My wife and I were doing what millions of people in America are doing, cleaning up from Christmas.\u00a0 It still amazes me that a perfectly clean house can turn into a federal disaster area in less than 10 minutes.\u00a0 With the opening of the new toys by the boys and the putting up of Christmas decorations, my wife decided we need to re-arrange some things in the house.\u00a0 Diana and I have been married for eight years now and one of the first purchases we made as a couple was an over-sized microfiber recliner.\u00a0 I absolutely loved that recliner, not only because it was over-sized, soft, and comfortable.\u00a0 But also because I could sit and hold the boys beside me in it, and I did just that with all three of them.\u00a0 I spent many nights holding our newborn sons and taking naps with them in that chair.\u00a0 However, it became slightly broken over the past couple of years.\u00a0 Diana argued that it should have been thrown away several years ago, but I will leave that discussion for another day.\u00a0 The first step in her plan to get me to throw it away was to move it from upstairs to downstairs in my mancave\/office.\u00a0 Although I knew what she was up to I figured it could go down there because at least it was still in the house.\u00a0 However, just 24 hours ago the final stage of her plan was accomplished and I took the recliner and threw it away.\u00a0 I tried every trick in the book I could think of to keep it including playing the “sentimental” card of “but honey that is the first thing we bought together as a married couple, it is special” (please don’t judge my desperation to keep this chair, did I mention it was the most comfortable chair I have ever had?).\u00a0 But alas I even realized that one side was laying back so far as to almost be touching the wall, it was broke, and it was time.<\/p>\n
That chair is kind of like our sin nature isn’t it?\u00a0 We know that once we become a Christian and God begins working in our heart that many things are going to change because our love for God out weighs our love for worldly pleasure.\u00a0 But it is hard to let some things go isn’t it?\u00a0 We make excuses such as “well it takes time” or “it’s not really that bad is it” or “God will forgive me for this.”\u00a0 We need to see them for what they really are, excuses to live in sin when God has said it needs to go.\u00a0 Paul wrote in Romans 6:11, “Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.”\u00a0 In other places Paul would say we need to crucify our flesh with the Lord Jesus.\u00a0 They both mean the same thing, our sinful lifestyle much like the broken recliner must go.\u00a0 If we are honest with ourselves we aren’t missing much.\u00a0 After all sin always over promised and under delivered didn’t it?\u00a0 But there is something about familiarity and comfort that causes us to want to keep it around even though we know there is something better in Jesus Christ.<\/p>\n
Since moving the recliner downstairs, Diana and I have gotten a couple of recliners that nice and comfortable, and the best part is neither of them will dump you in the floor if you lean back in them (the old one sure would). I still get to hold the boys in either chair, so I haven’t lost anything that was important to me, I have just gained safety and security.\u00a0 It is the same with dying to our sin nature and living for Christ.\u00a0 You won’t lost anything that is truly important to you (most things we call important simply aren’t really important), and what you gain is far greater than anything you ever had.\u00a0 Go ahead, confess your sins to Christ, ask for His help in giving them to Him and burying them for good.\u00a0 I promise you it is worth it!<\/p>\n
By His grace and through His strength may we live for Him<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
My wife and I were doing what millions of people in America are doing, cleaning up from Christmas.\u00a0 It still amazes me that a perfectly clean house can turn into a federal disaster area in less than 10 minutes.\u00a0 With … Read More