw ashes over their heads to repent. When I find myself in the act sometimes having subconsciously fallen into sin, that’s exactly what I want to do… ugh how did I let myself do that again? … give me that sackcloth and let me get some ashes on my head…

Sin is intolerable.
Please pray for our travels this weekend. September 3-6. I’ll be celebrating my birthday there. I’m really excited to be away and just be with A and have some fun. So pray that we’ll have safe travel to and from there and while we are there.

Please pray for visa processes.

My sister is coming to visit on September 15-30. I wasn’t sure if I would want family to come during this year. I didn’t know if it would make it harder or not, but we are really excited that she is coming. I think it will be a refreshing time for all of us. Pray for her safe travels as well.

We just had the first week of fasting… three more to go. Please continue to lift up the peoples.

Please pray for A. She’s been talking about daddy a lot lately and her behavior is sometimes just not her. I pray through it, but sometimes I just don’t know what to do. So please pray for her little heart. Don’t know what started it or what she’s thinking. Pray that she could express what she’s feeling and find healing and peace in her little heart.