Good Morning All,
When we perform the rites of Baptism and
Confirmation, we begin with the same basic set of questions. “Do you renounce the devil, all his works and
all his ways?” Of course, the answer is,
“Yes, I renounce them.” It is pretty
basic stuff. If you are willing to
follow Jesus, you must renounce the devil.
The devil and Jesus are complete opposites. So of course, we renounce the devil and all
his ways, or do we?
Do we really renounce the devil and all his
ways, or do we keep a few of the “good ones”?
Maybe we like to gossip, you know just so we know what is going on in
the community. Maybe we are greedy and
want to have “my fair share.” Maybe we
hold onto those lustful looks and thoughts.
Maybe our anger rules us more than we rule it. Maybe we are a little quick to let the tongue
run on and on. They all seem so
harmless. Just little things that we
keep around because we enjoy them and we take pleasure in them and, after all,
no one really gets hurt; they are “innocent” sins.
Yet they are sins and sins, no matter how
small we make them out to be, separate us from God. Sin has us serving the devil. The selfish and self-centered nature of sin
always causes harm and pain. It causes
us to lose respect for others, to lose respect for our self and to lose respect
for God. Sin is always saying, “I am
more important than God.” All sins do
this. It does not matter whether we
think of them as small or insignificant; sin causes a chasm to form between God
and us.
This is why Scriptures so clearly tells us
that you can’t have both. You can’t
profess or live a life dedicated to Christ if you are going to hold onto old
sinful ways. We have to throw them
away. It may even take a drastic change
in our life. Maybe we need to avoid
those places where we like to gossip or perhaps, we need to make a conscious
effort to avoid anger or a sharp comment.
All these contribute to our brokenness as humans. The healing is not complete until we rid our
lives of the baggage of sin. It destroys
us, little by little, and leads us down the path of sorrow. It leads us away from Jesus and into a place
of darkness and pain.
So, if we truly do renounce the devil, we
need to fully trust in God for all that we need. We need to stay away from those things and
places that lead us to sin. Yet above
all, we need to recognize that these “little things” are sins. We need to repent and ask God to help us move
away from them. God is gracious and will
help us to do so but we will only succeed when we truly renounce the devil and
his ways and only have Jesus as our master.
Father of all mercy, in you we have our only hope. In you is our only way forward. Help us to renounce the devil
completely. Help us to live as children
in your kingdom. Help us to serve you
with our whole heart and body. Give us
the strength to throw out the devil and his lies and to trust only in you. In Jesus’ precious name we pray, amen.
God’s Peace,
Pastor Bret
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