3/07/2006
The first step is admittance
With sin that entangles us into a web of shame and guilt, paralyzing us into remaining stagnant about repentance and looking to the Lord for deliverance, the first step is always admitting that you indeed have a problem. Almost like the 12-step programs that many people cling to, the first thing you have to do in order to escape and rid yourself if this "disease" is to verbally and actively admit to yourself, your God, and someone else that you have a problem.
It's almost like when you were younger and your friends told you secrets that you "pinky-promised" to them you wouldn't share with anyone else, in the same way, our sins that we "keep secret from God and everyone around us" that fester and breed in the dark places of our own mind can begin to take hold of us.
We generally think that God does and can see our deep sins, but in our own minds, we don't live that reality out. It's the "He's up there, I'm down here" mentality. Sure, He can see all and He knows all, but when we are in the middle of the muck of sin, purposely choosing to disobey God, He's a stranger to us. We don't know Him in that moment, we have decided that our sin is more important and more fulfilling than obeying the Lord.
In the past 7 months or so, every Monday morning, I meet with my accountability partner at Denny's to talk about God and what He's doing in our lives. One element of our weekly AM-meetings is that we both talk about purity and the week prior and "how we did." We talk about our weaknesses and the times when we let our flesh be satisfied. We talk about our eyes, our intentions, the thoughts that we entertained, and we really get into our past sins and how the devil uses them to haunt our present and degrade our future.
What started out as a very scary premise, of talking about and getting into the light the sins that I have kept so secret from everyone around me for so long, has turned into a tool that the God of our Creation has used to deliver me from sexual sin. He has brought into the light the ugliness that I have walked around with for so long. The ugliness that almost virtually ruined how I view my wife and our intimacy together, is now naked and out in the open for all to see and ridicule. That doesn't necessarily mean that I am "free of sin," by no means does it mean that, but what it does mean, is like what it says in 1 John 3:9...
"No one who is born of God practices sin, because His seed abides in him; and he cannot sin, because he is born of God."
Because of the Lord's power and my admittance that I can not beat this by myself and on my own power, I am now on the road to righteousness and in the continued pursance of holiness...
What's the second step?
It's almost like when you were younger and your friends told you secrets that you "pinky-promised" to them you wouldn't share with anyone else, in the same way, our sins that we "keep secret from God and everyone around us" that fester and breed in the dark places of our own mind can begin to take hold of us.
We generally think that God does and can see our deep sins, but in our own minds, we don't live that reality out. It's the "He's up there, I'm down here" mentality. Sure, He can see all and He knows all, but when we are in the middle of the muck of sin, purposely choosing to disobey God, He's a stranger to us. We don't know Him in that moment, we have decided that our sin is more important and more fulfilling than obeying the Lord.
In the past 7 months or so, every Monday morning, I meet with my accountability partner at Denny's to talk about God and what He's doing in our lives. One element of our weekly AM-meetings is that we both talk about purity and the week prior and "how we did." We talk about our weaknesses and the times when we let our flesh be satisfied. We talk about our eyes, our intentions, the thoughts that we entertained, and we really get into our past sins and how the devil uses them to haunt our present and degrade our future.
What started out as a very scary premise, of talking about and getting into the light the sins that I have kept so secret from everyone around me for so long, has turned into a tool that the God of our Creation has used to deliver me from sexual sin. He has brought into the light the ugliness that I have walked around with for so long. The ugliness that almost virtually ruined how I view my wife and our intimacy together, is now naked and out in the open for all to see and ridicule. That doesn't necessarily mean that I am "free of sin," by no means does it mean that, but what it does mean, is like what it says in 1 John 3:9...
"No one who is born of God practices sin, because His seed abides in him; and he cannot sin, because he is born of God."
Because of the Lord's power and my admittance that I can not beat this by myself and on my own power, I am now on the road to righteousness and in the continued pursance of holiness...
What's the second step?
// posted by the deharts @ 1:51 PM 
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