Wednesday, June 16, 2021
“Yes, and the Lord
will deliver me from every evil attack and will bring me safely into his
heavenly Kingdom. All glory to God forever and ever! Amen.” (2 Timothy 4:18, New Living Translation)
But it got me to
thinking about “immunity”. A
dictionary definition goes like this: “resistance to, resilience to,
nonsusceptibility to, lack of susceptibility to, protection from, ability to
fight off, ability to withstand, ability to counteract, defenses against,
immunization against, inoculation against.”
I’m sure that I feel all of that action coursing through my body right
now!
Now, if they could just develop some sort of immunization against doing something
stupid, saying something thoughtlessly or hurtfully, acting like a lunkhead,
making mistakes, making poor decisions, acting selfishly, etc., then we may be
on to a cure for the common sins of humankind.
Even better, give me immunization
against the inconsideration and rudeness of others, their insults and jibes,
their pettiness and ignorance, their prejudices and judgments, their
selfishness and arrogance. Now we’re talking!
But, of course, life doesn’t
work like that. We are always vulnerable to outbreaks of the ills of our
society and the rashes of our own and other’s questionable behaviour. It is
impossible to quarantine ourselves or protect ourselves fully from the unclean
spirit of those unhealthy characteristics about how we go about living our
daily lives.
Everybody catches the effects of
Sin at some point. Achoo!
But it can be argued that the
Love and Forgiveness of God goes a long way to immunize us from the long terms
affects of corruptible living. The stories of Jesus’ efforts to heal the sick,
the diseased and the handicapped were evidence of the sacred intent to rid people
of all that which debilitates and de-humanizes lives. “Healthy people don’t
need a doctor—sick people do. I have come to call not those who think they are
righteous, but those who know they are sinners.” (Mark 2:17, NLT)
God understands how hard it is
to be the kind of person you and I are supposed to be. We need a booster shot every
now and then to maintain God’s standard of living. God has given us Jesus
Christ as the beneficial cure for Sin, the effective remedy to counteract that which
attacks the immune system of living spiritually healthy lives.
A good dose of Christ’s example,
character, strength, love, grace, forgiveness, compassion, can cure a multitude
of sins. (1 Peter 4:8)
“Dear friend, I hope all is
well with you and that you are as healthy in body as you are strong in spirit.”
(3 John, v.2, NLT)
Dale
No comments:
Post a Comment