DS 31

I am the worst – Fear mongering media – He gave – I confess – Justified by faith – Thought Control

I am writing this on 9/11. When I say that in my brain, the image that comes up is my car. I have never been happy that the “name” of my car is the same as this day and the events of twenty years ago today. Both are important. Both are distinct. But they are intertwined in my mind in a way I cannot and do not want to change.

The day that Fear Mongering Media came about, I was overwhelmed with the partisanship shown in the media, both to the typical liberal side and to the “conservative” side. Neither seems to be focused on news, only on telling “facts” that support their story, yet facts seem to be missing from many stories. I had set my mind that the media was controlled by Marxist set on freeing the world from common sense. Now I see the other side is fighting just as hard to reach the same goal. I want to hear about the things that will help my life, not about the things that will rile up my neighbors.

I am the worst brings to mind Paul telling his audience that he is the worst of sinners and if he can be forgiven anyone can be forgiven. Its true, but the thing about sin is that it makes each of us the worst. We can have no pride in ourselves as sinners and we cannot hold ourselves above anyone else. Everyone else is the most important person in the world, the one that Christ died for and we should love every single one as He does.

He gave His son, while we were yet sinners. We have to move on from the being worthy bit. We were not worthy before Christ came into our lives and we cannot be worthy afterwards. All we can do is follow and pray that we can avoid missing the mark sometimes. A perfect Christian is not perfect, just humble. Humble enough to say “I confess” and leave the troubles of this world at the feet of Jesus and follow going forward.

Justified by faith is the mental image of Abraham, and while he was less than perfect in many ways, it was his faith in God that allowed God to use him to be the father of all nations. He was no worse a sinner than us and no better a person, but as he learned who God was, he found faith in God and was rewarded.

Thought control. One of the profound thoughts that Jesus gave us was that we could sin with our thoughts. Everyone knows our deeds can be sinful, and most know our lack of action can be sinful, but I’d guess than many people try to differentiate thoughts from sin. The old adage “It is ok to just look as long as you do not touch” is just wrong. Seeing is one thing, looking is another. The Bible tells us to take every thought captive and if it is not holy, reject it. To only think about holy things is our goal and the implication is that when we have removed unholy thoughts from our lives, unholy actions will diminish as well. If our eyes cause us to sin, poke them out. No one wants to do that, but it is better to live blind and go to heaven than to live seeing and perish in hell.

Our country was founded by a group of people with different ideals. Some were Christians and sought to protect Christianity and to implement good from the Bible in the country’s setup. Our country now has large numbers of people who are not Christian and do not want to protect Christianity and who want everything to do with the Bible out of the country’s setup good or bad. A verse I studied in Job recently talked about the sin of partiality. We do no need to fight to put Christianity into the country’s setup, we need to fight to protect good and the freedom to be good and the freedom to do good into the country’s setup.

Not sure where that rabbit trail came from. My idea was that if we take our thoughts captive, we lead better lives filled with fruit and giving God glory.